The Path to Getting Here Wasn't the Plan
I left Skadden thinking I knew exactly where I was headed.
Not back into private practice, but into the business world: a General Counsel role at a venture-backed B2B startup, with equity, a seat at the table, and what I imagined would evolve into something like a hybrid legal/operating role. I wanted to be in the room where decisions got made, not just the lawyer called in afterward to document them.
The reality was more complicated.
Startups are messy. That's not a criticism, it's just true. Priorities shift quickly, and organizational dynamics shift with them. And when they shifted in ways I hadn't anticipated, my options were more limited than they might otherwise have been—as a Canadian on a TN visa who wanted to stay in New York, you don't walk away from your immigration status without somewhere to walk to. So you adapt, you learn, and eventually you move on.
After that chapter closed, it took some time to find the right next step. I joined a tiny firm with only two other attorneys. That arrangement had its own twists and turns, and eventually I found myself at a decision point: find another situation to slot into, or build something of my own.
I started MGLS more than eight years ago.
And here's what I didn't expect: I actually found what I was originally looking for. Just not where I thought I'd find it.
At that startup, and now at my own law firm (though not as a junior associate at a firm like Skadden, incredible as that experience was), I get to be present with clients at these genuinely significant moments, making the decisions that will shape what their business becomes. How to structure things at the outset when there's a team of co-founders and everyone is still figuring out how they fit together. What to give and what to hold firm on when raising capital from VCs. How a founder thinks about an exit that's OK, maybe even good, but not the exit they'd been picturing since day one.
Those are high-pressure, often genuinely confusing moments. And I have the privilege of being in the room for them.
What I didn't fully appreciate until I'd been doing this for a while is what that vantage point actually gives you. You get to see these people—smart, driven, often first-time-at-this founders and owners—work through hard problems in real time. You see what the decision-making actually looks like from the inside. What someone's decisions are going to be when the situation is ambiguous, the constraints are genuinely limiting, and the path to a good outcome is far from obvious. It's a remarkable thing to witness, and it makes my work genuinely interesting in a way that few other professional experiences offer.
Skadden gave me an exceptional foundation. But this—being present for the decisions, not just the documentation—is what I was actually after.
The path to getting here wasn't the plan. But I'm not sure there was a shorter route.
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Disclaimer: This article constitutes attorney advertising. Prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome. MGLS publishes this article for information purposes only. Nothing within is intended as legal advice.