Breaking the Stereotype of a Typical Attorney Monday, November 1, 2010
PLANO -- Attorneys are oftentimes compared to sharks or bloodsucking critters of one make or another. Plano attorney Ike Vanden Eykel is breaking the stereotype.
Vanden Eykel received the state’s top award for meritorious service to family law recently at the Advanced Family Law Course, the nation’s largest gathering of divorce lawyers.
The Sam Emison Award, named after a former Harris County judge who helped to create family law in the state, is bestowed upon a person “who has demonstrated a significant commitment and made significant contributions to the practice of family law in the State of Texas.”
Larry Upshaw, owner of Professional Solutions Group, believes Vanden Eykel is a perfect candidate for this award.
“He is one of the nation’s top family law attorneys and president of the Dallas Bar Association for 2010,” Upshaw said. “He has distinguished himself for his intense advocacy of the Dallas Volunteer Attorney Program, which provides free legal assistance to the poor.”
Vanden Eykel has for 21 years been a managing partner of Koons Fuller, the southwest’s largest exclusively family law firm with 27 attorneys in four North Texas locations, including Plano.
Douglas Harrison, partner at Gardere Wynne Sewell LLP, has practiced law as a colleague of Vanden Eykel’s for 37 years.
“We were fortunate to have some cases together early in our careers and have been opposing counsel in many, many cases,” Harrison said. “It is a pleasure to work with Ike because he follows through. I do not have any difficulty relying on what he tells me. He exemplifies a strong sense of professionalism and has actually enhanced the practice of family law by setting high standards.”
Harrison says one thing he appreciates about Vanden Eykel is his sense of humor. “The practice of law is stressful, and I enjoy having cases with Ike because we can generally find something in the case that can help lighten the tone,” Harrison said.
Harrison said one of Vanden Eykel’s talents as a lawyer is his ability to take the complex and make it simple. “He aims for the essence of the matter rather quickly and delivers a succinct oral and written product,” Harrison said.
He said Vanden Eykel once told him that if he had his career to choose again, he might have become a minister. “With his effective style and brevity, I expect he would have made that a success as well,” Harrison said. “The reality is that being a successful family law attorney may not be so different than being a minister in many respects.”
Harrison admires Vanden Eykel’s ability to be a forward thinker.
“He has done that with his own individual practice, with his firm, with his involvement in the Dallas Bar Association and his own family life,” Harrison said. “During the last 37 years, family law has changed tremendously and has become much more complex. I believe that Ike anticipated many of those changes and has had a positive impact on many of the developing trends. His opinion is respected, and his receipt of the Sam Emison award is tangible confirmation of what he has done.”
Attorney Alicia Hernandez, director of the Dallas Volunteer Attorney Program and the Dallas Bar Association director of community services, sees the difference Vanden Eykel has made in both the Plano and Dallas communities.
“Ike and his firm have been tremendously supportive of legal aid to the poor for many years,” Hernandez said. “They have donated over $242,000 to the Dallas Volunteer Attorney Program since 1994. These funds make it possible for us to recruit and train more attorneys to take cases for low-income clients.”
Hernandez holds high appreciation and respect for Vanden Eykel because he goes above and beyond his call of duty to give back as a community member.
“Ike, his partners, and his associates do not stop there – they also volunteer their time and talents to take our clients’ family law cases,” Hernandez said.
She believes they are some of the most respected family lawyers in the community.
“To be able to offer low-income clients not only an attorney but real experts in their field is a wonderful gift,” Hernandez said. “Ike’s leadership has helped DVAP grow into the program it is today – a program that is recognized nationally and statewide as an example for other legal aid organizations to follow. We couldn’t have gotten here without him.”
Larry Miller, president of North Dallas Bank of Texas, first met Vanden Eykel in 2000 through a professional connection at the bank.
“Given his reputation as an industry expert, a published author and as one of our nation’s most highly regarded and respected family law professionals, my expectations for our first meeting included a feeling that he might be too busy, tense, somewhat distracted and aloof. I couldn’t have been more wrong,” Miller said. “During that very first meeting and all of our times together since, Ike has made me feel as if I am the most important person on the planet at that particular time. I believe he is able to do this because at that moment, in his eyes, I am.”
