RJon Robins

The art of starting, marketing & managing a successful law firm

April 28, 2011 by RJon Robins

I was speaking with my painting teacher today about the parallels between painting and my business of helping my fellow lawyers start, market & manage highly successful law firms.

We were talking about the “style” that's evolving in my painting, which is remarkably-similar to the style of my metal sculptures as well. Because the style is what comes out of me naturally and authentically. Does it require that I learn & practice certain skills? Of course. But regardless whether you love it or hate it, what you see is what you get. And that's exactly how the owners of the most successful law firms approach their businesses too. (continued below…)

You see, too many lawyers make the mistake of trying to create a distinction between who they are vs. what their law firm stands for. The trouble with that is it's alot like driving a car by mashing the accelerator and then letting it coast. Mashing the accelerator and then letting it coast. Mashing the accelerator and then letting it coast.

When you're working “hard” to market and manage your law firm it's like you're mashing the accelerator. But then when you get to do what you love to do, what you're probably best at, you don't have to work very hard and then running your law firm is actually FUN!

My art teacher was telling me that lots of artists make the same mistake. They try to make their art into “something” instead of just letting it be a reflection of who they are. She says that's why some very skilled artists are never able to create a collection while others sometimes even newcomers are able to find and explore their own unique style right away and soon find a market for their work.

I want to encourage you to think about what your law firm really stands for? What do YOU really stand for? Are the two in synch?

The Power of the Mastermind Principle: Napoleon Hill Explains

April 21, 2011 by RJon Robins

It’s not a coincidence that throughout history from biblical times and today, the most successful human beings on the planet have all drawn power from the “master-mind”.

In the video clip below Napoleon Hill, author of “Think and Grow Rich“, arguably the most influential business book in history, tells us in his own words of the power of the master-mind principle. And below the video I’ve included a copy of Chapter 10 in which Hill defines the “master mind” as he coined the phrase (the book was published in 1937 and is in the public domain).

It is my opinion, based on experience in my own life that, if you take your business at-all-seriously then you owe it to yourself to get yourself involved in a master-mind group.

Indeed, every-single-one of the lawyers I have known who owns or manages a highly-successful law firm, I believe would agree with me that one of the “secrets” to their success has been the power derived from participating in an organized masterminding group.

The group you avail yourself of, need not be made-up of only of lawyers. Of course, there are times when you may want to mastermind with a group where you are amongst only other owners of solo or small law firms. But then at other times, you will benefit-greatly by masterminding with non-lawyers.

The reasons for the benefits of masterminding are plainly-obvious to those who regularly mastermind. In fact we are often amazed that so many of our fellow attorneys overlook this time-tested and proven method of business, professional and personal advancement. I hope now that you have read this blog post YOU won’t be one of them.

Download Chapter 10 – complete with highlights

Dangerous daydreams

April 18, 2011 by RJon Robins

Dangerous Daydreams For Lawyers

Do you daydream about the sort of law practice you want to have “someday”?

Or howabout the kind of life/lifestyle you want to enjoy “someday”?

For the time being let’s set-aside the fact that the lifestyle is driven by the law firm and please allow me to warn you about a dangerous mode of thinking I hear too many lawyers talking about, far too often.

“In 10 years I’d like to have a X practice doing Y work for Z clients.”

This is not a goal. This is a daydream.

Daydreams are perfectly harmless, so long as you don’t call them “goals”.

Because daydreams that are mislabled as “goals” can be – and most often are – quite distructive to a law firm. (Unless you’re talking about the mislabeled daydreams of clients because when you get right down to it, that’s where a ton of legal work actually comes from in most litigation, bankruptcy, dissolution practices).

The difference between a daydream and a goal is the commitment that we’re prepared to make to turn it into reality.

Daydreams require no action because they’re not “real”. They don’t have a lot of emotion behind them to give them force. There’s no sense of loss or disappointment if our daydreams don’t come true. Because we don’t actually do anything to make our daydreams come true. So our ego is never put to the test.

I’d be excited to win the lottery. But I have no way to improve my odds of winning the lottery. So not-winning the lottery doesn’t force me to re-evaluate any part of my life, nor should it. Because winning the lottery is just a daydream.

