Practice Areas


Business Counseling

HCM advises businesses and business owners, helping them to identify and achieve their business objectives through agreements and policies.  Ideally, these policies and agreements are free of legalese and can be understood without advanced legal training.  Our clients have come from a wide range of industries throughout the greater Washington, D.C. area – including software and technology, government contracting, and political lobbying and consulting.  Our clients have sought our advice and assistance at all stages of the business lifecycle. Learn more


Business Disputes

 

HCM represents companies and people in the business world facing disputes over their businesses, often where control of a business or money is at stake, or where a competitor, customer, employee or employer is violating a contract or breaking a law.  When it is in our client’s interest, we will fight all the way through trial, and have done so successfully.  Usually we are able obtain positive results for our clients short of trial. Many of our cases are in federal and state court in Virginia – including on the “Rocket Docket” of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia.  We also frequently represent our clients in other courts in the greater Washington, D.C. area, and in arbitrations and mediations throughout the country.  Learn more


Guardianships and Conservatorships, Trusts and Estates

 

HCM assists clients who take care of others or who foresee a time when others will need to take care of them. Our clients include adults caring for an elderly relative, parents of adult children with special needs, and people with concerns about how the affairs of someone they care about are being managed. Generally speaking, these clients are guardians, conservators, trustees and executors, all of whom are called upon to act on someone else’s behalf through a relationship of trust. In the eyes of the law, they are fiduciaries. We counsel these clients on how to conduct themselves as fiduciaries, consistent with their legal obligations. Learn more


Executive Advocacy

 

Business executives turn to HCM when it is time to sever ties with their companies, to join new ones, or to do both at once.  For C-suite executives, we have negotiated severance agreements and employment agreements with significant incentive and equity compensation components.  We have provided similar services for professionals, including doctors and lawyers, as well as owners of LLCs. Because we are also trial lawyers, where a client feels she or he is being forced out of a company unfairly, we can advise on whether the client has a valid legal claim against the company and the strengths and weaknesses of the claim.  Often that kind of analysis should factor into whether to release claims in exchange for severance, and an appropriate severance amount.   Learn more