Introduction

We believe that your counsel is a key member of your company’s team. Inviting your lawyer to work with you on the platform creates a relationship that can give your legal counsel access to documents in your Data Room and authorization to act on behalf of your company in the platform. You can even send them documents to be reviewed before you execute them.

In this workflow, you will first add your main contact with your law firm, or you can add a solo practitioner. Once added, the workflow will have your counsel accept the invitation and review their involvement. The workflow is then sent back to the company for final review. Click the links below to jump to that section of the article:

Adding your legal counsel (completed by the company)
Accepting the invite and reviewing counsel involvement settings (completed by legal counsel)
Reviewing and accepting or rejecting counsel involvement (completed by the company)

Register Legal Counsel workflow

The Register Legal Counsel workflow is found in the Corporate Structure section of the Start New Workflow page. If you have recently onboarded or incorporated, there may be a icon on the Company Workspace to start the workflow.

Part 1 - company steps

Let's Get Started

Enter the name of your law firm, or the name of the solo practitioner.

If there are no users added from the firm, you'll be prompted to create a new user.

Select if you are adding a firm, or solo practitioner, and enter in the required information.

Once the contact information has been added, click Continue.

Upload Engagement Letter

If you have an engagement letter that outlines the terms of the engagement with your law firm, you can upload it at this step. Click on Document Options, and select to either choose the document from the Data Room, upload the document from your computer, or to waive the document if you do not have it or wish not to upload it at this time. Once uploaded or waived, click Continue.

Wait For Counsel

At this step, a request has been sent to the contact at your law firm, or to the solo practitioner. They will be prompted to accept the request, and set the counsel involvement preferences.

Part 2 - law firm steps

Confirm Your Information

You should receive an email on behalf of the company to accept the invitation as their legal counsel. When you open the task, you will be prompted to confirm your name and the law firm's information. If you need to make any changes to your name or law firm information, click the Edit icon. If this invite was sent in error, click the link to Decline this invitation. Once the information is correct, click Continue.

Update Counsel Involvement Settings

On this page you can set the preferred level of counsel involvement with the company. For each workflow, select if legal review should be required or is optional, and check if you wish to receive an email notification when the workflow is run. When legal review is selected for a workflow, you will receive an email notification to review the documents related to the workflow where you can approve or request edits.

Workflows that will generate stock certificates will always require legal review. This includes the Stock Transfer, Exchange of Stock, Create New Stock Certificates, and Reissue Existing Stock Certificates workflows.

Once involvement settings have been selected, click Continue.

Wait For Review

At this point, the workflow will be sent back to the company to review.

Part 3 - company steps

Once your law firm has accepted the invite and set the counsel involvement settings, you'll receive a notification to review and approve the settings. This page will show a summary of which workflows require legal review, which workflows are review optional, and which workflows will send a notification email to your counsel. If there are no changes you wish to make, click Approve.

If you wish to make any changes, enter the requested changes in the Reason for Rejection box, and click Reject. If you reject, your counsel will receive an email with your notes and they will be able to adjust the settings, and send the workflow back.

Additional resources

For tips on working with your lawyer, visit our blog post, Working Effectively With Your Lawyer. You can also share our For Lawyers: Counsel Involvement 101 article with your counsel.

See this article for more information on the counsel involvement settings, and this article for step-by-step instructions for how to change your counsel settings.

This article has information on adding additional team members to your law firm.

Screenshots are for illustrative purposes only.

Fidelity does not provide legal or tax advice. The information herein is general in nature and should not be considered legal or tax advice. Consult an attorney or tax professional regarding your specific situation.

Fidelity Private Shares LLC provides cap table management and other administrative services to private companies and their equity compensation plans.

Fidelity Private Shares LLC

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