Do you know your legal requirements for business?
By Shalini Nandan-Singh
We all want a beautiful, well-formed business that produces fantastic outcomes for our clients and allows us to live a happy life. Getting good at marketing what you do is an essential part of achieving business mastery; the more you promote, the more clients you attract.
As you sit back and relax, you breathe a sigh of relief; your customer base is growing, and you’re getting the hang of client sessions. You’ve acknowledged your strengths while also recognising your limits. All is moving well.
Legal Requirements For Your Business
You cross off marketing, money, systems, and procedures on your business checklist, but you realise you have a considerable gap when it comes to the legal part of the business. You, like so many other small firms, have neglected to address legal issues.
As a business person, you’ll have to deal with various issues, including terms and conditions, payment procedures, and client contracts. There’s too much at stake to make decisions like this on the spur of the moment. You don’t know what you don’t know, as with many things in life.
When it comes to company legals, the first step is to change your thinking about legal needs and procedures with your business. If you remember why you’re in business – to solve issues for your clients based on the beautiful relationships you build – then putting legal agreements in place in your company is all about cultivating the connection you’d like to have with your customers.
Relationships that reflect your beliefs and work procedures and educate your customer and determine what is fair to both of you in the dance that is your business and your mission.
Having company legals doesn’t always imply having a legal document for every business interaction—it might entail having:
-
a client agreement for your client work, as well as basic service terms and conditions disclaimers for outcomes
- Your website terms of service and privacy policies
- terms and conditions on your invoices so that consumers know how to pay you and what cancellations and refunds they may anticipate
- a contractor’s agreement
- a speaking agreement
- a partnership arrangement in the form of a joint venture
- a non-disclosure or confidentiality agreement to protect your intellectual property.
Addressing the legal position in any business interaction entails thinking about your interactions, quality-assuring the processes involved, and articulating the processes, expectations, and the other party’s (client’s or supplier’s) obligations—all in a document that’s made available to whomever you’re working with so they’re educated and informed about what’s going on in their interactions.
For flourishing businesses and customers alike, knowledge is power, and knowing your company legals means that both parties may feel at ease in business contacts since they understand their duties and rights.
5 Ways To #loveyourlegals
1. Your company isn't just about you; it's about the people you work with.
Understand that, while being a business owner is a rewarding personal experience, it is also a duty that demands you to treat your business relationships with respect. One important component is to carefully construct connections and make them available to your clients through legal agreements. This includes how you do business, your payment terms, how you handle conflicts, and how you will fulfil your commitments, so no one needs to guess how you run your company.
2. Embracing your legal obligations is about learning to negotiate.
These are essential for a company’s success. At its heart, the term “legal” refers to the negotiation of common terms and conditions between you and your client regarding your service, your business, and your customer’s duties.
3. In your business, legal agreements serve as a platform for dialogue, modification, and discussion.
Examining and defining your business connections in agreements, terms, and conditions gives you a place to start when dealing with a tough or unexpected issue in your company. Without it, you have nothing to work with or towards, nothing to refer to, nothing to lead you, and no negotiating platform.
4. Legal agreements serve as a quality control tool for your company.
When it comes to implementing business agreements with clients and suppliers, you’ll need to take a look at your business processes and client interactions to see what’s working, improve what’s not, and redesign or replace what isn’t.
5. Embracing your legal duties into your business is a sign of maturity.
This indicates you’ve progressed from a hobby mindset to a business mindset where your company is deserving of legal protection and professional behaviour.
Having company legals doesn’t always imply having a legal document for every business interaction—it might entail having:
a client agreement for your client work, as well as basic service terms and conditions
Shalini Nandan-Singh
Lawyer, Contract Specialist, Speaker
& Advocate for Women in Business
Shalini Nandan-Singh helps Australian service-based entrepreneurs safeguard their companies and bottom lines with empowered legal advice and contracts, drawing on more than 15 years of experience as a lawyer and a woman in business.
Her acute understanding of the complexities and practicality of law as a tool for protecting and strengthening women in business has led to her being invited to speak at both digital and live events, where she has addressed both Australian and worldwide audiences.
Shalini has spoken at a number of small business development events, workshops, podcasts, and summits, encouraging listeners and readers to #loveyourlegals. This includes holding a session as part of Queensland’s Small Business Week in 2018 and another for The Excellence Collective, an international business retreat.
Shalini is an entertaining and educated presenter who thinks that business legals should be a true extension of any organisation. She is a regular guest mentor in a number of high-profile masterminds. Her objective is to teach audiences that company legals should be intended to create good business boundaries that promote client relationships based on compassion and understanding, rather than confusing legalese.
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