Creative Competitors - episode 2

So here we are at the Nashville City Club. They've been gracious enough to let us film episode two of our program. Good to be here.

It is good to be here. We thought we were busy last time, I think in episode one, but we're, I think we really found out what busy is the last two or three weeks.

It's been a long month. It's been an exciting month. A lot of progress. A lot of really cool updates to share with everybody out there. One of the questions that we had after the last video, the remarks have been, for the most part, very positive. But people were saying, well, what's the point? What's the long term goal of what you're trying to do?

Right. And we gave them a clue. Right. Because we said episode one. And I think part of it is we weren't exactly sure what we were going to be doing with it. Episode one was just us recounting, you know, our backgrounds, how we got to day one. And we kind of left the rest up in the air. Right. Other than the broad principles we laid out.

Right. I mean, the main goal is we want to communicate, we want to be transparent with people. We want to sort of explain to clients what we're about. We also want to be able to reach out to attorneys and give them an idea of how we market our practice and the things that we're doing. So after some discussions, we've narrowed our focus to what we're calling creative competitors. And that's sort of the title of this video series, creative Competitors. And the reason being?

Well, I think the same principles that apply in athletics business, pretty much any, you know, any sphere you can operate in, you know, the same success principles in one apply to the other. So why limit ourselves to business or lawyers?

Right, Right. So the focus of Thompson Burton is to focus on business. We're a transactional firm. All things business we can handle from startup entrepreneurs, commercial real estate. With my niche, the vision is we want to be able to service businesses young, old, no matter what sector.

So part of this video series is we're going to interview folks in all of those spheres. Not just commercial real estate, not just direct sales, but athletics.

Right. I think with creative competitors, it's a broad enough umbrella where we can interview not just business people, which that'll be the majority of what we do. We can talk with athletes or people that run businesses from their homes, or struggling musicians that are trying to compete creatively because the principles of success translate whether you're an athlete or a musician or a successful business. The principles are the same. And so Walt and I are very competitive. It's one of the synergies that we bring to the firm. I think it's what makes us successful. And it's interesting. It's interesting for me to talk to successful people and competitive people. And so that's what we're going to do.

Right. And if our clients are interested in coming on the show, we're going to interview them as well.

Absolutely. That's the plan. So creative competitors. This is episode one, I guess you can say, but it's our second in the video series. So this past month, I just want to say you and you're bashful with numbers as you should be. You've always been very modest, but I've been very impressed with your ability to learn fast, compete. And it needs to be said that you've matched and or surpassed the income that you were bringing in at a big firm. You're charging less for your hourly rate. And I think you have a better lifestyle and more time with your family. It just needs to be said.

Well, I think if you say time with family based on hours actually billed to clients, I'm definitely billing less time. But given all the demands of getting the law firm up and going and getting, you know, learning the new systems and stuff, I'm definitely working hard. But given the systems that we put in place, I am more free to get away and do things with Melissa at lunch or pick up Liam from school. I'm definitely able to get away.

Yeah, I think it's really, that's one of the benefits of the firm is, number one, everything begins and ends with client satisfaction as long as quality work product is being produced.

That's right.

Right. That's the main goal. And based on what I've read from your clients or some of the remarks that you've shared with me, they're very, very happy with the quality of the work that you've been producing.

Well, and I think what we've been doing the last two or three weeks is building this vision that we kind of laid out in episode one. Right. Our emphasis was cloud based systems. We want to be innovative, we want to be efficient, we want expenses to be, you know, as low as we can get them without sacrificing any client service at all. So that's pretty much what we've been doing the last two or three weeks, is building those systems not just for us, but so we can scale them when we start hiring other attorneys.

That's right. Stephen Covey talks about, you begin with the end in mind. And so we could easily say, okay, we're going to focus on the Middle Tennessee area and build a practice that way. But we're thinking a little bit bigger. And the question that we're constantly asking ourselves, number one, is the client experience good? Does this work? And number two, does it work with 10 attorneys? Does it work with 100 attorneys? We're asking those questions. So with all of those principles in mind, we've sort of figured out this whole document management system.

Yes.

Yeah.

