Law firm Squires, Sanders & Dempsey LLP may have offices in San Francisco, Brussels and Shanghai, but managing partner Fred Nance ensures that it doesn’t forget its hometown of Cleveland.
With 31 offices around the world, Squires, Sanders & Dempsey is the fifth most global U.S.-based law firm, employing about 800 lawyers. But it keeps ties to its Cleveland roots by maintaining headquarters here and taking on local cases and issues, from managing the affairs of LeBron James to saving U.S. Department of Defense jobs in the Greater Cleveland area.
“Cleveland is a wonderfully diverse community,” Fred Nance, managing partner of the Cleveland office, says. “Part of my management goal is to continue to increase the diversity within Squire Sanders so that it not only reflects our community, but we take advantage of the talents of so many different ethnic groups and women in ways that large law firms traditionally have not.”
Smart Business spoke with Nance about leading Squire Sanders’ largest office and the benefits of staying engaged in Cleveland.
How does Squires, Sanders & Dempsey stay involved with Cleveland?
One of Northeast Ohio’s greatest strengths — and Cleveland’s greatest strength, in particular — is some very high-quality health care institutions. … We have been (The Cleveland Clinic’s) outside general counsel and an instrumental part of helping to move the clinic forward for the better part of the past 10 years.
There’s a growing recognition — both out of the health care industry as well as out of the university community — that there are opportunities to transfer technology and intellectual property to start new businesses. … We help start-ups that want to take advantage of that type of technology, help them find venture or other capital to get going and help them implement their initial business strategies.
We’re involved in the civic leadership of the community that includes those types of efforts to jumpstart our regional economy. My firm has given me a platform and the ability to spend a great deal of volunteer time in that regard. For instance, I’m vice chair of The Greater Cleveland Partnership, (which) has a number of arms that are all about transforming this economy. Those are all efforts to try to connect the creative class with resources and business know-how to start new businesses.
How do these efforts benefit your firm?
We recognize that our growth opportunities are inextricably tied to the economic health of the region, so we are devoting resources, by providing professional services as well as volunteer leadership, to entities both in the nonprofit and in the for-profit sectors to help make those things a reality.
How do you keep the Cleveland office connected to your other offices around the world?
Although we have 31 offices all over the world, we have a one-firm philosophy.
Wherever we have clients, anywhere in the world, our lawyers there have the ability, primarily through technology, to connect, communicate and tap the expertise that we have here in Cleveland.
Because Cleveland is our largest office and our oldest office, we support the globalization of our client service efforts by continuing to maintain and improve the expertise that we have here. Many of our lawyers from Cleveland spend a great deal of time on the airplane, supporting client work where our particular brand of expertise is needed.
It is not unusual at Squire Sanders to walk into the office one day, thinking it’s a normal day, and at the end of that day, to go home and pick up your passport and your suitcase, (having found out) you’re going to be in Prague for the next two weeks.
How did serving as Cleveland’s outside counsel in prominent cases prepare you to manage the Cleveland office?
For the better part of 10 years, the city of Cleveland and the city of Brook Park were locked in this death struggle litigation over the expansion of the airport. At a point in early 2001, Mayor Michael White and Mayor Tom Coyne each selected a lawyer to begin secret discussions to try to cut through it and get it resolved.
[Coyne’s lawyer] and I met lots of places, had lots of discussions, did some shuttle diplomacy between the two mayors, and we ended up getting it done, making a deal, ending what had been a long-standing battle that both sides had spent millions of dollars fighting, and turned that fight into an agreement that gave both communities what they needed to move forward.
We were able to work out a deal, find common ground, take what seemed like a completely insoluble problem and make it a win-win.
When the Browns first left, wow, there was a great deal of emotion attached to it. Everyone said, ‘It’s over. It’s done. No city has ever beaten the National Football League or any professional sports league for that matter.’
Through a combination of some litigation, but much more through negotiation and going back and forth between the powers that be at the NFL and the mayor of Cleveland, we were able to work out a deal, find common ground, take what seemed like a completely insoluble problem and make it a win-win.
Those kinds of facilitating, negotiating and finding a way for both sides to get what they need out of what appeared to be an irreconcilable conflict help.
How has working with LeBron James challenged your firm?
I’ve been practicing law for coming up on 28 years, and working for LeBron is unlike anything I’ve ever experienced. First of all, the level of interest in this young man and his career is unlike anything I’ve ever seen. [It requires] a great deal of caution, attention and sophistication in terms of the panoply of different issues that we need to deal with on his behalf.
Imagine a 20-year-old who needs estate planning, international contract assistance, endorsement contract assistance, professional sports contract assistance, employment agreements, employee pension plans, different types of entertainment-related contracts, and the list goes on and on. On top of the personal things that a person with his success level has to deal with, whether it’s building a multimillion dollar house, setting up trust funds, you name it, and it is nonstop.
Constant communication is critical, and being able to separate the wheat from the chaff is a pretty big part of it.
HOW TO REACH: Squire, Sanders & Dempsey LLP, (216) 479-8500 or www.ssd.com
