Lauren A. Shurman

Lauren also serves as a trusted employment adviser, counseling employers on compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act, the Family and Medical Leave Act, the Fair Labor Standards Act, the WARN Act, and other federal and state employment laws, as well as on executive and employee separations, restrictive covenants, workforce restructurings, and employment policies and agreements. For emerging companies in particular, she helps management teams address employment risks as their business operations become increasingly complex.

A significant part of Lauren’s practice sits at the intersection of employment law and corporate transactions. She serves as an employment specialist on mergers and acquisitions, divestitures, venture capital financings, and other strategic transactions, identifying employment-related risks in diligence and helping clients address issues arising from the transaction. She also advises on post-closing integration, including employee onboarding and offboarding. This combination of litigation, counseling, and transactional experience allows Lauren to help clients anticipate how decisions made today may affect the next financing, acquisition, or stage of growth.

Lauren has been recognized by Chambers USA for Litigation: General Commercial and was named to Utah Business’s Legal Elite and 2026 Women to Watch. She currently chairs the Utah Supreme Court’s Professionalism and Civility Counseling Board and serves on the Utah Business and Chancery Court’s rules committee. She is a past president of both Women Lawyers of Utah and the Salt Lake County Bar Association and a former co-chair of the Model Utah Jury Instructions (Civil) Committee. Her pro bono work includes partnering with the Rocky Mountain Innocence Center on wrongful conviction matters. The firm recognized Lauren as the 2026 Pro Bono Partner of the Year for her work in helping to vacate Adrian Gordon’s wrongful murder conviction.

• advising Utah-based private equity fund on employment aspects of the sale of a majority stake in Mo’Bettahs restaurant franchise.
• advising JOST Werke SE on the acquisition of hydraulics supplier, the Hyva Group.
• representing Profire Energy, Inc. on employment aspects of its sale through a two-step merger to CECO Environmental Corp.
• defeating an action by a staffing and recruiting company agency seeking to enjoin an employee from working for a competitor based on a non-compete agreement with her former employer.
• defending an information technology company against claims for breach of non-compete provisions, breach of non-solicitation provisions, breaches of confidentiality, and tortious interference in connection with the sale of the company.
• representing a manufacturer against pregnancy discrimination, FMLA interference, and disability discrimination claims asserted by a former employee.

For her pro bono work, Lauren has worked with the Rocky Mountain Innocence Center on post-conviction remedies act claims, seeking to overturn wrongful convictions. Recently, they achieved a significant victory in vacating the wrongful conviction of Adrian Gordon for a homicide that occurred in 2001.

*Includes matters handled prior to joining Mayer Brown

• Member, Utah Center for Legal Inclusion, Advancement Committee, 2018– 2020
• Member, Utah State Bar (Litigation, Labor & Employment, Appellate, and Education Sections)
• Trustee, Wasatch Waldorf Charter School, 2016–2020, (Chair, 2018–2019) Member, YWCA of Utah, Governance Committee, 2013–2016
• Trustee, National Association of Women Business Owners, Salt Lake Chapter, 2015–2016
• Trustee, Sugar House Park Authority Board, 2010–2014 (Vice President, 2012–2014)
• Director, YWCA of Salt Lake City, 2010–2013
• Volunteer, Utah Legal Services, 2002–2003