Drowning in emails, client demands, and late nights at the office? In this episode, you’ll learn how to use boundaries, focus, and smart delegation to transform your law practice from constant chaos into a business you actually enjoy running.
In this episode, Steve Fretzin and Elizabeth Grace Saunders discuss:
- Power of boundaries in time management
- Recognizing when your schedule has become a problem
- Niching and being selective about legal work and clients
- Setting and resetting client expectations around access and response times
- Delegation, email efficiency, and leveraging AI tools
Key Takeaways:
- Boundaries are one of the most powerful tools for managing time, and they start with taking responsibility for what you tolerate from clients, colleagues, and yourself.
- You have a time management problem when your schedule consistently harms your health, relationships, or client service—regardless of the number of hours you work.
- Saying yes to every kind of matter and every type of client creates “crazy” in a practice; focus on your true area of expertise and on clients who are a good fit and can pay reliably.
- Clear, consistent expectations around availability and response times—communicated up front and reinforced by your behavior—train clients to respect your time.
- Delegation, better email protocols, and AI tools that draft or prioritize messages can reclaim hours each week and free you to do higher-value legal and business development work.
“You need to be very clear within yourself and very explicit with your client when you are or not available.” — Elizabeth Grace Saunders
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About Elizabeth Grace Saunders: Elizabeth Grace Saunders is a time management coach, member of the Forbes Coaches Council, and best-selling author of The 3 Secrets to Effective Time Investment, How to Invest Your Time Like Money, and Divine Time Management. Since founding Real Life E Time Coaching & Training in 2009, she has helped thousands of individuals globally—including newly promoted professionals and parents—overcome burnout, reduce stress, and achieve work-life balance. Named one of the World’s Top 30 Time Management Professionals by Global Gurus annually since 2018, Elizabeth regularly contributes to Harvard Business Review and Fast Company, drawing on prior corporate experience at Meredith Corporation and Abbott Laboratories and her summa cum laude degree from Drake University.
Connect with Elizabeth Grace Saunders:
Website: https://reallifee.com/
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LinkedIn: Steve Fretzin
Twitter: @stevefretzin
Instagram: @fretzinsteve
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Email: [email protected]
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Call Steve directly at 847-602-6911
Audio production by Turnkey Podcast Productions. You’re the expert. Your podcast will prove it.
FULL TRANSCRIPT
Steve Fretzin [00:00]
Hey everybody, before we get to the show, just want to remind you that the Be That Lawyer community is up and running and rock and rolling. We have a lot of amazing business developer and rainmaking attorneys in there. We’ve got incredible content, courses, live events, and all kinds of ways to help you to be that lawyer. Check it out today at bethatlawyer.com/community, and other than that, please enjoy the show.
Narrator [00:29]
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 [00:51]
Hey everybody, Steve Fretzin and welcome to the Be That Lawyer podcast. Super happy that you’re here with us today. We’re doing this twice a week every week. Also don’t want you to forget about my sister company and in podcast, Future Rainmakers, combination of me answering questions. Sometimes I bring on some clients to share their experiences and wisdom, and moving forward in the next number of weeks, we’re going to be putting out more content where I bring in guests like we do here. Instead of me interviewing them, we together will be interviewed. So Elizabeth, you and I would be on the same side of the table answering questions instead of it just being me asking the questions. What do you think about that? Pretty cool?
Elizabeth Grace Saunders [01:32]
That sounds really cool.
Steve Fretzin [01:33]
Yeah, so I’m going to mix it up a bit. You got to keep things keep things moving forward and keep them moving moving around. I’m so happy that you’re here. We had just the most lovely conversation and was so thrilled to get you on the podcast and your quote of the show is a rock star quote. James Clear, he’s done a few things, right?
Elizabeth Grace Saunders [01:51]
Yes, just a few.
Steve Fretzin [01:53]
Was that Atomic Habits, right? Is that James Clear?
Elizabeth Grace Saunders [01:55]
Exactly, exactly. Oh boy, wow, what a good
Steve Fretzin [01:57]
book. I have to be honest though, with you and everybody listening, I never read the book.
Elizabeth Grace Saunders [02:02]
There
Steve Fretzin [02:03]
was a 22-minute video that was on YouTube that was like a breakdown of the book and I was like, Sold! I’ll just I’m going to watch that three times instead of reading the book. I got a I got a,
Elizabeth Grace Saunders [02:16]
but Good job being efficient.
