Be That Lawyer, Insider Tips to Building Your Firm, Becoming a Rainmaker

Episode Notes

Transcript

Announcer:

Managing your law practice can be challenging, marketing, time management, attracting clients, and all the things besides the cases that you need to do that aren’t billable. Welcome to this edition of the Unbillable Hour, the Law Practice Advisory podcast. This is where you’ll get the information you need from expert guests and host Christopher Anderson here on Legal Talk Network.

Christopher T. Anderson:

Welcome to The Un-Billable Hour. This is Christopher Anderson, your host, and today’s episode is about acquisition. Just to remind everybody, if you haven’t heard the show in a day, there’s three main parts of the triangle that make a law firm business work. You have to do all three, or it falls down like a stool with only two legs. You got to acquire new clients. First of all, you’ve got to produce the work that you promised them. We call that production, and you’ve got to achieve the business and professional results for the owner or otherwise. Why are they doing it right? That’s you, that’s our listeners. And so those are the three legs, but today we’re going to talk about that first leg acquisition because in the center of this triangle, of course, is you driving it all for better or worse. We all like to focus on acquisition as always the most popular shows.

But today’s is a little bit, it’s a particular aspect of us because what we’re going to be talking about with our guest is what he calls and what a lot of law firms call and people whose responsibility is called business development. And my guest, of course is Steve Fretzin and he’s the author of the new book, be That Lawyer, the 101 Top Rainmaker Secrets to Growing a Successful Law Practice. And he’s also the host of the Be That Lawyer podcast. Steve is a widely recognized coach. He trains folks on business development skills. He’s a facilitator in legal business development, and basically he helps attorneys master the art of business development unlocking both measurable success. And this is important to me, the peace of mind that comes with it because once you build it and you know it and it’s sustainable and repeatable, then you know can go get more business when you need to. Steve’s not only the author of Be That Lawyer, but also five books on legal marketing and business development. He also hosts, like I mentioned, the Be That Lawyer podcast and writes a monthly column for Above the Law. And you can learn more about [email protected]. But Steve, without further ado, welcome to the show.

Steve Fretzin:

Hey, Christopher, so good to be here and happy to be back.

Christopher T. Anderson:

Yeah, no, I was just looking at it think it’s been five years, you were on the show five years ago, but so just in case, there’s a couple of listeners who haven’t gone back and listened to the entire catalog, which I encourage everybody to do. You should listen to the whole thing every month. It’s wonderful. But in case you haven’t done it, let’s just get started with what you mean by business development.

Steve Fretzin:

Well, yeah, and so there’s a lot of different jargon that lawyers use to talk about client acquisition, business development, marketing, branding, and so I always try to separate them and business development is your own personal attention and time towards development of relationships that then turn into business. So strategic partnerships and alliances, referral partners, attending events, anytime you’re engaging with people on a one-on-one or one-to-many basis. And then how does that transform into getting in front of decision makers and actually locking up that business. So it’s all of the pieces involved from finding a new piece opportunity all the way through

Christopher T. Anderson:

Acquisition. Okay. Well that helps because I think people throw the term around and sometimes they mean just a piece of it. So I think it’s helpful to know that we’re talking about it as an overall concept. What I’d like to do then to start today’s show is to just go after what you’re encouraging our listeners to be. So your podcast is called Be That Lawyer, your new book is called Be That Lawyer. So I want to know who is that lawyer that you want everybody to be?

Steve Fretzin:

It’s a great question. Yes, definitely reoccurring theme and sort of our mantra here at Be That Lawyer and it’s all about the lawyer that everyone knows and recognizes as the rainmaker, as someone that isn’t sitting behind their desk billing hours, they’re out building relationships, generating work for the firm, bringing in the business week after week, month after month, keeping the lights on. So whether you’re a solo or you’re at a big firm and anything in between, there are five or 10% of the people that are out there hustling to bring in the business and bringing in the meat for the sausage to be made. And those are the people that that lawyer, everybody’s buzzing about them at the water cooler back when there were water coolers. And so that’s kind of what that be that lawyer theme is all about.

