Liane Keister has recently joined the firm as an attorney in the Trusts & Estates Group. Her practice focuses on sophisticated estate planning, business succession planning, trust and estate administration, charitable planning, long-term care planning, and wealth management.
Why did you become a lawyer?
I enjoy helping people to navigate challenging situations and to plan for and achieve their goals. Working as a legal assistant after college helped me to discover that I loved analyzing legal situations and coming up with practical legal solutions. Becoming a lawyer was a natural fit to combine what I enjoyed about the profession with my passion for helping clients to attain personal and business goals.
Tell us about your career path.
I have spent the past thirteen years, my entire professional career as a lawyer, at a small business firm in Boston.
Tell us about your practice.
I represent small to mid-size businesses, business owners, individuals and families in a variety of roles, including all phases of the corporate lifecycle, business succession, sophisticated estate planning, complex estates and trusts, and real estate. Estate planning for business owners and family businesses can have intricate challenges both personal and professional in nature. Proper coordination of the estate plan and the business governance documents is critical. My practice has a particular focus on this nexus where estate planning and business planning intersect.
What do you love most about what you do?
My greatest satisfaction is helping people to achieve their goals, personal and professional. When it’s helping family businesses transition to the next generation, cementing their family legacy, that’s even better.
Why did you choose the firm?
RIW offers a broader range of legal services than a smaller firm with a deep bench of excellent practitioners and a warm and supportive collegial culture. Being born and raised in a small town, I prefer an environment in which I can engage with my colleagues and have the opportunity to make meaningful contributions.
Tell us a fun or surprising fact about you.
I was on the U.S. National Team for rowing for 6 years and went to the Athens 2004 and Beijing 2008 Olympics. In 2004, while training at the ARCO Olympic Training Center, we went to the Coronado Naval Base and did the Navy SEAL obstacle course!
What do you do in your free time?
Most of my free time is family time, chasing my 5-year old daughter around a playground, reading, helping her to create the latest engineering structure du jour out of a cardboard box, or baking. I am an active volunteer with the PTA at the Winn Brook School in Belmont and at Riverside Boat Club in Cambridge, MA. I am also on the board of the Boston Rowing Federation, which supports elite level rowing talent in Boston.
