§ Advisory Retainers
Monthly counsel · Planned cadence · Scoped hours
Counsel, beforeit becomes urgent.
Advisory retainers are for growing teams that would rather ask before a question becomes a problem. Three tiers — Core, Growth, and Counsel Desk — each with hours, scope, and response windows spelled out in writing.
- Core
- from $950/mo
- Growth
- from $1,850/mo
- Counsel Desk
- from $3,500/mo
§ 01 — Why a retainer
Before a question becomes a problem.
Growing companies generate legal questions in bursts — a contract, a hire, a contractor, a policy, a workplace issue. Most of them are easy to answer in an hour. Almost all of them are expensive if left until something goes wrong.
A retainer is a structured way to ask those questions, review the documents, and keep a thin paper trail — on a cadence that matches how you operate.
§ 02 — Three tiers
Core, Growth, Counsel Desk.
Hours, scope, and response windows are published. Unused hours and out-of-scope work are governed by the retainer agreement, which is written before any work begins.
Core Advisory
Suited for: Small businesses that need monthly legal support
Monthly advisory time for contracts, policies, and employment triage.
- Up to 2 hours of advisory time per month
- Contract and policy questions
- Employment issue triage
- Monthly risk notes
- Preferred response window
Growth Advisory
Suited for: Growing companies with hiring, contractor, and contract volume
Support for teams actively hiring, contracting, and negotiating. Recommended for most clients.
- Up to 5 hours of advisory time per month
- Employment and contractor support
- Contract review queue
- Quarterly legal risk review
- Preferred booking
Counsel Desk
Suited for: Founder-led teams needing outside general counsel support
Outside general counsel support with planned cadence, matter tracking, and leadership time.
- Up to 10 hours of advisory time per month
- Employment, contract, and governance support
- Priority review windows
- Monthly leadership call
- Matter planning and risk tracking
§ 03 — What the hours cover
A representative month.
Contract and policy review
Vendor contracts, client agreements, contractor paperwork, and the policy updates that come with growth.
Employment triage
Offers, terminations, workplace issues, classification questions, and restrictive-covenant reads.
Risk notes
Monthly risk notes on open questions, with a running list of matters and their status — what is waiting on whom.
Quarterly risk review (Growth+)
Structured review across contracts, employment, and governance — with the changes worth making in the next quarter.
Governance and resolutions (Counsel Desk)
Board and shareholder resolutions, corporate record upkeep, and matter planning on a planned cadence.
Leadership call (Counsel Desk)
Monthly call with founders or operators to plan the quarter, escalate the hard questions, and align on priorities.
§ 04 — How a retainer starts
Five steps to a live retainer.
Business consultation
Sixty-minute call to understand the business, the team, the existing paper, and the risk patterns you are seeing.
Scope and tier
A recommended tier with hours, scope, and response windows — with room to right-size before signature.
Retainer agreement
Written retainer agreement covering scope, hours, fees, out-of-scope rates, confidentiality, conflicts, and termination.
Kick-off
Intake on live contracts and policies, the existing paper trail, and the open questions to work first.
Monthly cadence
Standing availability, monthly risk notes, and a running matter list. Quarterly reviews on Growth and Counsel Desk.
§ 05 — Related
Related practice.
Practice
Business
Structure, ownership, and the documents behind the decisions.
Continue
Practice
For Employers
Hiring, policies, terminations, and risk—before they become disputes.
Continue
Practice
Contracts
Scope, payment, termination, ownership, liability, leverage.
Continue
Guide · Employers
Employer Toolkit
Six modules covering hiring, contractor structure, workplace policies, performance and discipline, terminations, and dispute response.
Continue
Contracts
Business Contract Red Flags
Scope, payment, liability, termination, IP, and dispute clauses — the lines worth slowing down on.
Continue
§ Start an advisory retainer
Make legal a planned expense — not an emergency one.
A business consultation starts the process. The retainer is written before any work begins, with hours, scope, and response windows in black and white.
Toronto · Ontario