Personable, approachable, experienced.
I put in my time at traditional law firms. Then I chose to become a real person again. So I started Burgess Law to focus on offering client’s access to legal expertise that puts client service first and offers clients a more personable approach to legal practice.
This means investing more time in clients, taking more time to learn about their goals, challenges, and the different unique aspects of their businesses.
This focusing on the service I am providing before the time billed on each file.
And this means providing clients a more personal, dedicated service, while offering clients better value for their money and alternatives to the billable hour.
In the end, this makes a stronger working relationship and I am better able to efficiently serve my clients. I offer clients the kind of access to legal advice and business understanding that is normally reserved for big businesses with full-time, in-house legal counsel.
As a business lawyer, I love what I do because it challenges me to help clients solve problems and accomplish their goals. Sometimes this means interpreting or applying the law, other times it means making an informed business decision. I enjoy advising clients on both.
I embrace the idea of being a disrupter in the legal industry. Traditional law firms are too slow to adapt and innovate. The result can be negative for clients, especially small and medium-sized businesses. Lawyers should embrace technology, offer alternative billing options, and focus first and foremost on the service they provide to clients. That’s my goal for Burgess Law.
Jeff offers legal, strategic, and business advice to his clients and is often called upon to act as an external general counsel to businesses. His practice focuses on corporate and commercial work for small and medium-sized businesses, entrepreneurs, and start-ups.
He has acted for clients at all stages of the business cycle, from starting and launching a new business or preparing to purchase an existing business, through the business growth cycle (assisting clients in financing their growth and in dealing with employment, contracts, leasing, and intellectual property matters), as well as through succession planning and eventually selling or transitioning out of the business.
Jeff is also an experienced commercial insolvency practitioner, having represented debtors, secured creditors, monitors, receivers, and trustees in insolvency proceedings under the Bankruptcy and Insolvency Act and the Companies’ Creditors Arrangement Act.
In addition, Jeff serves as legal counsel to the North Saskatoon Business Association Inc., Saskatoon’s premiere business assocation.
Jeff volunteers with the Saskatoon Regional Economic Development Authority’s SK Startup Institute (formerly Square One), working with new business owners as they launch and grow their businesses.
In addition, Jeff has volunteered with numerous non-profits over the years. He currently sits on the board of directors of The Saskatoon Club. He previously was a member of the board of directors of Remai Modern, and he acted as the lawyer-in-residence at Saskatoon Ideas Inc., amongst other volunteer commitments in the community.
Prior to his law studies, he received a Master of Arts in International Relations from the University of East Anglia in Norwich, England and a Bachelor of Arts with a double honours in political science and history from St. Thomas University in Fredericton, New Brunswick.
Jeff also has significant governmental and public policy experience, having worked in the Government of Canada and at the New Brunswick Legislature. He has advised and worked with politicians, public servants, and stakeholders municipally, provincially, and federally.
Jeff was called to the bar on June 11, 2008 after studying law at the College of Law of England and Wales and the University of Ottawa.