Lee Rudin: Turning Purpose Into Profit In Modern Law

Steve Fretzin  [00:00]

Hey everybody. Steve Fretzin here, and if you’ve ever wished that law school taught you business development, marketing and time management, you’ll want to hear my new show, future rainmakers. It’s everything they didn’t teach in law school. But you need to know, check it out today, future rainmakers. But for now, enjoy the show.

 

Narrator  [00:19]

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. Steve Fretzin here, and thanks for coming to the be that lawyer podcast. This is the show where you’re going to learn how to be that lawyer, confident, organized in a skilled Rainmaker. You know, I want you to have some fun. I think, you know, things are stressful. I’m watching the news. I want to put my head through a wall. And I just think it’s good to just decompress. Listen to a fun podcast. Learn something and know that you know, you can kind of drift away for a little bit. So that’s what we’re going to do today. I’ve got Lee wait in the wings, and we’re gonna have some fun. We’re talking about PIM con rankings. Io is fantastic sponsor the show and pimcon, and we didn’t get to meet, but I had that go for you, that pimcon.

 

Lee Rudin  [01:18]

Slee, Steve, it went better than I could have imagined. I knew that the I knew that the opportunity was huge. I’m a young lawyer. It’s a young we’re a young firm. I saw folks like you and your peers on the stage, and I said, these are, you know, icons of the industry, like heavy hitters in their markets and throughout the country. The fact they asked me to be on stage, I was honored. And then I gave it everything I had in preparing, because I knew that if the opportunity hit, who knows what kind of doors it can open. And it’s just a good example of, you know, look, it started because I took a cold email and I actually responded to it, and that’s how the ball got rolling to open the door to Chris and the rankings team. And so it’s crazy.

 

Steve Fretzin  [01:57]

Awesome, awesome, yeah, and, I mean, the Nikki Glaser is their keynote. Basically, like, ragging on attorneys for about 10 minutes straight. I thought that was, like, the most uncomfortable and also the hardest I’ve laughed.

 

Lee Rudin  [02:10]

Material, Right? Steve, we give her material. We give her plenty of material.

 

Steve Fretzin  [02:14]

I thought you were saying, I gave her the material. I was that good of a writer. Really fun. And then, you know, you and I were kind of talking about, you know, living down in New Orleans, and I’ve got half my family down there and in the Mandeville, Madisonville area near you. And the last time I went down there, you know, it’s like, What time’s dinner? Seven o’clock. And I show up at seven because I’m a good soldier, and they hadn’t thought about dinner. And then at eight o’clock, we’re at the grocery. At nine o’clock, there cooking dinner. All right, you following along with what I’m saying. I’m losing my mind as a part of this experiment of having dinner with my lovely family down there. But anyway, it’s just the most wonderful place. If, again, I think if you can get into it right.

 

Lee Rudin  [02:54]

To embrace it. It’s so funny. I’ll tell you two things. I just was having this conversation with my wife. I’m sitting at lunch with my two little girls, and I’m talking to them about, like, where are we going for where are we going for dinner? And that’s like, a very typical New Orleans thing, right? People come to visit and you’re eating a great lunch, but all you’re thinking about, where’s our dinner reservation? Even though the thing in front.

 

Steve Fretzin  [03:11]

I was gonna say, that’s like a Jewish thing. Like, that’s what I’m thinking, Honey, what are we doing for dinner? Like, let’s start planning ahead.

 

Lee Rudin  [03:17]

Right. That too. But I said to you offline. I said, If New Orleans fits you, you become unfit to live anywhere.

 

Steve Fretzin  [03:24]

Yeah, I know, like, the first couple days I’m down there, my wife and I were looking at each other like, this would be so wonderful to live down here. And I think three to four days, and we’re like, you know, Chicago’s kind of calling us back, and they got a good we gotta get out of here. We gotta escape the asylum or something.

 

Lee Rudin  [03:40]

Well, we were in Scottsdale, and I said, Oh, this is beautiful. I could definitely, like, get a place out here. And then I realized that the play The times I want to get out of New Orleans, I also want to get out of Scottsdale, so Chicago and New Orleans would work quite well. Spend summers in Chicago, your winters in New Orleans.

