For the Zed Law founder, law was "always a means, not the end"
For Ryan Zahrai, becoming a lawyer was almost accidental. He had wanted to go into medicine, but love came into his life and Zahrai wound up pursuing legal studies like his sister.
In the first part of this interview, the founder of Sydney-based Zed Law discusses departing from the traditional law firm path, and why bringing his first child home from the hospital changed his life.
What made you choose a career in law?
I got into law almost accidentally. I was keen on medicine – life happened, got married, and didn’t want to press on for another 5+ years post-grad, newly married. My sister was studying law, I liked the sound of it, so I thought why the hell not.
I didn’t grow up idolising the law or dreaming of the courtroom. For me, law from the outset was always a means, not the end. I came into this profession with a deep interest in how businesses work, how deals get done, and how people make decisions under pressure. Law, when done right, sits at the intersection of human behaviour, commercial logic, and risk management. That’s what pulled me in.
What’s your favourite part of the job?
What I love most today isn’t the law itself, but how it empowers business owners, founders, and executives to move forward with clarity and conviction. I get to be a commercial partner, not just a legal technician. That means cutting through ambiguity, simplifying risk, and helping clients make informed calls; not just telling them what the law says, but what it means for them.
What in your opinion has been the most memorable event of your career to date?
Leaving the traditional law firm path to build Zed Law from the ground up was, and still is, the most significant moment of my career. There’s nothing particularly glamorous about starting your own firm - it’s messy, uncertain, and brutally honest. But it gave me a chance to rebuild the lawyer-client relationship around what actually matters: trust, commerciality, and clarity.
There’s a strange liberation in walking away from the traditional structures that is the hierarchy in-house, the obsession with billables at firms, the endless internal politics, and creating something that reflects how clients actually want to be served. I remember sitting in my small home office on day one of going all in, with a handful of clients, no steady income, and three young kids at home. It was pretty nerve-wracking. But it also forced a level of focus and resilience I never found in a large firm environment.
That moment of stepping off the ledge was more formative than any case, transaction, or title I’ve held.
What has been your proudest accomplishment in the last year or so?
The proudest achievement in the past 12 months has been building Zed into a lean, globally networked firm that doesn’t compromise on quality, humanity, or flexibility. We’ve managed to service scale-ups, family offices, mid-market and even ASX listed clients while staying agile and remote-first; without falling into the trap of over-engineering or chasing prestige for prestige’s sake.
If you could relive one day in your life, which day would it be and why?
It would be the day I bought my first child home from the hospital. That day wasn’t just joyful. It was clarifying. In the blur of building an early business while working as a junior lawyer, managing clients, and learning about growth, that moment reminded me why I was doing any of it in the first place.
It reset my compass. Family isn’t the thing I fit around work - it’s the reason I work the way I do. That day reminded me that success is not just about scale or visibility. It’s about creating space to live a life you don’t need to escape from, and building something with demonstrable grit, ambition and perseverance that your family can feel galvanised by, and hopefully something that my three kids can learn from.
