Andrew Abramowitz, PLLC

attorney at law

 LinkedIn RSS E-mail
  • Home
  • Practice
  • Our Team
  • Fees
  • Blog
  • Contact

Right and Wrong Ways to Expedite Deal Negotiations

January 12, 2017 By Andrew Abramowitz Leave a Comment

Use of Debt Financing by Law FirmsOf the many times that I’ve worked on a corporate deal – not a simple agreement, but a transaction of some complexity involving multiple documents and perhaps multiple parties – it is extremely rare that the transaction got done early, in advance of the target closing date set at the beginning of the process. This is not necessarily the fault of anyone involved, but it’s a matter of deal-making being a process with a lot of moving parts that takes time. This causes some frustration, usually among the principals more than the attorneys. Although there’s no magic bullet that will cause deals to get done instantaneously, the following are some tips that will expedite the process in a manner that doesn’t cause unnecessary stress and hard feelings:

  • Follow up, nicely. While job number one for you is ensuring that you are pushing out paper without much delay, once that’s done, if you’re waiting on something that’s in someone else’s hands, and it’s taken longer than expected, ping that person with a polite email, asking for an ETA.
  • Schedule check-in calls. Particularly if there is a large working group, it can be helpful to have periodic conference calls where the participants go through a closing checklist or otherwise get themselves on the same page. Having the call on the calendar has the side benefit of prodding people to attend to their to-do list before the call, to avoid having to admit on the call that the work is not done. But these calls shouldn’t be done too frequently, which causes frustration, with everyone thinking they’d rather be left alone to do the work.
  • Don’t showboat about off-hours work. Particularly when the transaction (inevitably) falls behind the unrealistic schedule, you’ll start to see behavior like someone emailing the group late at night or on a weekend, implying that they are sacrificing free time to work on this and wondering why everyone else isn’t as committed. Ultimately, it is unknowable what other people’s workload is and whether they’re doing as much as they can on your deal. Instead, treat everyone else as a professional, and if there are timing considerations, discuss them respectfully.
  • Don’t set fake deadlines. Deal principals will often announce that a deal needs to close by a particular date, without much explanation. If, as is often the case, it’s a BS deadline that was set to short-circuit the process and perhaps limit transaction costs, it will backfire when the deadline inevitably passes because of factors that may be outside anyone’s control. At that point, the deadline-setter has lost credibility.
  • Create a transaction timetable. In my experience, certain types of transactions (IPOs, for example) have a detailed weekly timetable, while others, like M&A, are less likely to have one, probably because they are too unpredictable. If it makes sense in a particular transaction, it’s good to try to impose a broad framework like this if it builds in buffer time and is more realistic than just “close by Friday.”
Facebooktwitterredditlinkedinmail

Related posts:

  1. The “Get Everyone in a Room” Fallacy
  2. A Trend of Not Involving Attorneys in Routine Contract Negotiations
  3. Recognizing and Combatting Strategic Umbrage in Negotiations

Filed Under: Legal Practice Advice

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

You must be logged in to post a comment.

Search the Blog

Blog Topics:

  • Crowdfunding
  • Financing Transactions/Securities Offerings
  • General Corporate/M&A Matters
  • General/Miscellaneous
  • Interesting Reads Archive
  • Legal Practice Advice
  • SEC Disclosure Matters
  • Startup Matters

Press Coverage

"Andrew Abramowitz, a lawyer in Manhattan who has worked with both buyers and sellers of private placements, said every investor should approach a private placement skeptically." -- Paul Sullivan (New York Times)

» Read more

"If the goal [...] is to protect people from losing all of their money in an illiquid investment, the current standard fails on that count, too. Andrew Abramowitz, a lawyer in Manhattan who has worked with both buyers and sellers of private placements, said a better standard might be to limit how much of their net worth people can invest." -- Paul Sullivan (New York Times)

» Read more

Sign up for Andrew Abramowitz, PLLC's Quarterly Newsletter

Your contact information is never shared or sold to any third-party.
* = required field

Browse the Blog

  • Crowdfunding
  • Financing Transactions/Securities Offerings
  • General Corporate/M&A Matters
  • General/Miscellaneous
  • Interesting Reads Archive
  • Legal Practice Advice
  • SEC Disclosure Matters
  • Startup Matters

Rankings & Awards

Ranked #7 nationally issuer legal counsel for total dollars advised in a PIPE transaction. (PrivateRaise.com January 2016)

Find & Follow

Follow Andrew Abramowitz, PLLC on LinkedIn.

Contact Info & Directions

©2019 Andrew Abramowitz, PLLC. All rights reserved. | 565 Fifth Avenue, 9th Floor, New York, New York 10017 | Legal Disclaimer