Watch the YouTube version of this episode HERE

Are you a law firm owner who needs help measuring the success of your firm? In this podcast episode, Tyson delves into the creation and implementation of Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) for law firms. 

Establishing KPIs for law firms are important because they show how a firm is progressing and what needs to be done to further drive success. Setting up and maintaining KPIs can be difficult, but Tyson provides a few tips on how to customize KPIs and ensure they are working for the firm. It is important to ensure that KPIs are tailored to different roles. Staff within law firms have different tasks and roles and there will be different KPIs needed to measure them. For example, a KPI might be used to measure how many files a case manager reviews every week. But for a receptionist, a KPI could be an average call time or how many calls are being taken a day.

Tyson shares the importance of reviewing your KPIs and adjusting them as the firm grows.  KPIs also need to be adjusted with individual performance. Job tasks will change over time as people take on more responsibility or change the way they are doing their work. KPIs will need to change alongside this as they will reflect new ways of working. Make sure to communicate these KPIs to staff and let them know when and why they are being adjusted.

Take a listen!

Episode Highlights:

  • 2:05 Tips for customizing KPIs to align with the unique objectives
  • 4:41 Setting KPIs that are challenging and attainable for team members.
  • 6:27 Importance of reviewing and adjusting KPIs to align with evolving needs
  • 8:13 Tips for effectively communicating the purpose and importance of KPIs

Resources:

Transcripts: Tip for Establishing KPI's (Key Performance Indicators)

Tyson (00:01.494)
Hey, it's Dyson and this week I am back with another Saturday episode and I'm going to be talking about tips for establishing KPIs. Those are key performance indicators for those of you that don't know what KPIs mean. They're an extremely useful tool for measuring and driving success for your firm and for really any company. I was listening to a podcast the other day with Jeff Bezos and he was talking about KPIs.

the largest companies use them, the smallest companies should be using them. They're really, really important. Um, before I get to this episode though, just as a reminder, if you are interested in joining the guild, go to maxlawguild.com. It's a wonderful community of amazing attorneys where they share, you know, their, their just best advice, best tips, uh, collaboration. And it's just an, it's just amazing group of people.

We have quarterly events where like we're going to be in Arizona soon. We'll be in Scottsdale. We're in Miami last year. We'll be in Vegas coming up. There's just a lot of cool places, just a lot of great people. And so if you're interested, go to maxolgill.com would love to have you, but let's get into the show. And we're going to talk some more about KPIs. So we just went through and we had our leadership meeting last week where we were talking a little bit about.

Revising the KPIs and we went through all of them and created new scorecards for everyone not new scorecards, but we edited the scorecards that we had for everyone and I fear this would be a really good episode to talk about KPIs because it's something that you do have to give it some Thought and it's not the easiest thing in the world. It's a it's a really challenging thing But it's something that once you have it it's a tool that allows you to make sure everyone's rowing in the same direction and that everyone is

is rowing just as hard as everyone else. And that may be, it's something that's really, really challenging to get just right. And we by no means have it just right, but it's something that we're constantly working on and we're striving to make sure that we're getting better at it. But let me give you some of the tips for getting KPIs in place. So here we go.

Tyson (02:21.35)
Let's first though talk a little bit about just the importance of KPIs. They are…

Tyson (02:37.475)
I'm not gonna I'm not gonna do that, but let me let me redo that All right, so let's jump in a little bit more with damn it

All right, so let me jump in with some tips on getting your KPI set up. They're something that they're really going to help you align your team members, the actions that they're doing to the overall objectives of the firm. So number one, make sure that you tailor the KPIs to the individual roles. Each position in your firm. So it's not like you can just take a KPI and just slap it on everybody. It just doesn't work that way.

Each position in your firm, it's going to have its own set of unique KPIs because each role has its own unique purpose, right? A case manager role is going to be completely different than a receptionist role. You've got different objectives for those positions, so you got to make sure that the KPIs help reflect that. So for example, a case manager's KPIs might focus more on

Okay, how do we make sure that the cases are moving forward, we're getting the progress, but we're also having clients that are happy, that wanna refer us cases, okay? Compare that to, let's say, a receptionist, right? The receptionist's role is to make sure that, you know, they're the voice of the firm, that when people call, they're getting questions answered, or they're getting routed to the right place, and they're not missing phone calls. You, there's, they're completely different objectives. So,

One of the KPIs for our case managers is to the certain number of file reviews that they have to do every single week. And that's to make sure that the files are moving forward and as a part of the file review, they have to make sure that the client has been communicated with. And when they do the file review, they're supposed to update the client as well. There's a lot that goes with it. So that is one of the KPIs. You've got to do so many of those a week. When it comes to a receptionist, one of the KPIs is the average call time. Okay, you don't want the receptionist

Tyson (04:44.934)
on the phone for a really long time, she needs to get that call to the right person, the right person, and if you have them on the phone too long, that means that you're probably not getting them to the right people in a timely fashion, okay? So that's just a couple examples of the KPIs that we have. We have, you know, I'll get to this in a little bit, but you wanna kinda limit it to three. You don't wanna go any more than three. Some of ours have two, some of our people have one.

Many have three, but you don't want to do it. You don't want to have more than three. All right. The next tip is you're going to want to make sure you're balancing aspirational and achievable KPIs. And that's something that can be tough because you want people really hitting the ball out of the park, but you have to also make sure that it's reasonable. If you set KPIs are just.

never going to be achieved. People take them seriously and they'll get discouraged and they're not going to work for you. Okay, that's a big problem. So you got to make sure that you that they can actually attain these kpis because they're going to be rated on these Okay as a part of your job scorecards. This is how they're going to be evaluated on a regular basis And if your team consistently hits their targets without effort though You're going to raise the bar because if they're always hitting it, it's just too easy. You need to you need to push them a little bit more but

You're gonna be aiming for that continual growth that way you don't have that complacency and you know That's obviously the opposite of the those unattainable goals because if you do that, they're just gonna get discouraged and they're It's gonna really demoralize them. So you don't want them to disengage So invest that effort in finding the balance that you need and it's gonna take some time You're not gonna get it right the first time most likely It's gonna take some time for you to really figure out what that balance is

Third tip is consider perception and motivation. Understand how team members, they're gonna perceive their roles and their contributions to the firm. The KPIs, they should not only reflect their responsibilities but they should also resonate with each team member and that in each position, that way they can value the work that they're doing. Make sure that you're having some KPIs.

Tyson (07:08.342)
that really do get to the core values of the firm, the values of the individual, and that way you've got this alignment that boosts motivation and also job satisfaction. So take that into consideration as well. Tip number four, regular reviews and then adjustments. Okay, so KPIs are not this thing that you just set it and forget it and that they're always there. It's not like a core value, okay? Core value, those are gonna be set in stone, you're not gonna be changing those. Those are gonna be there forever.

KPIs are going to change. They're probably going to change, I wouldn't say regularly, but they are going to be things that are going to change. So regularly review them in the context of both the individual performance and then also the firm's evolving needs. I talked about Jeff Bezos, but Jeff Bezos talks about making sure that you're not, you don't have these KPIs that people are using for years and years and they…

there have been several people that have changed over time. And by the time that 10 years after that KPI is created, no one knows why it freaking exists, right? You don't want that to happen. So you're gonna, because sometimes the KPIs aren't necessary anymore. What was necessary 10 years ago is no longer necessary. Your firm is probably completely different. So make sure that you are constantly, I would say least yearly, looking at your firm needs and see if the KPIs.

fit those firm needs. That's a really, really important part of this. And then the last tip I want to get to is just clear communication and support. Whenever you are introducing these KPIs, you're going to want to make sure that you're communicating clearly why you're using KPIs, why they're important, how they contribute to the firm's success. Having this communication to the team, instead of just dumping them on them and saying, do these things.

it's gonna go a long way to get buy-in. And that's one of the things that's gonna be the most challenging part of this too, is getting that buy-in. And I can tell you, you're gonna have some people that are not gonna like it. I'm just gonna tell you, we went through the whole top grading changeover and many of the employees that don't like accountability, they really struggle with KPIs. So just keep that in mind. You're gonna get a lot of, well, I like the way things used to be. Too bad.

Tyson (09:28.822)
Okay, you're gonna have to get past that and they're gonna have to get past that. It's something that's gonna be necessary for your firm to grow to take you to that next level. And it's also gonna be very rewarding for you and for the employees because they're gonna see the progress that you and the firm are gonna make in overtime. All right, that's enough with KPIs for now. As a reminder, if you have something you want me to cover on the Saturday episode, shoot me a text. Just text me 314-501-9260. I would love to hear from you.

Until next week, remember that consistent action is the blueprint that turns your goals into reality. Take care.

Join the Guild!

In this episode of Maximum Lawyer, CEO Becca Eberhart shares a cost-saving tip for individuals and businesses: switch from monthly to annual subscriptions to potentially save 16% or more.

Many services offer discounts for annual payments and urges listeners to actively review and manage their subscriptions. Becca advises checking for unused services and negotiating better deals, cautioning against long-term contracts that may limit flexibility. Listen in for encouragement and ideas to be proactive and mindful in financial management for immediate savings and long-term fiscal health.

Episode Highlights:

  • 00:24 Opting for annual subscriptions instead of monthly ones
  • 03:54 The importance of actively reviewing and managing subscriptions
  • 05:14 Cautions against locking into long-term contracts

Resources:

Transcripts: Mindful Money Moves: 16% Savings Through Annual Plans

Speaker 1 (00:00:01) - Run your law firm the right way. The right way. This is the maximum Lawyer podcast. Maximum lawyer podcast. Your hosts, Jim Hacking and Tyson metrics. Let's partner up and maximize your firm. Welcome to the show.

Becca Eberhart (00:00:24) - Welcome to another episode of the Maximum Lawyer podcast. I am Becca Eberhardt, CEO at Maximum Lawyer in. Today's quick tip will help you save on your recurring expenses. With no shortage in subscription services, it's easy for us to lose count of the subscriptions that we accumulate. The convenience of auto payments often causes us to lose track of the cumulative impact on our finances. Without hyper attention to our accounts, it's effortless to overlook the gradual accumulation of these seemingly minor expenses. One effective strategy for saving money is opting for annual subscriptions instead of monthly ones. It's common for companies to offer the equivalent of two months free when we pay them on an annual basis. By making this simple switch, you could potentially save 16% on your recurring expenses. When signing up for new services, we're usually presented with two options one pay a certain amount per month, or option two save a certain percentage and pay upfront for the year.

Becca Eberhart (00:01:29) - When this happens, our brains see that small amount, let's say $100, or then we see the other amount $1,000 for the year. Our brains tell us the smaller amount feels better or safer, but in reality, at the end of the year, you'll have spent 200 more dollars for that decision for the exact same service. This is applicable to various services such as Dropbox, acuity, Your Appointment Scheduler, Canva podcast hosting, YouTube premium, your Amazon Prime membership, Disney+. Almost all services offer this discount except for Hulu, no ads, and I have a bone to pick with them. Sometimes an annual plan is offered even if a company doesn't advertise that they have them. For example, you did not hear this from me, but SiriusXM does not advertise that they have annual plans. But I loathe monthly expenses. So I chatted in and asked if they had any available. They do and there is a cost savings to them. So if it appears paying monthly for something you or your law firm uses is the only option, it doesn't hurt to ask.

Becca Eberhart (00:02:40) - If all you did was change your monthly subscriptions to annual plans, you would cut at least 16% of all of those costs combined. For example, Amazon Prime has one of the highest subscriber counts. They are 1499 per month, which is $179.88 per year, or the annual Prime membership is $139 per year, saving you $40.88, which is almost a 23% savings. Now that $40 savings isn't going to change much in your life or business, but I do think that small purchases combined add up quickly, amounting to good chunks of money that could be repurposed somewhere else. And I also think that this can help you condition the way you think about money. Many people don't even want to think about money. So this exercise of reviewing where your money is going and always committing to the annual package will save you and keep you on alert to ways that you can pay less for the things you do use. Now, many of you have a bookkeeper, an accountant, or a CFO managing your finances and you might not like to deal with finances.

Becca Eberhart (00:03:54) - But here's my only warning. It's important to recognize that their perspective may not be aligned entirely with your financial goals. Your vested interest in saving money might not be as significant to them. Therefore, I do urge you to take an active role in reviewing your expenses to ensure that you're not overpaying after the first time that you review your subscriptions. Create a calendar invite at a minimum of biannually, but quarterly is preferred to review your expenses and make sure you're still using what you're paying for, and confirm that you're getting the best deal on what you are using. By doing this by annually or quarterly, you can catch some of the things before they renew and cancel them before it's too late. Be sure to set your calendar event to recurring on a quarterly or biannual basis, so it automatically adds this event, and you'll avoid too much time passing between reviews. Your focus during each review should be canceling what you no longer need, and saving where you can switch your plan from monthly to annual. Now, while committing to annual plans is beneficial, I do caution against locking yourself into contracts or subscriptions of longer than a year, even if the company is offering great savings for the commitment.

Becca Eberhart (00:05:14) - The fast paced evolution of technology with new products launching every month, our own personal changing preferences and business growth, it may render certain services obsolete or irrelevant. Keeping flexibility in your subscriptions allows you to adapt to these changes without incurring unnecessary costs, and being locked in can hinder your ability to explore newer and more efficient options. We'll go much deeper into vendor contracts in a podcast of its own in the future. In summary, adding in this practice will not only contribute to immediate cost savings, but it will also create a proactive and mindful approach to how you manage your personal and business finances.

Speaker 1 (00:06:02) - Thanks for listening to the Maximum Lawyer podcast. Stay in contact with your hosts and to access more content. Go to Maximum lawyer.com. Have a great week and catch you next time.

Watch the YouTube version of this episode HERE

Are you a new law firm owner who is struggling with running your business? In this episode of the Maximum Lawyer Podcast, Jim and Tyson are joined by guest Jose de Wit, an immigration attorney who shares his journey of starting and running his own law firm as well as the challenges that exist.