Steve Fretzin [02:17]
That was me, yes. I was doing the James Clear be efficient by watching the video. All right, here we go. You teach people how to treat you by what you let them get away with. All right, so again, welcome to the show and tell us why you love that quote.
Elizabeth Grace Saunders [02:30]
Well, I love that quote because as a time management coach, and then also as a time management coach that has coached many attorneys, find that boundaries are actually one of the most powerful tools for managing your time well. And what’s amazing about that, you actually have the ability to impact what happens. And so that quote really takes you back to don’t blame everything around you for what’s going on with boundaries, look at how am I teaching people what is okay or not okay, and how can I shift that to improve my situation?
Steve Fretzin [03:07]
Yeah. And the lawyers who don’t set boundaries, and then they then they wonder why they’re getting crushed with their time because every little question from every little client is coming their way, every person at their firm is, you know, eating up their time. No boundaries.
Elizabeth Grace Saunders [03:23]
Exactly, and it it creates a firm you don’t enjoy versus one that you really thrive in and provide highest level service to to your clients.
Steve Fretzin [03:33]
Yeah, awesome. Well, we’re going to dive deeper into that time management and setting boundaries, things that lawyers Oh, man, do they need this like air. So, this is going to be an impactful impactful show for you guys listening today. Elizabeth Grace Saunders, now here’s something interesting. In my area, there’s a road Saunders that is attached to another road called Sanders. So, you actually drive down a road that goes Sanders into Saunders. It changes when you pass Lake County and Cook County. It’s very confusing, but you’re a Saunders. We’re never going to call you
Elizabeth Grace Saunders [04:06]
Sanders.
Steve Fretzin [04:07]
And you are in charge of Real Life E Time Coaching. So is that a founder, is that an owner, is that a president, what do you like to be?
Elizabeth Grace Saunders [04:17]
All the above.
Steve Fretzin [04:17]
If you call me what
Elizabeth Grace Saunders [04:19]
you like, I Auto Washer,
Steve Fretzin [04:21]
you know.
Elizabeth Grace Saunders [04:22]
Exactly, exactly. So I I did start Real Life E Time Coaching in 2009. So I was one of the first people in the world to pioneer the area of time management coaching. Right now, there’s a number of different people who might call themselves time management coaches, but when I started out, it was really a time when it was just emphasizing time management training. So it was more like the era of like David Allen getting things done and much more the style of let’s give you corporate training for half day, full day, tell you how to be perfect, and then leave you to figure it out on your own. Good luck with that. Yeah, of course. That’s that’s not easy for people that really struggle with time management. So I was like, wait a second. Like, change takes time. This is difficult. People need help. And so I founded the company, I continue to run it, continue to do the coaching because I love what I do. I’ve been doing this over 17 years and plan to do it many more.
Steve Fretzin [05:23]
Yeah, when they say if you love what you do, you never work a day in your life, and that is absolutely false. You still work hard, you just happen to enjoy what you work at. You still working, I still like weekends. You are
Elizabeth Grace Saunders [05:35]
you are working, yes. You are working, but Never work a day in your life, give me a
Steve Fretzin [05:39]
break.
Elizabeth Grace Saunders [05:39]
Really love what I do. So, I
Steve Fretzin [05:42]
You know, people that have jobs people that have jobs and they they just they get up on a Monday morning and they go, Ugh, and they groan and they moan. And I I don’t think you and I are doing that.
Elizabeth Grace Saunders [05:52]
No, not at all, not at all.
Steve Fretzin [05:55]
Yeah, just awesome, just awesome. So, what sort of was your interest in time man- Did you have like a a time management meltdown, or did you find yourself overwhelmed? Like, how does somebody get into specializing in this area?