Christopher T. Anderson:

Cool. A lot of our listeners are also law firm owners, smaller to mid-size law firms where that’s really their job as the owner. They’re still out there as one of the lead rainmakers for the firm. Are they that lawyer too?

Steve Fretzin:

They are a hundred percent that lawyer. People that go out on their own and take that chance. They know they’ve got to make client acquisition their top priority. You don’t bring in the business, how are you doing any work? How are you feeding your troops, anything like that,

Christopher T. Anderson:

Which is why our acquisition shows are always the most popular. I think I always encourage people, please listen to the operations ones, the delivery and the efficiencies, the artificial intelligence words we’re talking about, those are important. But yeah, if you’re not doing this, the rest doesn’t matter. Now. You haven’t always been in the law, in the legal field, so let’s just talk a little bit about why you work with this as far as industry is concerned, this teeny tiny industry in the United States and teach lawyers about business development.

Steve Fretzin:

So it’s not something that I had ever planned on or thought would happen. My father, the late great Larry Freson practiced for 40 years and I remember as a teenager being grilled regularly about everything in my life by this guy who could never stop asking questions and had a genuine interest in everything I didn’t want to answer like Park, why’d you park on the lawn? Things like that. And ultimately I just sort of knew I was never going to be a lawyer like him. He just had a very different set of skill sets and mindsets than I had. I was just very good with people. So going into sales and moving up the food chain and eventually falling in love with not only sales, but also methodologies that were counterintuitive to what sales had become and what type of sales was being taught. So I came up with a methodology in the early two thousands called sales free selling and sales free selling is how do you accomplish bringing in business without selling, pitching, convincing all the conventional things that were being taught to people and salespeople and even lawyers call it, Hey, we’re going on a pitch meeting.

Well, that sort of insinuates, Hey, we’re going to be going and talking about us, talking about why we’re so great, sharing our ideas, free consulting and all of that. So I got into my own consultancy and I worked in over 50 industries helping entrepreneurs and big companies from Chicago Tribune and JUF in Chicago all the way to a local website person or a local financial planner. Again, never thinking lawyers was a thing. 2008, nine hits, recession hits. I start getting all of these entrepreneur clients of mine who are highly successful through this sales free selling method and my coaching started sending all their lawyer friends to me. The hours have been cut, lost their job, no longer a gc, big cuts everywhere. And so I just started getting flooded with lawyers and law firms that now hey said, hey, we actually need this stuff. So it was a combination of a need in the industry and every lawyer has said on multiple occasions, we never learned this in law school.

I mean everyone has said that a million times. So between that and the idea that I had a sales free methodology within about 16 months, Christopher, I found about 80, 85% of my business was lawyers and law firms. And so I was like, here I’m teaching lawyers how to niche down and how to be specialists and I hadn’t really pulled the trigger myself and I had to take my own medicine. So I changed the name of my company. I turned everything lawyer friendly and focused and I just pushed my chips in and said, Hey, I’d rather be a big player in a smaller industry than sort of a smaller player in a big industry like sales training, which is a massive multi-billion dollar industry.

Christopher T. Anderson:

Oh yeah. I think that like you said, that’s what you also teach for the law firms. But so let’s stick on this sales free selling concept for a second because in your explanation of it, what jumped out at me was you used the word convincing, and this is really simpatico with me and with the way that we’d like to do business as well, is this notion that selling’s not about convincing. And to me it’s even interesting that you call it sales free selling because you’re leaning into kind of the notion that sales is kind of icky and we just sort of try to teach it. It isn’t, but that people just get the wrong notion about it because they’ve been confronted with a lot of people who sales is about. You talked about sales training out there. There’s a lot of people who’ve been trained to be pushy, to be aggressive, to be presumptive and all these methodologies of some schools of selling. But you said it’s not about convincing. So if it’s not about convincing, let’s not call it sales free necessarily, but what is sales to you? What do you teach your people that sales is really about?

Steve Fretzin:

Yeah, the big shift that happened about 25 years ago with the internet and everything is that there’s so much information now. So if I want to find out the pricing of a car, if I want to find out what lawyers are charging at different firms, it’s not difficult to find that kind of information. So what we have is we have sellers that we’re selling and buyers who are buying and the sellers out for the seller, the buyer’s out for the buyer, and the buyer was controlling all of the engagement. They were asking all the questions, they were getting free consulting. We do this if we have to get a new landscaper or I’m putting in a new patio, for example, you interview and evaluate three presentations. You get pricing from all of them, work them over the coals, negotiate with all of them, and you end up with hopefully the best price.