 

Steve Fretzin  [03:55]

That might be the play. Listen, that’s the beauty of being not retired, but like getting up in the ages is like, you start thinking about how you’re going to do this and that and the other. My wife’s retiring from teaching in this year, and then two more years with full, like, tenure. So, like, we ran, I’m virtual so like that, that’s not off the table. But we will see. We will see. All right, we’ve digressed a little here in getting into the show. All right, let’s talk a little bit about the quote of the show. Now, normally people send me a quote from some philosopher or some famous person, and this you send it to me from The Wonder Years, which I immediately thought was the TV show, but it’s not. It’s a Philadelphia punk band. And that quote is, we put our faith in you. You turned a profit, which sort of summarizes, like, everything going on in our world right now, which is leading to, you know, bad news. But welcome to the show again, Lee, and tell us. Tell everybody why that quote. It’s kind of a unique quote.

 

Lee Rudin  [04:49]

Yeah. So I grew up. I grew up in Jersey. I was a pop punk, emo kid from the you know, my teenage years were in the 2000s I would take the train down from New York to Philadelphia and back and forth and see the. This kind of music, and this band kind of grew up the same age as me, and they’re still putting out music, so all their evolution and their growth tracks mine. Right now, they’re singing about their kids and what it’s like to be a grown up. And before, they were singing about probably drinking in basements and, you know, bar scenes and things like that. But this comes from one of their songs, and they’re talking about, like, taking care of people and what corporations and even America as a whole has evolved into being, right? Of course, we’re a capitalist society, and everyone runs businesses to make a profit, but some of these institutions that we know are for profit, but we think are out there to protect us, or at least help us in some way, and then all the time, like, we put our faith in them, and they turn a profit, meaning they don’t, they don’t try to take care of us. No. Insurance companies, healthcare providers, like, you name it. Yeah, and the stories are endless.

 

Steve Fretzin  [05:53]

I mean, one of my favorite movies is the Rainmaker that John Grisham movie, and I think it’s a, I’m trying to remember the director of that, but it was not Scorsese, was the other guy, but really, really good and, but like, you know, they have the insurance company screwing the policy owner and not paying out when someone gets sick. I mean, it’s, it’s across the board, and it’s, it’s, obviously, it’s just insane. But so let’s flip the script a little bit, and we’ll get into, like, some positive stuff about making a profit and building a law practice you can be proud of, and how you really help people. You can make money and be amazing at what you do and be, you know, saving people’s lives as you do. And I don’t know that I do, but I’m definitely helping them turn a profit to pay for, you know, health care for their families and such.

 

Lee Rudin  [06:38]

Sure. But yeah, Steve, when I was, you know, when I think about it, is that you can, the best thing about being a plaintiff, personal injury lawyer, right? Is that you can do well by doing good for somebody else, because your interests are aligned in that way. Yeah, you know. And so that’s always something that bothered me about being on the insurance defense side, because I was for a long time, and you would work your tail off, you do a great job. And then they, they’d look your your bill and run it through whatever system they have and say, Oh, we want to cut this. This took too long. I said, Didn’t we just deliver the exact result you wanted? That’s what you you hired me for. If we’re not aligned and you don’t trust that my judgment is in your best interest, why are you sending me work?

 

Steve Fretzin  [07:21]

Yep, everybody. You’re checking out. Lee Rudin, owner of Rudin law, and give us your a little flavor of your background. Obviously, you know, young, aggressive, hungry, you know, pi attorney. Mean, take us down that down the road that you went down.

 

Lee Rudin  [07:34]

I’ll do the quick, 1000 foot view. Right, say, Reader’s Digest. And then people right? I used to do that too, and I got that same feedback. Yeah, I’m originally from New Jersey. Came down to Tulane at the age of 18, stayed straight through to two lane law, same thing I said before. I just kept thinking, if I go back to the northeast, I’m never getting out. And I couldn’t think of a reason to leave. I just like it here. It fits me. So I’ve stayed. The city’s full of transplants, but also full of people that were born and raised and would never leave, and so it’s a fun place to be. I went to law school at Tulane thinking I was going to be a sports agent like Jerry Maguire, which is one of my favorite movies growing up, and ended up deciding that I should probably learn to be a lawyer. First got out, I got a job with a guy who was a transplant from the northeast, just like me. He was a trial lawyer on both sides. Had done, we did all sorts of stuff. So in some insurance defense, corporate defense, toxic tort, real estate plaintiff side work. So I got exposed to a ton of things. And then as my practice grew and as I moved to a couple different firms. The majority of my work was in injury work, mostly on the defense side, insurance, defense stuff with car accidents, slip and falls, that kind of thing. And I began to organically grow an injury practice on the plaintiff side, just by helping people. It started with my cleaning lady, and it was some guys that I knew who were complaining to our mutual barber about how they’d been scorned on the employment side. And after a while, that practice organically grew, and my last firm made me the offer I had to refuse. They said, Lee, like you’re doing quite well, but we want to claw back some money. We want to limit the cases you’re bringing in. And also, you know, this is a defense practice. If you’re building a plaintiff practice within it, that’s not really the idea. So I said, you know, I gotta go. And that was it.

