outstanding legal professionals

From left to right: Michelle Friends of Fairfield & Woods, Kendra Smith of Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck, Meranda Vieyra-Blass of Reilly Pozner, Heather Vignola of Fisher & Phillips and Juleen McGrane of Benson Kerrane
Storz & Nelson. Not pictured: Amanda Murphy of Caplan and Earnest. | LAW WEEK PHOTOS ALI BIBBO Page 10...
www.law week online.com
LEGAL PROFESSIONALS
80209 | 303–292–1212 | OUTSTANDING
PO BOX 9404, Denver, colorado
Vol. 12 | No. 30 | $6 | July 28, 2014
PO BOX 9404, Denver, Colorado 80209 | 303–292–1212 | www.law week online.com
Vol. 12 | No. 30 | $6 | July 28, 2014
OUTSTANDING LEGAL PROFESSIONALS
Whether they’re helping prepare a team for trial, organizing a managing partner’s calendar, facilitating a firmwide move or working to help land new
clients, legal professionals tend to make attorneys’ lives run more smoothly. Each year, Law Week solicits nominations for the top legal professionals
in Colorado’s law firms, and this year, we received more nominations than ever before. Among this year’s honorees are an office manager, a marketing director, a recruiting and marketing coordinator and a paralegal. Each of these women manages to handle just about anything their firms ask
them to do, and they all do it in style. To nominate your top legal professional or fill out any of our other surveys, visit lawweekonline.com.
In her 15 years working in the legal
profession, Meranda Vieyra-Blass has
never said “no” when asked to take on a new
project. It’s part of the reason she’s become
an integral part to one of the area’s leading
litigation firms: Reilly Pozner.
Vieyra-Blass, a Denver-native who is the
marketing and recruiting coordinator for
her firm, began working for law firms when
she was 18 years old and a freshman in college at Metro State University.
As a student who was paying her own
way through school, she wanted to explore
a potential career in criminal justice, and
working at a law firm seemed like a good
introduction into the field.
“In those years, it was a much different
system,” she said. “The firm I worked for
basically asked, ‘Can you type and can you
write?’”
In those first years, Vieyra-Blass’ work
was largely dictation and running filings
to the courthouse or picking up discovery
from the district attorney’s office.
“It was really good training to work for
sole practitioners because I was exposed to
everything,” she said.
Vieyra-Blass learned about the innerworkings of law firms including lessons
about the law, business development, marketing, billing and customer service with
clients.
It served her well when she moved on
to work for an insurance defense firm for
a couple of years, where she continued to
build on both her legal assistant skills and
her back office skills.
Nine years ago, a paralegal friend who
was working at Reilly Pozner started telling her how exciting and fun it was to work
at this growing litigation boutique, Reilly
Pozner.
Vieyra-Blass landed an interview and
knew instantly that it was a place she wanted
to be for the long haul.
“It’s why I’ve stayed,” she said. “It really
is different than other firms. When you get
to work with friendly people who are at the
top of their games, it makes coming to work
so rewarding.”
Since initially starting as a legal assistant
who supported the firm’s litigation practice
group, Vierya-Blass has worked to become
Meranda Vieyra-Blass
the firm’s go-to resource for marketing and
recruiting.
On any given day her work could include coordination of a training event for
the firm’s attorneys, working to organize one
or more of the dozens of in-house events the
firm hosts each year, working on the firm’s
website, submitting nominations to attorney
ranking lists, offering litigation support and
handling the integration or recruitment of
any one of the handful of semester or summer clerks that the firm regularly employs.
“I do a little bit of everything,” she said.
“Each day is different, which is part of the
reason I love my job.”
Vieyra-Blass also helps coordinate the
firm’s diversity and inclusiveness programs,
an area that she is particularly passionate
about. She finished earning a bachelor’s degree in Chicano/a Studies over the course of
the last few years with a tremendous amount
of support from the firm, she said.
She has been single-handedly responsible for the coordination of the Reilly
Pozner 1L Diversity Reception, which
brings together 200-250 law students, law
school deans, legal professionals, judges and
government officials to welcome incoming
diverse first year students to Colorado law.
The event, held at the end of August, is
in its eighth year, and it has grown steadily
since it was launched, she said.
“Meranda is also responsible for smaller
successes like leading the firm in making a
donation of clothing and personal hygiene
items to the Colorado Coalition for the
Homeless during the holiday season,” said
one of the nominations on her behalf.
She is working this summer with the
Arrupe Jesuit High School Corporate Work
Study program to train ethnically diverse
students to work in businesses, including law firms, to offset the amount of their
school tuition.
Outside the office, Vieyra-Blass recently
trained for and rode in the BikeMS, a bike
race organized to support the Multiple Sclerosis society.
It was an epic ride, she said, as it was the
first time she’s been able to ride the course
since she was diagnosed a few years ago.
Riding with her were members of a team
created in her honor including attorneys,
former coworkers and her husband, Derek,
who is an attorney with Messner & Reeves.
Back at home, Vieyra-Blass enjoys completing construction projects on the couple’s
80-year old home as well as playing with the
couple’s daughter, Itzel, who is 2 years old.
Her successes are all shared with those
around her.
“I don’t think we do anything alone,”
she said. “I work with phenomenal people.
I have a super supportive family and I’m just
so lucky,” she said. •
—Meg Satrom, Esq., [email protected]