Jose shared the challenges that exist with owning a law firm. One challenge is finding people who are the right fit. Sometimes, it takes a few hires to find that one person that matches well with the owner and the goals of the firm. Hiring for a law firm is also determined based on how the firm will operate. It is important to decide if a front facing or virtual setting is what you want and hire based on that.

Jose provides some tips for those who are hoping to run their own firm. Due diligence is an important aspect when becoming your own boss. There are some things that need to be ironed out at the start. Some of these things include setting up a bank account to receive payments and pay bills as well as seeking advice from other law firm owners in your circle. Platforms like LinkedIn are the perfect place to find other lawyers and make connections. Success in the law firm industry is all about networking and establishing good relationships!

Listen in to learn more from Jose!


Jim's Hack: 
Let’s push back on the idea that you need to get hiring perfect every time. Make note of what went right and didn't go right and change your strategy the next time around.


Jose Tip: 
Read the book by Benjamin Hardy, which is about a layered approach to reading physical books and audiobooks, which can help you get through your reading list.

Tyson's Tip: Try playing the game “A Moth Presents a Game of Storytelling”, which includes cards that are great conversational pieces.

Episode Highlights:

  • 1:56 Challenges in running a law firm
  • 6:57 The use of LinkedIn 
  • 10:26 The decision-making process for hiring

Connect with Jose:

Resources:

Transcripts: Navigating the Challenges of Law Firm with Jose de Wit

Jim Hacking (00:04.097)
Welcome back to the Maxim Warrior podcast. I'm Jim Hacking.

Tyson (00:07.887)
and I'm Tyson Mutrix. What's up, Jimmy?

Jim Hacking (00:11.395)
Tyson, my friend, we are going to be talking about immigration today, running an immigration law firm, and lots of things that I like to think about. So I'm excited.

Tyson (00:21.507)
You were doing the steepling thing as you were saying that. So I can tell you're excited. Yeah. And it's a guildy and it's someone that we like talking to. Jose DeWitt. Jose, how's it going? Welcome to the show.

Jose de Wit (00:35.714)
Thanks. Good morning. How are you?

Jim Hacking (00:38.563)
Great, we're great Jose. So tell everybody about you and your law school experience and how you came to own a law firm.

Jose de Wit (00:47.55)
It was a roundabout process. So I went to law school in the San Francisco Bay Area at Berkeley, and then I stuck around there for a couple of years. I started out at a big firm.

and then got into immigration by accident. I wound up in Florida for personal reasons. I thought it was going to be a short stay. So immigration, you can practice immigration in any state as long as you're licensed in any jurisdiction. So I thought I'd pick up a little bit of work while I was here. And one case turned into another, and then that turned into a book of business. And then I worked at a few firms as an associate. And…

a couple years ago decided to make a break for it and start my own firm.

Tyson (01:40.795)
So, is there anything that's surprised you from what you thought it was gonna be like compared to what it's actually like?

Jose de Wit (01:49.99)
everything. So yeah, in my, probably this is not unique for anybody who's done this, but I in my head this was I've been a perpetual associate. I'm used to grinding and pumping out the cases and I'm good at it and so it's going to be more of that except I'm going to make more money at it and maybe there's going to be some small percentage on the top of like miscellaneous admin work and occasional marketing and it you know it's been the inverse, right?

that was surprising to me. When I started the firm, I didn't have the benefit. I wasn't plugged into MaxLaw, for instance, or any of the other resources that I lean on now to understand what it's like to run a firm. So it was, I didn't know what I was getting myself into. And also I was surprised by how much I would like the…

running a firm aspect of it. I didn't see that coming. Everybody in my family is, they're all entrepreneurs. I was the black sheep so to speak in the sense that I was the one, the only bookworm, the only, the only, they always laughed at me because I was the one who wasn't practical minded and was just good at just sitting down and figuring out

cases and writing, but just not a people person, not a get things done person. And once I was in that seat, I was shocked at how much I liked it and that I actually wasn't half bad at it.

Jim Hacking (03:25.203)
Or those first six months, like Jose, how did you get clients? Was it just you? How did you sort of set things up?

Jose de Wit (03:33.894)
It was just me for maybe the first month or two. And then very quickly I hired one VA and one in-person paralegal, neither of whom worked out in the end. But it was…

Jose de Wit (03:55.454)
it was good to go through that experiment of hiring and figuring that out early on because at least I'd made a few mistakes and was ready to get into the hiring process with eyes wide open once we actually really didn't need people and were ready to grow a little bit more.

Jose de Wit (04:16.774)
So I was the only attorney, I still am the only attorney really. At first I was lucky in that a friend from law school, he's general counsel at a fairly large hospitality company and.

He I already had some cases lined up with them before I left my old job. So Um, I knew from the start that would be at least some um source of revenue. They were my only client at first and From there on um, it was it was slow going but that one client kept us afloat for a little bit. Um It I

The two partners I worked for a few jobs before I started the firm, they split right before I went on my own and I shared office space with one of them. So that was a really…

That was good at first. I had cheap rent from her and use of the copier and all those things that I wasn't ready to, all those costs I wasn't ready to absorb on my own yet. And she fed me some work, at least some contract work where she had overflow, so that was helpful also.

Tyson (05:32.251)
You know, there are things like that are really are, it is really something that helps out young lawyers that, I mean, I know I had the benefit of a lot of that whenever I first started out. And so like there are things like that where like just like use of a copier is just, it's such, it can be like such a really big thing. Are there like, what are some tips or some advice you might give to some young lawyers that are or older lawyers that are considering, you know, starting their own firm?

Jose de Wit (05:39.85)
Ahem.

Jose de Wit (06:00.962)
I was, you know, I probably wish I had done a little bit more due diligence before I did it. It was impulsive, but so I think it might have been a smoother ride if I'd figured out a few more things before I started because, you know, I was opening a bank account in a hurry because we didn't have a trust account and clients were ready to pay me and I just didn't have anywhere to put.

the money. So like very, very basic things like that, that I hadn't laid the groundwork for before I started, that it wouldn't have taken a whole lot of thought or effort to at least have in place. I think. So one thing that I started doing very quickly and that was

helpful was just ask for help, reach out, surround yourself with people who are doing this, have done this, and are willing to lend a hand and lend advice.

as a perpetual associate, most of my career I had been really cloistered. I was just in the office. I went to occasional, like AILA, the Immigration Lawyers Association, I'd go to occasional events and I knew a few people there and would say hi, but I didn't have a very strong network within the immigration sphere or outside of it. And so jumping in, realizing I was out of my depth.

and needing to figure it out quickly forced me to just build a network very fast. And so I think if you don't have one, start thinking about that right away, because it's been invaluable to see what others are doing, what mistakes others are making, how they figured things out has been huge.

Jim Hacking (07:49.663)
A lot of our members have consumer facing practices and I know you certainly do, but you also have part of your practice that is sort of more working with companies and corporate stuff and so a lot of the things that we talk about in MaxLaw might not necessarily apply and so sometimes people…

get frustrated with Tyson and I that we don't have more advice for people like that. So what tips do you have for people that sort of spend a lot of their energy working with corporate clients or, you know, repeat clients like that?

Jose de Wit (08:21.714)
So if a lot of what you guys talk about is video and social media and putting stuff out there and those types of channels and so I

dipped my toes into that and didn't have much traction. And then one thing I got out of the last mastermind I was in was, why don't you try LinkedIn? And I hadn't really given it much thought. And so it's, and that's been huge. Just in a few months, I've, you know, we've had a really good response. And so I guess, you know, a lot of what Max was about, it is applicable to…

corporate practice. It's just pick your platform, I guess. Know where the people you're trying to target are actually circulating and spend your efforts there. And then a lot more of my business development is still networking, networking. I think a lot of the kind of mass outreach type of marketing, we do it and we still have a lot of ways to go there, but it's a lot more about relationships.

Tyson (09:32.027)
All right, so I want to ask you a related question because Jim and I do get some pushback with the B2B people. We're different. I want your honest opinion. Do you feel like you all are different or do you think that many of the principles are the same? I'm super curious what you think.

Jose de Wit (09:54.122)
I'm still navigating that. So for example, intake. Intake is a puzzle that we haven't fully figured out yet. So with like the whole, Gary Falkowitz and the whole thing about not charging for the consults. And a lot of this is, it's not applicable for the types of relationships that we're building because a lot of our corporate clients, they don't.

they don't have a case they need help immediately with. It's more of they want help about how do we set up an immigration program at our firm? And that's something that we're gonna charge hourly for off the bat. And so the dynamics are different. So intake, for example, the mold you guys have set out doesn't fully fit us. So.

I'll report back once we do figure out something workable, but that. Other parts of it are, I think, a pretty close fit.

Jim Hacking (11:03.583)
I know that you are- Oh, go ahead.

Jose de Wit (11:03.882)
You know, like for example, I think that systems and money and all those things, they work the same at a consumer facing firm and at a corporate firm, right? But its intake is, I think, is very different.

Jose de Wit (11:23.794)
And to give you a concrete example, like, so we, I wave, we in theory charge for consultations, but I also wave.

Jim Hacking (11:24.099)
I know it.

Jose de Wit (11:33.006)
ton of them. But it really just depends on who's referring it. And I just kind of, at this point, have a you know it when you see it sort of feel for when this is going to be definitely the $250 I'm going to make out of this are nothing compared to what this relationship is going to be worth, even if they don't hire us, but just because I want to know this person, because they're going to not hire us, but they will refer us to others. And so figuring out how to translate

system that intake staff can follow is a nut I haven't cracked yet.

Jim Hacking (12:10.643)
You are on the precipice of hiring an associate and I'm wondering what, what was, what were the mental gymnastics you had to go through to finally make the decision to do that and, and what are you looking for as you go through this process?

Jose de Wit (12:25.026)
I think it in the back of my mind I've known I had to for a while now the two things that pushed us over the edge were a Good chunk of our revenue is seasonal and comes in at the end of the year so we wrapped up last year having money in the bank that Would let us absorb that salary even in the first few months that it'll take to get this associate situated so that confidence and then the other is

Okay, so we I opened the firm in early 2022. The first year went well, but it was just by the seat of my pants. And so I started 2023 with the idea that I don't want to grow or at least not grow much, but I want to just buckle down and actually

figure out systems and processes and get ourselves very organized before we are ready to push and grow some more. And 2023 went by without any of that happening because I was spending so much of my time working in the cases. And so just looking back at 2023 and evaluating why that goal didn't end up happening, I realized, okay, we're never going to…

be able to grow and get organized unless somebody else is really a good chunk of the casework, and I have time to work on the business.

Tyson (13:50.595)
Do you have an idea as to what you want the firm to actually look like? I mean, cause you're at the, you're at the sort of the bidding, beginning stages of hiring. So do you have like an idea in mind? Like, okay, I want, I want it to look like this. I want it to be in this number of locations. I want us to operate, you know, hybrid in person, virtual. I mean, do you, do you, have you thought about that? How you want it to look?

Jose de Wit (14:11.802)
Mm-hmm. So I want to grow just enough that there's some redundancy that I can take time off. And there's people who can take care of things. And if somebody's out, they have coverage. And it's not just one person in each seat. And if somebody's gone, everybody has to jump in and panic.

But about that much, I don't want our firm to get huge, really. So that's our kind of very fuzzy growth target. So maybe a couple of associates and maybe 50% to twice as much support stuff as we have now, and that's about it. We're at five full time to part time right now. So somewhere bigger than that, but not a ton bigger. And the…

I started out with the idea that we were going to be 100% virtual.

the immigration agencies have foiled us in that because they love getting these giant bricks of paper, you know, these substantial volumes. And so having a multifunction copier in my living room was really getting old. And it was my wife printing everything out. And then if we weren't home, then I couldn't have staff coming to my house to print out stuff, right? Or expect them to have a huge multifunction copier in their living room. So that has forced us to have a brick and mortar presence,

if it's a small one, right? For now, just to get the cases out and scan the stuff that comes in. But the vision when I started out was to be able to, I mean, we're in Miami. I've been in Miami for about six years now and I've lived here on and off my whole life. But.

Jose de Wit (16:04.102)
I'm a Spanish citizen as well, and also a Guatemalan citizen. And the idea was be completely virtual so that if we want to go back home to Guatemala and our son, who's two and a half, have him go to school down there for a couple of years and spend time with his grandma and his cousins, that we can do that. Or if we want to try our hand at living in Spain for a couple years, that we can do that. And business immigration facilitates that because there's not a huge in-person requirement.

USCIS are occasional, there's no court work. So that's where we want to eventually end up.

Jim Hacking (16:41.595)
Jose, Jose what stresses you out?

Jose de Wit (16:46.066)
everything. I'm a very tightly wound person. But I think one thing that I've struggled with from the start and I still do is I get excited about things. And so one of the things that prompted me to start the firm was that I…

I thought a lot of things were very cool to me and I wanted to try them in my practice, outside of my practice, and I wanted to have the freedom to do that. And so I have a tendency to jump in and try this and try that, and it's worked, and sometimes like our growth, right? Like we decided to get into traveling to Latin America to do speaking engagements and conferences, and suddenly we're putting together conferences on our own. And it was just kind of a, this would be fun sort of idea, and it's worked out. And now I'm…

advising a legal tech startup and that's building on a platform to build exceptional ability cases using AI and that's been a lot of fun and all that's well and good but it means that

our operations are kind of haphazard because I have a hard time systematizing. And that stresses, like that's of my own making, but it stresses me out to not have predictability as to who's handling what and how they're handling it and everything's just kind of as it comes right now. And if anybody who's spoken to me at length about

my practice and knows that this is just my struggle, right? That this is the thing that we struggle the most in my firm.

Tyson (18:30.056)
Have you considered maybe hiring someone to help you with that part of it since you struggle so much with it?