Miller said one thing he noticed about Vanden Eykel right away is his ability to make someone feel as if they truly matter.
“Whenever you are around Ike, his focus is on you, your needs and how he might serve you or assist you in filling your need. In my experience and observation, Ike treats everyone in this manner,” Miller said. “I know this because I know his firm and his associates, his partners and his employees. And I know how he treats them – how he cares, how he listens, how he coaches and encourages and cheers people on. And I know how they feel about Ike.”
Miller believes Vanden Eykel to be trusted, admired and respected by all.
“If you judge him to be successful, you must first recognize him as a servant,” Miller said. “Ralph Waldo Emerson once said that ‘The purpose of life is not to be happy. It is to be useful, to be honorable, to be compassionate, to have it make some difference that you have lived and lived well.’ I’m certain Emerson would have loved Ike Vanden Eykel – Ike definitely has made a difference.”
Vanden Eykel reaches out in areas where he can to give back to the community, but he does not do it for a reward.
“I was totally surprised at being named the recipient of the Sam Emison Award in August,” Vanden Eykel said. “This is the highest award in our field in Texas, and it was extremely humbling to be given the award.”
He loves what he does because of the overall outcome that he fights for each day: to help people.
“Family law touches people and families directly,” Vanden Eykel said. “We are dealing on a daily basis with family tragedies, and we are able to render a service that our clients need desperately. We are able to make a big difference in lives.”
Vanden Eykel thinks that family law is so rewarding because he deals directly with clients and his work comes at one of the most stressful times in his clients’ lives.
“We can have a very significant impact on the direction they will be going once our work is completed, and we can see firsthand the effect of our efforts. It is very gratifying,” Vanden Eykel said. “Working directly with so many people in family law has given me a strong conviction that every citizen is entitled to access to our legal system. It is regrettable that for many people that access is a myth unless our profession is willing to make it happen with our volunteer efforts.”
Vanden Eykel said that it is difficult to imagine how desperate one would feel if they had a legal problem or needed protection from the court system but had no way to afford the process.
“If you cannot protect your family with our court system, then there is a very large risk that a person can become detached from our system, and more problems will begin to arise,” Vanden Eykel said. “If I were able to improve one aspect of family law, it would be to instill in more attorneys that we have a duty to aid our community and its members. That extends to our time, our talent and our resources.”
He graduated law school intending to be a trial attorney, but that wasn’t his destiny.
“I started doing some trial work family law very early in my career and was fortunate to have some early successes, and I found it very rewarding,” Venden Eykel said. “Family law grew to be a larger percentage of my practice each year, and I finally started doing it 100 percent of my time in about 1985.”
Vanden Eykel thinks the bad image many people have of lawyers is self-inflicted by a small minority of the members of his profession.
“I believe it comes from people seeing lawyers as having advantages and opportunities but experiencing individuals who take and do not give back,” Vanden Eykel said. “Our profession can and should help the less fortunate among us in our communities. It is a privilege to practice law, and with that privilege comes responsibilities; one is to take care of the people who cannot afford to have legal representation. If we attend to our responsibilities, the image of our profession will take care of itself.”
While the law industry is hopefully improving and aiming for ideals such as Vanden Eykel’s, he hopes that more people will begin to trust attorneys, though he advises them to be careful in their choosing.
“I would tell people to make sure they are comfortable with the attorney they choose before they go forward in any legal matter,” Vanden Eykel said. “Pick one who is right for you and who will be there when you have problems. Take the time to do your homework, and interview the person before you make the hiring decision.”
Vanden Eykel has always had two main goals in his career: to be known as an honorable attorney and to be considered one of the best at what he does.
“I hope to have a lasting impact on our practice of law, and I want my firm to continue successfully long after I am gone,” Vanden Eykel said. “It has been a great privilege to practice law in Texas, and I look forward to continuing for many years. I value the experience I have gained and hope to continue working towards my goals in the future.”
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