But ultimately what ends up happening is you get the best price, but you might be lacking in service, you might be lacking in quality. There’s a gap there between what you think you’re going to get and what you get with the lowest price. So that all being said, what I’m trying to say is let’s not go about pitching, convincing and selling. Let’s walk a buyer through a buying decision. So let’s meet, let’s develop some rapport, build some trust, let’s establish a game plan of how we want this to go in a mutual fit, in a win-win type of setting. Who doesn’t want that? Everybody wants that. Then instead of answering questions and being grilled over the coals by the buyer, we are going to ask them the questions. We’re going to fare it out, everything we need to fare it out to understand what their problems are.

Why’re coming to me as a lawyer, what are their goals and ultimately what are their compelling reasons to engage a lawyer like me in this instance, in this made up scenario to solve a problem. Now they may not be a problem, in which case we can move our separate ways. We also want to make sure we’re qualifying that I’m dealing with the decision maker. They’re committed to making changes. They have the financial wherewithal to make a decision and move forward on it. So it used to be where the whole meeting would be about the lawyer answering questions and talking and giving information about how great their firm is and all this. I’m flipping the script and saying, we’re not going to do any of that.

Christopher T. Anderson:

All

Steve Fretzin:

We’re going to do is focus on diagnosis of the client and eventually we’ll know more to then give a proper prescription. So the mantra that I’ve been using for years is diagnosis before prescription is malpractice. I mean prescription before

Christopher T. Anderson:

Diagnosis, not go. There

Steve Fretzin:

You go. Yeah, exactly. So the idea that we’re going in and making a pitch is so backwards in my mind, and that’s what lawyers who are taught anything at all are taught. Let’s go on a pitch meeting and I’m saying, look, if you don’t have a solid process to follow, that allows for a win-win outcome and allows for us to know what’s really going on and not guess or hope or wonder. If somebody tells me, no, I’m thrilled because I know why. If somebody moves forward, great. I know why. If someone moves out, I know why. It’s the not knowing that is the killer for people and living in hope that they’re going to get the engagement letter signed and sent back when they really have no idea whether they are or not. They think they are, but they’re not really sure.

Christopher T. Anderson:

Right. No, I love that. We teach that too, that the sales process is aimed at a decision and in a lot of ways it doesn’t make us all feel really good, but in a lot of ways a no is just as good as a yes. It’s the unknown. Yeah, the leaving the potential client in a state of uncertainty that is the true failure. Alright, we’re talking with Steve Fretzin. Steve Freson is the author of Be That Lawyer and also the host of the Be That Lawyer podcast. We’re going to let the folks who make this show possible have a word and then we’re going to come back with Steve and talk about how to use this sales free selling to become that lawyer and we’ll be back after these words. Alright, we’re back with Steve Fretzin and we’ve been talking about what is business development and we got into the conversation with Steve about sales free selling and the most important part about that really, he called it flipping the script, which is unfortunate in a way.

The script was, I’m going to come in and tell you about us and then answer your questions and notice who’s missing in that entire conversation. The client, right? The client’s not a part of that conversation at all. And then they’re going to ask you questions when they are the most unsophisticated consumer of legal services. They don’t actually, like most clients don’t actually know what questions to ask. You are the expert, the lawyer, you’re the expert on what you can do for them, and you’re the one who will know the right questions to ask to flesh out what the opportunity to help them succeed is. So why should they be asking the questions? So I love that. I really love your sales pre-selling process. So let’s then now talk about how do lawyers use that process to become that lawyer? The rainmaker that you talked about, that five, I think you said five or 10% at most of the lawyers in larger practices who are known as that lawyer.