Jose de Wit (18:37.394)
I've considered it. It's something that I actually that the project of training myself to actually participate in building that out at the firm is it's a personal goal that I'm excited about and I want to try out before I say I failed and I want to hire somebody else at it.

just because I don't know, this has been a fun ride so far. Just building all these muscles I didn't know I had and this is one of them. Right? So you know it's like at some point…

When I was in high school, I tried skateboarding and I sucked at it, but all my friends did it and I had to try it and I had to fall on my ass a few times before I realized, okay, maybe this is not my sport. So, kind of, it's less fun than skateboarding, but this is, you know, something I wanna try before I delegate out.

Tyson (19:37.632)
I too tried to become a skateboarder and failed miserably at it. So I'm right there with you. I could see Jimmy on a skateboard.

Jose de Wit (19:41.698)
I'm going to go to bed.

I'm bad at most sports. It turns out I don't have depth perception. I didn't find that out until I was like 18, but it explained so much because you throw a ball of a set of keys at me and I'm just kind of flailing around. I figured it out when I was taking flying lessons and when I was gonna get my pilot's license, they gave us a test to test depth perception and it explained why I was really, I was good at…

taking off and navigating the plane but not so much as landing it because so fun fact.

Jim Hacking (20:23.863)
Ha ha. So.

Interesting. So how did you make the decision to join the guild and what were you looking for when you decided to do that?

Jose de Wit (20:37.134)
Um, well, so, um, like I said, it was, um…

Sorry, I clicked something here and lost the, lost my window and I can't see you guys. All right. Okay, so like I said, it was kind of drinking through a fire hose when I started out. And so I just started looking for resources wherever I could find them. And I can't remember if I came across the podcast first or the big group on Facebook, but I found one or the other and then,

Jim Hacking (20:51.684)
We can hear you.

Jose de Wit (21:17.05)
that was helpful and I just kind of lurked in the group and listened to the podcast and then found it valuable and jumped in. At the same time I was also joining a coaching program and I was also joining other groups and so I was just finding help wherever I needed it and this is one, so MaxLy is one of the things that just stuck, that clicked with me and I found helpful. And I just like, I like the people who participate

Tyson (21:47.891)
Yeah, I mean, like there's, that's my favorite part too. Like just, there's just like a lot of great people just, you know, they, they're so willing to share. They're like just, they're, they're sharers. It's, it's great. So very good. All right. Uh, Jose, we are getting close to time. So I do want to be respectful of your time. I'm going to wrap things up before I do. I want to remind everyone, if you want to join us in the guild, uh, with people like Jose who are fantastic, uh, go to maxlawguild.com. We'd love to have you there. Uh, just a lot of great people.

Jose de Wit (21:48.855)
ready

Tyson (22:17.219)
A lot of great business owners that are sharing all of their best tips and secrets, which is awesome. And if you want to, if you're not quite ready, join us in the big Facebook group, just search Maximum Lawyer and you'll be able to find us there. And if you've gotten something from this episode or from any of the other episodes, if you don't mind giving us a five star review, we would greatly appreciate it. Let's get to our tips and hacks of the week. Jimmy, what's your hack of the week?

Jose de Wit (22:47.042)
Thank you.

Jim Hacking (22:47.215)
Back in 2022, one of the greatest baseball players I'll ever see in my life retired, his name was Mr. Albert Pujols, el hombre. Albert Pujols had a very, very long career. He's going straight to the Hall of Fame when he's done. His batting average, 296. That means he got a hit less than three times out of 10. And I bring that up because I keep seeing people thinking that they have to get hiring 100% right every time.

And I really want to push back on this idea that you're going to get hiring right every time. And I think that the real lesson is each time you hire someone, if it works out, write down why it worked out. If it didn't work out, write down why it didn't work out. And then each time you go through the hiring process, do things a little bit differently. If you do it the exact same way every time, you're going to get the same result. But if you if you look at hiring,

way that you ideate with software and look at it as how do I keep getting better at this skill? How do I develop this muscle more? Instead of hiring becomes such a roadblock for so many of our members and such a scary, scary thing. It's not that it's not that hard. Just think of it as an experiment. Don't beat yourself up over bad hires. Just figure out how can I do better next time.

Tyson (24:09.563)
I like that. That's good. It's an experiment. Very good. Jose, you are next. By now you should know that you should have a tip or hack ready for us. What you got for us?

Jose de Wit (24:21.322)
Yeah, so I have a huge stack of books that I've been wanting to read and I can't get through them because the hours are long and then at home we have a toddler who demands attention. And this one's from Benjamin Hardy, the guy from what is it 10 how many X is easier than however many other X 10 X and two X, I think. Yeah, there you go. And it was he had this layered approach to audio books and then physical books where He it was on this podcast and it was like how I read some insane amount of books a year.

and it was first listen to the audio book and so as you're listening to it.

half of them he said like within the first 20 minutes I realized this isn't even worth my like background noise time and so it's out and I didn't waste time trying to read that book. Then others I listened through it and I just kind of absorbed at a surface level and then the ones that I find really potentially valuable I sit down and read and actually highlight and take notes and so forth because his point was if I try to read all of them then it's a lot slower and I'm taking notes on stuff that might not be all that valuable so it's kind of this like

process, right? That starts with the audio book and then going back to the… So I've tried it this month, and I already got through three books that had been on the waiting list for months and months and months. So it's working for me.

Tyson (25:41.027)
I like that a lot. I'm gonna steal that. Cause that's a, cause there are a lot of books where I like force myself to finish them. I'm like, oh gosh, this is like why, you know, just cause you do get the gist of it in the first third. So very good. All right, so here's my tip of the week. So I had mentioned a book on the potty that's before about storytelling, but I bought this game. It's called the Moth Presents a Game of Storytelling. So the writer of that book that I had mentioned before, he was like,

He'd spoken at the Moth quite a bit. I actually don't play the game, but it's, I like the cards inside of it. So it gives, it's like, they're, they're very thought provoking. It will, they're, they're really good conversation starters or they're really good questions you could ask on the podcast. There's, there's a lot of things you could do, but, or you can also practice your storytelling. Like for example, like, like on, I just picked a random card, like the, the one side of it says food, prepare a story about things you eat, Vittles, grub, cuisine, groceries, and it gives you some things that you could, that you use to talk about.

And then on the other side, it says, tell us about a time you bit off more than you could chew, a time you cooked up something special, a time when food soothes your soul. So it's just kind of a cool, they're just, it's, it's something to help get your, um, get your, get you thinking creatively. So, um, you can play the game. I've never played the game. I don't even know how to play the game. I like it just specifically for the ways that gets you thinking about, um, different things and also, um, gives you different questions you could ask people.

So I think it's pretty cool, good conversation starters. So if you want, if you're doing a bunch of networking and you want some conversation starters, it would actually be pretty helpful for you. But Jose, thank you so much. Really appreciate you sharing your story and coming on and being an amazing guild member. And we love seeing you grow and all the awesome things you're doing. So thank you so much for coming on.

Jose de Wit (27:25.822)
Yeah, this was a lot of fun. Thanks for having me on. Bye, take care.

Jim Hacking (27:28.291)
Thanks, buddy. See ya.

Tyson (27:29.223)
that. Thanks Jose. See you Jimbo.

Jim Hacking (27:31.735)
Bye buddy.

Watch the YouTube version of this episode HERE

Have you ever wondered what it takes to build a successful law practice? In this episode, Tyson takes a dive deep into the essentials of law firm growth and how to properly structure a firm for maximum efficiency. 

The way a firm is set up can really determine how well it will succeed. Tyson shares the successful method of structuring a law firm using the pod model. The pod model is a team of 3 people which is led by an attorney. They are supported by a case manager and a litigation assistant. This model ensures every attorney has 2 dedicated team members to help with their caseload. A benefit of this structure and why it works so well is the ability to cross train amongst the case manager and litigation assistant. That way staff are skilled in a few different things if there is a need to backfill.

Tyson provides a few tips for law firm owners to use to make sure the pod model works well. Communication is a huge key to not only the success of the pod structure but managing teams as a whole. Scheduling regular team meetings within and outside pods is great to touch base on what is happening with cases. Another tip is the use of a communication tool like Clic or Slack to quickly reach other staff as a way to ensure people stay connected.

Listen in to learn more!

Episode Highlights:

  • 1:11 The benefits of structuring law firms using the pod model
  • 2:10 The distinct responsibilities of roles within the pod structure
  • 3:11 The advantages of the pod team structure
  • 5:55 Tips for successful team management

Resources:

Transcripts: Staff Allocation for Case Management to Maximize Efficiency

Tyson (00:02.678)
Hey, it's Dyson. I'm back with another bite-sized episode that's gonna pack a punch. Yeah, I'm gonna change that.

Tyson (00:13.482)
Hey, it's Tyson. I'm back with another Saturday episode and this weekend we'll be talking about staff allocation for case management and how to put teams together that support your attorneys to maximize your firm's efficiency. Before I do that, I want to just talk a little bit about maximum or minimum time. If you've not yet gotten your hands on it, your time's running out. I'm just telling you you're I'm not going to tell you when but it's going to be very soon. We're going to

You pull in the plug on that. So we give it, it's something we give to all guild members, absolutely free. We're gonna give you stage one of it, absolutely free just for being a good listener. Just text us to, text stage one to 314-501-9260. That's stage one to 314-501-9260, and we will give that to you absolutely free. It's a roadmap that we've created that's gonna help you build the law firm.

of your dreams. All right. So this is interesting. So I'm going to talk about firm structure, but about an hour ago, I actually had a nice long hour-long video call with Ryan McKean, and we were discussing firm structures and a way to structure when it comes to compensation, a lot of different things. We talked about a lot of things over that hour. It was a really fantastic conversation. One of the things that we were talking about was…

the way to structure the firm. And he and I have both for a while been on the, I wouldn't say it's bandwagon, but on the approach, it's the correct approach of building pods and having pods run your cases. So I'm gonna talk a little bit about that and how we structure our pods. Because it's changed over time. We used to have much, the pods were much bigger and we were probably overstaffed, to be honest with you, when it comes to the pods.

We've moved our resources around, we've changed the way we've done things, and I'm going to go through that a little bit here. So let's get into it. All right, so the way we've really honed in our case management structure, we've done it to optimize our workflow. Each pod, so each attorney leads a team. We call them teams now, we used to call them pods, we now call them teams, but it's the same model. But each attorney leads a team that consists of both a case manager and litigation assistant.

Tyson (02:38.522)
And the setup, it ensures that every attorney has two dedicated team members that can help support their caseload. When it comes to the roles and responsibilities, we do differentiate those between the two. Obviously, their names are different, but as you might imagine, just by the names, litigation, assistance handle litigation tasks, case managers, they do venture into the litigation side as well. But the majority of theirs are, or of their roles are almost.

almost mostly focused on pre-litigation. But the case managers, really, their linchpin is client communication. They are there to make sure that the clients are getting the communication that they need. They handle a big part of the scheduling, not all of it, but they handle a big part of the scheduling, because we do, our receptionist takes on a big role of scheduling things, but they do case updates, most of the client communication.

and a lot of the things that keep the cases moving forward and they keep the momentum in the cases. Their role though is absolutely crucial in keeping clients updated and getting them the information that they need and then also getting information from clients. Litigation assistants on the other hand have very little client contact, if any at all sometimes. They take on the heavy lifting of drafting, dealing with service, doing legal research.

written discovery, it's invaluable in laying the groundwork for an effective case when it comes to the litigation side. So the case manager doesn't deal with all of that stuff unless they need to fill in, and that's one of the benefits of the pod structure is there is overlap. We do cross train on things so that people can fill in with each other. That's a big part of it. Another way of looking at this in a way is,

we've split up the traditional paralegal role into two roles, but by doing that, since the roles are so well-defined, that we're allowed to handle a larger caseload. So each team is able to handle more cases because people are working, their jobs are really, really focused, and that's a huge benefit of it. But let's talk about some of the other benefits of the structure. Because we've got it set up this way, a big part of it is cross-team support, and…

Tyson (05:06.41)
That means that a case manager for one team or litigation for one team, litigation assistant for one team, they can provide coverage for other teams. So if someone's gone on vacation, if they've lost a loved one, because we have, we have a very, very favorable bereavement policy at the firm where you lose a close loved one, you're off for 10 days. Okay. So there might be a situation without much notice, you know, people are going for 10 days.

and that's a long time, right? But because of this structure, you're able to have people fill in for each other, and that way the clients aren't just left without getting their questions answered, but the attorneys aren't left just trying to handle all the cases by themselves. It's a huge benefit. Another part of it is just the standardization of processes. Each team is structured to work the exact same way. That way you can move one case manager

over to another team without missing a step. That's a huge part of it, which we have had to do before. We've had to move people around because sometimes personalities, they don't work well with each other. And sometimes you have to move people around to make it fit. And that's one of the good parts about it is you've got each team, they're self-sufficient, they do their own stuff, but you can move people around to make it work better. Let me give you a few tips for making this work.

Clear communication is a big part of it. Having regular team meetings, so daily meetings, and if you need to have weekly meetings on top of that, you can do that as well, they're a little bit longer. But regular daily check-ins, super important. We also have click where people can communicate during office hours, it's another big part of it too. But the main thing is that daily huddles where the teams are meeting with each other to go over cases, big part of it. It allows us to make sure the cases are moving forward.

