As a middle child, Laura A. Colca spent a fair share of time keeping the peace between her older sister and younger brother. It was a role she took to naturally: The family diplomat, brokering treaties between siblings with competing interests.

At the time, perhaps, she was simply working to ensure harmony in the Amherst home outside Buffalo where she was raised. Yet as fate would have it, unbeknownst to her, Laura was developing a critical skill that would come to define her success later in life as an attorney whose practice focuses largely on corporate transactional work — the art of negotiation.

“It’s something I learned from when I was young,” said Laura, a partner in Goldberg Segalla’s Construction, and Commercial Litigation and Arbitration practice groups. “I spent a lot of time negotiating between my siblings. My older sister, who has since passed away, was very strong willed and stubborn. My brother, not so much. I was kind of in the middle, trying to keep the peace and making sure things went smoothly. So, I think that’s where I learned.”

From a childhood spent helping her siblings settle their differences and mitigate the risk of getting in trouble with their parents, came a career of helping clients and their businesses mitigate risk and avoid the often combative and costly trouble of litigation.

“When I first started practicing, I did litigation,” said Laura. “I did it for seven years, and as litigation goes, it was very adversarial. I thought: This is just not me. It’s not my personality. I try to help people solve problems. I like to get along with people. I just don’t like fighting. It’s not my nature. So, I was able to transition into this corporate transactional work, which really is centered around helping people achieve a common goal. I realized that’s really what I like to do.”

Laura’s practice is diverse. She serves a wide range of clients spanning the corporate world from manufacturing, technology, retail and construction, to start-ups, nonprofits, and small and family-owned businesses. And central to her work is helping clients avoid pitfalls, which she accomplishes in large part through the art of negotiation.

“You always want to make sure that parties are protected as far as things like scope of work and indemnification language, to prevent a litigation or some kind of dispute once the project starts,” Laura said. “So, I think that negotiating the deal, first off, is really important, and making sure that it’s really well-documented and negotiated.”

Laura also draws from her experience as a litigator.

“Because most litigation revolves around some kind of contract, some kind of agreement or something was breached. My litigation experience really helps me focus in on what issues should be addressed when a deal is developing, or when a transaction is occurring, to help avoid potential claims later,” said Laura. “It’s not always possible. People can sue for any reason. But my litigation experience definitely helps to mitigate things as a transactional attorney.”

Laura joined Goldberg Segalla in 2016, drawn to the firm by its reputation for being inclusive and team oriented.

“Goldberg Segalla cares for their employees.” she said. “I had colleagues I knew through just being in the community who worked here, and they said this is a great place to work. Additionally, when I started, the corporate business group was just starting, so it was a great opportunity to get in on the ground floor and help develop things.”

What especially sets Goldberg Segalla apart from other firms, she said, is its collegial environment. Coupled with the strength of a deep and expansive attorney roster, Laura said she is regularly able to find solutions to her clients’ concerns “sufficiently and expeditiously” by reaching out and tapping into the vast and wide-ranging expertise of her colleagues.

Thirty years into her career now, Laura — the mother of six children — remains driven in her work by her family.

“I have three boys and three girls. So, I think it’s important for my girls to see that women can work and have a career and have a family, and that women are strong and can be independent,” she said. “And I think it’s important for my boys also to see that women are strong and independent and should be respected for what they do. So, my children definitely keep me going.”

Laura is also motivated by a constant desire to help people.

“That’s really why I went into this” career, she said. “Helping people be happy at the end of the day and helping them to get their problems solved — that really is what makes me happy.”

Among those Laura is committed to helping are women and minority business owners.

“I think that women-owned businesses and minority-owned businesses have, historically, not been given the opportunities that big companies have had. So, I find it really rewarding to work with them,” Laura said. “It’s really very uplifting. It’s super important to me. There’s just so much inequality in the world. I think that lawyers should do more to help in that regard.”

Looking back to when she started her career in 1993, Laura said technology has dramatically changed the legal profession. The information age has brought increased immediacy to the work, and email and cellphones have essentially placed attorneys on call 24/7.

“Unless you decide to put your phone down and close your computer, there’s always work to be done” Laura said. “It’s a fact of life now. I think it’s not going to change.”

Yet, while technology has changed the business of law, the purpose of the profession, Laura said, remains the same.

“It’s about relationships, it’s about helping people, and it’s about doing the right thing,” she said. “People want to know that you are responsive to them and that you care. People want to be heard. And people want you to be honest. You build trust by being consistent, being responsive and being honest. All three are super important.

With her initials growing up being L.A.W. perhaps her path should have been obvious, but today, she’s just grateful to have this opportunity to help others.

“This may sound silly,” said Laura, “but I think I’m really lucky to be a lawyer.”