Elizabeth Grace Saunders [06:10]
Great question. So I actually began my first business in 2005. So I began in the world of journalism. I ran a freelance company, so I did writing, editing, photo styling for about 50 magazines around the country. Really enjoyed the work, felt incredibly blessed to be able to have a business that was working for me. But I had absolutely no work-life balance, literally. Like it was like [10:00] at night, I got home from a business networking event and thought I should check email, or, you know, it’s a Saturday or Sunday morning and I’m like, Is it okay for me to take time off, or should I be working? And it was wasn’t that I wasn’t getting things done, I was. I’ve always been like a hard worker, but I just didn’t have balance, I didn’t have boundaries, and I was experiencing a lot of stress on a day-to-day basis. And I was actually okay with that at first, just because I was so excited my business was working, but after a few years, I was like, Enough is enough! Like if I can literally never stop working without feeling guilty, I don’t feel successful, regardless of whether like I look successful with what I’m doing.
Steve Fretzin [07:15]
Yeah.
Elizabeth Grace Saunders [07:15]
And so that really led me to figure out how not to work at night, how not to work on the weekends, how to get meet deadlines without being stressed out. And I didn’t do that to become a coach, I did that because I wanted to like my life, and my entrepreneur friends were like, This is amazing! You should help other people, cause we’re stressed out all the time. And so they really gave me the idea for for doing this, and that’s what led me to innovate in the area of time management coaching, and since then, coach clients on six continents and write books with Harvard Business Review and McGraw Hill and all that, all that good stuff.
Steve Fretzin [07:52]
There was a moment in my life, I want to say it was around 20 years ago, where someone asked me, Hey, remember that person we met at that networking event, John something or other, and do you have his number? And I said, You know what? I know who exactly you’re talking about. I don’t have his number, but let me look for it. Now, I want you to just imagine I’ve got three stacks of business cards that are about six inches high each, okay? I’ve got piles of paper everywhere, okay? And I start pulling these cards, and I’m going through them one by one. About 30 minutes later, I come I run into John, I go, I got it! And then I said to myself, Wait a second. What is this? What is going on here? Right? I’m 500, 1000 emails deep. I’ve got stacks of business cards. I got, you know, a brochure for Italy mixed in with proposals mixed in. I’m like, this is not okay. Like, this is not working for me. And so that’s really when I got interested in time management, picked up David Allen’s book, and started going through the painstaking process of the purge, or whatever we want to call it, of going of clearing out the clutter. A lawyer is hearing this story, and they’re going, Wait a second, Steve, that sounds like someone I know. Me! What’s the first thing they should be doing to start to get their mind in the right place that they they’ve got a problem? Like, recognizing, like first step of recovery is a problem.
Elizabeth Grace Saunders [09:14]
Yeah. Yeah. Well, and also, just to step back and to give perspective to this in terms of like, do you have a problem or not, there is a huge amount of latitude into what that means for each individual person. And so I work with individuals and attorneys in all different sorts of situations. And for some people, like working late quite a few nights or even working on the weekend, they’re actually okay with it, as long as they meet certain requirements like, I’m home by seven, eat dinner with my wife, or, I have like one day completely off on the weekend. They’re okay. And then I have on the other side of the spectrum, some attorney clients who own their own firms who are like, No, I’ve got kids in school. I’d really like to be wrapping up at least my client meetings by like [3:30] or [4:00], and be able to see them after school or be involved in different ways, or I’d even like to have a no-meeting Friday or a Friday I don’t even work, so that I’m able to have that flexibility in my schedule. So, there is not a one-size-fits-all solution for, do you have a problem? I would say you have a problem if you think you have a problem. So, if you’re Yeah,
Steve Fretzin [10:23]
I agree. But I think there are people who if it’s taking you 30 minutes to come up with a name, if it’s if you’re if you’re just, you know, it take you can’t get to your through your emails and you’re you’re Now you’re Now you’re not responding to a client need, now it’s affecting your life. It’s like I hate to think of like alcohol, but like if alcohol’s affecting your life and you’re not able to function in your job or in and in your relationships, you have a problem, you need to address it. So I think you’re right. There’s different levels of where someone may be, but I think the level that I hit was this is not okay. I cannot really live my life and service my clients and do the things I need to do if I don’t make a change here.
