Investing In & Managing Family Owned Business Opportunities | 0.1 MSP Credit

Lee Plave

Partner of Plave Koch PLC, CFE

Lee is a co-founding partner of Plave Koch PLC, an entrepreneurial law firm in Reston, Virginia. He counsels franchisors and distributors, drafts and negotiates agreements for international and domestic transactions, and advises clients on all aspects of franchise and distribution law.

Lee also works with clients on how to apply technology in franchise and distribution systems, including social networking and social media issues, e-commerce, data, and security policies, cybersquatting and domain name disputes, as well as cybersmear/complaint sites. He also represents clients before the Federal Trade Commission, where he began his career.

London-based Chambers & Partners, which publishes an internationally-respected client guide, ranks Lee in Band 1 as one of the leading franchise lawyers in the United States. Another London-based publication, Who's Who Legal, named Lee one of the global Top 10 franchise lawyers in The International Who's Who of Franchise Lawyers.

In 2012, Lee was appointed to serve as the Director of the International Division of the American Bar AssociationÔÇÖs Forum on Franchising for 2012-14.

Shawn Goldsmith

CFE

Shawn earned both his BS and MBA degrees from the Cornell SC Johnson College of Business. As a student, he was geared toward a career in investment banking and worked within CitigroupÔÇÖs Real Estate Investment Banking Division. However, his entrepreneurial passions ultimately led him to discovering franchising, a middle path of risk-mitigated entrepreneurship.

Shawn is a Certified Franchise Executive (CFE), an active member of the International Franchise Association, and a graduate of Georgetown University's Franchise Management Program. He is Co-Founder of FranchiseLens, a digital marketplace that matches business owners with the best franchise brands and lenders. Currently Shawn serves as the Area Supervisor of several Great American Cookie franchises where he is leading an optimization overhaul in operations, sales/marketing, and growth opportunities.

In addition to his franchise experience, Shawn served as Chief Marketing Officer at Matrix Insights (an EQ and Team Development tech startup), Head of North America Demand Generation at BonitaSoft (a French-based BPM tech startup), and Social Selling Enabler at Oracle. He also founded and continues to run his own company, Markarie, a full-service marketing agency that serves an array of clients including non-profits, universities, and tech companies. Shawn's entrepreneurial spirit was first ignited as an Eagle Scout where he earned every merit badge; he remains active in Scouting. In his free time, Shawn competes in amateur boxing as well as enjoys studying ancient military history. He was acknowledged for his contributions to ÔÇ£The Death of CaesarÔÇØ, a work authored by former Cornell History Chair Barry Strauss and published by Simon and Schuster.