Starting and Running a Law Firm: Tips, Strategies, and Success Stories

Alan Schnurman is a senior partner in the Wall Street law firm of Zalman & Schnurman. He has been a practicing attorney since 1972 and is admitted to practice in the State of New York and in the U.S. District Courts of Eastern and Southern District of New York (1974) and the United States Supreme Court (1976).

He is the founding host of LAWLINE, a television program focusing on legal news and trends that has aired in New York, New Jersey and Connecticut for 18 years. Mr. Schnurman is currently Treasurer of the New York State Trial Lawyers Association and a former President of the Association of Trial Lawyers of the City of New York. He was Chairperson of the 1999 New York State Trial Lawyers Association's Annual Convention, and is chairperson of the annual lecture series "Marketing: The Business of Law", New York State Trial Lawyers. Mr. Schnurman is highly regarded among his peers throughout the legal profession for his creative approach to legal issues.

Through his law firm, Zalman & Schnurman, whose practice is limited to personal injury and insurance law, he has won handsome financial awards on behalf of his clients. Because of his highly successful practice and landmark decisions, he is a frequent guest lecturer and has appeared on a number of radio and television shows, and has been quoted in many newspaper articles. In addition to his law practice, Mr. Schnurman has served on a number of local and state panels. Just to name a few, he has been a member of the following: Judicial Screening panel (Democratic Party-New York County) Advisory Committee on Tort Litigation, New York County NYS Office of Court Administration Jury Project Implementation Committee Chair, Judicial Screening Panel for New York and Kings Counties, New York State Trial Lawyers Assoc. Judiciary/Trial Lawyers Joint Committee Office of Court Administration Chair, Committee on Advertising and Unauthorized Practice, New York State Trial Lawyers Association Mr. Schnurman is married to Judy Stein and has two children, Michele and David.

Alan Schnurman has practiced in the field of personal injury for 37 years. He has given CLE seminars at the New York State Bar Association and New York State Trial Lawyers Association. He has been written about in the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, NY Post, and USA Today. He has been featured on CNN, The Today Show, and Good Morning America.

VISIT: www.danielgershburg.com

Daniel Gershburg took a different road when graduating from law school. While he was a member of the Law Review and the Harlan Scholars program, Mr. Gershburg passed up the opportunity to work at large law firms and instead decided to establish his own practice, with the hope of changing the way small practice attorneys are viewed. His practice deals specifically with Bankruptcy and Real Estate Law. Mr. Gershburg has spoken to classes at New York Law School, has been published in New York State Bar Association newsletters, and also serves on the New York State Bar Association Young Lawyers Division Executive Committee. He frequently speaks at community functions in his Brooklyn neighborhood educating members of the community about Bankruptcy as well as financial advocacy. Mr. Gershburg also spends a considerable amount of pro bono time volunteering at the Brooklyn Bar Assocation Volunteer Lawyers Project, assisting low income individuals to file for Bankruptcy. 

A solo since passing the bar in 1978, Marc Garfinkle is an attorney whose practice is limited to legal ethics and discipline, judicial conduct and bar admission. He is also the author of several short books for new attorneys, including $olo Contendere: How to Go Directly from Law School into the Practice of Law without Getting a Job (3d ed.,©2010, 2019, Solo Contendere Press).

A nationally-acclaimed speaker, Marc has addressed the Solo Practice and New Lawyers divisions of state bar associations from coast to coast, and regularly offers CLE programs for state bars, bar associations, Inns of Court and others.

A former Ethics Committee investigator and Committee Chair, he is a regular contributor to the New Jersey Law Journal, having published approximately fifty ethics-related columns there. He is also frequently quoted in electronic and print media on matters of legal ethics. Marc also teaches Persuasion and Advocacy at Seton Hall University Law School and is public defender in his home town.