Elizabeth Grace Saunders [11:06]
Exactly. Well, and I think that’s where the nuance is. So, it’s not necessarily how many hours you’re working, because what that means for different people is totally different. It’s, is it working? So, are you taking care of your clients? Are you on top of your communication? Are you not fighting with your husband or wife every night because they’re annoyed at you for working late? Are you not having health issues where you’re going to your doctor and your doctor’s like, Your blood pressure is out of control. You need to calm down. So, that’s not working for you, and that’s objective. And so you may be experiencing that at like what some people might be consider not that many hours, or you might experience it a lot more. And so that’s really kind of It’s not so much the schedule, because that can vary, but the results and how it’s impacting you and is it creating a firm you want, a family you want, the health you want. Because if not, then, yes, you have
Steve Fretzin [12:00]
Okay. So then, back to my original question: If somebody finds themselves in a situation where they it is affecting their life, it is affecting their clients and things, what’s the first step that they should take to get to get to get
Elizabeth Grace Saunders [12:13]
in order? Yeah. So, I actually I really think with attorneys in particular, a top-down approach is really, really important. And so what I mean by that excuse me is that especially if you own your own firm, you need to start by looking at who you’re serving and what the focus of your firm and why that’s important is that I’ve seen attorneys create crazy for themselves by saying yes to every kind of work. So whether it’s like doing estate planning or doing real estate or doing like family law or whatever it is and creating like a very diffuse model where they’re not actually focusing on their true area of expertise, and so that’s actually where I would start at the very top. Like, am I making the choices about what I’m providing for clients and how I’m providing it to them, and am I willing to say no? So again, starting to set the boundaries to the things that are truly my area of expertise that take me longer, or to be fair, for whatever reason you just don’t feel you can bill for in the way that you need or want to, to be able to run the kind of firm you want. So that’s actually where I have everyone start, because if that’s off, then a lot of other things downstream from that are harder to fix.
Steve Fretzin [13:37]
Okay, okay. So what kind of business you’re bringing in and and just maybe recognizing is, yeah, is it right for you? I always think about it as, is it something I enjoy? Is it something where there’s abundance of that business, and is it profitable, right? So those three things align, but if you’re that, I don’t even remember the term of it, but like a door attorney, where anything that like walks in the door, I know there’s a better name for it than that, I just can’t remember what it is, but if anything walks in the door and you take it, and then you end up like on contingency on ridiculous stuff where you’re you’re billing insane hours, but not getting paid because it’s contingency, all that kind of stuff, that’s where I think people really run into get into a pickle.
Elizabeth Grace Saunders [14:16]
They do, and it takes them way longer because they don’t, it’s not really their area of expertise, and they ended up work working with clients that aren’t the right fit. So yeah, step one, are you being honest about what your firm really should be offering? And then actually the step two, right after that, would be: Are you working with the right clients? Because sometimes you are in your zone of genius, you are working with the right like type of law, but for whatever reason you’ve got client crazy, which, of course, lawyers are going to attract. Well, yeah, if you’re dealing with
Steve Fretzin [14:47]
crazy, you’re probably a litigator or a divorce attorney, but that’s okay.
Speaker 2 [14:50]
Yeah, yeah,
Steve Fretzin [14:51]
you know what I’m saying.
Elizabeth Grace Saunders [14:52]
So, you got it, yeah. So, you got it, so you’ve got to like figure out who are the right people who are good for you to work with and also can can pay their bills.
Steve Fretzin [15:01]
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Elizabeth Grace Saunders [17:01]
Yep. And that again starts with that internal game. So we talked about that quote at the beginning of, You get what you tolerate. So you need to be very clear within yourself and very explicit with your client when you are or not available. So whether it’s like what your meeting hours are, when you’re going to respond to email or other types of messages, how you’re okay with them communicating with you. And, of course, there can be exceptions to the rule. Like if you’re just about to go to trial and there’s something that needs to be attended to the night before, that’s totally fine. But what I recommend to my lawyer clients is be clear, decide what works for you, tell your clients that upfront, and then be consistent, because if you haven’t set expectations, that’s not their fault. Like they didn’t know that you couldn’t talk to them at [9:00] at night on a Tuesday, or whatever that looks like. So you got to start there, and then you have to refrain from engaging. And so what that often can look like is shutting down your computer, ideally having two different phones, so if you can have a work phone and a personal phone, and have the work phone like shut off or away from you when you’re at home at night and wanting to be present, either just yourself or to your family or whoever you have there, and you’ve got to be consistent. Because if you’re if you tell people one thing, but then you actually just text them back right away, no matter what time of the day or night it is, again, you’re teaching them like, Oh, that’s not really true. Like I can just expect a response right away. And the same is true with like email or other forms of communication. If you teach people, Hey, I’m going to respond to your email in two minutes, that’s what they’re going to expect versus if you say, Hey, you can expect a response by the end of the day or by the next business day unless it’s an urgent matter, and then you stick to that and have that boundaries, people will generally be fine with that. And if they’re not, again, it probably isn’t the right client and you’re going to want to move on.