 

Steve Fretzin  [09:30]

March into your own drama, right? I mean, there’s a lot, there’s, it’s almost like I’m hearing it every day, bad firm, cultures, closed comp plans and giving lots and lots of attorneys reasons to want to go out on their own or change firms. And it’s, I don’t want to say, at the highest level, maybe, that I’ve ever seen, but being in the industry for 18 years now, it’s like almost every day I’m hearing and talking with clients that are telling me like these stories and so but it’s. Scary to go out on on one’s own. Not everybody either feels like an entrepreneur or feels like they know. Like, what does it mean to be an entrepreneur that it’s really right for them? How do you look at opening up your own place, your hanging your own shingle? Like, what were your concerns and what were things that you realized maybe weren’t so challenging?

 

Lee Rudin  [10:18]

Think that all of the concerns that people have are valid in the sense that there’s so many components to a business that you didn’t learn about, you never got trained on. You never learned about it in law school. You probably didn’t learn about it at the firms you were at. I happened to take a shine to some of the operations stuff at various firms. I always wanted to know where was the money going? Because at the end of the year, you were going to tell me there wasn’t money for bonuses, for discretionary bonuses. I wanted to know where it was going, because I’m watching my numbers, and I see what I’m doing for you. The question is, how are you miss spending it? And it’s so funny, you a lawyer, Detective, that’s what I want to know. Yeah, as I was doing a little bit of scrutinization, but it’s funny. I talked to a couple managing partners recently, last two firms that I stayed close with, and I said, I have a new appreciation for the term cash flow. You would say it to me, and I now understand it. You know, that’s something we talked about offline, like building a big firm that’s big expenses, and if the money is not there yet. Someone’s got to pay him. The payroll doesn’t stop. The rent doesn’t stop. Case expenses don’t stop.

 

Steve Fretzin  [11:26]

Right. I mean, coming up as an entrepreneur, coming up in business, you know that the other, the other saying that people have heard is cash is king, you know? And like, you need to have cash. And so I always feel for people who are living check to check, or that don’t have 50, $100,000 like sitting in an account. And the goal that I try to help people with when they start their own firm, develop enough business so that you pay all your bills. You have every process set up and operation, everything set up, but you’ve got 50, $100,000 sitting in an account that you can invest and reinvest. And I’m not saying that’s easy. I’m trying to, like, downplay it how hard it is to start your own thing, but I think that’s when I knew, as an entrepreneur that I was okay when I was paying all my bills and I had that like, sack of money sitting in the bank that I knew, you know, would protect me.

 

Lee Rudin  [12:13]

Really call it the Oh shit, or the OH FUCK money, right? Like, Oh God, this didn’t come in, no way I wanted it to. Or it came in on a lag, and now I got to move money over just to cover the bill, whatever that bill might be. It’s not You’re not worried that the money isn’t there. It’s just not there right now, right, right? I just had this conversation with my pre lit team. I said, Guys, you don’t understand how important you are. You keep the bills getting paid by the cases. You move the lit cases. We know they’re going to take a long time if you’re not functioning and moving the pieces along the you know, the board, we do have a problem paying certain bills, yeah, at least in the way I want to do it, right, right?

