Starting a business is one thing, and navigating legal and compliance issues specific to your business is an entirely different ball game. We get it. Because we are entrepreneurs, too, and we have a track record of supporting aspiring and early-stage entrepreneurs to realize their vision of building a more sustainable future through business solutions.
This is why we at Foundation for Shared Impact (FSI) partnered with the law firms, Linklaters and Johnson Stokes & Master (JSM), to offer pro bono legal advice to FSI’s community of under-resourced entrepreneurs through the Virtual Legal Clinic initiative.
We launched the Virtual Legal Clinic in October 2024, with 12 lawyers from Linklaters and JSM volunteering their expertise, knowledge, and time to support five mentee entrepreneurs of our 2024-25 Mentorship Program for Ethnically Diverse Entrepreneurs through 21 cases, on matters related to client contracts, potential contract dispute, employment law issues, intellectual property and data privacy, and other company law issues.
A Win-Win for Purpose-driven Law Firms and Under-resourced Entrepreneurs
During the Mentorship Program period (October 2024 to March 2025), the lawyers provided 476.9 hours of pro bono legal support to early-stage impact entrepreneurs. The invaluable legal support is akin to an extra springboard for entrepreneurs to launch a program or expand their client base, which otherwise would not have been achievable due to financial or human resource constraints.
Said Sneha Roy, Co-founder and Managing Director of a collective space: “The legal clinic was such a helpful part of the FSI program. We were struggling with quite a few legal pieces, such as terms and conditions and policies etc, which this clinic helped us resolve. We found the communication between FSI and the legal team very smooth and timely. It’s the type of support every small business needs and looks for, but often comes at a very high expense, so having access to this help was incredible!”
“Legal is a big part of any business and can run huge bills,” said Ruchi Om, Founder and Publisher of The Mind Talk magazine. “FSI understood this and provided a free legal clinic, saving huge costs for new business owners. This shows that FSI has considered every aspect of starting and running a business when designing the Mentorship Program and other community business support initiatives.”
This sentiment is echoed by Senchu Chemjong, Founder and Owner of Nepcha: “The virtual legal clinic is a fantastic initiative by FSI, designed to support under-resourced entrepreneurs facing urgent legal issues, compliance challenges, or regulatory hurdles in their business. Your case will be handled by specialized legal firms with expertise in the relevant area, ensuring you receive tailored guidance, just as if you were a paying client.”
“The legal clinic was incredibly helpful for me as a small business owner,” said Yulia Kim, Founder and Floral Designer of Blooms Forever. “I was able to draft several important contracts and agreements that I now use in my daily operations. Legal services can be difficult to access due to cost, so I truly appreciated having this support through the Mentorship Program.”
The mutually beneficial nature central to FSI’s programs and initiatives means that the ‘helpers’ in the Virtual Legal Clinic benefited from the initiative, too.
Said Justin Yuen, a solicitor at Linklaters: “It was great to help solo entrepreneurs start their business from scratch! It was also very meaningful for us corporate lawyers to work with individual startups – we can feel how much our advice impacts their business. From influencer marketing agreements to setting up online order platforms, we need to think through how our contracts work against the commercial realities of a one-person business.”
The Virtual Legal Clinic proved a valuable opportunity for reflection and learning for other pro bono lawyers, too:
- “It was a fulfilling experience to work on real-life issues faced by small businesses.”
- “I’m happy to be given the opportunity to work on something different from what I’m used to doing, and to be able to help other people along the way.”
- “The engagement was very fulfilling for me. It challenged me to gain a better understanding of legal concepts I already had a prior understanding of, as well as pushed me to research topics I had never encountered or considered before.”
Work with FSI to Empower Under-resourced Entrepreneurs
At FSI, we are able to magnify our impact in uplifting under-resourced, ethnically diverse entrepreneurs in Hong Kong because we adopt a cross-sector collaborative approach with our partners and supporters.
For example, our collaboration with Linklaters dates back to the pro bono legal clinic, where Linklaters’ professionals helped mentee entrepreneurs of our 2023-24 Mentorship Program address their respective legal needs. And then there was the FSI Impact Jam, where Linklaters’ professionals supported our community of social impact leaders and entrepreneurs to build pitching skills and knowledge.
With JSM (formerly Mayer Brown), we also in the past engaged some of their lawyers to produce a business law toolkit online course series to help entrepreneurs navigate various legal and compliance issues.
We encourage you to join our various skills-based volunteering initiatives to use your expertise and skills for good causes and leave the experience with serendipitous finds, which can manifest in the form of new contacts, new knowledge, and/or new perspectives to grow yourself professionally and personally.
Find out how you can get involved with FSI’s work here or email us at info@shared-impact.com.
