In this episode, Steve Fretzin and Jaclyn Foster discuss:
- Changes in virtual law firm assistance.
- Understanding where hires need to be made.
- Keep it simple with roll clarity.
- Preventing bottlenecks in your law firm.
Key Takeaways:
- Hiring virtual gives you a broader hiring pool and gives more flexibility to your employees.
- You need to understand where time is being spent before you can understand where you may need to bring in additional help.
- As a lawyer, you should only be doing things the paralegals cannot do.
- Onboarding is a marathon, not a spring. But it is the best place to define and understand what a job roll contains.
“It just keeps reminding us, especially in this world of technology and software and automation and all of these little intricacies that have changed the face of how we work, that people are still the foundational component to making our businesses succeed.” — Jaclyn Foster
Connect with Jaclyn Foster:
Website: https://www.del-trust.com/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jaclyn-foster-60b457196/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/deltrustsolutions
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Connect with Steve Fretzin:
LinkedIn: Steve Fretzin
Twitter: @stevefretzin
Facebook: Fretzin, Inc.
Website: Fretzin.com
Email: Steve@Fretzin.com
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Call Steve directly at 847-602-6911
Show notes by Podcastologist Chelsea Taylor-Sturkie
Audio production by Turnkey Podcast Productions. You’re the expert. Your podcast will prove it.
FULL TRANSCRIPT
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
paralegal, firms, people, lawyer, business, workflows, roles, hire, law firms, attorney, support, jacqueline, steve, clients, process, job, staffing, hiring, legal, step
SPEAKERS
Stephanie Vaughn Jones, Narrator, Jaclyn Foster, Steve Fretzin, Jordan Ostroff
Jaclyn Foster [00:00]
I think it just keeps reminding us, especially in this world of technology, and software’s and automation and all of these little intricacies that have changed the face of how we work that people are still the foundational component to making our businesses succeed.
Narrator [00:20]
You’re listening to be that lawyer, life changing strategies and resources for growing a successful law practice. Each episode, your host, author and lawyer coach, Steve Fretzin, will take a deeper dive, helping you grow your law practice in less time with greater results. Now, here’s your host, Steve Fretzin.
Steve Fretzin [00:42]
Hey, everybody, welcome to be that lawyer. I hope you’re having a lovely day today. Oh, man, it is cold and rainy and terrible in Chicago and Jacqueline up in Wisconsin, probably not too much better. We’re going to meet her in a moment. But listen, everybody, it’s all about being that lawyer. And one of the things that’s been just just coming in as a regular part of the show, has been dealing with the great resignations, staffing, hiring, people leaving in record numbers, people getting offered ridiculous money is just just the wild west out there. And we’ve got to figure out how to get a handle on it. So we can get back focus to building the business and growing business and all of that. And having support staff is really, really critical. So Jacqueline’s going to talk to us in a moment. I do want to thank our sponsors, legalese, marketing, and money, Penny, and you’ll hear more about them later. And Jacqueline was so kind to send a quote to me. And first of all, welcome to the show. How are you?
[01:40]
I’m great. Yes, rainy and cold here. Thank you so much for having me, Steve.
Steve Fretzin [01:43]
And I’m a big fan of anyone from Chicago, because that’s where half of my family is my wife’s from from the Milwaukee area. And I’ve got family up in Fond du Lac, and I don’t know, I’m just you know, we’re the Midwesterners. We’re the you know, we’re the Down to Earth, folks, right?
[01:57]
We’re tough, we’re tough.
Steve Fretzin [01:59]
We’re tough, but we’re nice. And we’re fair. That’s what we are here in the Midwest. So anyway, I’m going to introduce you in more detail in a moment. But your quote is, you can design and create and build the most wonderful place in the world. But it takes people to make the dream a reality. That can’t be anyone other than Walt Disney. So tell me a little bit about why you submitted that quote, and why that’s your favorite quote.
[02:23]
Absolutely. So it’s my favorite quote, obviously, it speaks to this conversation we’re having today with staffing and managing people. And really, at the end of the day, it’s we all as business owners, have this idea in the stream in our head of where we’re going to take our business. And then we start to get into it and realize we can’t do it alone. And it speaks to the thought of at any moment in time you’re ready to hire, you’re ready to bring somebody into your business to help continuing the development moving that football down the field at all points of your of your career or of your business growth. And so I just I think it just keeps reminding us, especially in this world of technology, and software’s and automation and all of these little intricacies that have changed the face of how we work that people are still the foundational component to making our businesses succeed.