Utilize the technology I mentioned clicked before. Make sure that your case management software, it suits your team structure. So I'm not gonna, I mean, I've talked about, we use Filevine, but we also have Zoho. Just make sure whatever software you use, it can facilitate easy sharing of information and tracking the progress of your cases. Really, really important. Encourage collaboration. So you're gonna wanna foster an environment where the case managers and litigation assistants

Tyson (07:31.426)
They feel comfortable collaborating, and not just within their teams, but across the firm as well. You gotta make sure that people are sharing the knowledge and the experiences that they have. That way you can, this is gonna lead to a lot of innovative solutions, but you don't want a bunch of knowledge just stuck in one team. You wanna be able to spread that out. So you wanna make sure you collaborate. You encourage that collaboration. And then a couple other things. Make sure there is that continuous learning. So if you do have that team where

They hold a lot of knowledge and you're gonna have some lopsided teams sometimes where some have more experience than others. Make sure you have regular trainings that involve the case managers and the attorneys and the litigation assistants. That way everyone is up to date on latest processes, if there's any rules changes, all of that, they're all included. And then make sure you have a feedback loop where, you know, you establish a feedback loop where you're regularly asking for feedback from your teams.

on what's working, what's not working, what can be improved, and how to change case management, how to change case management systems, how to change workflows. Having that feedback loop is really gonna allow you to improve and then also propel you into the future. So structuring the way you handle cases is a big part of what we do. So I really want you to be thinking about how best to set up your team. I can tell you I'm…

I've tried it a few different ways. I've tried the departmental model. I've tried the pod model. I think the pod model is by far the best. So give it a try if it's something that you think you want to take on. As a reminder, if there is something you want me to cover on a Saturday show, just shoot me a text and I'll try to cover it. 314-501-9260. Keep those suggestions coming. They're always great and always welcome.

Until next week, remember that consistent action is the blueprint that turns your goals into reality. Take care, have a good week.

Join the Guild!

In this podcast episode, Becca Eberhart, CEO of Maximum Lawyer, challenges the mindset of waiting for the perfect time to start a law firm. She walks through debunking the myth of needing perfection, ample resources, or complete knowledge to begin. 

It’s time to take action with what you have and that “waiting” is a waste of precious time. It’s time to embrace "good enough" and start before feeling fully ready, with action being your key to turning dreams into reality. 

It’s time to choose progress over excuses and to commit to starting a business without delay. Listen in and be encouraged.

Episode Highlights:

  • 00:24 When you are waiting for the perfect time to start a business
  • 02:14 Successful businesses that started without the best equipment
  • 04:18 The regret of delaying, and the need to start before feeling ready

Resources:

Transcripts: Never Allow Waiting to Become a Habit

Speaker 1 (00:00:01) - Run your law firm the right way. The right way. This is the maximum Lawyer podcast. Lawyer podcast. Your hosts, Jim Hacking and Tyson Matrix. Let's partner up and maximize your firm. Welcome to the show.

Becca Eberhart (00:00:24) - Welcome to another episode of the Maximum Lawyer podcast. I'm Becca Eberhardt, CEO at Maximum Lawyer, and today we're talking mindset. And this quick message is for those of you who want to open your own firm but haven't yet. Today we're going to talk about the tendency to wait to get started. Do you have plans for the life you're going to live or law firm you're going to run someday? If you're telling yourself that there's going to come a perfect time to start your business, your perfect time will never come. Now is as good of time as any. Waiting is a habit we create. We often get hung up on the fear of uncertainty. But if you're someone who wants to open their own law firm, you must realize that those two things don't coexist certainty and entrepreneurship. So you're going to have to pick one.

Becca Eberhart (00:01:11) - Would you choose security at the expense of an unfulfilled life? Another common reason we wait is the desire for perfection. Brené Brown said, I'm a recovering perfectionist and an aspiring good enough list, and I think that's a really smart aspiration to have as someone who wants to run a business. Many of us struggle with the belief that if something's not perfect, it's not ready. Whether that's your business idea, website, your branding, your social media or anything else, you can change it all and you will change it all. It will never feel done because as soon as we get to the point where we've arrived, we discover new opportunities, come up with ways to make a bigger impact. And with all of that comes more growth, more change, and more work. You might also think you don't have the time, money, network support or the knowledge to start your business. You're going to have to choose between what's holding you back and what you want the most. Start where you are with what you have and do what you can.

Becca Eberhart (00:02:14) - That's how you'll gain traction. There are so many great businesses that started without thinking they needed the best. Dave Ramsey started in his living room. Facebook started in a dorm room, Google and Amazon started in garages. Spanx and Walt Disney started in apartments. What this all comes down to is if you want it, you'll find a way and if not, you'll find an excuse. Every single time this perception we have that we have to start our businesses with the best equipment, the best website, the best softwares and an admin team is just a lie. It's honestly just great marketing. So you have to be aware of what you're consuming. What are you seeing, reading and watching? The needs, even for startup businesses are actually very minimal. So the next time you get really excited and catch yourself thinking, I need this first, just take a step back and think, do you need it? Or would it be nice to have it? Being able to filter out these thoughts will serve you well.

Becca Eberhart (00:03:14) - As you get your business off the ground, you'll be able to clearly see if the business you're building is viable, profitable, and scalable without the added stress and pressure of excessive expenses in the beginning. Here's something a lot of people fall into and be honest with yourself. You'd rather learn about how to take action or read what you need to know before you take action, or watch someone else take action than to just take action. Soaking in knowledge and consuming information is easier, more fun, and makes you feel smart. But that's not what's going to make your dreams a reality. You really do have to start before you're ready, and that's a skill worth learning. Here's another thing I really want you to think about is this week typical for you? Chances are it isn't. You have a one off meeting, maybe a new show just came out on Netflix, or you had to skip a workout for some reason. Now think back to your last typical week. A week where 100% of everything worked out exactly as you planned.

Becca Eberhart (00:04:18) - Is that week further back than you thought? Does it even exist at all yet? I bet you live as if, though this imaginary week were a reality. The point is, we often tell ourselves this story that we're waiting for the right time or the perfect conditions that will never come. Finally, waiting is a waste of time. A truly non-renewable resource. You can easily convince yourself that tomorrow is the day and look back and a year has passed, or even more. And once you do get started, you'll wish you had just made the commitment a year ago. You'll think how far ahead you could be, how much you could have learned, how much you would have grown, the people you could have met, and the opportunities that would have come your way. You really do have to start before you're ready. So whatever excuse you're using to put off following your dreams and opening your business, it comes down to a decision. Your decision to find a way or find an excuse. I know this puts the ball back in your court and oftentimes people don't like that.

Becca Eberhart (00:05:17) - So while the answer is simple, it's not easy. So you choose choose not to wait. Make this day one, not one day.

Speaker 1 (00:05:28) - Thanks for listening to the Maximum Lawyer podcast podcast. Stay in contact with your hosts and to access more content. Go to Maximum lawyer.com. Have a great week and catch you next time.

Watch the YouTube version of this episode HERE

Are you a law firm owner who needs help running a firm? In this episode of the Maximum Lawyer Podcast, Jim and Tyson speak with Mark Lopez, a seasoned criminal defense and personal injury attorney. They discuss the do’s and don’ts when it comes to running a law firm

Running a law firm is not a simple task. It involves a lot of moving parts and strategic planning. Part of this includes hiring the rights attorneys for a firm. Mark provides a few examples of what he considered when hiring for his firm. One thing is to not hire people that are similar to yourself because they will have the same downfalls. You want attorneys who have different ways of working and bring different ideas to the table, so there is a good balance. 

Mark shares some things he does as a law firm owner that helps with keeping things running smoothly. One hack is using the Otter App in the morning to take note of marketing ideas and ways to improve client satisfaction. This is then turned into actionable items that he can bring to the team. Maintaining communication with former clients is a good way to ensure consistent business. Whether it is sending birthday cards or newsletters, this is a good way to get referrals and become the law firm everyone goes to. Having a successful law firm is all about ensuring the client is happy.

Take a listen to learn more about Mark Lopez.

Jim’s Hack: Read the book “10 X is Easier Than 2 X” by Dan Sullivan and Ben Hardy, which talks about how people move from one level of success to another.

Mark’s Tip: Read the book “Influenced” by Robert Cialdini, which outlines the best ways to market for a law firm.

Tyson’s Tip: Sort your inbox for emails in which you have a clean inbox on one side and emails that need reviewing on the other side.

Episode Highlights:

  • 5:26 Advice on managing a law firm
  • 14:12 Financial implications of law firms
  • 18:24 The benefits of working on weekends in a quiet environment

Resources:

Transcripts: Advice for Hiring Attorney’s: Shoulds and Shouldn'ts with Marc Lopez

Speaker 1 (00:00:01) - Run your law firm the right way. The right way. This is the maximum Lawyer podcast. Lawyer podcast. Your hosts, Jim Hacking and Tyson Matrix. Let's partner up and maximize your firm. Welcome to the show.

Jim Hacking (00:00:24) - Welcome back to the Maximum Lawyer podcast. I'm Jim Hacking.

Tyson Mutrux (00:00:28) - And I'm Tyson Matrix. What's up Jimmy.

Jim Hacking (00:00:31) - Oh Tyson I always get a little nervous when we do Riverside. For some reason it just popped up and said we can't access your video, but then it's it's all streaming, everything's good. So, you know, we've had lots of different formats. And I was watching a movie the other day, a wonderful movie called Past Lives, and it was set about ten years ago, and it was all on Sky. A bunch of it was on Skype, and I was like, oh man, I remember Skype. I remember those ringtones and everything. We used to record Maximum Lawyer podcast on some thing that over sat Skype. Remember that? Yeah, I.

Tyson Mutrux (00:01:01) - Do remember that it was a download onto my computer and if I did not remember to hit the record button then it would not record it.

Tyson Mutrux (00:01:09) - And it was yeah, we we recorded full episodes that never happened. So they were never released. But yeah. And I do remember that ring I, I couldn't like I couldn't do it right now for you. Yeah. Do you. Yeah. That's what it is. Yeah.

Speaker 4 (00:01:25) - Do do do.

Tyson Mutrux (00:01:26) - Do. Yeah. Yep. That's all I do like that. They should bring that back. They. Yeah I'm I'm missing the boat man. They were ahead of the game ringtone. Yeah. They missed the boat completely. But all right, let's let's get to our our guest though this week our guest is Mark Lopez a fellow Gildan who's awesome. He's a criminal defense and personal injury attorney dedicated to obtaining exceptional results for clients. I love that bio. Very short and sweet. Mark, welcome to the show.

Marc Lopez (00:01:57) - I'm so excited to be here. I feel like I'm with like celebrities, so if I'm blushing, I'm sorry, but I'm trying to I'm happy to be here. Thank you guys.

Jim Hacking (00:02:04) - We should had you on a long time ago. Mark, it's good to see you. Tell everybody about your firm, about the kinds of law that you practice and sort of what your firm set up is like.

Marc Lopez (00:02:14) - We are in Indianapolis and we practice in central Indiana for criminal defense, and we are statewide for personal injury. I am one of seven attorneys at the firm and I don't I know everyone said they love their job. I literally love coming to work. I love being a lawyer. I think this is the coolest job in the world. We get to mess with the government, mess with the insurance companies. I think this literally. I wake up in the morning and I am excited to be here. I'm often one of the first people here and I'm usually the last one to leave. And it's not because there's so much work and it's miserable. I just love being a lawyer and I don't know, I just love helping people. I love getting money from insurance companies. So that's a very simple existence.

Tyson Mutrux (00:02:51) - Where do you think that passion comes from? Because you obviously have a lot of passion for it. So where do you think that that that originates? You know.

Marc Lopez (00:02:58) - It's I think about that a lot because my dad was a police officer. And so part of me thinks maybe I'm getting back at him in some capacity. But I know and I've, I very remember for insurance stuff. It sounds so silly. But in college I had no money and I bought these giant speakers from BestBuy and I bought their insurance. And I remember I went about a month and a half later, hey, they weren't working. I had the insurance and they just blew me off. And like this, like this little ball of anger towards Best Buy insurance has just festered into this giant, I don't know. And that's that's where that comes from with the criminal offense. I'm not quite sure because my best friend is a cop, so I'm not anti-police in any capacity unless when they're lying. You know.

Jim Hacking (00:03:36) - Mark, some of our members struggle with hiring an associate.

Jim Hacking (00:03:39) - And I'm wondering what were the mental thought processes that you used when you decided to expand the number of lawyers you had in your firm from just beyond you?

Marc Lopez (00:03:50) - I will tell you this, the only reason I feel qualified to give any advice on this is because I've done it wrong so many times. And so, you know, my first associate, I hired him with the idea that he would help me with legal work, but I also wanted him to generate legal work. And so I would get so incredibly frustrated because he wasn't doing both. And it was only when I made that jump for the third associate, when I was like, okay, this guy, he has no new business requirements. I just need him to help with the legal work. And then when I did it like that, and that's what I've been doing since for everybody else, you know, have an idea of what you want them to do because it's it's not fair to the person you hire to be like, hey, I want you to do this, this and this.

Marc Lopez (00:04:31) - All the things that I was struggling to do. Hey, you do it too. So if you have more work than you need and you can't get that work to a paralegal criminal defense, you're just in court so much, you just can't avoid the court. But if you can't have a paralegal do it, then get an attorney. And when I was starting to do NPS, the clients would sit right back at the end of the case saying, hey, we want more attorney contact, we want more attorney contact. And so that was my cue that I needed to make it happen. And so any mental roadblocks that they weren't going to do it like me or they weren't going to be as good as me, I got rid of them because I got to give the client what they want.

Tyson Mutrux (00:05:04) - All right. So let's use some of your mistakes then. Mark, let's let's figure out how you're able to get to where you are now when it comes to you being one of seven attorneys. So if you were to give the, you know, how long have you have you been practicing? How long have you owned your firm?

Marc Lopez (00:05:20) - I've had this firm's in 2009, attorneys in 2006.

Marc Lopez (00:05:23) - So that's. Plenty of time to make lots of mistakes.

Tyson Mutrux (00:05:26) - Yeah. So let's go back to the 2006 self. Right. What advice would you give to the 2006 Mark Lopez when it comes to here's what you need to do when it comes to hiring attorneys. These are the things you should and shouldn't do.