Although I feel like we've just touched the surface, like only in the last couple days, I think you and I have been sending some invites to clients to join our. To collaborate with us on the server and comment on documents. You know, upload documents, download documents directly to a server, not via email, which is huge. That's a game changer in my mind.

Between you and I, it's really, really nice. And we knew it was an amazing system, but now that we're actually interacting with clients with the service and they're giving us feedback, they love it. One of the. Obviously, document management is a huge cornerstone piece to a law firm because we sell information.

Absolutely.

And so we needed to make sure that the systems that we used were best in class. As a solo practicing attorney. Pre Thompson Burton Dropbox worked. It worked fine. Dropbox is a household name. It works okay. It has all your files in sync between your systems. But at the enterprise level, it doesn't scale. There are no collaborative features.

Well, it would have worked for you and I probably, and we would have made it work. But we're thinking bigger, right. We're thinking it's not just going to be us two, it's going to be other lawyers in our office and in other cities, who knows?

Absolutely. So we look for best in class in that category. And we found a Service that various AMLOD 100 attorneys are using or law firms are using.

Not many. Not many.

Not many. And Proctor and Gamble uses the service mtv Disney. A few big name companies are trusting their data with this particular service.

And I think we had two very pressing questions for the consultant from the server firm that we asked them that we were very serious about. One is security and two is reliability.

Right, right. Well, redundancy, everything is triple backed up.

And redundancy. Right.

Everything is triple backed up. I'm not even smart enough to quote all the security features, but this thing is as secure, above class, above trade security that's out there. And reliability. I think he said it was 99.9% uptime I think.

Well, two minutes. In five years it was down two minutes of downtime.

Now that's the cloud service. Keep in mind that the files sync to our hard drives.

That's right.

To where we still have access to the files. Worst case scenario for those two minutes.

So we've been doing other things cloud based as well. I know. I interviewed an accountant last week and I think the same day you engaged an expense consultant who is knowledgeable in cloud based accounting.

Right.

So that's kind of set us in that direction. Not just, not just with our information and knowledge, but also the numbers side of the equation. Going to be cloud based and have that access to information just like our files.

Well, that's important. We need applications that are first class, but we also need access to those applications from a browser. That way, when we travel, when we're away from the office or when we hire somebody, we can plug them into these services very fast and it's easy to understand. And so from an accounting standpoint, we've got immediate access from our phones, from a computer, no problem. It's not reliant on a particular machine.

And one thing that we talked about I think maybe a week ago is we want to make sure we don't trip up in this process and do something that's going to be either difficult to reverse or is going to cause us problems. So we hired an IT consultant as well. Right, right. And we met with him for a couple of hours and I can think of probably the one thing that came out of that meeting that you're most pleased about. But definitely he made it very apparent the problems I was experiencing with Outlook specifically were not unique.

Right. Well, the IT consultant was necessary because he gave us a process that we can repeat with other people in the firm, with secretaries, with future lawyers. These are the steps we follow to integrate them to our systems. The challenge that we had was that we have Apple machines which are just fast, reliable, they never break. We both love them. We've got various online applications that interface with Apple. And then you threw in Microsoft, which makes Outlook. And those three services just weren't working really well with each other.

It works well with Microsoft Word, but Outlook, if I would accept an appointment, it was crashing. And everyone knows Melissa sends me invites all day long for my calendar. So every time she sent me an invite, my Outlook would crash.

Right. So, yeah, so these are the sorts of growing pains that we have. But we figured it out. We have, and it's part of the learning curve and it's been fun I mean, it's been hard work, but it's fun learning about.

That's right.

Ways to collaborate with each other and ways to collaborate with clients.

And I think the key is, and we talked about this just before the show, we're getting faster. Right. We're learning it. Getting more efficient. I think I've been kidding around that I've moved from beginner IT stage to I'm at intermediate now. Right.

I'd say you said that about a month ago, and I didn't think it was deserved. I think now it's deserved. You were officially intermediate.

Six months ago. I was making fire with Rock.

That's true. So one more thing about our whole document management system, which we just both love, the ability to share files with clients and to share access to particular folders. That's amazing. We can control. We have multiple permissions that we can give these clients. So if we want them just to be able to view the documents but they can't upload anything.

That's right.

We've got that kind of control. We can give them access to edit documents. We can have conversations with the client on individual documents.

That's right.