Steve Fretzin [03:14]
And I think that’s come through more now than ever, that people are the most important part of a law firm of a business without good people. Without that team. You see how fast things can crumble. And I think a lot of law firms have seen that and people getting taken jobs for more money. Why? Well, because the culture wasn’t there. The relationships weren’t there, there wasn’t a firm that had a had a, a common cause. Right, something that connected them to that, that employer, that firm. And so I think that’s a really good quote, and very timely. Jacqueline Foster is the founder of Dell trust law firm solutions. And I’d love to have you share your background leading up to running this amazing business, helping law firms with their staffing.
[04:01]
Sure, absolutely. So I’m a paralegal by trade I was a paralegal before I opened this business up, I worked exclusively in solos firms, I have a lot of hands on knowledge of what it takes to run a solo practice advanced as a case manager. And then when I moved into the very rural atmosphere, that is Wisconsin and the area of Wisconsin that I’m in and, you know, became a mother, it quickly dawned on me that it didn’t make financial sense for me to travel 3040 minutes into town to take a job at a very low rate and pay for daycare and all those things. Um, so while I really enjoyed being a stay at home mom, I quickly realized that my brain could not be settled on. Just that I like, No, it was, you know, I was designed to be his mother, but I was not designed to be only that. So in 2018, October of 2018, I started sub contracting through a company and was able to be connected with law firms in Chicago. I had worked for Texas Supreme Import candidate out in tech, obviously, Texas, I went to firms in Georgia and I just kind of bounced all around the state country in these different firms. And quickly got this appreciation for what I was doing for these firms and how much I had my firms that I worked for in house I could have been could have benefited from what I was doing. So tell me a couple of years to really get a solid understanding of remote work. This is before the pandemic, this is before there’s really any solid support out there on teaching companies how to manage this type of work, and understanding the technology behind it, the relationships behind it, and really how to make the situation succeed, that I finally got the confidence and just happened to get the confidence to open my own business in the thick of the stay at home orders of March of 2020. It was just kind of a happenstance, or it was a chance that I I started in the thick of the pandemic, which probably is a big reason for our quick growth, because everybody went home and everybody was working remotely suddenly. And it wasn’t such a foreign concept. And then from there just really took it in further where I don’t just like to offer these services here. And there, I really like to focus on staffing strategy, and especially in that legal atmosphere exclusively in the legal atmosphere. Because lawyers law firms, it’s a different animal, it’s different from your your realtors, it’s different from every other industry out there. So honing in on my skills, not only to keep the attorneys and the law firms supported in a strategic way, but also to really harness relationships with professionals across the country, paralegals legal assistants alike, and kind of marry the two and come up with these really great solutions for law firms to consider when they’re looking at their staffing needs.
Steve Fretzin [06:49]
Yeah, and I think the pandemic and now the great resignation has really opened up people to the idea that virtual assistants is kind of a great thing to have, and that you don’t need somebody you know, in the office filing, that there’s so much that can be done virtually. So talk about like the last two years, and what you’ve seen as a relates to changes in the environments and law firms in the way that they’re thinking and how you’re supporting that.
[07:14]
Sure. So when I first started, I saw a lot of firms coming to me saying, you know, I had to furlough my employees, and they left me you know, they’re they were able to be scooped up by these big sharks that have been able to dump all their money in and make this work quickly and adjust to that pandemic, quickly. They were scooped up, they didn’t stick around very long and waiting to be called back. But they lost their support, and they had nothing. So that was kind of the theme when I first started. However, as things have been evolving, and people realizing even as we’re on the back end of the pandemic, everybody’s back in office, things are sort of kind of coming back to a normal. So it’s such an approach, I mean, what is normal anymore, but realizing that having a taste for those solutions that they figured on how to solve, you know, losing employees not having anybody working for them, they need that little bit of support. I think now, firms are realizing that they can take leverage of these options, which the options I’m discussing is hiring professional contractors, paralegals, like you said, virtual admins, things of that nature to fill needs and incremental ways that we’re never going ahead of our growth. And we’re never staying behind our growth, we’re staying right there in that growth phase every step of the way, in a very predictable, a very measurable way. Knowing exactly what we need in the exact moment we need it, and who needs to fill that role. So it’s kind of evolved in a mixture of a panic to a strategy approach. And so it’s really I mean, like you said, with the great resignation, I a lot of paralegals a very large pair of Mona paralegals, legal assistants do not want to go back into the office, they’ve gotten a taste of our homework, it’s become a trend. And now that’s the new normal. So it’s kind of marrying the two strategy and that that need or that bond from the employees to make something work.