Marc Lopez (00:05:41) - So 2006 Mark was still working at a law firm, so I'm going to jump to 2009. I opened this law firm, you know, don't hire people that are just like you because they're going to have the same they're going to say the same downfalls as you. So my first associate, who still works with me, he's my partner now. He's very similar to me. And a lot of the things that drive him crazy. When I ask myself, why am I so mad at them? And it's usually like, oh, I'm irritated about that with myself as well. So I don't know if I'm answering your question. Tyson, do you want more specific? I want to make sure I give you what you want.

Tyson Mutrux (00:06:11) - Yeah, I appreciate that. No, I think what if I, if I were a listener I would want to hear okay. So like, what are some like do's and don'ts when it comes to like, like we were just earlier we're talking to Kevin Cheney about like, bonuses and things like that. So do you have any advice on, you know, pay structures, hours? How do you divvy up the work? I mean, any advice that you have, I think would be would be helpful to people.

Marc Lopez (00:06:34) - So regarding like bonuses, we do quarterly bonuses. And I love the quarterly bonus, just because I feel like it's easier for me to keep track of KPI. I my Kobe is, I think like four and 944493 or something. So I don't like having to like do 12 months of reviewing KPIs. But we do quarterly bonuses, and every attorney here has numerous ways to earn bonuses. Hitting KPIs. Every attorney here also has their own tracking phone number that they can. It's on their card and they can leave it at places.

Marc Lopez (00:07:07) - And friends and family have that. And it's very obvious when a call comes to that number. So they get a bonus based on those numbers, the people that call from them if they've handled the case. A lot of the people call for Mark Lopez, but if they handle that client and the client has a subsequent matter, or that client refers the firm, somebody after the case is done, they get a bonus on that. So I want to try to make it like I just be very honest with you guys. If I knew January 1st exactly how much money I was going to make for the year, I think I would be depressed. I think that would be very sad for me unless it was like, you know, $1 billion or something. But I like the idea that my work can generate further business. So regarding bonuses, I love to have like little things out there that they can they can really stack up. And I met with one of my associates last week for lunch, and I was kind of breaking it down for him, and it's just fun.

Marc Lopez (00:07:54) - I don't know, I love I love paying people because when I'm paying people, that means I'm getting paid too. And so on the other question, you had hours for the attorneys. It's self-regulating. We have like a master call log. And if I see a certain attorneys, clients are calling upset, they're not calling back and whatnot. You're not working hard enough. But we try not to be on them too much because criminal defense, we're driving to different counties. Some of us are taking calls on the weekends, so I'm not going to get mad at somebody that skips out at maybe 4:00 on a Friday or takes a three hour lunch in the middle of a Tuesday. Does that make sense?

Jim Hacking (00:08:26) - Mark talked to us what it's like having two different practice areas. How do the two coexist?

Marc Lopez (00:08:31) - It's been a big challenge. So we did this in 2020. Before that, I was primarily a criminal defense. I always had 1 or 2 injury cases floating around. And when I started as a lawyer, I work for a personal injury attorney here in Indianapolis, and he had a pretty big operation, so I knew how to do that.

Marc Lopez (00:08:49) - But after two years of working for him and I still had to take every single settlement up to him to get approved. And so I kid you not, he would grab the case. Hey, you did a great job. Let me make a quick phone call. He'd call them up and get ten, 15 more thousand dollars. And I literally was just one day I sat down, I said, hey, I want this. I want to be able to get more money per case. And he looked me in the eye and he was like, hey, you have to do trials. He's like, once you start doing trials, you will start getting better results. And I bet he wished he never told me that because I quit the next month and I went to the prosecutor's office because, I mean, I've been there for two years and I had two jury trials and it wasn't for lack of wanting. It was just I feel like in civil litigation there's not that many opportunities, or at least not as criminal.

Marc Lopez (00:09:32) - And then with criminal, a lot of jury trials in the prosecutor's office, a lot of trials in general. And so I feel like I'm rambling. What was the actual question, Jim?

Jim Hacking (00:09:40) - How do.

Speaker 6 (00:09:40) - You have personal.

Jim Hacking (00:09:42) - Injury and criminal work together?

Marc Lopez (00:09:44) - So 2009, I started my law firm. And then I've always maintained friendships with injury attorneys. And then 20, 21 of my good friends, Jamison Allen, he expressed a desire to leave his current firm and we were going to just join up. And my game plan was to use the marketing skills and my name to try to help him get cases, and it's definitely been a challenge. There's more like, you know, you pay $25 for a pay per click for a relatively good DUI lead. It's like 100 and 1520 for a personal injury lead. And then you call you, oh, I'm not hurt. My car is just messed up and you could just see money evaporate. So it's been a definite challenge. Combining the practices. I'm very lucky.

Marc Lopez (00:10:26) - I've known the guy who's my injury partner who handles most of that. The actual substantive legal work. I've known him since 2000, like four. So there's a lot of trust I have with him, I won't lie. Sometimes I'll be listening to things and I'll be like, man, it'd be a lot easier just to focus on one or the other. But it really is kind of for me, who, you know, attention. I enjoy my attention being drawn in different areas. It's kind of fun to do different areas of law, like making slip and fall videos, then making a domestic violence video. So it's hard work, Jim. That's the real answer.

Tyson Mutrux (00:10:54) - If you were to give up one of the practice areas. So whether it's criminal defense or personal injury and just focus on one of them, which which of those would you would you give up and why?

Marc Lopez (00:11:04) - You know, that's it's a scary question. They both fulfill so many things for me and the passions I have regarding the law enforcement and insurance companies right now.

Marc Lopez (00:11:13) - I feel like I've been almost I've been doing criminal offense for a long time. So when I wake up in the morning, sometimes I have better marketing ideas. I'm more passionate about making the injury marketing as opposed to the criminal, but I do love both. And it sounds I'm serving two masters, you know you shouldn't do that. But you know, Tyson, you had a I listened to a lot of Max. I didn't listen to a lot of Max Guild podcasts. And we have the, you know, the we have those really cool weekend ones where it's just a guild. And Tyson, you made a comment that you have a particularly good ability to persuade in court and you weren't bragging. It was just kind of talking and you're just like, hey, I've, you know, I'm just really good in person. I don't necessarily like zoom because I'm really effective in person. And when you said that, I literally smiled and I, I owe so much to courtroom presence. I owe so much to anything I do in the courtroom.

Marc Lopez (00:11:59) - The fact that I've been a criminal defense attorney, I've done so many jury trials. When you get to court, you're not scared. You're not hesitant to say things that maybe other attorneys like, you can't say that, man, I've asked for a bond on someone that's got her fourth DUI and got another DUI while you let them out last time, judge and look the judge in the face. I mean, this guy out. Judge, you got Christmas. If you ask for crazy things in criminal and you go to civil. Yeah, I want $2 million. That sounds outrageous. It's not outrageous. Asking for bond on a fourth DUI when they on probation for it. That's outrageous. So when you said that, man, I I'm not I'm not trying to speak for you, but I literally I knew you were coming from the fact that you have been in criminal court. The fact that you were doing that, that's made you a better an amazing injury attorney. I mean, I'm sure you've put those two outs together before, but I love criminal defense, man, I love it.

Marc Lopez (00:12:48) - I love the nonsense things we have to deal with.

Tyson Mutrux (00:12:50) - Yeah. No doubt. I mean, there's being in because you're just you're just inundated with it. It's a constant. I mean, it's like kind of like when you're learning a religion, I guess, or not. Religion, a language like the immersion, like the immersion is the best way of learning a new, a new language is they just be immersed. It's like the same thing with court, like being immersed with it. And the best way of doing it is just doing criminal defense.

Marc Lopez (00:13:10) - So I don't know if I could give one up. I'm sorry, but sometimes I wake up more passionate about injury. For marketing at least.

Jim Hacking (00:13:17) - Is there much overlap? Is there cross-references from one to the other?

Marc Lopez (00:13:20) - There are, and it bites both ways. So we do get some referrals from injury from we do get some injury referrals from our former criminal clients. We do a good job following up with them. Just hey birthday cards, newsletters, emails.

Marc Lopez (00:13:32) - But we also find that sometimes they call with absolute nonsense. And because there are former clients, we do spend maybe a little bit more time than we would just explaining to them, hey, this isn't a viable case. Here's why. We all were never rude on the phone. But if I don't know somebody and they've just wasted $125, click. Hey man, I can't help out with that. I'm sorry, but if they're a former client, you know, I've seen them in court and they sent those cases. There's a certain way you have to be more graceful about it. So I have loved the the cross references, but it does take some time to build and also maintain.

Tyson Mutrux (00:14:03) - All right. I'm gonna I'm gonna ask this in another way. I'm gonna try to pin you down the. If you were to give up one, which one would make you the most money and make you the happiest?

Marc Lopez (00:14:12) - That's a that's a that's a very interesting question. And the reason why I see a lot of future in injury is there's more dollars per case.

Marc Lopez (00:14:22) - So we're talking a pure business perspective. I love my I love my criminal cases. But when somebody calls me just hypothetically, if I have ten criminal cases, I know each one of those is worth $4,000. And so there's no outlier. That doesn't happen. If you take ten injury cases, maybe eight of those are going to be $8,000 cases. But we have seen where these outliers are. All of a sudden you case hired you. You thought it was good. All of a sudden there's a $300,000 max policy offer. So if I had to be the only one doing the law, I was going to court every day. I was the only one answering the phones. Thank God I'm not. I would probably focus on personal injury just because it's a lot of work. It's a lot of hand-holding, but just the sheer numbers. You don't need to accomplish those same numbers to pay for seven attorneys and 20 support staff. You could do it a lot less people, so it probably wouldn't make me happier with the most money and pushing me hard here.

Tyson Mutrux (00:15:19) - Yeah, no, I get that too. Yeah, I get that too. And I wonder if your experiences like. To see where my highest, like the highest moments as a lawyer, was probably due a criminal defense, but my absolute lowest moments as a lawyer was doing criminal defense because like the highs and the lows are so extreme and it's the same. I think it's the same way with money too. But when it comes to criminal defense. But it was it was there was definitely some extremes when it comes to that.

Marc Lopez (00:15:44) - I had no gray hair until I was walking back from a murder verdict, walking to a murder verdict and I, I, we ended up winning. But that walk between my office and the courthouse, I just felt them grow. I was like, this is yeah, man. So the stress is insane. And then Tyson, I don't know if you've noticed this, but I've helped out on a few jury trials. On the injury side, the injury jury trials and criminal defense is like a no holds bar.

Marc Lopez (00:16:08) - Everyone's mad at you. I feel like, you know, most criminal defense attorneys feel like the judge doesn't really like you either. Everyone's mad, everyone's fighting, objecting. I mean, you're sweating every hour, and a criminal jury trial is like ten. We did a civil jury trial. And I'm not saying it was easy, but most of the witnesses were recorded. Everyone's super nice pros. And council brought us coffee. I was like, no, man, when do we attack? When do we go crazy? And they're like, nah man, just, just chill out. Good day everyone. I was like, these guys have been the biggest jerks pre litigation and now everyone's nice. Whereas with criminal defense I feel like before the jury trial everyone's just hey man what do we got to do. This case done. Hey man, it's just so funny I don't know man. Like I, I'm excited to do more jury trials on the civil side because they're not the stress is not as crazy.

Marc Lopez (00:16:54) - I mean, people's lives and people hurt and there's never enough money. I get that, but the actual minute is not there. Did you notice anything like that?

Tyson Mutrux (00:17:02) - Yeah, I agree yeah, 100%. It's it's a different world for sure.

Jim Hacking (00:17:06) - Here's my question. When you get to work first thing in the morning and you're there ahead of everybody else, and when everybody's gone at the end of the day, how are you spending those bookends of your day? How do you spend that quiet time when no one else is in the building? That's my favorite time as a law firm owner in the building. How do you spend that time?

Marc Lopez (00:17:23) - The morning is just on the way to work. I use the Otter I app. I don't have the phone in my hands. Not allowed in Indiana, but I have the app and I'm just talking and I'm just shooting ideas. Usually they're marketing ideas. Usually there's ways to improve client satisfaction, but I just talk. It's a 15 minute drive. I get to the office, press the stop button, I get up to my office.

Marc Lopez (00:17:45) - I actually import that in the ChatGPT and I say, hey, give me some actionable items from this, this dictation, and I'll kind of just kind of go through ideas like that. And I just, I love the quiet time when I'm just me by myself. A lot of that spent on just process improvement, marketing ideas, just trying to get ahead of my day. It used to be like I'd be here the only one before an hour. Then we started getting people who got here earlier too. And then we have quite the little crew here that's super early, but we all kind of agree we're here because we want to be. We love each other. We want to be separate. But I do love those times. Jim and I just I used to be typing everything out and just writing stuff down. Now Otter and ChatGPT, I'm just flux of ideas and it's just the quiet time is wonderful, I love it.

Tyson Mutrux (00:18:24) - Yeah, I think those are my favorite times. We're even coming in on a Saturday or Sunday.

Tyson Mutrux (00:18:28) - It's like it's, you know, it's complete, you know, quiet. You're not going to get interrupted. It's pretty nice. But all right, Mark, we are getting up against time. So we want to respect your time. So I'm going to start to wrap things up before I do. I just want to remind everyone to join us in the big Facebook group. Just search Maximum Lawyer and you'll be able to find us there. And then also give Jimmy and myself a follow on on ex. Jim's been posting quite a bit there and he posts a lot on LinkedIn too, but we've been posting a lot more on LinkedIn too. But give us a follow I'm at at Lawyer Tyson. Jim, what's your handle on on Jim hacking? Jim hacking at Jim hacking. Very very good. And then if you want to join us in the guild, that'd be great. A lot of great people like Mark Lopez in the Guild go to Max Law Guild Comm, and we would love it if you would give us a five star review.