 

Steve Fretzin  [12:55]

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Lee Rudin  [14:32]

Yeah, I’ve done it a lot, and the first thing I tell people is, figure out how long you can go without taking a penny. Okay? I tell people it’s probably 120 days at the earliest before you’re going to see a dime if you’re in a more traditional practice, right? So let’s say you Bill. Let’s say you’re of an insurance or an hourly client that isn’t going to pay you a retainer. If you bill the work that you do on day one, you’re billing it on day 31 and maybe you don’t get paid till day 60 or day 90. Okay? That’s the first money you’re seeing. I had clients when we came out. I was a hybrid firm to start that billed quarterly. So you might bill on day 90 and not get paid till day 120 same thing with a plaintiff injury practice. If you get a client on day one, they’re not done treating maybe for 90 days. By the time your demand goes out, the response, the checks in the house, you deal with your liens, you’re at 120 days. So can you and your family survive that that’s money coming in, then is what do I need to put out to begin to build that flow of new cases, new clients. Because, you know, we market, at least in my personal injury space, you mark, you can market a lot, yeah. And so you have to decide, what kind of appetite do you have to go, get those cases, get those clients to begin the flow of work, moving down the line.

 

Steve Fretzin  [15:53]

Yeah. I mean, I obviously it also helps if you are leaving with some clients, right? I mean, if you can bring, you know, 100 200 300 400,000 with you, you know, do you know, do that. And the other piece of it is it used to be you needed have an office and an expensive website, and you needed all this overhead. And I feel like, like never in history has there been an easier time to get into starting your own gig, not trying to play it off. That’s easy. It’s not but it’s never been easier, agree?.

 

Lee Rudin  [16:22]

Great. Steve, I started in my bedroom, in a bedroom at my house, right? I joked at PIM con, I was the butcher, baker, candlestick maker, you know, like I knew the guys at the FedEx all that, because I was there all the time, like, dropping that thing in the mail, dropping that thing in the mail, you know, then I added the local paralegal. And then what I think people really should be looking at, if you’re going out on your own, look at technology, see how you can leverage it, right with with AI, and even just, like more, I’m not even called AI, but like the very typical doc generation, you can do that’s rinse and repeat. I’ve got a couple cool tools that aren’t AI. They’re just very simple tools that you can use that will make you more efficient, because your time is all you have. And then I went and hired a bunch of folks offshore to start because they’re high quality talent. They are relatively inexpensive compared to an American, and you could have many bodies for the price of one domestic worker. So there’s a lot of value to me.

 

Steve Fretzin  [17:24]

Okay, yep, I love it. I love it. So then what should someone be afraid of? Like, what are the mistakes that can be made? Or what are the things that people come in and they don’t understand that, but they should.

 

Lee Rudin  [17:37]

Yeah, so I we, I’m advertising Injury Lawyer, right? I’m gonna I’m all for it. I don’t care what people think about well, how I do it, or what I do, but I thought about it this way, if you’re in business, what business would you ever start where you don’t tell anybody what you do, and if you’re good, you should want to tell everybody, because you don’t tell them who you are, they’re gonna hire someone who’s not good, who is telling them who they are? Yeah, and that’s, you know, when I was on the defense side. Obviously, the marketing is different, you know, it’s not as typical, but you got to be out there, shaking hands, kissing babies, asking for help, yeah? Because people are more generous than you would think. So don’t be afraid to go out there and, you know, say, Hey, I’m looking for work. I’d love to partner with you. Do you have anything you’re not working on? You’d be surprised how many people are willing to, you know, bring you on, because you’re a good lawyer. You just don’t have the cases yet.

 

Steve Fretzin  [18:30]

Yeah, okay, got it, got it, got it. So, all right, so that’s fine, but then, you know, you’re in there, and then it’s into your point, like, people need to know about you. So I’m I’m like, I like marketing and branding and I like business development. I lean towards business development because that’s my space. I’m not an agency, I’m not rankings, I’m not trying to be any that. But I think both are important. What, how do you build business? What’s your share with everybody listening of how you’re doing it?