Steve Fretzin [09:11]
And are there still the same level of concerns that that law firms want to have their paralegals in in house and working at the firm versus being virtual or is that dissipating significantly?
[09:23]
I think it’s both it’s dissipating significantly, in the sense of they’re finding, you know, the main reason people wanted somebody in house in the in the office butts in the seat was for that phone ringing those clients coming through. I think that a lot of firms are realizing they can hire somebody strategic for that. As far as a receptionist, the client services coordinator, somebody that can be in that seat, but the more expensive professionals they’re learning they can outsource and keep at home for productivity reasons for access to that talent, you know, if they’re across the state if they’re across the country, so I think it’s it’s a mixture a lot of firms have gone fully virtual I’ve even seen estate planning firms going fully virtual. So it’s a mixture of meeting that person in house, but being strategic and who that person really is. Yeah.
Steve Fretzin [10:10]
So what what’s, from your perspective, the magic formula to determine the best hire for a firm, because that’s a huge gap right now in firms not really, you know, they’re trying to fill roles. They’re trying to replace associates, they’re trying to figure out how to manage the work. But they also don’t want to make a bad hire. So what’s what’s what, how are you doing it? Or what’s the magic formula that you’ve seen?
[10:32]
So my other favorite quote, other than Walt Disney is one that we discussed in the beginning is Simplicity is the ultimate form of sophistication. And I always go to the simplest, simplest approach at the beginning, which is this, it’s, we don’t know what we don’t know. So we have to have all the data in front of us before we can make those decisions. A lot of my firms get shocked when I say, here’s this simple sheet, I want you to go ahead and write down exactly what everybody in your office is doing for an entire week, we need to understand first where time is being spent before we know who we can start supplementing or, you know, if you have your paralegal that you’re paying $75,000 a year, ordering paper, or taking phone calls or intakes, things of that nature, that’s not a great way place to have that person spend their time. Likewise, a lot of the times I’m getting attorneys that are solo, they’re absolutely solo, they have no support staff are very, very minimal, maybe assistant that helps them just keep on track, you know, manage my calendar, pick my phone calls, right? That attorney really needs to buckle down for a week and understand where they’re spending their time. Because if we don’t know where we’re spending our time, how are we going to know who needs to come in to support to take that, that work off of our plate. And so when they do that, they can then see, you know, and I have three columns, you know, the paralegal, the legal assistant work, and then the attorney and they can start calculating their hours. And I give this cheat sheet on this is really what you should be doing attorney as an attorney, this you went to law school for, to start marking down and then we get this beautiful little easy total at the bottom that says I’m spending 95% of my time on admin work. That is a very big waste of my billable hours that I went to law school for four years to be able to charge. So that’s the first step of understanding where that hire needs to be made. Yeah.
Steve Fretzin [12:28]
And I think it’s, it’s amazing when I interview my clients and prospective clients to understand how they’re spending their time. First of all, nobody’s really tracking their time other than billable hours, but it’s making copies. It’s bookkeeping, it’s, you know, trying to figure out software. It’s it’s all these things that are outside of the billable hour and business development, which are the two things I want them spending time on, I want them making money billing hours, and I want them outgrowing business. And so not having a good assistant, not having a paralegal not having an associate, to delegate to is like the number one reason why lawyers I think aren’t successful in growing a law practice, whether that’s a solo practice, or small, firm or, or or or working at a big firm.