Steve Fretzin:

Well, thank you, Christopher. I mean, the issue is that most lawyers fear business development because of either rejection or that it’s going to waste their time. They don’t have a process. So going out and winging it and just trying to put yourself out there for hundreds of hours a year or more and not get results from that effort when you’ve got billable hours in front of you, I think is a big part of the problem. So I’m always talking to lawyers about the importance of having a business plan or a business development plan, having structured processes like sales free selling to follow so you’re not just winging it. And then how we attach some marketing elements to help build the brand alongside business development. So they’re like twins of business development and marketing working hand in hand and ultimately with a plan, with a process and with a way of understanding whether you are following a process and getting results or if things need to change, some language needs to change, you missed some steps, having some ways of tracking it and identifying what’s working, what’s not, and making changes.

I mean, that’s how anybody does anything, right? If you think about I’m going to make a batch of chili and I’m just going to throw a bunch of ingredients in a pot and heat it up, well, I’m not using a process. I’m not using the timing of it. I’m not doing things in a way that a chef would agree with. So if I make a bad batch of chili, maybe next time I do it, I better make it differently and maybe use a recipe, okay, now I’m using a recipe. Is that blue ribbon chili? No, maybe not. What if I make the chili taste it and say, Hey, you know what, it needs a little this little that. Then it improve it. And so that’s not happening. You can go into a Courtroom 10 times and get better each time. So your 10th trial is better than your first and business development lawyers are just trying it out and doing what they do and they’re not realizing that this is a skill that needs to be improved and honed over time.

Christopher T. Anderson:

I was getting caught up in the chili analogy, but if the chili’s bad and you don’t know even what you did, it’s really hard to improve it. And the same thing with sales. So I love that it’s a methodology that they can follow. So let’s boil it down then. So do you have a list, like a checklist or a set of tools that a lawyer can then use to grow that book of business using this methodology that you’re talking about?

Steve Fretzin:

Yeah, so I mean, I have YouTube channel with 500, 600 videos. I’ve got, my first book is titled Sales Free Selling. So if somebody’s hearing this and they say, Hey, that’s a methodology I want to explore further, certainly could pop on Amazon. It’s probably 15 bucks or something to grab a copy. Ultimately what I’m doing is I’m giving people a stairway that leads up to where the business is or the time savings would be. So it’s an efficient way of saying, all right, step number one, I’m meeting with you, Christopher. You’re someone that I can do business with. You have some problems that you need resolved. I’m going to build some relationship. We got to start by developing some likability and some trust, and we are not going to jump into business in the first five minutes if possible because we need a little bit of time to talk about our teenage kids or about our favorite sports team or whatever it might be that we would start off in find some common ground.

We establish a game plan of a win-win, and there’s specific steps within that game plan that I would suggest to identify a fit and how we’re going to move forward or maybe move it to a no, if we’re not a fit, that’s okay. Moving into questioning, do you agree to ask to answer questions? And is it okay if I go deep with this? I want to learn about your business. I want to understand if there’s a good fit for us to work together. And then there’s a number of other qualifiers, as I mentioned earlier, commitment to change. Are they the decision maker? Sometimes we think someone is the decision maker because it says CEO on their T-shirt in front of you, but you don’t recognize that they’ve got a CFO that keeps ’em in check or that they have a board or they have a spouse.

You just don’t ask. And so we just think that we’re dealing with the right person and in fact we’re not. And then lastly, do they have the financial wherewithal and interest to invest to make a change? All of that is happening in a meeting prior to presenting solutions rates, anything. So that’s where that diagnosis and then prescription later. And in fact, I just went to an ENT for some issue with my nose. The guy asked me a hundred questions. He looked in there, he did all the diagnosis and tests, and then he gave me the gel. He didn’t walk, I didn’t walk in. He says, you have a nose problem. Here’s the gel, put this in your nose three times a day. That happens at the end of the doctor’s meeting. So why are we doing it backwards instead of the way that’s going to develop a stronger tie between us and the prospective client and learn more and understand what the truth is as opposed to just shooting in a rocket and just answering questions and doing. So, you could see that there’s a series of steps and you have to touch each one to get to the top, and that’s where the business is.

