Super Lawyers - New England 2011

There’s a group of people that I work with—the bank, because most of the time I do represent the lender. The lenders I represent typically are relationship lenders, so I may do a project today and three months from now I may do a project for the same group of people. So it is very team-oriented. I like that. I like working on a collaborative basis.

Every deal these days seems to have problems. I like trying to figure out creative solutions to get them done. I like to close deals. I’m not one who likes to [pick] nits. I really do like to bring people together to a closing. That’s fun. We pride ourselves on trying to understand our client’s business. If you don’t understand the business, you can’t figure out the solution. Some people view transactional lawyers as filling in the blanks on the documents. That couldn’t be further from the truth. You have to figure out how to get to the solution.

Q: Of all the deals you’ve been involved in, does one stand out?
A: Back in 1999 and 2000, when Fleet National Bank acquired
Bank Boston. At that point, it became the seventh- or eighth-
largest bank in the U.S., but it needed to divest [about 300]
branches due to competitive reasons and regulatory requirements.
It may still be the largest branch divestiture in U.S. history. I was
in charge of the real estate portion of that divestiture. There
were two types of divestitures. One, on the real estate side, there
were owned real estate sites, so those sites had to be physically
prepared, title work done, and transferred. Then there were
a number of them that were leased, which meant we had to
negotiate with landlords and get landlord consents. It was all
done on a very tight time frame. That was a fun transaction: lots
of hours, lots of time involved, some creativity to move some
landlords who seemed to think there would be some hold-up value
in saying “no.”

click on video icon GAIL MCCANN ON HER APPROACH TO MAKING HIGH-DOLLAR DEALS

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