Additional menu

Pamela DeNeuve

Lawyer & Law Firm Peak Performance Strategist

The Lawyer of the Week- Episode 13, Jacksonville, Florida

posted on

Share
Tweet
Pin
0 Shares

Crystal T. Broughan, Esq.
Intellectual Property

Shareholder at Marks Gray, P.A.
Jacksonville, Florida

http://https://youtu.be/tuSG0o42vuo

Interview Transcript

Pamela: Hi, my name is Pamela DeNeuve and I’m pleased to invite you to Lawyer of the Week. This week we are interviewing Crystal Broughan and she is with Marks Gray.

She manages a complex litigation practice in the area of trademark, patent and copyright infringement; licencing agreement and business contracts in the states and federal courts.

Crystal prepares and files trademarks, copyright applications, licencing agreements, non-compete and non-disclosure agreements for a wide variety of clients.

She represents clients before trademark trials and appeal board on trademarks disputes. Crystal also assists clients with domain name disputes, arbitration and Federal courts. Crystal has been very involved in litigation and she has actually has an award of excellence from the Florida Office of the State-wide Prosecutor. She’s also AV rated by Martindale-Hubbell for ethical standards and legal ability and the Jacksonville Business Journal of 2016 awarded her the best Intellectual Property attorney. So we’re so happy to have Crystal with us today. Hello Crystal!

Crystal: Hello Pamela.

Pamela: How are you doing today?

Crystal: I am great I just came back from the Jacksonville USA Chamber Luncheon and thoroughly enjoyed myself with all the energy in the room in Jacksonville.

Pamela: Wonderful. Well I would like to ask you our Lawyer of the Week questions and the first one is when and what made you decide to become a lawyer?

Crystal: Well I was working in public relations and event planning in the Orlando area and I didn’t feel that much challenge. A good friend of mine talked to me about going to law school and that good friend of mine was a judge at the time; he convinced me sit for the prep course and I sat for the exam to get into law school and once I did well enough I applied and went to law school and behind all of that thought process was in the practice of law you need to use your writing skills, your analytical skills, your speaking skills- a wide variety of skills and you can do all of that in the practice of law and I have used all of that in the practice of law.

Pamela: Wonderful. And has your practice been everything that you had hoped for when you began?

Crystal: Oh my practice began as a criminal prosecutor and has evolved 20 years later I’m now an intellectual property lawyer. So I’ve gone through several different types of practices and now I have found I really enjoy serving my business clients and helping them protect their intellectual property assets.

Pamela: That’s really good. That’s wonderful that you were able to translate your skills to do something that you really feel passionate about and that you enjoy. A lot of lawyers have not been able to do that. What do you think helped you to make a decision to find a practice like Intellectual Property (IP) that you could practice that what gave you the idea to do that?

Crystal: Well I had a litigation background, I tried some complex cases, I did a lot of white collar crime prosecutions and I wanted to use that background but I also wanted to work with clients that appreciated my assistance and I can do that in the business community. I can work with creative people, entrepreneurs, marketing personnel and developing an idea and labelling it with a brand and getting the product into service, out to market and I find that thrilling.

I like working with creative people, I like working with entrepreneurs and business people. How did I come to that? I had a good friend who was an intellectual property lawyer; I talk to that person about can I try it and they said yes and I tried it and I really liked it so here I am today.

Pamela: That’s great. There is a lot to be said for mentorship and finding people who are doing what you enjoy doing, what you like to do and taking the lead from them. That’s excellent I love that story Crystal. Can you tell us a little bit about your biggest wins and challenges in your practice?

Crystal: At this point in my practice my biggest wins are when I successfully protect a client’s brand or their trademarks or their copyrighted materials. Sometimes I have clients that are sued and I am able either through careful negotiations or through litigation I am able to protect their company’s intellectual property and that’s a big win when you’re able to do that.

My biggest challenges are educating my clients and fellow lawyers as to exactly what is intellectual property, how to protect it, why you want to protect it and the value of it to their business; that is an ongoing educational process to lawyers as well as clients.

Pamela: Crystal why do you think it’s so challenging for your clients as well as lawyers to understand the importance of trademark law and intellectual property law?

Crystal: Most clients when they start a business they are very concerned about getting their product or their service to market, getting their name known, having people recognize them. They don’t necessarily understand that they need to protect their ideas, their creative inspirations often times their logos, their brand.