Christopher T. Anderson:

Right. And one thing I want to actually touch on that you said, because I think what I’m concerned with is that the listeners heard all that they said, yeah, yeah, of course. I need to know what the problem is. That makes sense. I’ll do that. But your nose guy, your ENT guy really just gave me an image that sometimes you walk in the room and you know what the problem is or in the first five minutes because you’ve been there, done that, heard it. There’s patterns in our business. There’s patterns in all businesses. And so the NT guy walks in and goes, I go, yeah, marble in the nose, I know that one. And so he’s got a solution. And what jumped into my head was, even when that happens, respect the process. Because part of what you just described is really, it’s, again, I said it earlier, not about you. The process is partially about you understanding the complexity and the wholeness, the holistic problem absolutely need to do that. But like I said, sometimes you get it, but the process is also about the client getting their story out, being heard and understanding and feeling

That you’ve listened, that you’ve heard the whole problem. Am I getting that right?

Steve Fretzin:

Oh man, you’re so on the money that it’s hard to one up you. So I won’t, but I’ll add to it and just say, look, there’s something that happens when we pitch where we talk and we sell and we tell ’em how great we are and why our firm is the best in the world and all that. There’s something else that happens when we sit with somebody and listen and ask and take a deeper dive and demonstrate empathy and interest in understanding and their belief in us as the top lawyer goes up far beyond what it would be if I just told you why I am so great, their belief in me is stronger than it would be if I just told them that I’m the best. There’s a connection that occurs the same way it would be with a patient and a therapist. If the therapist just says, here’s why my Harvard degree and this is why I’m the best therapist around versus asking me questions, me bawling my eyes out and at the end of the meeting I would be like, I got to come back next week. Now we’re tied together. And so even when you know the answer and it’s clear that this litigation needs to proceed and here’s why. The prospective client needs to own what’s going on and needs to be able to vomit all over the lawyer and the lawyer has to sit in there and just let it happen so that we can all be on the same page. And that just isn’t happening in most business development meetings.

Christopher T. Anderson:

We’re talking with Steve Fretzin. We’re going to take another break to hear from our sponsors. Well, we come back, we’re going to shift a little bit and talk now about the other aspects of the client development, the business development process, that being the content creation, marketing and that sort of stuff, because Steve’s amazing at it and I’m sure he is got some thoughts to share with you. But first we’re going to hear some thoughts from our sponsors and we’ll be right back. Alright, we are back with Steve Fretzin and we’ve been talking about sales free selling and business development, and we talked about the steps to a successful sales conversation. But so now I wanted to shift a little bit because Steve, you’re really good at this. The stuff that surrounds it that gets you to that sales conversation, the content creation, marketing, how does that play into what a lawyer needs today in 2025? What does a lawyer need to be doing with all that stuff in order to be able to have the conversation that we just got finished discussing?

Steve Fretzin:

And so if it isn’t hard enough that I’m telling lawyers they need business development and they need a system and a process and they need a plan and they need to go out and do it, then on top of that you have all this other brand building and marketing that we’re also saying needs to happen. So the way that I think about it is there’s a mountain that needs to be climbed, Christopher, and you got to climb two sides at the same time. So there’s the business development side and then there’s the marketing side. And when you can get to the peak of that mountain on both, that’s when the business is going to fly in at a level you haven’t seen. So yes, we need to go out and network and develop relationships and leverage clients for introductions and all the things that I’m teaching lawyers to do every day.

Then we have to ask a lawyer, what are you open to getting involved in? Are you open to speaking? Are you open to writing? How do you feel about social media? Is it something that you’ve leveraged in the past? And so it’s almost a point of like you’re either in the game and you’re playing or you’re not, and you have to decide which way you want to go. My job is to help encourage and get lawyers started on a path of slowly integrating marketing in many cases into their business development so that they are doing both. And for some it’s like it opens up their worlds. I’ve put more lawyers into podcasts where they can meet the right people. They’ve got unlimited amount of content that they can market, video, audio in some cases written and getting them to write for publications or just their own blog, how they’re leveraging that to then repurpose on social media. And so I think when we can get past the angst of social media or the angst of the marketing part, that’s really when things can open up for a lawyer that is doing both the business development and the marketing.

