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    Welcome back to The Family Law Formula Podcast, proudly sponsored by Juris Digital!

    In this second episode, Casey Meraz, the visionary Founder of Juris Digital, delves into the heart of what it takes to build a family law practice that not only thrives but also supports your ideal life. Drawing from his rich entrepreneurial journey and extensive experience in legal marketing, Casey shares actionable strategies and insights that can transform your practice and help you achieve your personal and professional goals.

    Join us as Casey recounts the story of Jake, a seasoned attorney whose firm’s value was entirely tied to his name, leaving him with limited retirement options. This episode underscores the importance of starting with the right mindset and setting long-term goals to build a sustainable and scalable practice. Casey discusses the significance of envisioning your ideal future, adopting a growth mindset, and embracing continuous learning.

    Learn how to reverse engineer your goals, create a business model aligned with your vision, and maintain a healthy work-life balance. Discover how to identify your ideal clients, build a strong team, implement efficient systems, and develop a client-centered culture. Casey also shares practical tips on setting boundaries, prioritizing self-care, delegating tasks, and staying up-to-date with industry trends and technologies.

    Whether you’re a seasoned attorney or just starting your practice, this episode offers valuable insights to help you design a family law practice that thrives independently of you, providing the freedom and flexibility to enjoy your success.

    Why Listen?

      •  Actionable Insights: Practical tips to elevate your family law practice.

      •  Expert Interviews: Learn from case studies and personal stories.

      •  Work-Life Balance: Strategies to balance professional success with personal well-being.

      •  Expert Guidance: Insights from a seasoned entrepreneur and legal marketing expert.

    Want to watch instead? Check out the video below!

    Do you prefer to read? Read The Transcript Below.

    Interview Transcript

    Casey

    Welcome to the Family Law Formula podcast.

    I’m your host, Casey Meraz, founder of Juris Digital. And today, we’re diving into a topic that resonates with many family lawyers. The family lawyer’s dream life, designing your ideal practice in life.

    But before we get into the nuts and bolts, let me tell you a story about Jake, a seasoned attorney and a friend of mine. See, Jake started his own firm right out of law school. He worked tirelessly building a practice centered around himself. Clients loved Jake, and his reputation soared. His firm became synonymous with his name.

    However, after decades of hard work, Jake found himself at a crossroads. As he approached retirement, he realized his firm was unsellable. The firm’s value was tied entirely to him. And without Jake, there was no business to sell. Instead of retiring comfortably at that time, Jake had to commit another 5 years to an earn out deal with another firm.

    His dream of a leisurely retirement was postponed because he hadn’t built a firm that could thrive without him. Jake’s story highlights the importance of starting with the right mindset and setting the right goals to build a sustainable and scalable practice. Today, we’ll explore how you can avoid Jake’s fate by designing your ideal practice in life. Let’s dive in. Let’s start off with the foundation, mindset.

    Building a successful family law practice begins with a clear, positive mindset. It’s really about envisioning your ideal future and believing that you can achieve it. A mindset shift is crucial. Many attorneys like Jake focus solely on immediate client needs and revenue. And that usually leads to neglecting the long term vision of your firm.

    This shortsightedness can trap you in a cycle of endless work without growth or scalability or even retirement. What I like when I’m working with clients is to ask them, where do you envision yourself? It could be 5, 10, or 20 years from now. Picture your ideal work life balance, the type of clients you want, and the kind of impact you want to make on your community and other people’s lives. Take some time to get a piece of paper and write this down and make it as detailed as possible.

    Imagine waking up in your ideal day. What does that look like? Once you have that, you need to kind of move into a growth mindset, embrace continuous learning and improvement. You have to be able to adapt to changes in the legal field and be open to new ideas and technologies. The industry is evolving and it’s changing and being disrupted faster than ever.

    And those who stay ahead of the curve will thrive. This might involve learning new software, might involve attending workshops, or even pursuing additional certifications. Whatever it takes, you have to put in the work. And having the right mindset to grow a successful company also really has to do with abundance mentality. You really need to believe in the possibility of growth and success.

    Avoid those limiting beliefs that hold you back. An abundance mentality means trusting that there’s enough clients and opportunities for everyone, even the firm next door to you. And your success does not come at the expense of others. And I found that when you adopt this positive mindset, you kinda set the stage for building a practice that aligns with your personal and professional goals. It’s the difference between seeing challenges as insurmountable obstacles and viewing them as opportunities for growth.

    And it all starts there at that foundation. See, now that we’ve established the importance of mindset, let’s talk about reverse engineering your goals. This approach involves starting with your end goal in mind and working backwards to create a step by step plan. This helps make sure that you’re working towards your goals every day. And if you’re starting with that end goal and you know what does success look like for you, Maybe it’s a firm that runs without your daily involvement or a specific income level or a particular lifestyle, like more time with your kids and family.

