McAdow can’t let the law go

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Jerry McAdow intends to wind down his career.

But after nearly five decades at the same firm, his friends keep giving him work.

McAdow, 72, is of counsel and a former partner at Boardman & Clark LLP, which has gone through a few name changes and a merger since he started there, fresh out of law school, in 1967.

His legal philosophy of building friendships and affinities isn’t lip service. McAdow is an upbeat verbal Rolodex, a social network that far pre-dates Facebook. His law work reflections are interspersed with couple’s dates with clients, joint bicycling trips and shared community involvement.

“I’ve never felt I needed the incentive of a friendship of a client to do the best job that I can,” McAdow said. “I’d like to think I’m committed to do that. But when you add the additional friendship to the professional relationship, there’s a give-and-take and reward of knowing that you’re doing something that has deeper meaning.”

With client American Family, McAdow snowballed a friendship with one insurance exec into the annexation of 700 acres for a headquarters.

McAdow’s friendly aspirations even work when two sides have no interest in getting along, David Weller, a partner at Boardman & Clark who has worked with McAdow since 2001, said. In one recent deal, Weller said, relations between an ownership group selling to a rival veered toward nasty disagreements, but McAdow kept the tone airy in reminding everyone of the end goal.

Weller said the greatest lessons McAdow has taught him and others are in dealing with the “softer side” of transactional cases.

“In a large part, I am the attorney that I am today because of the fact he took the time to mentor me,” Weller said. “There’s no doubt.”

Though he remains active with the firm, McAdow said he has made more time for family in recent years. That includes his wife of 50 years, Carol, two grown children, nine grandchildren and six great-grandchildren.

But the thing about counting your clients as friends, he said, is that they’re never far.

“I switched from partner to counsel, thinking I’d taper off,” he said. “The blessing and curse of that is that I still love my work and I love contact with my clients and friends.”