They don’t understand the difference between a trademark, copyright or a patent. They don’t understand the need for non-disclosure agreements, confidentiality agreements. They just want everybody to know about their idea and they want to sell it and they don’t understand the need to protect it from people who will take it and use it for their own gain. They don’t necessarily educate themselves on that aspect of the law either; so that’s what I do. I speak to all kinds of small business organizations and I educate clients and my fellow lawyers. Some fellow lawyers they may be business lawyers, commercial litigators but they may not understand the value of intellectual property to their clients so I have to educate the lawyers on that.

Pamela: Excellent. Who would be a perfect referral to your practice?

Crystal: The perfect referral is a client or business that has been successful for 3-5 years, they’ve been established, they had some money flowing in and they’re recognized. But now it dawns on them how valuable their intellectual property assets are, their trademarks, their inventions, maybe their formulas for their beer or their formulas for a recipe or a chemical formula, they may have an architectural plan that’s unique and they now realize, “I really need to protect this.”

They come to me and I can help them register their trademarks, I can help them get architectural plans copyrighted. I can help them do all these things and have the non-disclosure agreements put into place, teach them how to protect their trade secrets, if they don’t want other people including their employees to have. So that’s what I can do for them.

Pamela: Okay excellent. Now what legacy would you like to leave in your practice Crystal?

Crystal: I would like my clients to think of me as of being a valuable resource to them and a knowledgeable resource that helped them protect their business and the most valuable assets of their business which is their inventions, their ideas, their brand and that they remember me has somebody they could go to at any time to help them protect their intellectual property assets.

Pamela: Tell me, say there is a large corporation that needs some extra support, maybe they already have their attorneys is there some way that you work with them as well?

Crystal: I can. I have helped companies merge, doing inventory of their intellectual property assets, go from mergers and acquisitions by helping them do an inventory, handle all the assignments. I have taken on the management of trademarks portfolios for large corporations, where I managed the day-to-day defence basically; making sure nobody else is out there using their trademarks. Every large corporation, every medium and small business needs to have somebody who is making sure nobody is out there using their brand as a new domain name or on a new product line that may competes with them. So I help large companies as well as medium size companies with that type of protection.

Pamela: Wonderful. Well we always ask our lawyer of the week what do they do to manage their stress levels?

Crystal: I do a lot of different things. I do yoga every morning. I also try to make sure that I swim a mile at least once a week sometimes am able to do it twice a week. I also walk a lot and I exercise in the gym.

I started doing meditation so that really helps me focus my mind and clear it of anxiety and all those things that can descend upon you when you’re practicing law. I try to have a healthy a lifestyle as possible as I can to help manage stress that comes with the practice of law.

Pamela: Wonderful. That’s great I love hearing that Crystal because that’s an example for many of us and many attorneys to; and I have been meditating for about ten years myself so I really do know how important that is.

What is one thing that you would like anyone who is watching this to know about you maybe that they don’t know?

Crystal: Oh, that’s a surprise question. What do they need to know?

Many years ago in the 80’s I was in a sing and dance group called ÜP with People and we travelled all over the United States and Mexico, singing and dancing and spreading the word of peace and that we can all live together and get along.

I think that is still a very relevant message in this day and time that with all the wonderful cultures and people that we have in the United States and in the world that we can live together. We can work together and doing my international trademark association work I am still living that we can work together.

Pamela: Wonderful. I imagine you saw that when you were in INTA in Barcelona a few weeks ago.

Crystal: Yes, I did that’s a wonderful experience with over 10,000 people representing brands through the world and you have interaction with people from all over the world, all languages and cultures.

We are a global community and we are trading, exporting and importing to each other all the time with our brands. So I encourage all my clients to go beyond their little world, take their message and their products to other cultures.

Pamela: Wonderful. Well Crystal we so appreciate you being our Lawyer of the Week and to everyone else out there we hope you join us again next week for our Lawyer of the Week.