    For instance, you wanna be able to take a month long vacation without worrying about your firm, or is your goal to build a legacy that outlasts you? Knowing the why and defining that end goal really helps you to work towards that every day. And then that allows you to break down milestones. And what we typically recommend is to identify those milestones. Break down that end goal into smaller, manageable milestones.

    These could be financial targets, hiring goals, or personal achievements. Think about what needs to happen in the next year, the next 3 years, and the next 5 years to get you closer to that ultimate goal. And then just like with any SMART goal, it does need to be time bound. You need to create a timeline. You need to establish a realistic timeline for achieving each one of these milestones, and this helps keep you on track to provide a sense of urgency.

    Because let’s face it, no matter who you hire, they’re never going to work with the same sense of urgency that you bring to the table every day. For example, if one of your milestones is to hire an office manager within the next year, set quarterly objectives that’ll help you to meet that goal. And that allows you to finally break those down and develop actionable steps. For each milestone, outline specific actions that you need to achieve it. This could be marketing strategies, operational improvements, or professional development.

    Break these actions into monthly or even weekly tasks to ensure you’re consistently moving forward towards your goals. Because by reverse engineering your goals, you can create a clear roadmap that guides your daily actions and decisions towards your ultimate vision. It’s like plotting a course on a map. You need to know where your destination is to choose the best path, and you will lead the way. And with your mindset in place and the goals clearly defined, it’s now time to think about your ideal practice.

    This involves creating a business model that aligns with your vision and supports sustainable growth. It reminds you of an exercise I did with a mentor a few years ago when I was saying, I want to grow my company to this number and do this and achieve all these things. He said, okay, what does your org chart look like at that revenue number? I had to pause. I had to wait.

    I hadn’t figured that out yet. But what I found is when I plan and build these things ahead of time, I’m always working towards the success that’s of that goal. I’m getting there by these steps. So figure out the ideal elements of your ideal practice. And this is gonna start with identifying your ideal clients.

    And this may not be something that we’re gonna do right now because I’m definitely gonna dedicate at least a whole episode to this, but think about it as a whole right now, focus on a specific niche or demographic that you enjoy working with and who can afford your services, of course. When it comes to marketing in general, you don’t have to be the best at everything. Being the best is always good, but what you really have to be, if you want to stand out in a crowded market is you have to be different. So sometimes that takes me down the path of encouraging our clients to really niche in, go really deep and say, Hey, I am the divorce expert for this demographic. You could be known as that.

    It’s easier to be known as that than the attorney that is the best at all family law matters or all personal injury matters or, you know, a full service attorney. This not only makes your marketing more effective, but also ensures you’re working with clients who appreciate your value. It allows you to find your tribe, so to speak. For example, you might decide to focus on high network divorces or perhaps your passion relies or perhaps your passion lies in child custody cases. Whatever it is, it does help if you are passionate about it as well.

    And that’ll kind of guide you towards building a strong team. You know, you need to invest in hiring and training a team that can support your vision. And even if you don’t have the budget today, you know where you’re going. This allows you to delegate tasks and focus on higher level strategic work. One other exercise that I’ve done over the years, and I’m constantly working with in my staff is to write down the tasks that you do every day and then assign a dollar amount to it and say, Hey, how much could I pay somebody else to do this task?

    It’s a great way to track your work for a week and easily figure out what you need to offload first to focus on the things that will help you drive your goals the most. And that might be revenue. It might be doing some high level casework, whatever that is for you, You need to focus on that. Think of the 8020 rule. And so when you’re looking at talent, you need to look for people who not only have the right skills, but also share your values and commitment to client care.

    But another lesson that I continually learned the hard way is it’s not just about hiring a rock star or hiring up, hiring people that have maybe run something twice the size of what you’re trying to build. All of that kind of goes on the backbone, and the backbone is gonna be efficient systems. You need to adopt technologies and processes that streamline operations and enhance client service, especially now with AI and just the way that the legal industry is changing, the days of not returning phone calls for clients or not being a client advocate, I think those days are gone. So you need to do more for your clients. Okay?

    And you need to do a better job in some cases. Right? And some tools that you can use for operational efficiency might be case management software. Automated marketing is a big one. Like, 9 out of 10 firms I speak to leave on the table.

    They’re not even marketing to their past clients. And instead they have to come up with new clients every month and client communication tool software. See efficiency not only improves the client experience, but it is also going to reduce your stress and workload. And bigger picture, it’s gonna get you to that point of systemization and being able to train people to do these roles. So eventually, while you still wanna only hire maybe these rock stars or these certain people, they’re kind of easier to kind of plug into these roles over time.

    But one thing that I see an attorney that I used to work with in a firm in California doing a really good job with is really creating a client centered culture. Okay. He’s out there on social media, really talking about his case results, not from his perspective, but from his client’s perspective. What pain were they in? What pain point did I solve?

