Acquisition International - Legal Awards 2020 7 Most Innovative Business & Estate Planning Firm - California At Regnum Legacy, all employees are also encouraged to ask questions in pursuit of innovation. The leadership team encourages its lawyers and staff alike to ask questions around why, and why not, when it is appropriate to do so. For the team, it is about more than simply creating legally sound documents, but also looking at its own systems as a whole and making them better. Moreover, as a litigator for more than ten years, Mr. Long was able to see where a lot of estate plans break down. With that as a starting point, he was able to develop new ideas to help prevent common mistakes and conflicts between family members. Finally, the core value of compassion is equally important to Regnum Legacy. “A business without compassion has no moral compass and no soul,” remarked Mr. Long. Again taking inspiration from Pope John Paul II, Regnum Legacy believes that its function in society is not to simply make a profit or to provide a service, but is to be a community of persons at the service of the community and clients alike. Again borrowing from more outstanding teaching by Pope John Paul II, Regnum Legacy ensures that each client and employee is treated with compassion, which requires the recognition that each client and each employee is a value in and of themselves. When combined together, these three core values create a culture at Regnum Legacy that sees the company and those that make up the company not as the means to make a profit, but as unique ends in and of themselves. The culture is a community of persons at the service of one another, but there are also a great number of bonuses and reward structures. Mr. Long has strived to create an environment where work-life balance is lauded. Since Regnum Legacy has a professional focus on families and family legacies, it also focuses on its employees’ families. It offers leave for mothers and fathers when they have a baby, kids are always welcome in the office, and there is a constantly well-maintained collage of family photos of all employees and clients in the firm’s conference room. With this in mind, the hiring process takes into consideration the quality of the candidate’s skills, as well as their adherence to company values and family values. The objective is not to find like- minded individuals, but to find those whose strengths complement the weaknesses in existing team members. To attract the best possible talent that the legal industry has to offer, Regnum Legacy also offers very generous benefits and highly competitive salaries. Again, since the focus is almost exclusively on family, the firm wants to make sure that its employees are able to support their own families. It celebrates and welcomes the candidates who demonstrate their own history of being authentic, displaying great innovations, and living out compassion on a daily basis. However, for all the excellence displayed by Regnum Legacy and its team of professionals, there are challenges that the firm must face on a daily basis. One of the biggest challenges in the legal community at present is access to justice. Another challenge is that there is a tendency amongst some lawyers to treat their clients like numbers in a system, rather than people with a rich family history. Law school trains individuals to think critically about facts and laws to leverage both for the benefit of a client. To do this, it often requires and mandates that lawyers turn off their human brains and think purely on a logistical level. When lawyers see their counterparts, employees, and clients as individuals in and of themselves, then the way that people interact with one another becomes radically different. Another of the most significant challenges has been COVID-19, and trying to safely help families prepare their estate just in case the worst should happen. While a lot of this can be done remotely, the notarization and signing must be done in person, albeit at a safe distance. Another problem is that those who need the planning the most, the elderly community, are afraid to leave their homes, meaning Mr. Long and his team make a lot of house calls. For all the challenges that Regnum Legacy has faced over the years, there has also been a wealth of opportunity. One of the biggest opportunities that Mr. Long has found is that clients are more open to doing business through electronic media. In fact, Mr. Long shared that “prior to COVID-19, I could count on one hand how many client retainers were signed using an electronic signature. Now, all of my retainers are signed in an electronic manner, which makes the intake process easier and far more streamlined than ever before.” Outside of the work that Regnum Legacy actually does for its clients, the excellence continues. The firm gives twenty percent of all its net profits to charity, and the firm is currently involved in a project to build a Catholic Church in Eastvale, California. Beyond that still, the team is helping to develop two scholarships for graduating members of the class of 2021 for Bloomington High School and Eleanor Roosevelt High School. Mr. Long has continued his work for the clients as well, and made sure that the firm is in the process of developing a bank of video resources for those who cannot afford traditional estate planning services. The goal is to help those who choose to use other resources to understand what a good estate plan should include, so that they can make better and more informed decisions. Ultimately, having the wisdom of Pope John Paul II underpin the core values, professional services, and moral compass of a company is seldom a bad thing. Offering families the chance to preserve their estate is one thing, but Mr. Long has created a firm that does far more than that. It treats people as they are, and works tirelessly on their behalf to ensure families can retain their memories, values, and principles for generations to come. There are few more worthy winners in this years’ Legal Awards, and Regnum Legacy is fully deserving of every past, present, and future success. Company: Regnum Legacy, PC Inland Empire Office: 3990 Concours Street, Suite 410, Ontario, CA 91764 (951) 228-9979 Orange County Office: 600 Anton Boulevard Plaza, 11th Floor, Costa Mesa, CA 92626 (949) 464-4483 Satellite Offices: Pasadena, Glendale, Newport Beach, Laguna Hills Contact: Claudia Krucinski Email:
[email protected] Website: www.regnumlegacy.com