Christopher T. Anderson:

That makes a lot of sense. So let’s split this out for a second because we were talking, some of what we were talking about earlier was about building a book of business within a firm versus being the law firm owner who’s gone out and hung their shingle and is doing that. So because I would think a lot of people that are inside a firm talking about building a book would say, oh, we got a marketing department. They do that. What are you talking about? Are you talking about that or are you talking about they need to be doing something in addition to what the firm’s marketing’s doing?

Steve Fretzin:

If you can leverage the firm’s marketing to help you with your personal brand and the things that you’re creating and putting out there, a hundred percent do it. Most of the marketing departments at the big firms from my experience, is that they’re there to support RFPs or they’re there to support getting research done, or in some cases branding the firm out in the marketplace.

They’re not really positioned to help out of a thousand attorneys, one individual attorney to build their individual brand. So most of this stuff needs to either be done by you as the individual attorney at a big firm, the same way it would happen for a solo or a small firm owner. And the good news is it’s never been easier to find help to do it. So I have, for example, two VAs that work with me. So people think, as you mentioned, I’m this marketing guy who’s doing a ton ton of stuff and I am, but I’m not the person that’s putting everything into LinkedIn. I’m not the person editing video. I’m not the person repurposing a podcast transcript for a blog cast, which is like an article that we create from the podcast. So the idea that you could find someone for 10, 15, 20 hours a week to do your bidding that has that skillset and actually enjoys the repurposing of content, that’s sort of the new investment that lawyers should be thinking about and making.

Christopher T. Anderson:

Cool. And of course, if you are a law firm owner or if you are responsible for bringing the business into the entire firm, then you can leverage your own marketing engine. But it’s really the same stuff. You still need those doers, the people who will repurpose and repurpose and repurpose the work, get it generated. And it’s really the same kind of motion that you were just talking about, leveraging people who love doing it and are good at it and not trying to become an expert at all these things.

Steve Fretzin:

Well, and the beautiful thing too is if you’re doing the business development and developing the relationships that can enhance your social media significantly. So just as an example, I’ve got a friend in the UK named Rob Hannah, he’s a recruiter, he’s got a podcast. So we’ve been on each other’s podcast. The guy has a massive network. Anytime I post something really good, I may ping him and say, Hey Rob, I just posted this. Would you mind blasting it out or would you mind sharing it? He’s like, of course I do the same for him. So we we’re taking the relationships and we’re bringing the social media into it, and we’re getting a lot more traction with our social media, leveraging relationships in conjunction with the content we’re creating. Even to the degree where I have a Friday morning pod that meets where we all enhance each other’s posts one day a week for an hour. Look, it’s not a big lift, but for us to get a lot more traction on our most important post of the week makes a difference.

Christopher T. Anderson:

Absolutely. No, that makes total sense. So before we go, I just do want to touch on your new book, be That Lawyer and it’s subtitled 101 Top Rainmaker Secrets to Growing a Successful Law Practice. First of all, how was getting that book out? What was the message? This is your fifth book. What was the message you felt you needed to put out there with this one?

Steve Fretzin:

I hate to say it this way, but it’s like enough about me. All of the books I’ve written have been my stuff, my ideas that I’m saying, Hey lawyers, this is the process. This is the plan. This is what you need to do to network more effectively. And you could check out those on Amazon. This book isn’t about me. This book is based on the interviews I conducted on my Be That Lawyer podcast.

Christopher T. Anderson:

Oh, cool.

Steve Fretzin:

And I’ve taken the top rainmakers from the shows I’ve done. I’ve taken their best ideas and I’ve truncated it down into a very readable format, into a number of sections, business development, marketing, maybe time management. And I’m not going to rattle ’em all off, but they’re all there to say, Hey, if you had 101 rainmakers on a bus with you and you are an upcoming lawyer, even if you’re a rainmaker already, what would you want to hear from them? What could they tell you that’s going to help you live your best lawyer’s life? So that’s the beauty of this book, is that I really didn’t make it about me and my stuff. I really cultivated the information that I’ve taken on my podcast and put a book together that I’m incredibly proud of.

Christopher T. Anderson:

Cool. That is a different approach. That sounds like it would be extraordinarily valuable. So yeah, highly recommend that. Alright, so as we come to the close of the show, let’s dive into that for a second and ask, there are probably some recurring themes, some notions that come up one time and time again that lawyers who are listening to this show could benefit from. Can you just pick a few?