Steve Fretzin [19:00]
So somebody’s already neck-deep in calls coming in and emails coming in. They’ve already kind of blown it from a standpoint of not setting those expectations.
Elizabeth Grace Saunders [19:10]
Right?
Steve Fretzin [19:10]
How do you flip the script and start changing things? Because once you’ve, you know, how do you put the toothpaste back in the tube, is another way to say it. But we know that it can be done, but you must have some steps or some language that you can share that would help people sort of figure out, Hey, I just heard this. I need to do this, and now I know what to do and say. Yeah, exactly. And this is extremely common. Like people come to work with me because they’re doing everything perfectly. Yeah.
Elizabeth Grace Saunders [19:35]
They come to me because they have like the crazy inbox, and the like people texting them on Saturday at [2:00] while they’re at their son’s soccer game. So this is this is all part of it. So first of all, sometimes with any new clients, I would be like ultra-clear. With current clients, there’s a few like little more subtle things that you can do that can often fix this without you necessarily having to be like having a super direct conversation. So one is just changing your behavior. So when you’re doing focused work on like reviewing a brief or working on a memo or whatever it is, shut off notifications on your phone or flip it over or whatever it is or put it on Do Not Disturb, so that you’re not even seeing what’s going on. And the same with your email, you shut off your notifications. You look at it just when you’re ready to in between meetings or when you’re working on different legal work that needs to get done. And just that in and of itself will start to change the dynamic because regardless of how often people contact you, like you’re contacting them at the time that works for you.
Steve Fretzin [20:43]
Yeah.
Elizabeth Grace Saunders [20:43]
And that like slows the flow of communication. You could also do something that’s like clear, but not having to have a one-on-one conversation with everyone. Some people I’ve seen even put in their email signature. So they say like, I’ll be available to respond to incoming inquiries between [9:00] and [6:00] Monday through Friday. If there’s something urgent outside of that time, please like contact this person or please text this number, or whatever that is. So that’s another way you can put that in place. If you start to do this, and because it’s very different behavior than what clients are used to, and you get a client that, let’s say, like you don’t respond within 10 minutes, and then they like start emailing you every 2 hours, and at the end of the day, you’ve got three emails from them about the same thing, two things. One is, absolutely fine to have conversation with them and just say, Hey, I know that this is what you’re used to. I know you’re used to that. I want you to know everything’s okay. I promise I will get to you, even if it’s not in 10 minutes. You now expect a lead by the end of the day or next business day, whatever standard you want to set, or 48 hours. And then also, depending on the type of work you do, if you are someone that does billable hours, you’re not wrong or bad. And I know lawyers do this, to tell them, Every time I touch something from you, you know, that will be billed six minutes. So if or 15 minutes or whatever the increment is. So like if you send me three emails about the same thing, you know, I’ll need to to account for that. And that can again, deter that from happening again, or even keep it from starting. If just right up front in the client engagement you say, If you need something from me, make it consolidated in a single message or email. Because every time I touch something, the minimum billable is this, and I want to make sure to use your funds as wisely as possible.
Steve Fretzin [22:39]
Yeah. Well, I think a lot of it isn’t about what you say, it’s about how you say it, right? It’s the approach and the softness in your voice and the way that you’re gonna, you know, apologize that, you know, I didn’t set, you know, better, you know, expectations early on. This is how, you know, I I’m going to be able to work on your stuff and everyone’s stuff more efficiently. Like setting up that little like those softening statements to lead into this stuff generally will take some of the heat off of being like, you know, I’m not gonna call you back in 10 minutes, or whatever, you know, just something that you’re you’re getting frustrated with them.
