What Partnership Means to Me

The past few weeks have been a little overwhelming – in the best possible way.

Since Lawson Creamer announced that Mara Mallory and I had been named partners, I’ve heard from colleagues, clients, former classmates and people I haven’t spoken to in years.

Every message has meant something to me. That kind of response makes you stop and think about the community you’re part of – and how fortunate you are to be in it.

All of this prompted me to reflect on my career so far, and how fortunate I have been to spend it at Lawson Creamer.

I didn’t arrive at commercial litigation by the most direct route.

I grew up in the Saint John area and went to Saint Mary’s University in Halifax for an undergraduate degree in criminology. I arrived at UNB’s law school fully expecting to become a criminal defence lawyer. That expectation didn’t last long.

What changed my thinking was business law – the inner workings of companies, how conflicts arise between shareholders and creditors, what happens when those conflicts can’t be resolved without formal process.

Cases involving hostile takeovers, corporate restructuring, insolvency: I found myself genuinely absorbed in a way I hadn’t been on the criminal side. Commercial litigation was where my academic interest and my practical appetite finally lined up.

By second year, I knew what I wanted to do. I also knew where I wanted to do it.

Mentors In The Truest Sense

Lawson Creamer was already familiar to me through my family’s connections to the Saint John business community. It was full-service but not a factory. The partners were genuinely present – not managing files from a distance but in the room, available, invested in the people around them.

That was what I was looking for: somewhere I could learn the work properly, from people who cared about how I was developing as a lawyer.

That turned out to be exactly what I found.

Over nearly a decade, the partners here became mentors in the truest sense. Each of the partners have been a constant presence – generous with their time, honest when it mattered, and genuinely committed to the kind of lawyer I was becoming. I joined as a summer student, completed my articles here and was called to the New Brunswick Bar in 2017.

I never left.

My practice has focused on bankruptcy and insolvency matters, contractual disputes and civil litigation. I appear regularly as lead counsel before the New Brunswick Court of King’s Bench and Court of Appeal.

What I love about litigation is the process.

There is something genuinely satisfying about taking a complicated, emotionally charged dispute – shareholders who can’t agree, a creditor pursuing a business in distress, a contract that has broken down badly – and moving it through structured steps toward resolution.

You meet with the client, you understand the human story behind the legal problem, and then you put that story into a framework the court can work with.

On Behalf of a Client

In almost every case, there is a path forward. Finding it, and walking your client through it, is the work.

I also appreciate something specific about practising in New Brunswick. The bar here is collegial in a way that isn’t universal.

You can have a genuine fight on behalf of your client and do it with the kind of mutual respect that makes the whole process work better for everyone. Lawyers here truly treat each other as officers of the court, and I don’t take that for granted.

Being named partner means I’m now part of a different set of conversations – about the direction of the firm, how we build our practices, how Lawson Creamer positions itself as it approaches its 50th year.

I’ve always been interested in how organizations work and how they grow. Getting to help shape that here, at a firm I’ve been part of for a decade, is something I’m genuinely excited about.

I’m also looking forward to working alongside Mara Mallory in the partnership. She brings real talent and a practice that complements mine, and I think the firm is in a strong position with both of us at the table.

Home, In Every Sense

My connection to this region is personal as much as professional. When my parents wanted to downsize, I bought back the Rothesay house I grew up in and am raising my family there.

I serve on the board of directors of the New Brunswick Lung Association and have previously served on the Saint John Law Society Council. I have also had the pleasure of guest lecturing, on occasion, at UNB on advocacy – work I find genuinely meaningful, particularly when it comes to helping young lawyers find their footing.

I’m home, in every sense. It feels good to be building something here – and to be doing it from inside the partnership.

Christopher Isnor is a partner at Lawson Creamer, practising commercial litigation and bankruptcy and insolvency law. He can be reached at cisnor@lawsoncreamer.com.