Tyson Mutrux (00:19:10) - If you get something from this podcast to help spread the love to other attorneys all across the country. Jimmy, what is your hack of the week?

Speaker 6 (00:19:18) - I have a book that.

Jim Hacking (00:19:19) - I've been putting off reading for, and there's a. When I tell you the title of the book, you'll know why I put off reading it. And it's ten X is Easier Than two X by Dan Sullivan and Ben Hardy. I've. I have to be careful with how much time I spend thinking about the glorious future. So I wanted to be in a place where I was ready to listen to this book and read this book while grounded in where we currently are. So it's it's it's great the discussions as to how people sort of shed the things that got them to one success level so that they could get to a new level of success is eye opening. And these are the same pair that did the Who Not Howe book. So I know a lot of our members listen to that or read that. And, and this sort of builds on that because it's about sort of reinventing yourself when you need to get to a new level.

Tyson Mutrux (00:20:10) - I well, I can't wait to read that one. That's I'll put it on my, on my long list of books that I want to get to, but let me know if I need to move that bump that one up the list, because I do like the sound of that one. So very cool. All right, I'm not going to screw this one up. Mark. What is your tip or hack of the week?

Marc Lopez (00:20:27) - Tip of the hack of the week is a book as well. It's influenced by Robert Cialdini. I know we've all talked about this, but if you are a law firm owner, if you are in charge of marketing, if you are helping writing copy or anything like that, please get that book. The most recent addition is made 2021, and every time I read that and it's always around my office, I don't have it here right now, of course, but every time I look at it, I just find a new idea. And we've been asking people for reviews and we've been using that phrase.

Marc Lopez (00:20:57) - Do you find yourself to be a helpful person? Everyone says yes and then ask them, okay, it would be helpful for us to get a review. And we have actually increased our close percentage on reviews, which I'm like, this is like a mind hack. So a Robert Cialdini influence get the most recent one. Like it is too funny. Thanks for having me, guys.

Tyson Mutrux (00:21:16) - You just you just aggravated the hell out of me because, like, that's so true. I need to go back and read that books. I love that book. And that's such a good, good hack. That's fantastic. That's great. All right, so let me give my tip of the week. And then I'm going to ask more how people can get in touch with you. But so mine is I was getting a little behind on my email probably an understatement. But we I thought of this idea and it's actually pretty effective is so if you if this this works for people that are Gmail users. So if you've got Google Work Workspace or whatever it's called.

Tyson Mutrux (00:21:46) - So if you create you set up multiple inboxes. So you go in and you go into your current inbox and you mark, you label all of your current emails and I label them emails to sort, and then I archive all of them. And then I created multiple inboxes inside of the settings. And then I created a like in just section one is just it's called sort. And so I've got a clean inbox on the left side, but on my right side it's the emails that we need to go through. And so we can go through kind of one by one. But then all the new emails, we were able to address those as they come in, clear the inbox and then get to the other ones. So Elizabeth has been working on the other other column, you know, getting there. She's been working on it for a while, getting it organized. But so that's my, my, my tip is to if you if you want to get control of your inbox, but you're you're sort of out of control at this point.

Tyson Mutrux (00:22:33) - Do that. It's really, really helpful because it, it, it allows you to have that clear inbox, address those, get rid of them and then move on to the next ones as you can get to them. So it's pretty it's been pretty helpful for me. So that is my tip of the week. Mark, how do people get in touch with you if they want to reach out to you?

Marc Lopez (00:22:50) - I'll go email me Mark with a C at Mark Lopez Law.com. You can give us a call (317) 632-3642. And members answered 24 over seven. And that can be answered by me. But I will get your message and I can give you a call back again. Mark Lopez Mark with a C I love it.

Tyson Mutrux (00:23:05) - Thanks, Mark. Appreciate your time. Appreciate you all for all your insights.

Jim Hacking (00:23:08) - Thanks, buddy. That was great.

Speaker 1 (00:23:12) - Thanks for listening to the Maximum Lawyer podcast. To stay in contact with your hosts and to access more content. Go to Maximum lawyer.com. Have a great week and catch you next time.

Watch the YouTube version of this episode HERE

Do you need a vacation but don’t know how to prepare for it? In this podcast episode, Tyson underscores the importance of vacations for maintaining work-life balance and recharging. 

For business owners, it can be stressful to plan for a vacation without thinking about how the business will run while you are not there. Tyson shares some things to think about when planning a vacation and leaving the work to your team. Preparing for time off is all about strategically planning and figuring out who needs to oversee what and what needs to be worked on. In preparation, find a point person (for example, an executive assistant or office administrator) and brief them on everything that will need to be covered over the course of the vacation. If you have clients, let them know so they can contact your point person during that period.

Briefing your team and delegating responsibility is a big part of prepping for a vacation as a business owner. Set some time aside to meet with your teams and figure out what is coming up during the time you will be away. Go over what needs to be delivered and how to respond to certain scenarios so there are no surprises. Tyson shares the importance of ensuring you have an out of office message with all the relevant contact information so people know who to reach out to. As a business owner, have trust that your team will be on top of things while you are gone!

Take a listen.

Episode Highlights:

  • 00:23 The need for strategic planning to take vacations
  • 3:53 Briefing the assistant 
  • 5:01 Briefing the team and clients prior to a vacation
  • 10:20 The importance of trusting the team during a vacation

Resources:

Transcripts: How to Get Your Firm Ready for Your Vacation

Tyson (00:02.166)
Hey everybody!

Tyson (00:05.974)
Hey there, it's Tyson. And today for this Saturday episode, I'm going to talk about vacations. And before those of you that say, I don't have time for a vacation, I'm going to give you a step-by-step way of getting ready for vacation so you can actually take a vacation and enjoy it while you are gone because stepping away from

does require some strategic planning, but it is necessary for you to really recharge your battery and get some of that creativity back that you need. You got to spend time with your family. You're not going to want to, in 30 years, 20 years, 30 years, wherever you are on the timeline, 40 years, you don't want to regret not spending time with friends, family, friends and family. So I'm going to hopefully give you some…

some tools on how to address that. But before I do, I just make sure you, if you want maximum or minimum time, for those of you that have been listening for a while, if you've not gotten it, make sure you get it. Get stage one for new listeners. Get stage one of maximum or minimum time. It's the roadmap that Jim and I created that we give to all Guild members absolutely free. You're going to get stage one for free just for being an amazing listener. And just text stage one to 314-501.

9 2 6 0 that's the number or the word either one stage 1 3 1 4 5 0 1 9 2 6 0. I'm going to talk a little bit about one of my favorite places to vacation with family. I don't know if it's the number one, it might be, but we really love going to the Smoky Mountains. We really enjoy it. It's a lot of fun. Kids like seeing the bears and being out in the woods and going hiking and it's a really cool place.

to recharge. What's also kind of cool is you, on the Tennessee side at least, there's a lot of touristy things. So if you do want to take the kids into town to do some touristy things, you can do that as well. But it is one of the things where we normally go once a year. One of the first times we went, I don't know if it was the absolute first time, but our daughter, she had been wanting to go on a vacation.

Tyson (02:29.546)
She came home one day and said, hey, I want to go to the Smokies. And we talked about doing it and we had taken a trip and we hadn't really decided on anything. And we did things maybe the wrong way. We did things where I wouldn't necessarily recommend that you do, but we got on a Verbo or Airbnb that night and booked a place for the week and left down the next day. So it was a lot of time, a lot of fun.

And luckily we have a wonderful team that did not interrupt me at all. It was awesome. And they really allowed us to enjoy our time. And that's what I want for you. But for those of you that are maybe in a smaller firm, I understand that it's very challenging to do something like that. And for those of you that are in bigger firms, same thing. I get it. It can be tough, but I want it.

you to be able to have the same thing, those same types of well-deserved vacations without worrying about the firm while you're gone. Now, could I have done that every single week? No, because of other obligations, but I just so happened to have that week available and we had the resources, the team that could fill in where need be. So I was able to, but let's do things the right way. And let's first talk about…

the role of your assistant or whatever you want to call them, but you're going to have to have someone that you can really rely on in this. And so it's one of those things that having an assistant, once you get to a certain size, I definitely recommend having an executive assistant, but even if it's just someone that you, an office administrator, someone like that, that you can rely on while you're gone, really important. But before you leave…

you're going to want to brief them thoroughly. So whoever this point person is, you're going to want to brief them about everything that's going on. While I'm gone, my executive assistant, Elizabeth, she monitors my emails, she messages, she monitors my messages, and she is the main point of contact, the only point of contact for staff while I'm gone. During the vacation, she is empowered to handle.

Tyson (04:44.37)
routine matters and only reach out to me if there's an absolute emergency. And having this buffer it's key to ensuring that I'm not going to be bombarded with a bunch of messages and that the firm runs smoothly without me being there. Really, I can't stress that buffer enough. But now let's kind of give you a step-by-step on what you should do in preparation for the vacation.

about two weeks before leaving, you're going to want to brief your team and any clients that you need to inform of your upcoming unavailability. And you're going to want to assure them that your assistant or whoever the point person is, is going to be handling any of your matters in your absence. So you're going to want to give them someone that they can reach out to. Because if you don't, they're going to reach out to you. Okay. So does it matter?

None of this matters if you don't give them a point person. So you're gonna wanna give them a point person to reach out to, especially those of you crazies that give your clients cell phone numbers. You're gonna wanna give them a point of contact in case they need to reach out to you and get ahold of you. Number two is you're going to delegate specific responsibilities. Okay, so you're gonna assign responsibilities to your team members. Ensure that each person knows what's expected of them.

and how to handle specific scenarios that may arise. One thing to consider is as you're doing this, start to document it, okay? So this is what happens if blank occurs, and then you explain what happens. And as you document that, you're not gonna have to tell people the next time because they're gonna already know, right? Because you've got it documented somewhere, so just that's a little side point. But make sure you're delegating specific responsibilities.

This is what happens if a court calls. This is what happens if a new lead calls. Assign different responsibilities to different people. The third thing is emergency protocol. Okay, so you're gonna establish a very clear definition of what constitutes an emergency, and then you're gonna tell them what to do if that actually happens. But this is gonna ensure that you're only contacted when absolutely necessary.

Tyson (07:13.378)
but you need to define for them, and I'm not going to define for you what an emergency is, what an emergency for your firm is, it can be different from an emergency for our firm. You're going to also want to list some examples so people have an idea, kind of like what I did before when it comes to, before I get another episode, I talked about an urgent matter, we talked about office hours in a previous episode. And if-

And if a client were driving to the office looking for the office because they had a deposition scheduled, that's an urgent matter. Now, this is not an emergency, but that's an urgent matter. But that's an example of an urgent matter. That way someone might break the office hours protocol to reach out to you. So that's something that's urgent, right? Here's something that might be an emergency. Client says that they are on their way to the office for their deposition.

you're out of town. That sounds like it might be an actual emergency. But what you would do is you would hand it off to the assistant. They would contact the assistant. The assistant would try to resolve the matter and they probably would be able to. That's the situation. Well, it's actually pretty simple. Even though it may seem like an emergency, it's probably more disurgent than anything else because you could say, well, the reality is there's nothing we can do about it because I'm out of town.

So the assistant would work on rescheduling everything, letting the necessary people know, great. However, what may be an emergency if you're a criminal defense attorney and you don't have a jury trial scheduled on your calendar and your case gets called out. So I'll use the city of St. Louis for example, city of St. Louis for criminal cases, they put you on this rollover docket and then your case might get called out on a Monday, a Tuesday, Wednesday.

or it may not get called out at all. Maybe you don't have it on your calendar and your case gets called out. Well, that's an emergency that you're going to have to deal with. Is anything going to happen? Are you going to be able to appear? Probably not, but you could at least address it. So that's an emergency. There is a distinct difference between urgent and emergency and you need to define that for your people. The next thing is, is that, make sure you're preparing your point of contact.

Tyson (09:37.366)
So you're going to provide your assistant or your point of contact with all the necessary information and resources they need on where you're going to be and how to get all of you. So this includes access to files, key contacts, any detailed instructions on handling various scenarios. So you're going to want to make sure that they have all the information that they need to handle any matters while you're gone. Really important. And then the last thing, this is simple, but it's something you should do.

Set your out of office reply. Just remember to do that. That way people know if they do respond to you or email you that they're not going to get a response right away. And they may not get one for one or two weeks. It depends on how long you're gone. But let them know in that out of office reply that how they can get ahold of your assistant. So give their information, give their email, give the phone number to the office and who to speak to.

Make sure that they have that information that way they can get any answers for any urgent matters that they might have. All right. So I can just tell you from my personal experience, I can't stress enough the importance of trusting your team in this. I know that many of you have issues with that. You have trust issues, but you've got to trust your team. If you don't, you're never going to get to the point where you can go and you're relaxed somewhere. You've got to give them the ability to make mistakes. They might make some mistakes while you're gone.

but most mistakes can be fixed. You're going to want to delegate here, resist the urge to micromanage. Remember, vacations are meant to be fun, but a big part of it is disconnecting from work so you can recharge. All right, so remember to effectively take a vacation, you're going to want to prepare as a firm owner. It might seem daunting, but…

Use those steps that I just gave you and it's absolutely doable. Trust your team to handle the things while you're gone. As a reminder, if you have something you want me to cover on the Saturday show, shoot me a text and I'll try to cover it. 314-501-9260. I would love to hear from you. We've had just so many great suggestions and I will continue to get to them as I can. Until next week, remember that consistent action is the blueprint that turns your goals

Tyson (12:05.663)
into reality. Take care.

Join the Guild!

In this podcast episode, Becca Eberhart, CEO at Maximum Lawyer, explores the "10X is Easier Than 2X" principle for law firms. She discusses insights from a book by Dan Sullivan and Dr. Benjamin Hardy, emphasizing the need for a mindset shift from incremental growth to exponential thinking. 

