Ms. Charissa Potts

CHARISSA is the founder of a woman-owned and operated law firm that focuses primarily on consumer bankruptcy and litigation. The firm utilizes technology, data analytics and highly streamlined business processes to provide high-quality and cost-effective legal representation. She formed her consumer bankruptcy-focused firm in 2014. From its start at her dining room table, the firm has consistently grown over its five-year life into a small but highly profitable enterprise with multiple locations and additional practice areas. When she is not managing the firm’s growth and development, she enjoys taking on the complex issues arising in the firm’s consumer bankruptcy practice. As an employer, she is proud of the firm’s progressive workplace policies, including its parental leave and “infant-at-work” policy, which allows employees to bring their infants to work until they are six months old.

Charissa has served on the Sixth Circuit Merit Selection Panel, and she serves on the planning committee for ABI’s Shapero Cup Regional Moot Court Competition and as Bankruptcy Committee co-chair for her local chapter of the Federal Bar Association. She has published articles in the ABI Journal and spoke in 2019 at the Michigan Judges Conference, leading two seminars on the interplay of federal bankruptcy law and state court proceedings. She has also served on her local chapter of the International Women’s Insolvency & Restructuring Confederation. In addition, she recently passed the American Board of Certification’s consumer bankruptcy law exam and is awaiting board certification.

Charissa’s parents immigrated to the U.S. the year she was born, and life was a near-constant financial struggle. Her father passed away from a long illness when she was 12 years old, and her mother worked multiple jobs to make ends meet and was always exhausted; neither of her parents went to college. This history has informed her practice, enabling her to often empathize with her clients’ struggles, and today she serves on the board of and as a volunteer attorney for Access to Bankruptcy Court, a nonprofit that provides pro bono legal services to indigent bankruptcy filers.