[13:12]
Yep, absolutely. And I think we’re on the same page on what a lawyer should be doing. I tell the lawyer and they kind of get flabbergasted when I told them this, they said, one thing you should be doing is thing that paralegals can which is giving legal advice, setting fees, attending court hearings and trials and network marketing your face needs to be out in the world, the things that we can do for you you need to be doing. And everything else should be handled by professionals that you can bill out, for instance, double what you’re paying that paralegal on their billable rate. And so it’s, again, like you said, it’s narrowing down what that attorney should be doing to actually promote business growth, not just running a business but growing a business. And then figuring out then from there, can we hire somebody cheaper, you know, we don’t need a paralegal. 20 years of paralegal experience to make copies or fill in a template form a notice of appearance, dealing with Discovery exhibits all of those things, we can be strategic at that point on where the best hire is. That’s not only lucrative to the business operations, but also financially
Steve Fretzin [14:14]
sound. Yeah, and it’s, it’s amazing how lawyers rationalize, it’s just easier if I do it myself. And they’re not they’re not really thinking about the 20 to $40 an hour or even 75 to $100 an hour that needs to be must be delegated, because their billable of 400 500, whatever the case might be. And I think it’s like the is it just the pain, of change the pain of like bringing in someone new, and having onboard them and having to train them having to take the time, that just stops them in their tracks and they just say, well, I’ll just do it myself. It’s easier than that.
[14:55]
100% It’s either they don’t and this is something I personally learned. As my business is growing, and I’m bringing in more recruiters and bringing in more support for myself, it is impossible to seamlessly onboard somebody if you don’t have procedures, anything written out. So it’s taking that time upfront, or having somebody help you take that time upfront, to start creating workflows, procedures, this is how we do things. This is where we communicate this, you know, and creating training modules, things of that nature that makes those onboarding processes seamless. And then also that onboarding that that system, you have put in place, make delegation seamless, especially when you’re working in a remote environment? Yes, it is going to take you more time to download a file, email it, send it over with all these instructions than it is to have a good case management system in place where the paralegal can run through and know exactly where the case is that so it’s kind of a mixture of both and I and definitely, I think that is exactly why we all as business owners say it’s just easier if I do it myself, then show somebody how to do it and then you know, and then they go and do it.
Jordan Ostroff [16:01]
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Steve Fretzin [16:24]
Hey Steph, tell everyone what Moneypenny does for law firms
Stephanie Vaughn Jones [16:28]
where the call handling and live chat experts and Moneypenny receptionist can ensure that your calls are directed to the right person seamlessly saving you time and money. Steve, did you know that 69% of people don’t like to leave a voicemail?
Steve Fretzin [16:41]
I did not know that. That’s a lot of business going away right there. Let’s cut to the chase. What are you prepared to do for my listeners?
Stephanie Vaughn Jones [16:47]
We’re offering an exclusive two week free trial. If you’re interested in hearing more, you can call me directly on 470-534-8846. I mentioned that you’ve heard this ad on Steve’s podcast.
Steve Fretzin [17:01]
Very cool. Thanks so much. But let’s let’s do this, then that’s we’ve got a few minutes here. Let’s let’s break it down into like three simple steps. If we can, there may be maybe four, maybe two, it might be not so simple. Of All right, I make a decision that I have a Bama lawyer and I make a decision that I am doing a ton of paralegal work. Okay, I am reviewing Doc’s I shouldn’t be reviewing. I am doing, you know, administrative tasks. I shouldn’t be doing whatever the case might be. And I say you know what, I need to hire Jacqueline or I need to I’m gonna bring someone in. Okay. Now I’ve made the hire. What, what are the key processes procedures? What is the onboarding? How do I break it down so that I don’t mess this up that I don’t just leave them. Here’s your desk. Here’s your phone. Good luck. That’s the old model. Right? You know what to do? And then it’s a disaster, right? What are the what is like step one, step two, step three, let’s talk about, you know, you made the hire. Thank you, Jacqueline. Great job. This is a great fit. I think. Now we’ve got to onboard.