Becca shares that envisioning a tenfold increase in business can lead to innovative strategies and a re-evaluation of challenges. She provides questions to help law firm owners adopt this mindset, encouraging them to set ambitious goals and rethink their approach to growth, ultimately redefining their firm's future.

Episode Highlights:

  • 00:23 The concept of exponential growth and the mindset shift needed to achieve it
  • 01:13 The typical mindset of business growth in percentages and the limitations it poses
  • 02:18 The mindset shift to think beyond incremental improvements and brainstorm innovative strategies for explosive growth
  • 03:28 Questions and strategies to embrace the 10X mindset for transformative growth in law firms.
  • 07:15 Creating a roadmap for implementing 10X strategies and defining specific action steps and timelines.

Resources:

Transcripts: Breaking the 2X Barrier with Becca Eberhart

Speaker 1 (00:00:01) - Run your law firm the right way. The right way. This is the maximum Lawyer podcast. Lawyer podcast. Your hosts, Jim Hacking and Tyson Matrix. Let's partner up and maximize your firm. Welcome to the show.

Becca Eberhart (00:00:23) - Welcome to another episode of the Maximum Lawyer podcast. I'm Becca Eberhardt, CEO at Maximum Lawyer, and today we're going to talk about why thinking of doubling your firm actually keeps you doing more of the same things. Last week, I attended a live podcast recording while we were in Scottsdale for the Guild Mastermind. The main topic of the conversation was based on the book ten X Is Easier Than Two X by Dan Sullivan and Doctor Benjamin Hardy. One of the hosts had read the book and the other had not. I also have not read the book yet, but I want to share some of the things that the host said. First, as someone who hasn't read the book, it was the idea that ten X is not actually the outcome. It's a counterintuitive process that you can apply every time you want exponential growth in your life or business.

Becca Eberhart (00:01:13) - Ten X is better than two. X isn't about going from 200,000 to 2 million. It's a strategic way to skip a lot of repetition and collapse time frames that you otherwise wouldn't. The typical mindset when it comes to growing a business is typically spoken in a percentage, up to a double. When people are setting goals, they say, for example, I want to increase revenue by 20%. And I do think for the purpose of goal setting, this makes sense. It's realistic with a push. But when it comes to brainstorming what's next or what does explosive growth look like for you and for your law firm? This is where I think implementing the idea of ten x is better than two X comes in. Because if you were to ten x your law firm, you wouldn't be doing the same things you are now. You wouldn't think your current problems were big problems. You might not be around the same people. When we think about doubling something, what you're really doing is just more of the same. But when you're ten axing something, everything changes.

Becca Eberhart (00:02:18) - It's opening up your mind to ten x growth that gets you thinking of things that two X doesn't. Because when you're doubling something, you're really just asking, how do I get a little better? If you wanted to x your business, you end up still writing down the same things you're doing. You're just doing more of those things. However, when it comes to envisioning explosive growth or brainstorming innovative strategies, the ten X mindset encourages you to think beyond the incremental. It challenges you to consider. What would scaling my law firm ten fold actually look like? Conceptualizing ten x growth causes a radical shift in perspective. It prompts you to question the status quo. The ten strategy isn't just great for growth, it's also great for problem solving and can help you re-evaluate your current problems. What may seem like a significant issue in A2X scenario might become minuscule. When considering a ten x expansion, it's likely that something that is stressing you out today in your current situation, you wouldn't even be bothered with if your firm was ten times bigger than it is today.

Becca Eberhart (00:03:28) - And if that's the case, then is it really worth letting it be bigger now? It's similar to the concept that if it won't matter in five years, don't spend more than five minutes worrying about it. The next one is a tough one, but your current circle of influence, which may be suitable for your two X scenario, might not be who you need for navigating the challenges and opportunities presented in your ten X business, you have to consider who do you need to cut out or lessen your exposure to, and who do you need to add? I have a list of questions that you can work through to use this concept that ten x is easier than two x to envision what could be next for your firm. To do this, you have to be open to the possibility that these things could be real for you, as big or as far out as they seem for you. You have to be open minded enough to believe that with the right mindset and work ethic, you could do this. And you also should have fun with this.

Becca Eberhart (00:04:27) - When you run through these, don't let your mind say that's not possible. Let yourself be open to infinite opportunities and have fun. Also, don't just consider from a revenue perspective, your next firm probably has different processes, client interactions, a different location, or even multiple locations. Challenge traditional approaches and be willing to question the status quo. Identify areas where significant improvements or changes could lead to your exponential growth. So the first question to go through is what does success look like for you on a grand scale? Think beyond incremental improvements and picture a scenario where your firm has grown exponentially. Don't hold back. Next, I want you to consider current market trends and any emerging opportunities. Do any of these align with the ten x version of your life or business? And as I mentioned a few episodes back, these market trends might not be ones just in the legal industry today. We also can't avoid the necessity to evaluate the potential impact of adding technology. Consider how automation, AI, and other advancements could enhance your efficiency.

Becca Eberhart (00:05:42) - Think of technology not as a tool, but as a transformative force. If there's something that you can leverage to skip two X and possibly 3 to 4 X your business, it's going to be technology. Next, I want you to define specific goals for the law firm. These could include ten x revenue, ten x client base, ten x market presence, or other relevant metrics. This process requires thinking big and setting ambitious targets that go beyond the norm. Don't hold yourself back by only what you can rationalize as possible today. All right, next up, because I didn't want you to think about any restrictions now is when you should consider what are assumptions about the legal industry, possibly client expectations or other capabilities of your firm that need to be reconsidered. And this does not mean it's a real restriction, but it's something you may have to market or educate around these transformations. Finally, you're going to develop a roadmap for implementing your ten x strategies. Again, the idea of ten x isn't to say that you're going to ten x this year, but now you get to choose what goals from your ten x roadmap do you want to make changes toward? What part of you as a person or a manager, a leader, a business owner, a visionary, or an implementer? Do you want to work on to get to the next level of you or your business? Finish by defining specific action steps, timelines, and due dates.

Becca Eberhart (00:07:15) - Breaking down your vision into actionable steps to wrap up, embracing the ten X mindset will help you break free from the limitations of incremental thinking. By daring to think on such a grand scale, you open yourself up to infinite opportunities, challenge traditional approaches, and embark on a transformative journey towards achieving your ten goals. The path to exponential success is not about achieving numerical milestones, but about evolving into the best version of yourself and your business. So as you contemplate the possibilities that lie ahead, remember the ten x mindset is not just a strategy. It's a mindset that has the power to redefine your future. Keep thinking big and watch as your firm transcends boundaries you once thought were insurmountable.

Speaker 1 (00:08:07) - Thanks for listening to the Maximum Lawyer podcast. Stay in contact with your host and to access more content. Go to Maximum lawyer.com. Have a great week and catch you next time.

Watch the YouTube version of this episode HERE

Are you a law firm owner who is struggling with trusting others? In this podcast episode, Jim and Tyson discuss the reluctance of law firm owners to delegate and rely on others' expertise. 

Many law firm owners struggle with wanting to take on every task that exists within a firm. But, the reality is lawyers, like many other professionals, are experts in law and not experts in all areas needed for the success of a firm. Jim and Tyson share a few reasons why law firm owners choose to not delegate tasks to others. One reason is owners starting their career handling all aspects like bookkeeping, intake and scheduling and not being comfortable with letting that go. Another reason is not having the time to recruit or having a bad experience with too many other professionals. 

Jim and Tyson provide some solutions law firm owners can take to give some of the responsibility back to others so they can get back to doing what they do best. It is important to practice delegating tasks to other people. Think about one area that is taking up too much of your time and search for a tool, company or an individual who can come on board and take it over. Spend more time perfecting your craft as a lawyer and let go of those tasks that can be done by others. It is all about optimizing your time!

Listen in to learn more.

Jim’s Hack: Check out the podcast Tetragrammaton, which is about startup culture.

Tyson’s Hack: Watch the Rick Rubin interview with Andrew Huberman where they discuss how to keep the body still while keeping the mind active.

Episode Highlights:

  • 2:22 The challenges law firm owners face in delegating tasks
  • 4:17 The reasons why law firm owners may avoid hiring experts
  • 14:41 Proposed solutions to address the issue

Resources:

Transcripts: How Can Law Firm Owners Overcome the Fear of Delegating Tasks?

Jim (00:04.31)
Welcome back to the Maximum Lawyer podcast. I'm Jim Hacking.

Tyson (00:07.804)
And I'm Tyus and Mewtrix. What's up, Jimmy?

Jim (00:11.234)
Tyson, my friend, it's good to be with you. I'm excited about recording this episode with just the two of us today.

Tyson (00:17.892)
I am too. We didn't have the Saturday show in the guild because of the holiday. And so we've not talked for a couple weeks, at least on a show together. So I'm too. I cherish these times with you, Jim. I do. I really do. I say that jokingly. But I do. I do mean it. But what's going on with you? How was your holidays?

Jim (00:33.886)
You jerk.

Jim (00:42.658)
We had a great holiday. The highlight was we had our open house, which we haven't had in a few years since before COVID, and you and Amy and the kids came up, so that was fun. We had a lot of traffic, a lot of happy people, and we kicked off the new year right.

Tyson (00:55.824)
Dude, you had so many people in that house. It was crazy. It was an interesting mix of people. It was, you had, I don't know the youngest child, but I'm assuming the youngest child, the least that I saw, was, I don't know if I saw any babies, but I saw maybe someone that was like three or four, all the way up to people that were, I won't even guess their ages, they're older people. You had a wide mix, you had every race, nationality, it was…

Jim (00:57.966)
Hehehe

Tyson (01:25.792)
It was an interesting mix. I don't know if I've ever been in that much of a mix of people before. It was interesting, it was cool.

Jim (01:34.462)
My kids thought it was funny because they don't know the concept of independent George from Seinfeld, but just that all these different parts of their lives were colliding and like their friends from high school were talking to lawyers or you know, like, and then and then there's, you know, I have some friends who just like to talk to each other. So I would just put them together because they just sort of go.

Tyson (01:53.364)
Normally in those situations, I'll be like the one talking to people and stuff, but like I was having fun listening to conversations. I was like more eavesdropping. It was really, it was just interesting listening to the conversations. It was, so kudos to you for having such like a diverse friend base. It was cool.

Jim (02:14.142)
Awesome. Well, I think we got a good topic for today and it comes out of a recent discussion I was having with one of the members in the guild and you know when we When someone joins the guild usually their First order of business is to come to one of our Monday meetings So at 8 in the morning for me and 1130 for you We meet with whoever wants to show up for the guild that week

and talk about their goals for the week or their one thing they're going to get done this week to move their firm forward. And then we alternate on Fridays at 11 30 checking in. And then if there's a new member, they have the option of staying on that call and meeting with you or me to talk about what the guild is about and what happens there and all that good stuff. So I was talking to one of the new members and they were kicking around the idea of hiring someone to help them with something. And

You know, they were in a pretty specialized legal field as I remember. And I just left myself a note for a podcast episode because I think a lot of law firm owners hold themselves out, hold themselves out as experts. Like, so for me, that would be immigration for you would be personal injury. And we do develop an expertise, but we talk a lot about on this show and in the big group and in the guild about, you know, um,

getting rid of the things that you're not really good at or that aren't your strong suit. But there's so many law firm owners who fight that and who want to try to do seven different things. They want to do their bookkeeping. They want to do their intake. They want to do their marketing. They want to do their operations and they want to handle cases. And so what I wanted to talk about today is this sort of disconnect where we're holding ourselves out as legal experts and we want people to hire us based on our expertise and we understand the value that we bring people.

based on our expertise, but we don't see that as consumers ourselves. So I wanted to throw that out there for you.

Tyson (04:21.036)
I do agree with that. I think this is a problem in any business. I don't think it's just specific to lawyers, but I do think it's, like I see my dad, my dad's a mechanic and he's the same way. He runs a business and he has problems letting go of things. But I think it is a common problem. It's something we do to our detriment for sure. Let's try to dissect this a little bit. Because I do, like,

Off the top of my head, I kind of think there's a few reasons why that is. One, I think it's partially because it's like the way we've always done things. So you start, you start with just you, you know, you're doing the bookkeeping yourself, you're doing the marketing yourself and you expand, expand. And you, you kind of hold onto these things and you're afraid to let go of these things. I, I think another reason might be that they, I think they, you know, they think that they could, they're the only ones that can do it.

So they think that they're the best, and if they give it off to someone else, it's gonna go to crap. I think some of it's hiding. I think some of it, they like to hide things from people. I think that may be another reason. Maybe things are not as great as what they tell people they are, or that they tell their employees that they are. That may be another reason. But I think there's a variety of reasons. It doesn't matter what the reasons are. But I do think it's important that we…

I guess it is important to know what they are just because that way you can kind of diagnose it a little bit. No matter what, for example, you might want to say that you could probably say that about SEO with us. We had hired a company for a while, but we've decided to bring it in-house. But we are relying on an expert. We hired an expert. They're in-house. They're just full-time with us. So we just shifted gears.

I know I'm guilty of many things too, where I don't rely on experts as much as I should, but I wonder how, so this came up as a topic in with the Guild member, but did any of this, because a lot of times you bring things on the show because they've affected you, and not necessarily because of someone else. So you're very good and open about that. Is there something that is going on in your firm that you're like, I need to do a better job of this?

Jim (06:40.374)
No, I think there's a lot of problems that I have and a lot of things that I do that I shouldn't be doing. But this particular thing, I've always been sort of leaning more towards the side of getting help. And, you know, I know how to edit a YouTube video. I know how to upload a YouTube video. I know how to rip audio. I know how to make a podcast. I know how to send a package in the Federal Express. So I've never really had this particular…

Dysfunction when it comes to owning a law firm But I do sometimes find myself pulled back into doing things that I don't wish I was doing so maybe that's where it's coming from But you know just sometimes things catch my ear when people say things and I just think

How can we hold ourselves out as experts if we're not willing to use the expertise of others? I mean, you know, I think some classic things that we see with law firm owners that they probably shouldn't be doing and should be relying on people who do that thing every day is bookkeeping and numbers. I mean, you could spend all day looking at your numbers, running reports, inputting data, extracting data when if you just got someone who knows QuickBooks inside and out.

