K. Nichole Nesbitt

Goodell DeVries

K. Nichole “Nikki” Nesbitt serves as managing partner of Goodell, DeVries, Leech & Dann, where her practice concentrates on litigation in the healthcare field. She focuses primarily on the defense of medical malpractice cases while also handling employment matters and civil rights disputes brought by patients, guests and other claimants.

Nesbitt represents clients before tribunals ranging from administrative agencies such as human relations offices and offices of administrative hearings to state and federal trial-level courts and appellate courts. Beyond the healthcare context, she handles employment matters for employers in this region and beyond. Her background as a litigator informs the counsel she provides to healthcare and corporate clients, advising them on preventing claims and crafting guidelines, policies and agreements in addition to defending matters that have reached litigation or administrative review.

Her path to the managing partner role spans the entirety of her 25 years at the bar, all of which have been spent at Goodell DeVries. She progressed through the ranks from summer associate to her current leadership position.

Earning an undergraduate degree in criminal justice, she initially was interested in pursuing law enforcement. Law school shifted her perspective, and her first summer associate year at Goodell DeVries drew her to litigation within the healthcare context, where she found combining science with advocacy fascinating.

She draws inspiration from her mentors Don DeVries and Linda Woolf, both of whom held the managing partner position before her.

Nesbitt has also held leadership positions in the Maryland Defense Counsel, the Defense Research Institute, the Trial Network, and Breakthrough T1D, an organization dedicated to finding a cure for Type One Diabetes.

Although their leadership styles differed, each was effective at encouraging collaboration and teamwork among lawyers working in wholly different practice areas. She watched them balance their own litigation practices with their administrative work with great care, and their encouragement to let her learn gradually meant that by the time Woolf stepped back from the position, Nesbitt felt equipped to handle even the trickiest of administrative problems. She still calls on them occasionally in retirement to ask questions.

This is an honoree profile from The Daily Record’s Managing Partners awards. Information for this profile was sourced from the honoree’s application for the award. The honoree profiles were written using an artificial intelligence program and supported by honoree nominations, applications and letters of recommendation. Each profile was reviewed, fact-checked and edited for accuracy by The Daily Record’s editorial staff.