[18:11]
Yes. So first of all, its role clarity. I am a very big believer. And this is important for step one is that I’m a big believer that everybody should remain in their zone of genius that not only turns around quicker, profitability, productivity, things of that nature, largest margins for ROI. It’s going back to what I said the simplicity form of it. What what does everybody do? What is their job, I know in a solo firm, trust me, I was the wearer of all hats. I did all the things all the time for all the people all the time, that was my job. But even if that’s me, we still need to compartmentalize those job roles. So that then we can lead into step two, create workflows, you know, for instance, Clio, they have a task list that you can apply to a matter. And those task lists are automatically going to be assigned to the paralegal legal assistant, the attorney and a certain workflow procedure. And the reason that’s important for groundwork before you bring somebody in, is because then you bring them in and every single day, they already have those tasks assigned to them. And whoever’s training, whoever’s developing them can kind of go through that each day. And as things progressed, I don’t I mean, onboarding is a marathon, not a sprint, it takes time. But it’s it’s the number one component to define job roles and what everybody does, so that they can stay in that zone of genius. Nail it, grow at it, get very, very good at it, where they’re doing it in their sleep, and then you start advancing them into more projects, more roles as things go on. I cannot tell you how many times I get firms that scare away our hires that they all of a sudden it’s day one and here’s 35 assignments due by tomorrow, get them done, and they’ll quit because we’re in this job market of it’s not I always say my My colleague, Molly McGrath always says this perfectly Gone are the days where people should just be thankful they have a job, sit down and do the work, no matter how emotionally taxing it is. So it’s just getting those job roles defined, you should be creating those job roles for that job posting, and then putting them in there with your training modules or your your training support, however, that looks on each specific role or task they’re doing, depending on their experience level, and then developing from there. I hate to make it that simple, I could get into the eight steps of legal project management and how to actually integrate people into that, but for purposes of time, and simplicity, job roles, job roles, job roles, where we’re not just putting them there, and I don’t know how to where you’re gonna fit in.
Steve Fretzin [20:43]
Alright, so my job role is to, you know, if I’m a lawyer, right, it’s to, it’s to, you know, build the hours practice the law, it’s to manage the firm, it’s to handle the marketing. Alright, so I have a bunch of things that I define are for me, then I’ve got to define for the paralegal, what exactly is in his or her role, and write that out on a list. So it’s not just in my head, it’s down on paper. And maybe it needs to be refined, like if there’s things that are absolutely insane, like pick up my laundry, or feed my dog, right may not, may not go over so well. So we need to make sure that maybe that that list is reviewed, or that list is is you know, really within the scope of the experience and the talent of the of the person that’s coming in, right?
[21:31]
Absolutely. Yep, absolutely. 100%. And also adding into that lawyer. And I’ll just say this, because I know your listeners are lawyers is that they also play an integral part in the process of reviewing and returning documents. So making sure that the, you know, if they don’t trust that we send things out with their signature stamped on it, they better be in that process of reviewing. The idea is to never let anybody become the bottleneck. And so the more we can stretch those tasks out and really refine who is in charge of what the less bottlenecks we’re going to we’re gonna get actually we usually find that the attorney is the bottleneck. Yeah, there you go many ways. But that’s, that’s exactly it is getting those jobs. A lot of times I even say you don’t want that into a into a firm handbook, not that you’re going to slap this handbook on somebody’s desk their first day, but just so that that new hire also knows, this is who I go to for support in this process. This is who I go to, if this comes up, they really know what everybody does. We especially in solo firms, we fail to to actually define that.
Steve Fretzin [22:32]
Okay, so we got the real clarity, and I think you moved into create workflows. Is that step two?
[22:39]
Yes. So then when you’re getting all that out, and also obviously, this is going to depend on practice area, estate planning is a lot more predictable than a personal injury case, we have no idea if our clients gonna go rogue if our defendants gonna go rogue, we just don’t know what’s going to happen. But to at least have some sort of shall have a process that we can also enter in our humanity and our personal knowledge to adjust and tweak and not rely so heavily on that process telling us to do this, this, this, this and this next, is to get that in some sort of workflow, you know, whatever practice management case management,
Steve Fretzin [23:15]
that could be and I’m gonna stop you that could be a software like a case management practice management, or can it be on a piece of paper, like if they’re not that sophisticated, or they’re not interested in that technology, which I think we all need to be at this point. But let’s say we’re not, it can still be something like step one is this step two is that but having that workflow down so that the lawyer knows what what he or she is doing in the in paralegal, for example, knows what he or she is doing, and those that works within the role definitions?
