Zana Tomich is a Detroit business attorney who serves as outside general counsel for small to midsize businesses in the creative, food and beverage, financial services, and other industries in Michigan. She has been advising entrepreneurs as a lawyer for more than 15 years, but her history with small businesses dates back even farther. From a young age, she worked at her family’s Westland restaurant, learning lessons that inform her approach to client service today—one that emphasizes responsiveness, listening, and efficiency.
While her law school degree means she was trained to think like a lawyer, her immersion in her family’s business over the last four decades allows her to understand the unique challenges faced by the business owners she serves as legal counsel.
Zana helps her business clients in various capacities, including serving in the role of fractional general counsel. As a fractional general counsel, Zana offers her clients the benefits of a general counsel—including, most importantly, having a trusted advisor deeply familiar with their business—without the burden of staffing a full-time attorney. More information is available at dtbusinesslaw.com.
Through her role as fractional general counsel, which enables her to proactively advise clients, Zana provides counsel on a range of legal issues, including:
• business formation, including organizational documents such as shareholder agreements
• employment issues
• securing funding
• negotiation of contracts, including leases and vendor agreements
• acquisitions and mergers
• selling or otherwise disposing of assets
• succession planning
Attentiveness, a deep understanding of her client’s business, and a pragmatic approach allow her to provide value in each engagement, and help her clients to spot and address issues before they turn into problems. This allows her clients to focus on their work, and not their legal challenges.
Zana’s work has earned her recognition as a Michigan Lawyers Weekly Go-To Lawyer – Business, one of Michigan’s Top Women Attorneys, and she has been named a Super Lawyers Rising Star and a Michigan Lawyers Weekly Up & Coming Lawyer.
She is a graduate of Wayne State University Law School (J.D., cum laude) and the University of Michigan (B.A., with distinction). She is a proud graduate of Leadership Detroit XXXII, a selective leadership program aimed at identifying future leaders of the city, serves on the State Bar of Michigan Character and Fitness District Committee, the ICLE Labor & Employment Law Advisory Council, and the Detroit Athletic Club Community Outreach Committee. She is also a member of the American Bar Association Business Law Section.
Zana lives in Beverly Hills, Michigan with her husband and two daughters. A self-described foodie, in her downtime, Zana enjoys exploring Detroit’s culinary scene, practicing Pilates, and trying to master her serve in tennis.