Elizabeth Grace Saunders [23:12]
Yeah. Well, and I also find, as long as you’re consistent, people are usually okay. Like for example, my protocol is I I respond by the next business day. So people don’t hear from me right away, but I always respond by the next business day. So people don’t get nervous, like, Oh, I’m not gonna am I gonna hear from Elizabeth or not? It’s like, no, I know I’m gonna hear from her, it’s just not gonna be immediate. And so, if you can actually provide more consistency, so clients aren’t having like either you respond in five minutes or you don’t respond for two weeks or completely forget, you’re actually providing a better client experience
Steve Fretzin [23:44]
Yeah.
Elizabeth Grace Saunders [23:45]
for everyone.
Steve Fretzin [23:46]
And what about also leveraging your team, right? Like you don’t have to be the one answering the emails or or the calls if you set expectations of the team or, you know, my my assistant Jonathan is going to be handling, you know, the, you know, if you need something, you’re going to want to talk with him and it’s, you know, he could probably handle 80% of what you need as part of this, you know, team, and then if something needs to be escalated, elevated to me, I’m here for you 100%. But now 80% of the calls that you were getting from this client and how it was eating away your day, right, might be alleviated. So talk through that a little bit more.
Elizabeth Grace Saunders [24:22]
Yeah. Delegation is amazing, and there’s obviously a little nuance in this with lawyers because like legally and confidentiality, there may be some things people can or can’t see depending on what work you’re doing. But that being said, in some instances, you can have paralegals or office assistants be helping with your email. So helping manage it, answering the things they can answer without you necessarily needing to be involved in every little thing that’s coming to your inbox. If you’ve really struggled with this before and had terrible boundaries and need people to start contacting other people, you can even set up as an autoresponder, and I’ve seen people do this at first, where you know, for a month or two, as you’re retraining everyone in a new way, that each message gets a reply that says, Hey, thank you so much for your message. We’re working on being more efficient with our staff. If it’s an inquiry about billing, contact Carla. This, you know, if it’s an inquiry about like the status of your case, contact you know, our docket manager, whatever it is, and they just literally have basically the decision-making tree of who to contact to get responses as quickly as possible. And so that can be another way I’ve seen people dig out of being the person that’s fielding every question, even though it doesn’t really relate to them.
Steve Fretzin [25:46]
Yeah. But delegating your inbox the best you delegating the inbound calls best you can, and you do the math on that. Lawyers listening right now and you go, Holy mackerel, wait a second. If I was looking at 25% of the emails I look at now, if I was taking on 25% of the calls that I take now, how much more productive would I be? And what’s the path to that? I think that should be the next question is what’s the path to that, and who do you have in your office or or what kind of you know email system can you set up that’s going to allow for that. And I think with AI, too, it’s there’s going to be a lot more automated stuff going down. So you know, when the emails come in and it’s clear that that email is just setting up a meeting or setting up a next step to get together to review what you got to review, the AI will pick up on that because it’s seen a thousand of those emails before and can quickly, you know, maybe you just have to hit send or have your assistant hit send. But it should. I mean, I’m using an auto emailer now where I’m not really constructing many emails. It’s just taking what I’m getting in and automatically completing it. I just review it, hit send. That’s five minutes added up, five minutes, five minutes, five minutes, and you start realizing you get an extra hour, two a day. Well, what’s that? Two hours a day is like an extra week every every month that you’re now adding to your to your day or to your your time, so.
Elizabeth Grace Saunders [27:11]
Yeah, absolutely. Totally crazy.
Steve Fretzin [27:14]
We have time for maybe one more quick answer before we get to our final question, which is is there any other email hacks that you have found to be really effective to help people take some of the weight off of the 200, 400? I mean, I play email games with my clients, like who has the most emails in their unopened in their inbox. What’s a hack that you’d rec- that you see and that you help lawyers resolve?
Elizabeth Grace Saunders [27:37]
Right. So, what I Well, one thing I’m seeing a lot that you just mentioned is, in particular, clients using Copilot to help draft their messages, and or if they don’t like typing as much, just speaking out their replies and then having Copilot clean it up. So, that’s been like a huge thing that’s been really helpful. Also, something you can do with Copilot, with Outlook, is to ask questions like which emails should be flagged that are in my inbox, or which flagged emails have I not responded to yet. And basically, it can even help you with prioritizing and sorting and figuring out what should be a priority and if you’ve been on top of it. So, that’s something that I’ve seen people use very effectively and get through their inboxes a lot faster. So that’s just definitely been, I think, the next level that you’re seeing right now in terms of email efficiency and what in what people are doing for sure.