 

Lee Rudin  [19:00]

Yeah. So my mantra was, praying for a referral is not a business plan. So, you know, folks are like, Hey, we’re a referral business. I’m like, Well, how do you go make sure those referrals are recurring? Because, you know, having a random client send you somebody is not a plan. So I’ve got a decent mix. We’re not we’re nothing is traditional. So we’re in digital we’re in social media. We’re doing SEO, which we’re very far behind in the race just because of how young we are, but we’re running some ads on meta, so Facebook and Instagram, we’re doing stuff on YouTube, kind of just trying to get out to the consumer in a similar way to TV, but in a much more cost effective way. We do a lot of grassroots stuff. So I sponsor the local independent pro wrestling promotion because I thought it aligned with my brand. I thought it would be a good opportunity for hand to hand combat. You know, I could meet people that could get to know me, they would hopefully like me, and then hire me because I’m affiliated. With this thing that they love. And I think that’s something that anybody can do. And then I create as much fun merch as I can, like stuff like this, and I try to give it out. It says, stop being polite. Right the front says, stop being polite. The back says, Get rude. Those are my two trademarked leveraging the name. I love it, leveraging the name. And again, this is something, you know, if you said to me, Steve Lee, I love that shirt, I would respond to you. Okay, give me your size, give me your address, and I’ll send it to you. We have a.

 

Steve Fretzin  [20:29]

I’m saying that let’s do a shirt swap, because I’ve got the be that lawyer podcast T shirts. I’ll send you those and you will swap.

 

Lee Rudin  [20:34]

Got it. Do a t shirt. I have a free on my website, on getrood.com, I have a free store, you pay the shipping, and you can pick out there. 

 

Steve Fretzin  [20:43]

Oh, my God, that’s so cool. Okay?

 

Lee Rudin  [20:46]

Because I figured if people want to wear my merch like that is the free advertising.

 

Steve Fretzin  [20:49]

Very inexpensive advertising, right?

 

Lee Rudin  [20:52]

How many leads could you develop for 10 bucks a lead? 11 bucks a lead like never, no. And I just think it’s a cool thing to do. And if I see people, which we do, like at all these different events, and they’re wearing our gear. I’m like, That’s how cool is that?

 

Steve Fretzin  [21:05]

Yeah, so people have a name like Rudin and can say, you know, stop being polite. Get rude. I don’t leverage my name necessarily externally, but frets in I do frets introductions, and I do frets inators for my clients, and little silly things I do, mostly internally. Someone that doesn’t have a name that’s workable, like that. How do you what are your thoughts on how they build a brand? Is, are there other elements that could go into it?

 

Lee Rudin  [21:31]

Well, this is what I said at PIM con because I thought about this because not I was lucky that my name worked in the space that we’re in, right? Like, get rude might not work if I was a trust and estate lawyer, yeah, right. Doesn’t have the same panache. But look, you can do it based upon how you look, who you are, right, your personality type, yeah, you can do it based upon something you love to do. Like, there’s folks around the country that are branded based upon hobbies they have or that, like, there’s a guy out of Texas who’s called the attorney that rocks. There’s a guy that Michigan called the skateboard lawyer. It’s different, and the key to all of it is being different so that you can be memorable. Because if you’re the same guy, I mean, I’m a white male, like, there’s a lot of us in this lawyer space, yeah, yeah. Why pick me over somebody else? You got to give them a reason. And, you know, like, my my angle being kind of the tough, rough, aggressive angle. There’s guys that do that too, right? There’s the hammer and the strong arm, no matter where you are, yeah. So it’s not like, it’s not like, it’s exactly unique, but it’s unique in my own way, right? And then you can always just make it up, right? There’s great brands around the country that are just made up, names that they think sound good, and it’s just a matter of pounding that name into people’s head.

 

Steve Fretzin  [22:44]

Yeah, yep. Sweet James comes to mind. I interviewed their seat, their COO, and it’s talking about, like, well, everybody called him sweet James. And so, all right, let’s just name the firm sweet James. And it works. And they you, they leverage the junk out of it for B to B attorneys and folks that aren’t in a space where, where you can get crazy and aggressive and fun, a professional in, you know, estate planning, or an M and A, or whatever, I would just offer to consider a differentiator of a specific experience that you have, or life experience, or just something you do better, faster, stronger than other people. Maybe ask your clients what makes me unique in this space and get some feedback. I’ll give a quick example, Greg, if you’re listening, you know who you are, intellectual property attorney, but he worked for the patent office. So you know what makes him unique? Well, you know, not only my patent attorney, but I worked in the patent office for many years. I know exactly how to get things done, because I worked, you know, to stop people from getting things done. And I know how to, you know, circumvent the well, who, who wouldn’t want that, right? Who wouldn’t want someone that knows the internal workings of a place that could stop your patent from going through? So just talk with your clients, but think creatively. And I think you’ll come up with something that you can leverage.