Which is pretty amazing. Which is really nice because it focuses our attention on the particular matter at hand.

And I think in any major transaction, the documents are flowing traditionally at big law firms who are doing the big transactions through email. Right. Lawyers are sending those documents back and forth, and email works. But this system is so much better. It gives you much more control. I think it gives, you know, I think everyone who's listening, particularly people who have worked on deals, have lost track of that email that's somewhere in their folder that they just can't find. I. I think with this system, all the commentary is right there with the document and it's in the server and you can see it. So I'm pretty excited about it.

I'm very excited about it. That was a big problem and I think we solved it in a big way.

I think so, yeah. We're both excited about it.

Now back to the idea of you having a great month, which. Congratulations. I'm really proud of you. I'm not surprised. I know you're bashful. I know you're bashful. But the model is working.

It is.

The fact that you can charge a little bit less while providing the same quality service is a big deal. And you still have the flexibility to spend some time with your family.

What seems like a little. I'm actually charging about a third less. So I think it's beneficial for Everyone, right. It's beneficial for the client. If I am more efficient and my expenses are under control, then hopefully me and any other attorney we bring on would be able to actually do better while not working, not working less hard, but just more efficiently working smarter. Smarter, exactly. There is a difference.

And so the question is, okay, are you guys big enough to handle big clients? And so the answer that we have is that attorneys are actually approaching us now, which is fantastic.

Right?

Because I think they see the potential in what we're putting together.

So what you're referring to, I think is that someone actually approached you. We didn't approach them. They approached you and said, I like what you're doing, I want to be a part of it.

Absolutely. And so that did happen. It happened very recently. As we scale, we can find really, really quality attorneys that are willing to plug into the system.

Right.

And scale the business. So if we need a litigator, we can get one. We need an IP attorney. We need. We can get one.

Right.

And we will.

Right. I think the interesting thing about that is he approached you directly and raised the idea of potentially join us. I can't tell you how many conversations I've had, and maybe they're just entertaining me, but kind of in jest, they were like, man, I wish I could join you guys. So anyway, I think we're, I think, I think what is attracting those people is we, they can see we're having fun, we're doing something that I think is worthwhile and at the end of the day, hopefully is rewarding both personally and financially and professionally.

Right. In order to be a successful business firm, company, whatever, you need to have a really good culture. And I think you and I, that's one of the utmost priorities. Attorneys need to have a good experience. And it's really good because I can see that you're having a good experience. When we first started talking about it, we kind of knew that we could build something that works, but it's just good to see it in practice.

Right.

I see you with, with your son Liam. I see you doing great work. The whole work life balance is better.

Right.

And I think that we're not bragging, we're not being arrogant. I think we have just a more agile model appealing for attorneys.

So. And I think that's a good segue. So one of the reasons we're building this cloud based system is to not only service our clients better. Right. And have access to a file sitting here in this room from our iPhone, from a remote, you know, client location. If we need to access our files, you know, we're building it. So location is not as important. Right. If we're in the office, out of the office, you know, at a client's. Client's location. So I think that's important. And as a side benefit of that, I think it frees us to be with our families more, to be more flexible with our schedule, etc.

No, that reminds me, that's one of the reasons why I started thinking about starting my own law practice was that I was visiting with an attorney, and he was in his upper 60s, one of the nicest guys I've ever met. Just an incredible man. But he was saying that he has never been away from the office for more than two weeks his entire career.

Right.

And I thought to myself, if I keep on this current track, that's going to be me.

And don't you think the culture that I think is bred in a lot of law firms is that. That would be a badge of honor. Right? The badge of honor is I have never left the office for more than a week in my 30 years of practice. And I think that work ethic is admirable. But I think what we're building is something different. That's a work ethic that's built on the billable hour and being in the office, that's kind of a sign of productivity and making money. I think our focus on the row work environment, which we mentioned last time, a little bit, and less focus on hourly rates, more on fee arrangements and that sort of thing. Hopefully lawyers are able to get out of the office, and maybe it makes more sense to go to the client and work from the client's office. Or maybe for efficiency purposes, maybe it is better to take a week vacation. But I think that's something we're going to perfect as we move forward.

