A new career that is also a retirement plan
by Glenn RittWilliam Yates is not only a new face of law on Cape Cod. He also represents the baby boomer invasion – white-collar professionals establishing new businesses and homes here, with no intention of retiring. His story is illuminating for any Cape company striving to understand the rapid changes to our economy and population.
Consider his profile:
• He was a career officer and helicopter pilot in the Marines who retired as a lieutenant colonel in his mid-40s.
• Yates worked in the insurance and finance fields when he was on reserve status, developing a strong knowledge of business and taxation.
• He received his law degree as he approached his 50th birthday. “I wasn’t going to be like so many military retirees I’d seen,” he said. “I watched too many retire without something meaningful to do and be dead a year later.”
• His move to the Cape was based not only on professional goals, but a personal preference about where he wanted to reside for the rest of his life.
• His choice of specialty, estate planning and small business law, was based on his analysis of the Cape’s demographics.
Yates was inspired to apply to law school after encountering a former military colleague, a sergeant assigned to a maintenance shop, who did just that. With degree in hand, Yates obtained a position with a Hyannis firm. He was 48 years old.
Five years later, Yates struck out on his own, establishing a solo practice in Sandwich. Today, he employs a paralegal and an associate and has plans to recruit another attorney to keep up with a practice that extends into the South Shore.
“I can do this for the rest of my life,” marvels Yates, who is now 59. “It’s as much a retirement plan as a career plan.”
In building a practice, Yates points to several critical factors:
• He brings a life story that has enriched his understanding not only of the law, but also of the fields he has chosen – small business law and estate planning. “I come from a position of experience. I can show some understanding and compassion in situations that are complex.”
• He was a businessman prior to becoming a lawyer. “I consider myself a fairly decent salesperson and rainmaker. I enjoy introducing myself to stockbrokers, CPAs and other professionals. And my background in insurance has proven very valuable when it comes to issues of estate planning, nursing home care, Medicaid and Medicare.”
• Like so many of his colleagues, technology has proven a boon to building a practice – from running his office to extending his brand.
Yates’ practice also reinforces another dominant theme among the Cape’s changing face of law: He believes he can offer Boston-quality legal skills at Cape Cod rates.
“A lot of people think they have to go to Boston for complex asset protection and estate planning,” he said. “Quite frankly, that would mean paying through the nose for what I can do for half the price. For me, it is about the quality of life here. I don’t want to commute to Boston and pay 20 times the rent for the same space.”
Locating in Sandwich, however, has allowed him to practice as much over the canal as on the Cape.
“The canal doesn’t make a difference to my practice,” he said. He meets many of his South Shore clients at the office of one of his best business associates, a Pembroke CPA. “I will schedule two or three off-Cape clients on specific days – usually Tuesday and Thursday. I will work on the Cape on Monday, Wednesday and Friday.”
Like many independent practitioners on the Cape, Yates has forged a solid working relationship with an accountant to provide both of their clients with as much of a one-stop resource as possible – especially when competing against larger firms.
When the CPA’s clients come in for tax returns, for example, he will ask them if they have wills, powers of attorney and health-care proxies. If not, he refers them to his trusted legal adviser. Yates has also developed similar relationships with an insurance agent in Rochester and a financial adviser on Nantucket.
At the heart of Yates’ late-career model is his own entrepreneurial spirit. “I wanted to own my own business,” he said. “So this is one way to do it. After 27 years in the Marine Corps reporting to some one else, I don’t have to report to anyone now. Just my wife,” he smiles.
Published in Cape Business March/April 2008
Glenn Ritt Glenn Ritt is editor and co-publisher of Cape Business Publishing LLC. He is the former publisher of Cape Cod Community Newspapers and editor of The Bergen Record in New Jersey. 
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