Crystal’s Links:

http://www.marksgray.com

http://www.marksgray.com/practices/intellectual-property/

http://www.marksgray.com/not-register-trademark/

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/when-register-trademark-crystal-t-broughan-esq-/

 

 

Pamela DeNeuve

Lawyer & Law Firm Strategist

feel free to email me at:

pamela@pameladeneuve.com

Website: https://pameladeneuve.com

Share
Tweet
Pin
0 Shares

Reader Interactions

Leave a Reply

Quotes from our Lawyer of the Week

  • I am here to protect the human rights and I will do the best in my capacity to do so.
    Diana Constantinidou
  • I love this work. I really do. To me, especially now more than ever, we need a strong news media. It’s not just a business. It’s part of our democracy.
    Edward Birk
  • You don’t have to be large and on the world stage to seize these opportunities and to apprehend these threats. It really is a function of the vision and the insight of the leaders. When they get it, then there’s an opportunity for them to persuade and help their partners get the message and act to remake themselves.
    George Beaton
  • I did not intend to create this legacy, but I see the ripple effects of it, and it’s so meaningful to me. I think that through the podcast, I’m also hoping to create a legacy of service to the profession.
    Okeoma Moronu
  • That’s one of the things that I find very satisfying; building bridges between people from different countries, working closely with them and seeking those deeply satisfying relationships that are created in cross-border trade and investment facilitation.
    John Grimley
  • I’m very lucky to have a family and a wife that absolutely just creates a life that’s there and that one can go to. I think about the stress that we experience in our work, that is the best we can offer. So I really live for that. It’s something to be grateful for.
    Nic Swart
  • The legacy that I want to leave in the work that I’m doing is having made a difference and having hopefully spearheaded some type of meaningful change in the culture of the legal profession, as it relates to addiction and mental health specifically.
    Patrick Krill
  • It’s not so much my practice that I want to make a difference in, but I want to know that I left the legal professional a little bit better than I found it.
    Courtney Wylie
  • the real reality is some of the lawyers, some of the law firms, are going to be left behind because they’re not moving into the current reality where they can’t just rely on referrals.
    Montina Portis
  • When you take a lawyer out of the system, you take the voice and the ability of the people to protect themselves from overreaching government and overreaching organizations out the equation.
    Ian Connor Bifferato
  • I think a lot of attorneys are very, obviously, economically driven, which is fine, because we all need to make a living. But, at the end of the day, I also think that we are in this profession to give back and I would like to see that happen to a greater degree.
    Dr. Jeanne-Mari Reteif
  • "I would like my clients to think of me as of being a valuable resource to them and a knowledgeable resource that helped them protect their business and the most valuable assets of their business, which is their inventions, their ideas, their brand and that they remember me as somebody they could go to at any time to help them protect their intellectual property assets.
    Crystal T. Broughan
  • The person I’m looking for is the one who is going to come along and say ok; we can’t just tweak what we do with law; we have to radically re-invent it.
    Ken Grady
  • So you have to be that person who is challenged again and again so that you will grow as an expert.
    Dr. Peter MacMillan
  • I always tell my clients and my friends and colleagues, it’s a two-way road. You know- you give, and you receive, you give back, and it keeps going that way. It’s wonderful.
    Fernanda Alem-Freitas
  • In terms of successes, I will tell you, having done this, I’ve gone much further and made more connections and more friends and more inroads into the industry much earlier in my career than I ever could have possibly imagined.
    Gene Quinn
  • my thinking was that I really need to understand what clients really wanted. So in order to really do a good job, I needed to find out what moves them, what kept them up at night.
    Silvia Hodges Silverstein
  • So when we talk about a legacy, it’s a legacy that people to this day tell me — oh, I remember working with your Grandfather and he was such an upright man. Wow, let’s hope they say that about me.
    Jordan W. Charness
  • this answer made me to become a lawyer instead of a mathematician.
    Anandavasagan K.
  • What I want to try to do is create the beacon, or the light toward, developing law firm culture, as in the legal profession culture in general...where they do find a sense of meaning, purpose, connection, joy and want to stay in the profession.
    Anne Brafford
  • it is my goal to try to increase diversity within our profession, and even for as long as I’m here, I will advocate for the inclusion of different perspectives, different peoples, and different ideas that can make this world a better place.
    Robert Johnson
  • I have learned a lot of things the hard way and if I can help others sort of avoid the mistakes I’ve made and have the vision I lacked, then that’s how I want to help
    Frank Ramos
