Spencer Nathan Thal

I engaged Mr. Thal for a consultation related to an employment matter. He reviewed the severance agreement I had been offered, pointing out potential landmines and possible responses as I considered a negotiating position. At all times, he was thorough, competent and utterly professional. I would not... hesitate to recommend him to anyone I know. Thanks again, Mr. Thal!

I hired Spencer to rework a Separation Agreement from my previous Employer. Since I have never hired a lawyer before, I was a little unsure of what to expect. Spencer was great. He listened patiently to my long explanation of my situation. Then he gave me a straight forward opinion as to what he thou...ght my position was, and what he could do for me if I chose to retain his services. The same day I hired him, he started to work on my case. He contacted my former Employer to work on my behalf and he gave me daily updates on how it was going. Spencer was able to get me a more lucrative Separation package than what my former Employer originally offered. I am very happy with the services I received from Spencer and would highly recommend him to anyone else.

I first engaged Spencer Thal as an attorney in 1993. As executive officer of one of the largest local unions in the Teamsters Union, we had a great deal of legal work. In 1995 I made the decision to employee Spencer directly for the local union, first as a staff attorney, and subsequently as General ...Counsel. In all aspects Spencer provided the highest level of legal counsel and representation. He has been an outstanding litigator in both union arbitration and court room cases. He was adept at providing initial reads on matters, and when necessary conducting in-depth research. As General Counsel he developed even more diversified skill sets, including contract negotiations, staff management, and membership presentation. As the needs of our representation staff at the local union increased, Spencer developed an outstanding and thorough training module covering all aspects of union representation and labor law. Besides having a brilliant mind and an excellent education and other training in the practice of law, maybe the most meaningful of Spencer's assets is a willingness and ability to work hard and effectively. Whereas labor law and union representation were the core of the work Spencer performed, he also displayed a broad sense of legal knowledge and strategic thinking as other situations arose. As my career moved to a regional and national level with the Teamsters, Spencer remained my most valued source of legal and strategic opinion.

Spencer negotiated our recent labor contract with us. His genius at the table is subtle to notice, but eventually you find him playing dumb, asking silly questions, and delaying the process long enough for him to give thought to all the minutiae of the question at hand to ensure that he's got every f...ine detail. He's asking small questions about this or that when really he's biding his time so he can think about the whole. Combine that with a very open-handed negotiation style that leaves nothing to mystery and you get a very fast, cooperative effort on the part of both sides to come up with a deal. The reason he can be so open about strategy and negotiation is because he has a complete mastery of strategy and negotiation. He pays attention to what comes out on the paper and works the offers and counter offers more soundly than the opposition. It's in this way that he's able to say something like, "Yeah, we really feel the 2% mark is the best one, so we'll go ahead and just wait for you to agree to that one."