 

Lee Rudin  [24:01]

And don’t if you’re sitting on the other side of this listening, don’t think it’s easy. You know, when I’ve been probed, what’s your unique selling proposition? I don’t know. It takes a while to stew over. That’s why asking somebody else, Hey, why did you pick me over the other guy? And you’ll get some pretty good feedback. You put all those words together, and all of a sudden that salad becomes something you might actually want to eat.

 

Steve Fretzin  [24:24]

Right? Right? I love that. I love that. So then what are, what’s like a strategy that you’d suggest a law from looking to grow, keeping in mind, we’ve got, you know, pi and we’ve got every other practice area represented here. But is there one thing that you would routinely go to to suggest to attorneys looking for advice?

 

Lee Rudin  [24:40]

Yeah, well, I think that the thing we talked about before right technology, offshore staff, it just adds an element of being able to be bigger than you might be on your own, or that your finances might allow you to be and there’s, you know, we have a guy in house that he serves as a paralegal for us, but he’s a lawyer, and. Pakistan. He’s brilliant. He just isn’t licensed here, so we’re getting this great brain power out of somebody who just happens not to be domestic. If you care about people, and you care about doing right by people that are your clients, or people that you work for, go hire somebody who isn’t in the US, and give them a bonus that is relatively comparable to your folks in the US, and then see how much you’ve changed their life. When I did it last year, and I got tears from one and speechless from the other, because they just had no expectation of that. Yeah, it’s pretty awesome.

 

Steve Fretzin  [25:37]

Yeah, being generous is. It’s sort of like not. It’s not done as often as it should be. I think, you know, generosity and charity, it’s just becoming more and more challenging for people to do it, but I think it’s an important part of how we, you know, show appreciation, or how we get more out of people, or how we, you know, help people in their lives. Because we’re very, you know, we’ve got a lot going for us, right? I mean, we could be where we live and in our careers and all this stuff, and people just don’t always have it as great as me. But so why aren’t we sharing that? Sharing the wealth?

 

Lee Rudin  [26:10]

There’s a saying, and I’m probably going to butcher it, but like, people don’t remember what you say. They remember how you make them feel, right, right? You know? And there’s some of that where you can do something for somebody, and it’s going to be the indelible mark that you didn’t intend it to solicit a client. You didn’t intend it for any reason, besides, you were just trying to do the right thing for somebody. Yeah, and it’s going to pay you back in spades. You don’t know it yet, but you do enough of it, put it out in the world like it’s going to come back to you.

 

Steve Fretzin  [26:38]

Yeah, I love it. I love it. Well, let’s wrap up with what we love to call Lee’s big mistake. What’s going on Lee?

 

Lee Rudin  [26:44]

Yeah, so you asked me this before we came online, and I was thinking, you know, I when I went to law school, I had, I went right from Tulane undergrad to Tulane Law, and I had a bunch of friends that were doing a victory lap, and I thought that I was going to come out of Tulane, I kicked butt in undergrad. I was going to walk into law school and behave the same way and get my, you know, become top 10% and make the law review and all that. And I did not. I did. I underestimated the people around me. They were telling me all, I’m not studying for this. I’m not doing that. And all of a sudden, like they were in the library and I wasn’t, and my first year grades reflected that, yeah, but you know, in the end, if that had been the case, and I had done what I would have been capable of had I actually focused on it, I probably am not here. I’m not in New Orleans. I’m not running my own firm. I’m probably not. I might not even be a lawyer, because I might have gone to one of those white shoe firms in New York, and given my pound of flesh, and made a bunch of money, but hated being a lawyer, and it ended up working out for me, because I stayed here, I met my wife here, I got a job that I learned really well how to be a lawyer and what it’s like, what the practice is like, yeah, and I love it. I love doing what I do it. My practice has evolved in a way. So, you know, that can help people. And I really get some gratification beyond the monetary side of it. So two things to take away from it, right? You just things are going to happen to you in life, and it’s just a matter of how you respond, because you can’t control the stuff that’s already happened. You just got to figure out how to roll with it and make the best of it. And, you know, looking back, you might see something that might have been your worst day, and you realize, no, that was a blessing disguise.