  • "I’m sort of traditional with an edge. I have respect for tradition. I have respect for history, but I’m also very inquisitive. I like to, you know, sort of architect things.
    Mark A. Cohen
  • I am all or nothing. I believe that the world has enough mediocre people. I had a mentor tell me that once and I give 110% to everything I do.
    LaKeisha Randall
  • You’ll never know how high that peak can be unless you find recovery, and with recovery, anything is possible
    Brian Cuban
  • Being able to live and work anywhere in the world. And we do live, you know- we live in one of the most beautiful places in the world, in County Cork, Ireland now.
    Walt Hampton
  • You know, the best thing that anyone could possibly do is think about what’s important to them and get back to that really basic thing. Personally, professionally, financially. You know, where would you like to be? Because you can be there if you take a couple steps, you know? And it just- it can be incremental
    Bridget Venus Grimes
  • The people I represent have their own families and their own spouses and I see that vividly through my own experiences and trying to help them. I often try to, although perhaps not the easiest thing to do, but try to put myself into their shoes and approach a case with that regard.
    Mark A. Torres
  • My legacy really is to try to enhance the wellness of the members of our profession and to open up this dialog.
    Heidi K. Brown
  • At the end of my days, I want people to look back and say, "Yes, he really did make the world a better place and here are some concrete examples of places where he's influenced people, or influenced organizations, or cultures." So, if I can do that and leave that to the world, then I think I've done a pretty good job.
    Maurice L. Rabb
  • Pamela helped brought us a $12MM deal and was a key player to help finalize the negotiations. She was a valuable investment for our firm with a magnificent return on our investment.
    Bill L., Chairman of Litigation
  • I was on the verge of losing it. I felt confused and had no idea why I was practicing law in the first place. Pamela helped me to regain my enthusiasm and grow my practice enjoy my life again.
    Lewis M., Partner
  • I have worked as an in-house attorney for 20+ years with major corporations. I hired Pamela during a transition in my career. When I began working with Pamela, I needed clarity and direction as I forged a new path. Through Pamela's unique coaching techniques, I learned a tremendous amount about myself and what I wanted out of life. She helped me put plans in place, encouraged me and held me accountable for taking necessary actions. Coaching is clearly not just a business for Pamela. She truly cared about me and repeatedly went above and beyond to help me achieve the goals I set for myself. Pamela is highly knowledgeable and accomplished and I trust her judgment and coaching. I would highly recommend her to anyone who is looking to make a job or career change.
    Renee Cogdell Lewis
  • Why should only sports figures get coaches? I represent whistleblowers in highly complicated litigation cases. The work is stressful and I can't afford to be distracted or unfocused. Maybe some lawyer out there finds that easy, but if any lawyer/mom/wife does, I'd like to meet her. I needed to be at my peak ALL the time so I hired Pamela DeNeuve as my coach and -- wow! Hiring Pamela is like having someone right there with me in my practice as coach, mentor, confidant, and troubleshooter. I am on my A+ game thanks to Pamela.
    Lee Wallace
  • Pamela DeNeuve works with powerful men and women who look to the world like they have it all together. So that includes everyone who is successful because we all have skeletons in our closet. We all have an area of life that is painful or frustrating. While I looked like I had it all, a beautiful wife, a son who I have a great relationship and a long-time financial career, a growing business as a motivational speaker, something was missing. Something was off and I couldn't put my finger on it. Working with Pamela DeNeuve is one of the best things I have ever done. Her insight, her showing me the blind spots that I tried to ignore or avoid was an awakening. I have regained my enthusiasm again. I wake up with the wonder and excitement I had lost as the years wore on. I highly recommend Pamela DeNeuve's 8-hour intensive session. You will make quantum leaps in your career, increase your income and your wife will become the love of your life again.
    Tom Heitz
  • Any lawyer or law firm who want to expand their practice, increase client base, or re-ignite your love of the law will be wise to work with Pamela DeNeuve as your business/marketing coach. She has more than 25 years of experience working with AM100 law firms, small firms, and individual lawyers across the United States, in Asia, and South Africa. Pamela understands all aspects of the legal profession. She understands the challenges that we attorneys face. I retained Pamela to help with business development and some special projects in my First Amendment/Communications law practice. Almost immediately, I started to once again see opportunities in the challenges rather than the other way 'round. Practicing law is more enjoyable because of this work with Pamela. Asking for help is sometimes the hardest ask of all. After working with Pamela for her help, I'm glad I asked. I highly recommend her to any attorney or firm.
    Edward Birk