    And helping guide them through that. We’ll talk a lot more about this in coming episodes. But develop a firm culture that prioritizes client satisfaction and ethical practice. Happy clients are more likely to refer others and provide positive reviews. Not only that, the ones in that top 10%, they’re gonna be brand advocates.

    And for that small percentage, guess what they’re gonna do? Refer business back to you. It puts your firm’s growth on autopilot in a sense. So that might involve regular client feedback sessions, continuous improvement initiatives, and maybe focusing on delivering exceptional service as well. And you can do all this with the mindset of planning for scalability if that’s in your plan.

    Ensure that your business model can scale as you grow. And that’s important if you’re trying to build something that’s not so legacy based as well where you wanna sell it eventually. Right? This might involve creating standardized processes or procedures. And with now, like AI and automation, you’re going to be able to do a lot of this stuff with a click of a button.

    If it applies to you, you might use it to diversify your service offerings or expand your team in office space. But scalability ensures your growth doesn’t come at the cost of quality, which I think is a big problem that firms run into when they grow too fast. And then they’re kind of a net reverse problem that I mentioned during the why episode of this podcast, which, I’ve experienced, which maybe you’ve hired too fast. Right? And then now we have payroll and then client satisfaction drops, and you’re trying to do more with less.

    So designing your ideal practice means thinking ahead and building a firm that can operate independently of you, providing you with the freedom and flexibility to enjoy your success. It’s about creating a business that serves your life, not the other way around. Finally, let’s discuss the most elusive thing I find for attorneys and that’s work and life balance. Maybe because law school beat it into you, or maybe it was because of a firm you worked with had to reach these billable hours, building a successful practice shouldn’t come at the cost of your personal life or your health. Here’s some strategies that you can use to achieve balance.

    Number 1, probably 1st and foremost, is setting boundaries. And this was something I had a problem with as an entrepreneur, just kind of getting started and with like my relationship with, like, with my wife when we first started, I didn’t set clear boundaries between work and personal time. So what you need to do is establish those clear boundaries, and this can include designated work hours, avoiding work related emails after hours, and taking regular land vacations. It’s unhealthy to not have the mental break, and I think it’s one of the things that leads to burnout. It’s essential to communicate these boundaries to your clients, team members, and your partner to manage all these expectations.

    And with that, the business is only going to ever be as good as you. If your health is suffering or you’re mentally not okay, that is gonna show up in the business every day in your firm. So you need to prioritize self care, make time for activities that recharge you, whether it’s exercise, hobbies, spending time with loved ones. A healthy attorney is a more effective attorney. Remember that you can’t pour from an empty cup, so take care of yourself first.

    If you don’t have your health, you don’t have anything. And this is a controversial one, at least the outsource part of it, but delegate and outsource. Definitely delegate. Don’t try to do everything yourself. Delegate tasks to your team and consider outsourcing administrative tasks that take up valuable time.

    Focus on the activities that only you can do and let others handle the rest. And you know what? At the end of the day, anything that we’re doing is not rocket science. You are probably going to be better than everybody else in your firm at 1 or 2 things, but that’s not the case with everything. So you can hire for these roles.

    And the biggest kind of roadblock that we see there is somebody can do it so well, but they don’t train anyone. Right. And training is hard and process creation is hard. I’m gonna empower you with all these tools that are gonna make this a lot easier to do over time. But it’s important to have that mindset.

    And, you know, never stop learning. I think as a leader, you should never stop learning, first of all, but also just for growth in general. Like you need to invest in your professional development to not only stay up with industry trends outside of what’s required, of course, but, improve your practice. Right? You don’t wanna get left behind.

    And this is not only gonna enhance your skills, but it’s gonna keep you motivated. It’s gonna keep you engaged. And I think, especially now it’s important to have your pulse on it on the technology side, because so much of the work that’s been so manual over the past well, since the existence of, you know, any family law matters can now be automated. Okay. A lot of that administrative and paper stuff.

    So it’s just, it’s crazy the amount of efficiencies, operational efficiencies you can drive if you have your pulse on this. And then reflect and adjust. Regularly review your work life balance and make adjustments as needed. Life and business are dynamic. What works today might need tweaking tomorrow.

    Schedule regular check ins with yourself to assess how you’re doing and make those necessary changes. Balancing work and life is an ongoing process. But with intentional effort, you can create a fulfilling career that compliments your personal life. It’s about finding harmony and ensuring that your work supports the life that you want to live, not the other way around. To wrap up building your dream practice and life as a family lawyer is about starting with the right mindset, reverse engineering, your goals, designing a sustainable practice, and maintaining a healthy work life balance.

    Remember Jake’s story and the importance of planning for the future, not just the present. Thank you for joining me on the Family Law Formula podcast. I I hope you found today’s episode insightful and actionable. And if you have any questions or topics you’d like us to cover in the future episodes, please feel free to reach out. Until next time, please keep striving for your ideal practice in life.
    And remember, the practice you build today shapes the life you live tomorrow. Make it a great one.

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