 

Steve Fretzin  [28:27]

Yeah, we need to have a worst day, and we need to have lots of worst days, and so. And I was saying to someone earlier today, I mentioned this maybe too many times, but like, you know, I got a teenager. Now, my teenager is interesting because he and he’s at Colorado State. He only learns from making mistakes. He can’t learn by me telling him something or sharing something with him that might be really brilliant, not that that happens all the time, but let’s say hypothetically, I see something to him about living his life in a way you know, healthier or better or smarter, maybe using your calendar to remember when your classes are. I mean, we’re going there now. Okay, right? And but, you know, he misses a midterm and has to email the teacher to apologize and slept through or whatever, and like, that’s the only way it works for him. It’s got to be, you know, punched in the face three times, or maybe I’ll duck the fourth and so we can’t clear out all that for people, because that’s the only way that some people learn, and it’s the way most people learn, actually so.

 

Lee Rudin  [29:20]

What’s good on you, Steve, is that a lot of parents, they try to protect their kids from those things.

 

Steve Fretzin  [29:27]

Yeah, but coming to my wife, because she’s the one that’s going to try to save that, I’m not right,

 

Lee Rudin  [29:33]

Sometimes people have to save themselves so they can learn, yeah, you want it to happen to him because you don’t but.

 

Steve Fretzin  [29:39]

I explain to my wife all the time like this, like he needs to go through this pain, he needs to go through these challenges and get turned down or rejected or not get the job or whatever. That’s all character building. And I think, you know, adults, we know this, right? We’re living life, and we’re getting punched in the head all the time. But anyway, it’s but that that’s how we become who we become, right? I mean, it’s. You know that’s heaven and hell or angels and demons, right? You can’t have one without the other, because what would be the point?

 

Lee Rudin  [30:06]

Said, I let my hair grow a little longer than usually is, and now it’s getting gray. And I was like, I earned these. I don’t want to color them. I earn these.

 

Steve Fretzin  [30:14]

Yeah? So, and you know what? Eventually you end up like this, and your wife looks and goes, oh, you know my Yeah. So there you go, right, yeah. Like, okay. Well, listen, Lee, this has been an absolute pleasure. So much fun, and I appreciate you sharing your wisdom and helping lawyers who need to think differently about the way they’re going to, you know, market themselves, or the confidence to start a firm and and just so many wonderful things that you were sharing today that was very generous with your time and and meeting with me and doing this. So thank you so much.

 

Lee Rudin  [30:46]

Steve, I appreciate you having me. And you know, people were so kind with me when I came out, generous of their time, their resources. And if there’s any way I can help your listeners or anybody else, hit me up.

 

Steve Fretzin  [30:56]

So how do they hit you up? What are the digits? How do they What’s your website if they want free merch?

 

Lee Rudin  [31:00]

So get rude.com. The buttons in the top right hand corner phone number 833, get rude. You can find us on social at get rude law, we try to idiot proof it so you can find us if you’re looking.

 

Steve Fretzin  [31:13]

Awesome, awesome, awesome. All right. Well, let’s take a moment thank our wonderful sponsors, of course, as we talked about pimcon, of course, rankings, io, just unbelievable for PI firms. Check them out online law her podcast, amazing legal verse media, of course, and our newest sponsor, hire paralegals. So check them out. Elevate your legal projects by engaging with exceptional talent that will align perfectly with your requirements. So check them out. Everybody at hire paralegals.com thanks. Lee man, this was so much fun. I appreciate you. Thanks. Steve, likewise, yeah, thank you everybody for hanging out with us. You know, I don’t know if this was 25 minutes or 35 minutes. I lost track, but really, really wonderful stuff. And you guys, you know, go back and listen to some of the older episodes we’re on, like 550 or whatever we are, but you know, a lot of great stuff you can pick up. You know, we had to, you know John Morgan to my, my late great Larry. Larry the lawyer frets and at two episode 200 and John Morgan at 500 and a ton of other you know, great legal experts that you can learn a lot from. And also, don’t be afraid to check out my newest podcast that I totally forgot the name of. No, it’s called Future rainmakers, everybody. So again, if you’re looking to up your game, I’m giving direct advice to help you be that lawyer. So thanks everybody. Take care, be well, be safe. We’ll talk again soon.

 

Narrator  [32:31]

Thanks for listening to be that lawyer. Life changing strategies and resources for growing a successful law practice. Visit Steve’s website, fredson.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.