Does your Chicago business need ongoing legal counsel without a full-time in-house attorney?
At Kravets Law Group, we serve as outside general counsel for Chicago businesses, providing consistent legal support on a flat monthly retainer or hourly basis.
If your company has outgrown calling a lawyer only when something goes wrong, then outside general counsel fills the space in between. The arrangement gives you a lawyer who already knows your contracts, your people, and where your risk sits. That familiarity means issues get handled as they surface, not after they have turned into something expensive. You get the judgment of an in-house legal department without carrying one on the payroll. Our Chicago, IL outside general counsel provides ongoing legal support to small and mid-sized businesses across Cook County. Kravets Law Group structures these relationships as a flat monthly retainer or an hourly arrangement, keyed to the volume and type of work involved. Schedule a consultation and we can talk through what your business needs.
Chicago, IL Outside General Counsel
Outside general counsel is a model where a lawyer or firm handles a company’s ongoing legal work on a retained basis, without joining as a full-time employee. In practice, the attorney operates as the business’s legal department. That means reviewing contracts, weighing in on employment questions, keeping filings current, and catching risks before they harden into disputes. A growing company gets seasoned legal judgment this way for a fraction of what an in-house hire would cost.
The market for it in Cook County is sizable. The county is home to more than 27,000 minority-owned employer firms and over 23,000 female-owned employer firms, per 2023 Census data. Plenty of these companies reach the point where legal questions come up regularly, though not often enough to warrant a salaried lawyer. Outside general counsel is built for exactly that stage of a company’s growth.
Types of Outside General Counsel Services We Provide in Chicago
The scope of an engagement follows the company’s size, its industry, and the legal questions it tends to generate. Here is the ongoing support we provide to Chicago businesses.
- Contract drafting. We prepare, review, and negotiate agreements as they come up, from vendor deals and service contracts to employment offers, NDAs, and partnership terms. When your counsel already understands the business, the turnaround is faster and the advice fits the situation.
- Employment law guidance. Hiring and firing, employee handbooks, wage and hour compliance, non-compete provisions, and workplace policies all raise questions that benefit from steady counsel. We advise on them as they arise rather than once a complaint has already landed.
- Regulatory compliance. Depending on the industry, a business may face licensing requirements, reporting duties, and periodic audits. We track those obligations and help the company stay ahead of deadlines and rule changes instead of scrambling to catch up.
- Corporate governance. We advise on board meetings, officer duties, shareholder rights, annual filings, and the records it takes to hold the company’s legal standing. Sound governance keeps personal liability off the owners and officers.
- Dispute prevention and early intervention. A lot of business disputes can be headed off or resolved early with the right legal attention. We look at situations while they are still developing and recommend steps that keep them from escalating, which saves the company the time and money a full-blown case would cost.
- Entity maintenance and filings. Keeping the business in good standing with the Illinois Secretary of State means annual reports, current registered agent information, and timely updates when ownership or management shifts. We handle those filings as part of the engagement.
- Vendor and customer negotiations. When a key vendor changes its terms, a customer disputes an invoice, or a new supplier needs onboarding, having counsel on hand to review and negotiate keeps the business from agreeing to terms it does not fully grasp.
Why Choose Kravets Law Group as My Chicago, IL Outside General Counsel?
Consistent Legal Support Without the Overhead
Daniel Kravets has practiced since 2016 and opened Kravets Law Group in 2020, building a practice that keeps transactional business law and litigation under one roof. He earned his J.D. from Drexel University’s Kline School of Law and holds bar admissions in Illinois, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey. He belongs to the Chicago Bar Association.
That mix is what an outside general counsel relationship should bring. Because Daniel handles contract work, corporate formation, and commercial disputes, he reads every issue that lands on his desk against the whole picture. When a vendor threatens to walk from a deal, he already knows whether to negotiate it down or get ready to litigate. When a new hire needs an employment agreement, he drafts it with the same care he would give if the relationship ended in a fight. His clients lean on the firm as a single resource for the legal questions their companies throw off week to week.
We build these engagements as a flat monthly retainer or on an hourly basis. Retainer clients get priority response times and a predictable monthly cost. Hourly clients pay only for the time actually used.
What Is Important to Understand About an Outside General Counsel Relationship?
What Are Important Aspects of an Outside General Counsel Engagement?
The value of outside general counsel tracks how well the attorney knows your operations. The relationship pays off when the lawyer spends time upfront learning the business, its key relationships, its growth plans, and how much risk it is willing to carry. That context shapes every piece of advice that comes after.
Response time is part of it. Situations that need a legal read do not always wait for the next scheduled call, so your counsel should set clear expectations about availability and turnaround. You should not be left waiting when something urgent comes up. Being proactive is what separates real outside counsel from reactive legal help. Your lawyer should be reviewing agreements before you sign, flagging the risks in a new initiative, and suggesting structural fixes instead of waiting for you to raise every issue. The written contract statute of limitations in Illinois runs 10 years under 735 ILCS 5/13-206, so the agreements your company signs today will bind it for a long time. Early review catches the problems while the terms can still be changed. That shift from reactive to preventive is where the relationship earns its keep.
What Does an Outside General Counsel Engagement Look Like?
Most engagements open with an onboarding stretch, during which the attorney goes through the company’s existing contracts, corporate documents, employee agreements, and any pending legal matters. That review usually runs two to four weeks and gives every later piece of advice a foundation to sit on.
After onboarding, the work settles into a rhythm. The lawyer fields questions as they come, drafts and reviews contracts, sits in on key meetings when it helps, and passes along developments that matter to the company’s industry. Some clients generate steady work every month. Others go quiet for stretches and then hit a burst of activity around a transaction, a round of hires, or a dispute. A good engagement structure bends to both patterns. We also coordinate with the company’s accountant, insurance broker, and other advisors when a legal issue crosses into their territory. That cross-functional communication is one of the first things a business loses when it relies on disconnected, one-off legal help.
How Is Outside General Counsel Priced?
What an engagement costs depends on the volume of work, the size of the company, and the range of services folded in. Two structures are common. A flat monthly retainer covers a defined scope for a set fee, which suits businesses with steady legal needs and gives them budget certainty. An hourly arrangement bills only for time spent, which fits companies whose legal needs rise and fall and who would rather pay as work is performed.
Either way, the relationship should start with a clear agreement in writing that spells out the scope, the billing method, and how communication will work. We send a written engagement letter at the outset of every relationship, so both sides know what is included from day one.
What Should You Bring to Your Outside General Counsel Consultation?
Coming in with organized materials lets us read the company’s current legal position and pinpoint where ongoing support would do the most good. Bring what you have from the following:
- Your operating agreement, partnership agreement, or corporate bylaws
- A summary of your current vendor, customer, and employee agreements
- Any pending legal matters, disputes, or demand letters
- Details on your business model, your industry, and your growth plans
- A sense of how often legal questions come up and which types recur most
Even a rough read on your monthly legal volume helps us recommend the right structure. Owners who have never worked with outside counsel often underestimate how many everyday decisions carry a legal angle. A short conversation tends to bring those to the surface fast.
Reach Out to Kravets Law Group to Schedule a Consultation
If your business needs legal support it can count on without the cost of a full-time hire, contact us to schedule a consultation. We will review where your company stands, talk through the services that would help your operations most, and recommend a structure that fits your budget. Kravets Law Group serves as outside general counsel for Chicago businesses across industries, giving growing companies the steady, informed legal attention they need.