Here’s what a lawyer’s daydream looks, sounds and feels like. Go ahead and try saying this out loud:

In 10-15 years I’d I’d be thrilled to double my practice and transition from X to Y practice area with no less than 75% of my cases and clients being what I’d consider to be “A” or “B” level cases or clients.

How does that feel? Sort of soft and cuddly, right? Afterall, 10 years is a long time away so there’s no real sense of urgency.

Now compare that to what a real goal looks and feels like. Try saying this out loud:

I’d be thrilled to double my practice in 18 months and transition from X to Y practice area with no less than 75% of my cases and clients being what I’d consider to be “A” or “B” level cases or clients.

Feels a lot different doesn’t it?

You may have even resisted and refused to say it out loud. That’s because you have integrity. That’s also exactly why it’s dangerous to mislabel daydreams as goals.

Because each and every time you fail to achieve a goal, you are teaching yourself a negative lesson. And the next time you want to achieve anything, you know it’s going to be that much harder to accomplish. Because your ego has a memory. Probably a better memory than your mind. Your ego remember every disappointment in your life – even the long-forgotten ones.

So what’s the solution?

The solution is to get real about your goals and be honest with yourself and be honest with your family too, if the improvements you’re talking about making in your business are just daydreams.

As for me, I have the following goals and the following daydreams (amongst others and subject to change as opportunities enter my conscious-awareness 🙂

Goals:

I have a goal to enroll 100 new members into my various coaching programs by December 31, 2011.

I have a goal to lose 15 pounds by December 31, 2011.

I have a goal to make myself sufficiently-redundant in my business by December 31st so as to be able to take-off for 30 consecutive days with only “emergency access” to me.

By July 2012 I have a goal to be seriously in the market for a new home that we can not-outgrow for at least the next 5 years.

Before August 2011 (this year) I will host a snorkeling/dive trip/mastermind event for 12 awesome lawyers to seriously-supercharge their single-shareholder solo or small law firms.

Daydreams

I would love it if Minidog was sufficiently-trained that I could take him with me for walks “off leash”.

It would be fun to get a new boat this year.

I would feel great about myself if I could complete the next Miami Half-Marathon.

I have this neat idea for a new business that would be like an incubator service for start-ups in South Florida and then we’d replicate it in other markets around the Country.

I’d like to find an agent to rep my sculptures to galleries and collectors.

I invite you to leave a comment and share some of your goals and some of your daydreams too. Daydreams are fun. Daydreams are even productive. Some of my best goals are an outgrowth of some of my best daydreams (witness: www.National-CLE-Tour.com) . What are yours?

How to Start a Law Firm (part 2)

March 10, 2011 by RJon Robins

Steps

Define your goals:

Financial – How much money does the firm have to ‘gross’ in order for you to ‘net’ enough to live the way you WANT to live? ;

Personal – How many hours do you WANT to invest on a daily, weekly and monthly-basis?;

Professional – What types of cases, clients do you WANT to work with in your practice? Remember starting a law firm is an opportunity to create the life you WANT. Don’t settle.

2. Inventory your skills and resources. If you know a particular practice area very well that’s probably the best practice area to concentrate on in the beginning rather than having to learn a new practice area at the same time you’re learning how to run the business of a law firm.

What kind of hands-on business management & marketing skills do you have?

What kind of budget do you have to cover living expenses while the firm gets established, working capital for start-up and operating expenses and to invest in educating yourself about the business of how to start, market & manage a law firm so you don’t waste years of your life & career learning these critical skills the hard way

There are many free resources available to help you. Including many provided for free by me.

But consider the hidden ‘cost’ of free in terms of the time required to piece everything together vs. just enrolling in a course.

Imagine the difference between the student who chooses to enroll in a well-organized course in law school with discussions lead by a supportive and experienced professor vs. the law student who simply takes the course syllabus and endeavors to spend the whole semester on his own looking up and studying all the cases in the library by himself or with a few of his buddies. Who is going to do better on the exam?

3. Make a plan and put that plan to budget and time-table to acquire the skills you find yourself lacking in.

Do this BEFORE you start trying to follow anyone’s advice about writing a business plan or how to create a law firm website that actually generates business, etc. The root cause of the successful law firms isn’t what you can see from the surface from a casual conversation with another lawyer in passing, or in a blog.