[23:43]
Yes. So you can if you want more paper, and I’m all for paper and writing those things out there to slip that into the your big accordion file, Every case has this workflow on it, where people are initially checking things off writing notes, where you can make it a Word document that’s stuck in their in their file, online, whatever approach you want to take, but I always say it, firms go in and out of software, case management systems, they say they’re too clunky, they don’t do what they need them to do. Because they’re expecting that software or that management system to create procedures for them. They’re not designed to do that. You need to create your processes, your workflows, put them into the system, use that system as a tool. So exactly. And I, I definitely encourage writing it out on paper and having that firm Bible, this is how we do things. And of course, it’s always amendable as we learn things and get through a trial and go back and say we could have done this better. Let’s change our process a little bit. You might
Steve Fretzin [24:43]
even you might even identify inefficiencies when you when you write out the process and you only macro this is like from the 70s like I need to, you know, there’s a bunch of things that I should be doing differently or automations. I should be inserting in here. So once we have that workflow created on paper through an end Take a software etc, then what’s the third, the third step to the next piece of the puzzle?
[25:06]
That would be to Well, obviously, it’s kind of a mixture of knowing who does what, and then creating your workflows and then plugging those people into the workflows, that is also going to help you in turn, if you didn’t do this now, and you don’t have staff, that’s going to help you determine who you need for for your practice. In general, I always tell the story of a personal injury client I had we created these huge, long workflows, I mean, we went into depth, because this particular individual had a hard time hiring people that already knew what they were doing, he felt he needed to spell it out for them, do this, ask for medical records asked for, you know, discovered this, this, this, this this. And then he was very shocked to find once we created these and now it was time to hire I said, I think you have a stronger need for a cheaper legal admin here than you do for the paralegal because you’re very much bottlenecking in that medical records requests dealing with documents filing. So it’s kind of a two part where you find out who that person is and where they’re going to fit into that process. And then looking at the volume of your cases, to determine what what hire you need to make now. And then once you make that hire, you’re ready to put them in that process, you have a clear vision of understanding back to square one, this is your job role. These are our workflows. And this is where you’re fitting into our processes. These are the people you go to for help.
Steve Fretzin [26:28]
But then there’s also some level of onboarding, relating to Alright, it’s day one, what is this person doing day one, day two, whether that’s work, whether that’s training, whether that’s live got to learn your systems? How do we deal with that is that that that’s, that’s got to be in there, right is this step three or step four?
[26:48]
Oh, of course, once we hire the person, and now this is going to depend on how you’re approaching either, if you’re if you’re hiring a contractor for 10 hours per week, the onboarding is going to look a little bit different than if you’re hiring a full time 40 hour per week, managing all the things on the case, you know, you’re really into each case. For instance, if you have a contractor, you’re just going to hire train onboard, you got to get them in those systems, get them into the workflow, and then start showing them how you’re going to delegate tasks to them, drafting motions, if they’re just paper pushing. Those people that are more the paralegals that are full time, in boots on the ground in your firm, or even working remotely full time as your employee, I would give them an entire week to familiarize themselves with your system. And I shouldn’t even just say a week, it depends on how complex your systems are. It depends on how large your case volumes are to give them that opportunity. I record how to do things you know, if you need to access this, I do little short, I use loom or zoom or something where you can record your screen just have that’s really good. I like that. Yep. And then giving them touchpoint meetings, maybe every night for 30 minutes an hour to say I need to I have questions on this, this this the mess, let me ask you these questions and then letting them continue to get through your processes. And then when they’re through that, it’s only fair to give your new hire a two hour, three hour half a day. Meeting team meeting to breed be brought up to speed on every single case, at least to some degree. I’ve seen too many times firms, throw them at a case and watch their paralegal or assistant spending hours just trying to understand the status of a case or where things are at. Versus it would take you three hours, four hours to run through them all and then say, okay, you kind of have a good knowledge of our open cases, you have a good understanding of our workflows, let’s now execute and ask questions for the next month as things come up, you know, understanding that they’re probably still going to be clunky until they get it down.