Steve Fretzin [28:36]
All right. Well, half a dozen to a dozen takeaways later, we’re wrapping up with our final question. What’s Elizabeth’s big mistake?
Elizabeth Grace Saunders [28:44]
Yeah, so I wanted to share this in particular because I know you focus on marketing for firms. So, my big mistake with my business was when I started out, I completely miscalculated what my niche would be. So I was a young female entrepreneur, and I was like, Well, there’s not that many of me, and at the time, particularly, there weren’t that many young female entrepreneurs. And I was like, Business owners are stressed out, so that must be my niche. And so my entire website was all about women business owners, thought color pink, all that. And again, at the time I was one of the only time management coaches in the world. And what I discovered is that that was actually not my target market. My target the people that ended up coming to me, despite my marketing, were both men and women. So I’d have men reach out to me like, Well, you work with me, too. I need help. And then I attracted both people that like own their own firms or own their own businesses, as well as many people that were employees of companies who were just stressed out and overwhelmed and wanting my help. And so, I feel like the the big takeaway I got from that is don’t assume you know who values what you have to offer. Allow allow the market to tell you what you’re attracting and who values things, because I found that although, yes, young female business owners did need my help, they often wanted to invest more in like pure business coaching versus people at different phases of their business or career or employees actually did value that work-life balance more. So, huge learning lesson. Thankfully, I overcame that and since then coach many people all over the world, both men and women, and really enjoyed the ride.
Steve Fretzin [30:38]
You’re definitely in the right niche with with lawyers. I mean, talk about needing help in time management. Holy mackerel!
Elizabeth Grace Saunders [30:44]
Yeah.
Steve Fretzin [30:45]
It’s not my full-time gig, but I have to know enough to be dangerous because how do lawyers do business development and marketing and branding and all that without getting their act together? So I’ve got to do that, but I also love to refer out to, you know, people that are specialists because they might, you know, they might need more than just a little handholding, right? So Right. I love that you’re in the space. And, want to take a moment to thank our incredible sponsors, lawyer.com and PIMCon coming up soon, Personal Injury Mastermind Conference, and, of course, Lex Reception. Well, there’s a a delegation tool right there, right? Get someone to answer your phones for you and do it in a professional way. Elizabeth Grace Saunders, people want to get in touch with you. They want to, you know, find out more about your business and how you can help them. What are the digits?
Elizabeth Grace Saunders [31:31]
Yep, the best way to find out more is to go to my website, so that’s reallifee.com, that’s r e a l l i f e and then another e as in elizabeth.com. Or if you want to email me directly, it’s esaunders, which is s a u n d e r s @reallifee.com. And I would be delighted to help you be less stressed in your firm and make more money because when you get your time in order, I’ve seen people be able to shoot through their previous revenue records to the point where they’re easily able to hire more staff simply because they’re not wasting as much time spinning their wheels. So, would love to help you be very successful in that regard.
Steve Fretzin [32:18]
Yeah, time is money and time is the one thing you can’t get back. I mean, you can always, you know, bill another hour, but there’s time for business development and there’s time for, you know, family and and free time. And like we, you know, we need to take it, make I, you know, just if you’re not if you’re not becoming a master of time management, I just don’t know, like I don’t know where I would be right now if I didn’t do that 20 years ago. I just don’t know. But being paper-free, zero inbox, taking off Fridays, I mean, I’m still working a lot, but I’m doing it in such an organized way, and I think lawyers need to emulate people like you and I, not because we’re our egos are so big, but because we figured some things out that really allow us to live a phenomenal life that’s pretty stress-free. And I know that’s not going to happen for everybody, but that’s the goal is to try to get it as stress-free as possible. So, thank you so much for coming on the show, sharing your wisdom. I’m I’m just thrilled that we were able to get get this together and and put out some great information for my audience.
Elizabeth Grace Saunders [33:20]
Thank you. I really appreciate you having
Steve Fretzin [33:22]
Yeah, my pleasure. And thank you, everybody, for hanging out with us for the last 30, helping you build your book, own that future, and be that lawyer. Take care, everybody. Be safe and well. We will talk again soon.
Narrator [33:37]
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.