Steve Fretzin:

Yeah, absolutely. So as I said earlier, we never learned this in law school. How many times is that going to come up on my show? A lot. So the idea that being a student of the game and learning business development and marketing as a learned skill to ensure your freedom, your control, your lateral mobility, if you need to change firms with all the economic climate that’s happening right now, this is your security as a lawyer. That came up a lot, which I get because that’s my jam. Anyway,

Second to that was the idea that being in the right firm and developing the right culture, that if you’re at a firm where it’s the angry rainmaker at the top dictating everything down, there’s no transparency. You don’t know how to make partner, let alone equity, and it’s just an old school way of running a firm that those are the ones that are going to end up losing out in the long run because people don’t want to work there anymore. That’s not fun and it’s not enjoyable. And I talked to a number of lawyers that are at those firms and they’re never going to stick around because they don’t know what their path of trajectory is. So culture eats everything for breakfast, if you will. And then the last one I’ll just share with you is just the power and importance of delegation. Lawyers are so stressed out and with 2,500 billable hours and 500 emails a day and the list of things that they’re dealing with go on and on and on that if you don’t have a system for time management and in particular delegation, that is going to be the end of you from a standpoint of your brain functioning properly.

So we talk a lot about how to delegate, why to delegate. So earlier when we talked about having VAs, having a great associate to hand stuff off to, you should be doing the high level brain work that you’re being paid the big bucks to do, and almost everything else other than maybe business development should and must be delegated.

Christopher T. Anderson:

Makes sense. And even like we talked about earlier, even the nuts and bolts of the rainmaking should be delegated and just the actual content coming from you.

Steve Fretzin:

Yep. Yep.

Christopher T. Anderson:

Steve, thanks so much for being on this show. We are going to need to wrap up. We’ve reached the top of our time, but before we do, I know we’ve just scratched the surface on several of the things you talk about in your book. So if you don’t mind, just give our listeners how they can get in touch with you if they want to learn more, or what are the resources they can go access to learn more.

Steve Fretzin:

Yeah, really appreciate that, Christopher. So number one is I’m all over LinkedIn posting multiple times a day, all of this great content Above the Law podcast, books, anything I’m producing is up on LinkedIn. So connect with me there and it’s just Steve Fretzin. And then my website is freson.com and that’s where you can find more information about all of my books, all of my deliverables, the things that I’m helping lawyers with every day. And of course just pop on Amazon and grab a copy of Be That Lawyer and hopefully it’ll impact you the way it impacted me and all I’ve learned from it. So really hope that everybody takes the time to really reflect on why this is such an important piece of your life as a lawyer.

Christopher T. Anderson:

Perfect. That’s so great. And that’s F-R-E-T-Z-I-N folks, in case you didn’t get that, that’s going to be freson.com. Alright, and with that, that wraps up this edition of The Unbillable Hour. I want to thank our listeners for hanging out here with us. Thank our sponsors. Of course. Our guest today has been Steve Fretzin, and once again, he’s the author of the new book, be That Lawyer 101 Top Rainmaker Secrets to Growing a Successful Law Practice. And he’s the host of the Be That Lawyer Podcast, as he mentioned. You can learn more about him on LinkedIn [email protected]. Of course, this is Christopher T Anderson, and I look forward to being with you, seeing you, hearing you all next month with another great guest as we learn more about the topics that help us build the law firm business that works for you. And don’t forget about the community table.

Remember now that you can subscribe to all the additions of this [email protected] or on iTunes, and you can also access the community table on iTunes right here at the Legal Talk Network and come on the Community Table Live every third Thursday at 3:00 PM Eastern. Third Thursday at three Eastern Time is the community table where you can come on live and ask us anything. It’s me and other guests. We might invite Steve to be on an upcoming community table and you can just literally ask us anything. And it’s a fantastic place to go. And if you can’t make the third Thursday at three, you can actually just leave your questions right there on the Legal talk network.com right here on the show notes at The Un-Billable Hour, and we’ll ask your questions for you and we’ll get them answered for you. So we’ll see you at the community table. We’ll see you back on the next episode of the Unbillable Hour, and hopefully we’ll see you real

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