Warnings

If you’re reading this and you’re a lawyer I’m going to assume you’re a pretty smart person and you want to be successful. So I’m going to skip the usual and obvious warnings here. Instead, the biggest danger to look out for is advice from other lawyers.

Some aren’t nearly as successful as they’d like you to believe.

Some are in fact very successful but may not have traveled a deliberate and replicable path and so their well-intentioned advice can be a real distraction.

And sad to say, some lawyers are just jerks who would rather have company in their misery and can be quite persuasive in their efforts to recruit you into their merry band of losers.

How to Start a Law Firm

March 9, 2011 by RJon Robins

Starting a law firm can be one of the best decisions a lawyer can make. Not only can you make more money as the owner of your own law firm but you can also enjoy the freedom to pursue the types of cases and clients you get energy from vs. working for a firm where your cases and clients may be dictated to you even if they’re energy vampires. Good News: Did you know that according to ABA statistics nearly 60% of lawyers in the US are actually solo practitioners? And that’s not a recent statistic. The fact of the matter is that the face of the most successful lawyers in the US has always been a solo practitioner. More Good News: Did you know that lawyers have been starting SUCCESSFUL solo & small law firms for more than 500 years? That’s right, this is a very well-documented fact. As business models go law firms are pretty well tried & true and you can make alot of money just sticking to the fundamentals. Only trouble of course is that they don’t teach us the fundamentals of starting, marketing and/or managing a successful law firm in law school. Which is why, sad to say, so many solo lawyers DON’T have “successful” law firms. Zig Ziglar, a well known success coach said that if he was going to go into a new line of business he knew nothing about the first thing he’d do is study what the average person in that business is doing…and do the opposite! Because if you do what everyone else is doing you’ll only get the results everyone else is getting. The main reasons most lawyers who start a law firm don’t find as much success as they could are: 1. They don’t stop to ask themselves what it means to have a “successful” law firm vs. just having a law firm. 2. They don’t appreciate the difference between the job of being a lawyer vs. the business of running a law firm. One we are reasonably well prepared for by law school and subsequent years practicing law; the other we are not. Because ten years of becoming the best lawyer in the world in your chosen practice area may expose you to little or no experience in how to run the business itself. 3. They fail to consider the opportunity cost of trying to figure it out themselves the hard way. Figure if you’re good enough to pass the bar exam and choose a reasonably straight forward practice area, if you know what you’re doing when it comes to the management & marketing of your law firm you should be able to gross at least $100,000 in your first year. If you’re already well-established in a practice area, have a book of business, contacts in the community etc. that number could be much higher. But what if you waste the first five years of your practice trying to teach yourself how to start, market & manage the business? That could easily cost you half of your time, energy, enthusiasm and creativity, couldn’t it? Translate that into dollars and it’s easy to see why some experts estimate that lawyers who try to teach themselves how to run a law firm vs. pursuing a deliberate plan to acquire these skills could easily be leaving as much as $250,000 or more on the table in terms of opportunity cost. In a future post I’ll outline the steps I recommend every lawyer takes when starting a law firm. You can get much more detailed information that space here permits at: www.HowToMANAGEaSmallLawFirm.com

Telephone etiquette

March 7, 2011 by RJon Robins

Especially when you're speaking by cell phone, please use these call signs to spell out your words when leaving messages and confirming information from clients:

A ……….	ALPHA	N ……….	NOVEMBER
B ……….	BRAVO	O ……….	OSCAR
C ……….	CHARLIE	P ……….	PAPA
D ……….	DELTA	Q ……….	QUEBEC
E ……….	ECHO	R ……….	ROMEO
F ……….	FOXTROT	S ……….	SIERRA
G ……….	GOLF	T ……….	TANGO
H ……….	HOTEL	U ……….	UNIFORM
I ……….	INDIA	V ……….	VICTOR
J ……….	JULIET	W ……….	WHISKY
K ……….	KILO	X ……….	X-RAY
L ……….	LIMA	Y ……….	YANKEE
M ……….	MIKE	Z ……….	ZULU

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