You know, you save yourself all kinds of time and allow you to develop your expertise better. I mean, your time is more well spent studying your craft and studying your field and getting better as a practitioner than it is being sort of good at lots of different things.

Tyson (08:08.504)
May I propose that maybe the question is the wrong question that you're asking? That maybe is, how can you really be the expert that you say you are when you don't rely on the expertise of others because you are wasting so much time doing those other things?

Jim (08:24.266)
Yeah, yeah, I mean, you know, I have this immigration answer show where people call and ask me immigration questions And I know that I should be spending more time Staying up to date on the latest immigration news And sometimes I don't know the answer when people ask me something There's this new pilot program that the department of state has and I was like, I don't know. I got to go look it up. So um, I think that if we if we are Truly wanting to be an expert spend more time getting good at what you're good at versus, you know

covering up things that you're sort of halfway good at.

Tyson (08:59.02)
I think what you said there is a little different because there's a lot of value in doing what you're doing. I mean, there's a ton of value, as you know, in your doing your immigration answer show. So doing that, because I don't want people to have this excuse, oh, I shouldn't be doing this marketing activity because Jim says I should be spending time on my craft. And that's not what you're saying. So I think what you're saying there is a little bit different. But I do think that maybe we need to spend a little bit more time on.

because you and I talk a lot about business and marketing and management and all that kind of stuff and operations and systems and everything else, but there does need to be a part that's just a given that you need to dedicate time to your craft. And even if you're just running your business and you've got someone else that's really, like you're the CEO and there's someone else that's running the cases, you still need to understand the business because understanding your craft is understanding the business.

It's like someone that is, if you're making cars, right? If you're running Tesla, guess what? Elon Musk knows a lot about cars. He does a lot about engineering. He knows his craft. So he's got to know those things. And if you don't know your craft, if you don't know trial skills, if you don't know, you know, the ins and out of injury law, negotiations and all that, then you're doing your firm a major disservice.

And so I do think that maybe you and I, we don't talk about that maybe enough.

Jim (10:33.11)
Yeah, and I always come back to that great talk that Alicia gave, Alicia Kinchelow gave at Max Law when we were at Del Mar.

Tyson (10:39.992)
Why do you say that? Because I was thinking about that as you're talking, I was thinking about her talk. Yeah, absolutely.

Jim (10:44.65)
Yeah, and she said that when she wanted to learn a new practice area, she studied for 30 minutes a day for her practice area. And just think what more of an expert we would each become if we were doing that. Or if you are the one in charge of marketing or the one in charge of running a business, then you spend your time developing your skills as a marketer or as a CEO. I mean…

I think that's so much more valuable than doing the low-level stuff, the polishing, the silver, the easy stuff that you said is sort of a form of hiding. I think that's right, and it's also a form of not pushing yourself to get better.

Tyson (11:23.852)
Yeah, I do. So you're talking about like the 30 minutes a day and all that. And I wish I could remember who said this, but this person was talking about how rather than read like 20 new books in a year, read one book a year and read it again and again.

Jim (11:44.622)
That was yesterday, I saw that yesterday, someone said that on social.

Tyson (11:47.736)
Oh, it may have been, you may have seen it yesterday. This is something I saw like months ago, but it definitely got me, it was around the time that I read A World with That Email by Cal Newport. And it was right around that time frame where like, I kind of like was sort of obsessed with that book, and I still am, I think the whole concept is amazing. But I wonder, so if I kind of zero back in on what we're talking about, I wonder if when you do kind of focus on,

skills if you do kind of focus on like one skill set at a time until you've really mastered that skill and then move on to the next one. But I don't know the right answer to it, but it is something where it doesn't matter. You should, I think we should be focusing on it more. But why do you, I mean, are there other reasons that you think that maybe people are not focusing on it enough? Like, and why they're not higher? What I mean by your initial question is, like, what are the reasons why you…

do you think that people are just avoiding hiring experts? Is it money? Is it other things?

Jim (12:50.598)
I think money might be tight or people are cheap or the I mean when people when lawyers get on and brag about this great New website they built on Squarespace. I'm like, what the hell are you doing? What the hell are you doing? Who wants to see your radius website on Squarespace? Right and why are you spending all this time? You know perfecting your logo, right? It's just it's just

Not doing the real work. It's not doing the work that matters and it's sort of busyness for the sake of busyness As opposed to you know what we're talking about Developing your expertise. That's sort of a On the business thing. That's something that's going to pay dividends. That's something that's going to allow you to scale That's something that's an exponential investment. So You know spend

$20 an hour five, you know for five hours give that hundred dollars to somebody else if that frees you up To do five hours of higher level work. It's it's what we're talking about all the time around here

Tyson (13:47.94)
Yeah, and I wonder if part of this too is starting early is probably better because you're building the bedrock, but that's the hardest time to do it because you have the least amount of money. But if you can rely on the experts early on and build that strong base, it's probably best. But even though that that's the hardest time for you to probably do it, that's probably the best time for you to do it because that way it'll accelerate your.

growth as you get like three, four, five, six years into it, because you've already got that growth, you've already invested that money in it. Whereas if you were to start and not use the experts early on and you kind of do things your own way, you do things the wrong way, we'll use the bookkeeping example, you get your book set up the wrong way. So now you're four or five years into it, they're all jacked up, now you hire an expert, now you're spending a ton of money to fix everything and get everything on the right track. So it…

if you can do it earlier on, so if you're just starting your law firm, relying on the experts is probably even more important than, because you're going to set that groundwork for everything else.

Jim (14:53.25)
Which is the same thing we say to clients. Oh, I wish you would have hired me earlier. Oh, I wish, you know, it's much easier for me to have filed this case from the start. I'm gonna have to charge you double because it's so much of a mess now that I've gotta try to save your ass from getting deported or something, right? So.

Tyson (15:08.78)
Yeah, I get so aggravated whenever someone calls me, you know, even a month into an injury case because they've jacked so many things up at that point. Their treatment is so messed up. Like they gave a recorded statement. Yeah, you're right. I mean, like it's like, gosh, you're right. It's the exact same advice we give clients. Exact same advice.

Tyson (15:32.688)
Did it cut out for you? Yeah, I said it. Because it did the same thing whenever you were talking to. I'm going to clip this. What I said was, I just agree with you. It's the exact same advice we give to clients. Let me kick a question over to you. That way, there's an easier transition. So I guess, what's the solution to this? Let's do some RSF on this, Jimmy. How can we RSF this?

Jim (16:00.718)
Well, I think one thing that is the reason we keep going back to Alicia's talk is because it's making a decision to set aside time every day that isn't interruptible, that isn't subject to negotiation, that this is just a half hour where I'm going to get better at what I'm doing. And that's like making an affirmative decision before the craziness comes in. If I recall, she did it sort of first thing when she got to the office before the bullets were flying. I think that's important. I think…

Practicing letting things go and delegating, you know, I'm a big believer when you and I come upon someone who's Trying to do everything we always talk to them about trying to develop that muscle of letting go the muscle or the skill of delegating

with supervision, delegating a little more, delegating a little more, till you get more comfortable at it, give away small things, you know, start small. It's like in Atomic Habits when James Clear talks about, you know, leave your shoes out and your gym clothes out in the morning, you know, the night before, just so that you sort of, like, just break that cycle a little bit. Just do something a little bit different. Like, get in the count on Fiverr or Upwork and just look at the things that people can do for you.

and just find something simple, maybe not even in your business, maybe just in life. I mean, hell, just sign up for Instacart and have somebody deliver your groceries. You know, just start to learn that you don't have to do everything. And I know the biggest hurdle, I think, to this is the most part that people view it as an expense. But it's not an expense. It's an investment. It's your buying time. Ultimately, you're buying time.

to do the things that will make the biggest impact on you and your firm, as opposed to just piddling around on low-level stuff.

Tyson (17:55.32)
Yeah, I think that's, there's a lot of lessons what you're just talking about, like when it comes to like optimizing your time and just reconfiguring your week. So we, you know, I'm having to, you know, take over some cases recently, just cause, you know, you and I have talked about it, but like there's just to kind of, you know, keep things, you know, moving, you know, consistently and efficiently until we, you know, hire a new lawyer, but it is, it's interesting because I spent so much time.

last year giving up, like saying no to things and kind of, you know, minimizing the things I had to do. It has given me the bandwidth where I can be a little more flexible too with my time, where I can fill in and it doesn't really interfere with a whole lot of other activities that I've had to do. So there's a lot of other benefits to it where sometimes you do, we talked about, you know, getting dragged back in a previous episode. When you've optimized your time like that,

it does give you that flexibility where you can adjust it, where you've kind of zeroed in on the things you should be doing the most. But whenever you do have to inevitably step back in on a couple of rolls just to fill in, it allows you to adjust. And so that flexibility is there, and it gives you that bandwidth. And I mean, I don't think I could go at this click at this pace for a year, but if, I mean,

It does allow me to, because I've got that flexibility, to go for extended duration until we can kind of fill the gaps. And so there's other benefits to it whenever you are relying on those experts, whenever you are freeing up your time, you're optimizing your week, whenever shit does hit the fan.

Jim (19:41.054)
Yeah, and remember, you know, just try experiments. You don't have to declare this is how it's going to be forever Just try experiments and try that letting go try You know setting aside time to do the big thinking work because if you're not doing it No one's doing it because you're the law firm owner. So if you're not doing this stuff It's not getting done and you're just going to keep spinning your wheels

Tyson (20:02.7)
Yeah, I agree. Um, all right. Any final words on that Jimbo?

Jim (20:08.5)
No.

Tyson (20:09.924)
Alright, so I'm going to wrap things up before I do. Because I enjoyed this talk. I think it went in a few different areas. I didn't think it was going to go, but I do want to wrap things up because we're running out of time. For those of you that are not yet in the Maximum Lawyer Facebook group, join us there. I just searched Maximum Lawyer on Facebook. And there's, I can't imagine how many.

Thousands or tens of thousands of or I don't maybe hundreds of thousands of posts inside of Facebook. So if you name the topic It's gonna it's gonna be in there. So check us out there if you want a You know higher level conversation with guild members and the ability to go to masterminds across the country will be in Scottsdale soon You know, we'll be all over the all over the country Vegas later on this year Join us in the guild go to max all guild calm and if you if you've gotten a benefit

benefit from this podcast over the years or even recently join us or give us a five-star review if you would do that it would we really appreciate it helps us spread the love to other attorneys that need the help so Jimmy what is your hack of the week

Jim (21:22.786)
So, our hack of the week, my hack of the week, comes from our friend Michael Edelman from Infusionsoft. He suggested that we check out a podcast called Tetragrammaton. I don't know, I've never heard of it.

Tyson (21:36.6)
Hold on, is Michael Edelman still at Infusionsoft? Or keep? Okay. Yeah, yeah, okay.

Jim (21:39.41)
No, no, he's on his own, but that's where we know him from. So he suggested this podcast called Tetragrammaton with Rick Rubin. I don't know who Rick Rubin is, but he did an interview.

Tyson (21:49.4)
Oh, Rick Rubin's like a music guru. Yeah. Rick Rubin's a big deal.

Jim (21:53.522)
Yeah, well, he's also a pretty good interviewer and this interviewer interview is with mark and resin who created netscape and is a vc guy who started one of the first vc firms called andresen horowitz and I mean i'm about a half hour in and it is so good It's it's a lot about the startup culture and startups, you know, the biggest problems that startups haven't rick asked him you know, what's the Biggest problem that causes companies to fail. Do you know what he said?

Tyson (22:24.796)
Um, the, I mean, I think most people say cash, but I'm sure he's gonna say something different.

Jim (22:31.554)
He said, in-fighting. He said, you gotta keep your team together and on the same page. And I'm feeling that right now, so I appreciated that message. But he had a great line. He said, there's an old VC adage, most companies die of suicide, not by homicide. And so, that it's death from within versus death from without. So, I highly recommend it. I can't wait to finish it. It's really, really good. It's just like pure good stuff.

Tyson (22:33.469)
Oh, interesting.

Jim (23:01.438)
Every answer is just boom boom. And Andreessen is just a freaking genius.

Tyson (23:05.924)
Yeah, okay, so I'm gonna shift gears then. I'm gonna give you a different tip of the week because it'll be consistent with what you just gave. The tip I have then is look up the Rick Rubin interview with Andrew Huberman. And that was a really good one too. What was really interesting about that interview, Andrew Huberman was interviewing Rick Rubin. They're apparently really, really good friends where like their family spent time with each other and everything.

but he talks about what he found to be really interesting and you might really like this, Jimmy. You know how we talk about physical activity but keeping the mind quiet? Rick Rubin has this exercise and it's one of those things for creativity. He focuses on keeping the body still and keeping the mind active. So when I can't sleep at night, what I do is I will lay in bed and instead I will try to be…

like as still as possible. And I just let my mind go. He's like, I think most of the advice is, hey, like just, you should, you know, quiet the mind so you can fall asleep. Yeah. And so I've stopped doing that. And it's amazing the ideas that you'll come up with. And so I think it's a, I'd never heard that before, but it's a great interview. So yeah, Rick Rubin is like a, apparently he's like a genius and all that. I had not heard of him until recently either, but. So yeah, the Rick Rubin interview with…

Jim (24:13.326)
Mind like water, mind like water.

Tyson (24:34.053)
with Interhuman.

Jim (24:36.127)
Awesome.

Tyson (24:36.836)
Alright man, well good stuff. I will see you in about 30 minutes. See you dude.

Jim (24:41.39)
Thanks, brother. Later.

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