Christopher Lamberson, a new addition to the management committee at Glankler Brown PLLC, got interested in pursuing law as a career in a roundabout way.

LAMBERSON

 (Photo: Lance Murphey)

It started with a family-fueled knack for business and finance that included some practical, hands-on experience, followed later by enrollment in law school as a way to continue that interest.

Lamberson is a transactional attorney. A lot of his work involves business deals, such as acquisitions and dispositions of businesses, and commercial real estate deals.

He’s been with Glankler since the fall of 1999, but he clerked a little with the firm before that.

“So, really, I’ve been kicking around the halls for about 15 years now,” Lamberson said.

Lamberson represents various private companies and their owners in transactions that include mergers, acquisitions, dispositions and structured finance, and also provides general commercial representation.

In addition, he represents commercial property owners in connection with the acquisition, development, rehabilitation, leasing, financing and disposition of multifamily, retail, industrial and office projects. And he works with both borrowers and lenders in all areas of secured lending, including bond-financed transactions.

Lamberson received his bachelor’s degree from Washington & Lee University in 1995 and his Master of Business Administration and law degrees from the University of Memphis in 1999.

Lamberson lives in Germantown with his wife, Kelly, and daughter, Lucie, 7.

“When I was in high school, my father got me interested in business and finance,” Lamberson said. “I remember he bought me a dozen cassette tapes to learn how to use a Hewlett-Packard financial calculator.

“In college, I spent a couple of summers buying mobile homes, rehabbing them and reselling them through purchase money loans. And I guess that kind of taught me a lot about finance and taught me even more about people.”

Lamberson said he became interested in working at Glankler, one of the biggest firms in town, because of its reputation.

“I knew about them from an early age,” he said. “In fact, I was and still am friends with one of Frank Glankler’s sons and kind of grew up with him. Frankly, I’d always wanted to come over here.”

Glankler announced the 2012 members of the firm’s management committee last month. The committee addresses firm matters and advises other members and staff on administrative issues.

Lamberson said he focuses on mid-sized companies and has dealt with a lot of sellers and first-generation business owners who have run and grown their companies and are now looking for an exit.

He said those are rewarding deals because they involve helping people reach their goals at a key moment toward the end of their business career. That’s also part of what he enjoys most about his job – that his particular brand of law does not have the adversarial aspects of courtroom work.

As far as advice for aspiring attorneys, Lamberson stresses the importance of hours logged in the cockpit, so to speak.

“If you’re going to be a transactional attorney, you have to realize that law school is essential, but there’s no substitute for experience,” he said. “There’s a relatively steep learning curve, and it’s very difficult to teach something like that in a classroom setting. So it’s a little bit of a trial by fire when you get out of law school and you get to my side of things.”