Handling Friend and Family Requests for Legal Advice: Guidance for New Attorneys

Mr. Majchrzak is a seasoned ethicist, civil litigator, and certified specialist by the State Bar of California in legal malpractice law, is listed in Best Lawyers in America and Super Lawyers, and is rated AV®-Preeminent™ by Martindale-Hubbell. He is Managing Shareholder of the firm’s Arizona office, and serves as Deputy General Counsel. Mr. Majchrzak also chairs the firm’s writing committee and attorney training college. He represents clients in matters involving attorney and law firm risk management, discipline defense, and legal malpractice claims. Mr. Majchrzak devotes a substantial portion of his career to counseling his clients on how to achieve their professional goals in an ethical way. For lawyers and firms with or without general counsel, he helps navigate the often complex ethical waters of the legal profession. Mr. Majchrzak performs law office risk management assessments, trains law firm staff in ethics requirements, and advises on a variety of topics. These include conflicts of interest, fees and billing requirements and dispute handling, trust account procedures, internal and departing lawyer compensation, law firm advertising and online marketing efforts, engagement and common interest agreements, non-engagement and disengagement protocols, attorney-client privilege/confidentiality analyses and protection, subpoena response, multi-jurisdictional practice, lawyer mobility, and ancillary business ventures. Mr. Majchrzak is active and widely visible within the legal ethics community. He served as the co-chair of California Lawyers Association’s first Ethics Committee and as a member of the organization’s Future of the Profession Task Force; and he co-chaired 2022’s annual meeting. He currently serves as the secretary of the Association of Professional Responsibility Lawyers, the chair of the ABA working group on Model Rule 5.5, a member of the ABA Standing Committee on Professionalism, a member of the editorial board of the ABA/Bloomberg Law Lawyers’ Manual on Professional Conduct, a liaison to the ABA Standing Committee on Ethics and Professional Responsibility, and a member of the ABA National Conference on Professional Responsibility Planning Committee. Mr. Majchrzak also served as a three-year member of the State Bar of California’s Committee on Professional Responsibility and Conduct, and chair of its outreach committee; and is a past chair of the San Diego County Bar Association’s Legal Ethics Committee. In 2015, Mr. Majchrzak revived the then-abandoned Ethics Quarterly, and has continued as one of its two editors. He has also taught professional responsibility as an adjunct law school professor.

Mr. Potter works with lawyers and law firms in all aspects of legal ethics law and risk management. He has over a decade of experience in compliance and legal roles, having served previously as Intake Bar Counsel at the State Bar of Arizona. Before joining the State Bar of Arizona, Mr. Potter had served as Chief Compliance Office and General Counsel at EZ-Messenger, a legal support services provider with locations in 15 states. He led the quality and compliance team, oversaw compliance and security programs, and negotiated contracts and service agreements.