Murn sacrifices firm ownership for client satisfaction

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Waukesha attorney Don Murn has always enjoyed being his own boss.

He started his own painting business at age 17, which he ran until he started law school in 1982. While attending Marquette University Law School and for several years after, he ran a ski boat dealership and was a competitive water skier.

After graduating law school in 1985, Murn joined his father in practice. Several incarnations of the firm followed, before it became Murn & Martin SC in 1995.

So when Murn, 52, decided to merge his four-attorney firm with Madison-based Axley Brynelson LLP earlier this month, he said it was difficult to surrender the control he had grown accustomed to throughout his diverse career.

“The hardest thing for me was to get it in my brain that I would not be running day-to-day,” Murn said. “In bigger firms, there are rules and regulations you have to follow.”

But he acknowledged it was the business-savvy choice to join the 57-attorney firm and expand the range of services available to clients.

Murn, who focuses on corporate mergers and acquisitions and real estate, said the number of cases he referred out had risen in recent years, which led to an interest in merging with another firm.

“I was referring out a ton of business in labor and IT areas,” he said. “It got to the point where it was hundreds of matters a year and clients were frustrated and wanted me to be working on things that I didn’t know anything about.”

Murn said Axley was a perfect fit given the firm’s range of practice areas and comparable rate structure, despite having to sacrifice his familiar ownership role in previous endeavors.

Wisconsin Law Journal: If you could develop one CLE course for credit, what would it be about?
Don Murn: Exercise, hobbies and mitigating stress in the practice of law

WLJ: What was your least favorite course in law school and why?
Murn: Constitutional law. The professor was not a practical man.

WLJ: What do you consider your biggest achievement to date and why?
Murn: Arguing two cases before the Supreme Court of Wisconsin because it advanced the state of the law. I was able to expand the law in the real estate area which I have practiced extensively in.

WLJ: What is the one luxury item you cannot live without?
Murn: Open space around me. I own an 80-acre tree farm in Waukesha with 70,000 spruce, oak, cherry, maple and black walnut trees. I planted the first 3,000 trees by hand and the next 67,000 with a two-person tree planter pulled by a tractor that could do 2,000 in an hour. I love walking my dogs out there every morning, rain or shine.

WLJ: What do you miss most about your childhood?
Murn: Not being able to water ski with reckless abandon. I never worried about money, getting hurt, and only had to worry about myself.

WLJ: What is the first concert you went to?
Murn: I was 17 when I saw Steve Miller Band and the Eagles at Milwaukee County Stadium in 1977.

WLJ: If you could trade places with someone for a day, who would it be and why?
Murn: The president of the United States. Just to know what he knows.

WLJ: What is your motto?
Murn: Do not be anxious for tomorrow, for tomorrow will care for itself.

WLJ: If you could be a superhero, who would you be and why?
Murn: Spiderman. I would then no longer be afraid of heights.