Reflections on a Career in Commercial Leasing: Keynote Speech for the 5th Annual Northern California Women in Commercial Leasing Law Symposium

• Publication year: 2020
• Author: Chan Stroman

Reflections on a Career in Commercial Leasing: Keynote Speech for the 5th Annual Northern California Women in Commercial Leasing Law Symposium

Chan Stroman

Chan M. Stroman represents commercial real estate owners and managers in leasing, financing, and development, as founder and principal of Landlord Counsel LLC in Madison, Wisconsin. She began her career in San Francisco in private practice and in-house. She is a member of the California, Illinois, and Wisconsin bars.*

Good morning, everyone. It's great to be here at the 5th Annual Northern California Women in Commercial Leasing Law Symposium. So, thank you to the Real Property Law Section of the California Lawyers Association, and Jo Ann Woodsum especially, for the kind invitation.

When Jo Ann reached out to me about the Symposium, she shared the program from last year's symposium. I read the program and saw the presentation topics. They were things like: the work letter, the TI disbursement process, mechanics' liens, AIA contracts; and I thought: "these are my people." I am so happy to be here talking with you, and I am so looking forward to hearing more later today about LOIs (yes, really), SNDAs (yes, really), and specialized retail uses (yes, really).

Because, you see, there is no more profound reality check about how esoteric commercial leasing law is as a practice niche until you've had the experience of visiting a school classroom on "Tell Us About Your Career Day"—you know what I'm saying? Where do you start?

"I'm a lawyer."
"Do you put criminals in jail?" "Uh, no."
"Do you help defend innocent people from getting put in jail?" "Uh, no."
"Do you help people buy their house?"
"Do you help people when they're getting divorced?"

And so on. You get the idea. So it's bad enough with kids, but it's not much better with adults! No, I don't do residential. No, I don't file lawsuits or go to court. No, a commercial lease isn't just a preprinted form that companies just sign on the dotted line.

But I think I finally came up with a decent, workable, shorthand description of what it is I, a commercial leasing lawyer, do. I was having lunch with a cognitive neuroscientist who does research using fMRIs of the brain to study how human beings acquire language and the ability to read language in written form. So, not a lot in common in terms of our day jobs, but I ended up stumbling upon a way to describe who I am and what I do as a commercial leasing lawyer. I told him: "I'm a cabinetmaker." And he got it.

In other words, I practice a craft. When I draft a lease, I'm an artisan building a bespoke article of—let's metaphorize this as "furniture"—that needs to be artfully designed, sturdy, beautiful, and, most importantly, needs to work long after the cabinetmaker has put away her tools and walked away. The drawers need to be organized, functional, and usable. They need to open and close smoothly, and not get stuck, when they're put into use frequently and constantly—just like a commercial lease.

Unlike other commercial real estate transactions, where the attorneys can dust off their hands, put their closing plaques on their office shelves, and dump their memories of the transaction into their recycling bins, a commercial lease is just getting birthed when it's signed. Its life is just beginning. The space needs to be designed; plans and specs need to be prepared, reviewed, revised, reviewed, revised (rinse-and-repeat), and approved; the space needs to be built, with an eye on deadlines, change orders, landlord delays, tenant delays; translating the lease into administrable elements of data (especially financial data and space management data) and tasks; and providing a roadmap for property managers and facilities managers to answer questions and resolve disagreements when—not if—they come up during the lifespan of the lease. It's my job, as a cabinetmaker, to make sure that I've built a living, functional document. And, I hope, one that is gracefully and elegantly drafted; in other words, beautiful too.

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I like to think of myself as being a painstaking cabinetmaker, and I take pride in it. So I'll share with you today the story of my journey in learning my craft. And the first big cabinetmaker's lesson I want to share with you is: "Stock your toolbox." Stock your...