Randal J. Brotherhood is an attorney in Meissner Tierney’s transactional group. He devotes a substantial part of his practice to representing businesses and their owners, as well as tax-exempt organizations, foundations and trade associations, on a wide range of matters, including mergers, acquisitions, joint ventures, various types of commercial transactions, and intellectual property matters.

Where are you from?
I was born in Tampa, Florida on the McDill Air Force Base, where my Dad was serving as an Air Force radar technician. However, my parents, being from Milwaukee, returned to Wisconsin shortly after I was born, and I have lived in Wisconsin ever since, except for three years when I lived in St. Louis while in law school.

What was your first job?
When I was a teenager, I worked for a landscaper, planting trees, hauling soil and mulch, and laying sod. To this day, I look back fondly on that experience, because the job allowed me to be outdoors and get constant exercise.

What are your hobbies?
I enjoy boating with my family and friends on the waters of Green Bay along the Door County peninsula, and especially boating to and around the numerous islands between Michigan and Wisconsin.

Also, perhaps subconsciously prompted by my experience working summer landscaping jobs, one of my other favorite ways to decompress is doing heavy-duty outdoor work, such as clearing trees and maintaining the walking trails with my chain saw, on my residential property in northwest Mequon, which is mostly wooded land. I do the same on my property in northern Door County, which is entirely wooded. I also spend a good bit of time maintaining a decent-sized pond on my Mequon property, including keeping it stocked with fish to accommodate my grandkids’ frequent visits with their fishing poles. All of these activities get me outdoors for long stretches and provide opportunities for strenuous exercise. They also provide a good psychological counterbalance to the stresses of practicing law.

What is something on your bucket list?
Some day, I would like (and I intend) to deeply explore Italy, particularly the city of Assisi, where I’d like to see the artwork and trace the footsteps of St. Francis. One of my sons just returned from a visit to Assisi, which redoubled my interest in visiting there.

Why did you become an attorney?
I went to law school because I was interested at the time in getting involved in public policy and working in an attorney capacity on Capitol Hill. However, while in law school, I gained exposure to subjects such as corporate law, securities law, and intellectual property law, and I found myself gravitating toward private practice and representing businesses, which is the career path I ultimately took.

What does a typical workday look like for you?
I have numerous regular clients who commonly e-mail me overnight or very early in the morning, so my typical workday begins at about 6:30 a.m. in responding to those e-mails and working the corresponding follow up activities into my day. Beyond that, I normally communicate with a number of clients and handle a wide range of matters in the course of a typical day; for example, I may be pushing forward an acquisition transaction for a business client, while simultaneously guiding the board of directors of a tax-exempt organization client toward a decision on a particular matter, and then handling an SEC regulatory matter for a registered investment adviser client. No two days are the same, and the types of matters that I work with clients on each day can vary widely.

Why did you choose your areas of practice?
I gravitated toward transactional practice early in my career, in major part because of my interest in businesses, how they operate, and what it takes for them to succeed. That interest continues to manifest itself in how I approach my clients and their problems—certainly I approach the matter from a legal perspective, but also try to put myself in the client’s shoes and approach the matter from their vantage point –and this approach has served me well over the years.

What is your biggest achievement, professional or personal?
Clearly, my greatest achievement has been to have somehow coaxed my spouse, Mary Lynn, into marrying me and devoting her life to the care and growth of our family, which includes five sons, three daughters-in-law, and eight (about to be nine—and counting) grandchildren, as well as a 13 year-old blind and diabetic (but very loving) dog, Toby. All five sons are all talented, productive, family-oriented and otherwise exemplary men, in large measure due to Mary’s steady hand and influence.

What activities do you participate in outside of the firm (professional)?
In recent years, my professional activities have centered around taking on various leadership roles with the State Bar of Wisconsin, as I have found that this is the best way for me to give back to the legal profession. I have previously served as Chair of the State Bar’s Business Law Section and as Chair of the Section Leaders Council. I am currently serving on the State Bar’s Board of Governors and as an advisor to the Business Law Section Board of Directors. Earlier in the summer, I was elected to the Executive Committee of the Board of Governors, and I was appointed as Chair of the BOG’s Strategic Planning Committee. So, it’s fair to say that these State Bar leadership activities take up a wide swath of my available nonbillable professional time (in addition to causing me to burn a lots of driving miles between Milwaukee and Madison).

What is your favorite thing about MTFN?
Without a doubt, it is the exceptionally high intellectual and ethical standards that are part of the DNA of each of the firm’s members. These are the common denominators that make our firm unique in the Milwaukee legal community. Additionally, we have the type of practice at MTFN that is of a quality and caliber usually found only in large law firms; yet, we are small enough to know and collaborate with each other well, which is something that you usually do not find at a larger firm. For this reason, I like to say that MTFN is the best of both legal worlds.

Randal can be reached at rjb@mtfn.com. Learn more about our attorneys by visiting mtfn.com/attorneys.