Steve Fretzin [28:49]
Yeah, and I think the key thing here is that, you know, you’ve got to be patient and put the time in, the more prepared you can be the better, but you have to put the time in to train somebody up properly. And it’s, it’s it is something that isn’t going to happen overnight. But you need to, you know, give them direction in a way that they can try to accomplish something, and then see how that’s going and then make improvements, improvements, improvements. And eventually you go from telling them exactly what to do to where they’re sort of like running themselves. And they’re helping you run the firm and run your your your practice without having to say too much. It’s all part of the process. And that’s when you know, you know, and then anyone that has that environment never says geez, I wish I hadn’t done that. Right at that point. It’s like you can’t go back. Now you figure it out, you have so much more free time to focus on the law and focus on BD versus having to do all the stuff in the weeds that you shouldn’t be doing as a as an attorney, you know, trying to try to build a practice. So really good stuff. Wow. I mean, we’ve come full circle with, you know, sort of like where the world is right now and then what people need to do to get staffed up and get prepared for being efficient. And then of course, you know how to actually, you know, in, you know, onboard and get those people lined up. So really good, really good stuff there. Let me ask you about your book that you submit a game changing book time everybody building a story brand by Donald Miller. Why is that? Why is that your favorite book,
[30:17]
you know, and maybe I should have picked a different book for the niche I am. And this is very much about learning how to market your business. But what I loved about it was that it helped me understand my role and my clients lives in a different way that was so impactful, and a mindset shift. So Donald Miller really talks about building that story brand of the story brand isn’t your story brand, it’s your client story brand. And I think we as individuals in the service industry, especially forget that we are not the hero in our clients story. Our clients are the hero, and we are their guide to get them to achieve what it is that they want to achieve. And it’s not saying that we put ourselves in that hero position because we’re, you know, conceited, or think high too highly of ourselves or anything like that. It’s that we forget that we’re not our clients hero. They’re our heroes. And we’re there to like the Yoda to the Luke Skywalker, we’re there to guide them to the mission that they are trying to accomplish. They already are the heroes in their own life and their own business, we just need to guide them to that solution. So that’s how I really felt that book. It was a page turner, very good book, highly recommend it.
Steve Fretzin [31:25]
Wonderful, wonderful. And Jacqueline, if people want to get in touch with you to learn more about Dell trust law firm solutions, what what what’s the best way for them to reach out
[31:34]
so they can find out my if you go onto my website, Dell, Dell, d l bash trust.com. And you’ll see there’s a area to be able to schedule a strategy call. It’s totally free. And all we’re going to do is strategize on what hiring you need to make. Whether that’s w 210 99. However, that may look, you can find me on LinkedIn, I’m out there. I’m sure you’ll have my spelling of my name in the show notes. Because it’s not an easy one to spell always. I’m on Facebook, I’m on Instagram, del trust. Just go ahead and find and reach out anyway. That’s most convenient for you.
Steve Fretzin [32:05]
Awesome, awesome. Do we meet through Molly McGrath? She was just on the she was just on the show like a week or two ago. But she is awesome.
[32:13]
Yeah, she’s amazing. I get to meet her in person in June. So okay, okay.
Steve Fretzin [32:17]
Yeah, I’m a fan. I hung out with her at the ABA tech show. And we had a blast, and she got out to watch my ping pong prowess. We go. We went out, we went out for drinks and some ping pong. Anyway, thanks, again for being on the show sharing your wisdom. I think we got into an area that we don’t spend maybe enough time on the show with which is not only delegating, but also how do we delegate in a way that’s going to get traction and results because I think that’s really the fear a lot of attorneys have. So I think it was really, we really hit the nail on the head with our topic today. So just thanks again. Appreciate it.
[32:51]
You’re welcome. Thank you so much for having me, Steve.
Steve Fretzin [32:53]
Yeah, and thank you everybody, for hanging out with Jacqueline and I today we had some really good conversation on a really important subject of delegation and hiring and onboarding and training and all that. And again, you know, it’s all about helping you be that lawyer be your best self and without being able to bring in good people underneath you, whether that’s a VA assistant, a paralegal, associate, whatever, very hard to scale and very hard to really be your best self. So hopefully you got some good takeaways from today, to be that lawyer someone who’s competent, organized and a skilled Rainmaker. Take care, be safe, be well, and we will talk again real soon, everybody. Bye bye.
Narrator [33:34]
Thanks for listening to be that lawyer. Life changing strategies and resources for growing a successful law practice. Visit Steve’s website fretzin.com. For additional information, and to stay up to date on the latest legal business development and marketing trends. For more information and important links about today’s episode, check out today’s show notes