The beautiful thing is that with the billable hour model and most law firms, you have to be in the office to produce, and you have to sell your time. It yields a certain lifestyle. When you eat what you kill, it's up to your own personal ambitions. And you and I, make no mistake about it, we work really hard. But back to the story. When I was meeting with the older man that's never been away from the office, I thought to myself, I've got to build a model where I can take my work with me, actually build some memories with my family.

So. And I think you're about to do that. You informed me last week that I needed to watch your dog for a couple days. I Did while you go to Thailand with a client. Right. The client invited you to come speak to their group in Thailand.

Absolutely. No. Yeah, that's. It's like a dream come true. The client actually invited my wife and I on an expense pay trip to Thailand for a week. Literally on my bucket list I had go to Thailand. And so when he called and made the invitation, I snapped my fingers, I said I'll be there. And I didn't have to think about, well, what's going to happen at the office. The fact is I'm going to bring my laptop. They're going to have an Internet connection. I've already checked. I can still service the clients the way with the level of expectations that they deserve. But I can get away and have a remarkable trip with my wife and.

You and I won't miss a beat because we already Skype from our offices because we're not in a central office location right now. We can do the same thing with you in Thailand and me in Nashville, Tennessee.

Yeah, no, the work product's not going to drop. Going to have an amazing time. Check one off the bucket list and.

You'Re going to service your client and.

I'm going to meet with clients and service the client. I'm actually providing you with some videos while I'm there. It's going to be a fun trip. Got some ideas in mind, but I don't want to share them with you.

So.

Yeah, so I think that mission of building a model where I can get away from it, this is validation for me. It's proof that, okay, we're on the right track. And before the Thailand trip, I'm actually taking my family to Florida. So the idea of being away from the office for two weeks, it's already going to happen.

But you're still going to be productive and you're still going to work. And the results oriented work environment very much in effect.

Absolutely. I actually anticipate a record month in May. I think that's going to happen and that's going to happen while I'm traveling. May's pretty is pretty much a busy month for me. And so based on the way my business is going, it's going to be a good month. I'm not going to miss a beat.

It's pretty amazing.

Yeah, that's the point.

So I think the Thailand trip, I think obviously it's on your bucket list. It's something important to you. But, but I think another principle, and another principle that Thomson Burton stands for is client satisfaction, client interaction, client development. Right.

Well, yeah. So on the back of our business card, and I give you the credit.

For this, we put relentless pursuit of client satisfaction.

And the proof is in the testimonials that we have on our website. I've been collecting testimonials for a long time. I've got over 40. You're going to have a lot. You've got a lot of stuff.

I don't have quite that many.

Yeah, but you just started. So to have a client give you praise publicly, that's a big deal. So let's go ahead and wrap it up. We've covered a lot of stuff. We've covered the past month. We've covered our intentions of scaling the model and building systems at scale. And I'm really excited for the future of the firm. It's just going to be a fun ride. One more announcement. Mr. Burton here just launched his website, the reattorney.com the reattorney.com it's the realestate attorney website. And you're going to be promoting your own brand and creating content on that particular platform.

That's right. We talked about this a little bit in the last episode, but the idea is that people don't interact with the law firm. They interact with the brands, as we call it. Those are also known as practice groups.

So.

So Kevin has his page, themlmatorney.com and I've created a similar page, the reattorney.com so for specific practice area, brand type announcements, information, you go to those individual brand pages.

Absolutely. Or content. So as people search for commercial real estate, Nashville, they don't want to go to my page because my content has nothing to do with that. They're going to find you, and then you share information. And the new model that people need to understand is that you need to inject as much value in the relationship as you possibly can before you extract a single dollar.

Well, I think that's part of our. Again, our core principles we've laid out. We're not going to erect a barrier between the information that lawyers typically have, like this repository of legal books. We're going to tear that wall down, and we want to make that information available to clients. Where we provide value is interpreting that information and counseling on that information and just providing the experience that we, you know, that we have, you know, that we've accumulated over the years working.

We're going to give away more than what any other firm is giving away.

Right.

And in return, I think it'll yield a great legacy and a great firm.

So today is day three of week four. Hopefully we can do this again sometime soon.

Absolutely. So here we are at the Nashville City Club again. Thanks to those folks for letting us do this. So with that being said, thanks so much for tuning in and goodbye.