1 00:00:02,469 --> 00:00:04,470 Nikki, thanks for joining me this morning. 2 00:00:04,470 --> 00:00:06,307 Hi Ted, how are you? 3 00:00:06,395 --> 00:00:09,151 I'm doing good trying to stay warm here in St. 4 00:00:09,151 --> 00:00:09,551 Louis. 5 00:00:09,551 --> 00:00:14,871 It's, um, we've been on a crazy cold streak, so it's not pleasant outside. 6 00:00:14,956 --> 00:00:16,198 Yeah, thank you for having me. 7 00:00:16,198 --> 00:00:19,354 This is the warmest moment I've had in three weeks. 8 00:00:19,354 --> 00:00:25,305 In DC, we are also struggling with ice, which apparently is rocket science for the roads. 9 00:00:25,305 --> 00:00:27,668 So I sympathize. 10 00:00:27,759 --> 00:00:28,940 I hear you. 11 00:00:29,160 --> 00:00:29,571 Yeah. 12 00:00:29,571 --> 00:00:32,613 Well, let's start with, with an introduction. 13 00:00:32,613 --> 00:00:38,889 You've got a different background than my typical guest, which I think is refreshing. 14 00:00:38,889 --> 00:00:46,266 You know, we are not an AI show, but it seems like we talk about AI constantly and it's nice to mix things up. 15 00:00:46,266 --> 00:00:49,249 And we have a cool agenda today. 16 00:00:49,249 --> 00:00:52,942 That's going to be a little bit off that topic, which I think is great. 17 00:00:52,942 --> 00:00:54,323 Um, 18 00:00:54,767 --> 00:00:57,051 So yeah, so you have an interesting background. 19 00:00:57,051 --> 00:01:02,689 Why don't we start with you just taking a couple of minutes and telling us who you are, what you do and where you do it. 20 00:01:02,894 --> 00:01:03,735 Sure, sure. 21 00:01:03,735 --> 00:01:05,065 No, I'm really happy to be here. 22 00:01:05,065 --> 00:01:07,567 I know I'm a little bit of a tweak from your normal guest. 23 00:01:07,567 --> 00:01:10,579 I hope I don't scare away your loyal followers. 24 00:01:11,360 --> 00:01:12,441 But yes, you're right. 25 00:01:12,441 --> 00:01:16,204 My background is a little bit of a tweak from the normal guest. 26 00:01:16,204 --> 00:01:24,310 I have climbed the ranks in what I would call business services in law firms for the last 20 years in a myriad of different roles. 27 00:01:24,310 --> 00:01:28,193 Fun fact, I started as a receptionist once upon a time. 28 00:01:28,453 --> 00:01:29,313 And 29 00:01:29,486 --> 00:01:36,486 I started at a law firm because I needed a job and it was posted in the newspaper and I thought, okay, I'm, you know, 20 years old. 30 00:01:36,486 --> 00:01:37,266 I'm going to do this. 31 00:01:37,266 --> 00:01:38,706 I'm going to do this thing. 32 00:01:38,706 --> 00:01:46,766 And I still remember interviewing in a black suit and a neon green t-shirt under it thinking I was just so slick. 33 00:01:46,766 --> 00:01:58,086 And I got this job and even to date, the partner that I worked with at the time said she plucked me from obscurity and trained me how to be a legal secretary, which 34 00:01:58,190 --> 00:02:00,591 call a legal assistant depending on where you work. 35 00:02:00,771 --> 00:02:11,637 And I fell in love with litigation very quickly, loved working in the space, really enjoyed the fast pace and all those things, and quickly found that my career needle moved 36 00:02:11,637 --> 00:02:13,398 over the years very quickly. 37 00:02:13,398 --> 00:02:16,750 So I got a paralegal certificate, I became a timekeeper. 38 00:02:16,750 --> 00:02:20,941 I really thrived on the idea of having the respect of the lawyers. 39 00:02:20,941 --> 00:02:22,752 I really thought that I needed... 40 00:02:22,752 --> 00:02:24,593 elevation in order to earn that. 41 00:02:24,593 --> 00:02:28,986 And so I became a paralegal and started contributing in different ways. 42 00:02:29,087 --> 00:02:33,370 And then after a few years of that, I thought, okay, well, how can I manage the business? 43 00:02:33,370 --> 00:02:33,600 Right? 44 00:02:33,600 --> 00:02:37,142 Because that seems like where the real seat at the table is. 45 00:02:37,142 --> 00:02:42,336 And I would really like to be behind the scenes instead of sitting on this side of the table. 46 00:02:42,516 --> 00:02:50,822 And so I went back to school and got a master's in law firm management and started managing a smaller IP boutique and 47 00:02:51,446 --> 00:02:52,407 ran the full gamut. 48 00:02:52,407 --> 00:02:54,478 I I tried HR and facilities. 49 00:02:54,478 --> 00:02:55,849 I managed the IT department. 50 00:02:55,849 --> 00:02:59,752 And that's kind of where I found myself listening to you. 51 00:03:00,486 --> 00:03:01,824 And I did that for a few years. 52 00:03:01,824 --> 00:03:04,315 And then I got picked up at an AMWA firm. 53 00:03:04,436 --> 00:03:11,401 And I managed a giant office of 300 people and then eventually emerged into a global new business strategy role. 54 00:03:11,401 --> 00:03:16,825 So it has been quite the organic growth journey, but I've really enjoyed it. 55 00:03:16,946 --> 00:03:17,966 And 56 00:03:18,338 --> 00:03:25,316 I think generally just having that breadth of experience allows me to look at firms from a number of different lenses. 57 00:03:25,607 --> 00:03:26,727 Interesting. 58 00:03:26,867 --> 00:03:33,847 So just out of curiosity, mean, are you familiar with the ALA? 59 00:03:33,996 --> 00:03:35,931 Yes, I was a member for many years. 60 00:03:35,931 --> 00:03:39,921 Yeah, I would assume that your role kind of aligns with their mission. 61 00:03:39,921 --> 00:03:41,185 Is that accurate? 62 00:03:41,494 --> 00:03:48,638 I think when I was managing the offices on what we call operations of a law firm, yes, my current role actually sits in innovation. 63 00:03:48,638 --> 00:03:53,711 And I work on a little bit of a different, in a little bit of a different capacity. 64 00:03:53,711 --> 00:03:55,612 But yes, the ALA was fantastic. 65 00:03:55,612 --> 00:04:04,767 think it's, membership is targeted towards law firm, call them administrators, the DOOs, the operations folks, right? 66 00:04:04,767 --> 00:04:08,309 But when you start turning into business strategy or 67 00:04:08,438 --> 00:04:17,852 maybe the fiscal analytics of the performance of a practice or something like that, you start leaning into different organizations that support those professional initiatives 68 00:04:17,852 --> 00:04:18,818 differently. 69 00:04:18,818 --> 00:04:20,676 It doesn't devalue the ALA at all. 70 00:04:20,676 --> 00:04:22,258 I think they're fantastic organization. 71 00:04:22,258 --> 00:04:25,002 I still keep in touch with a lot of my colleagues there. 72 00:04:25,256 --> 00:04:29,090 So what organizations really align to your current role? 73 00:04:29,314 --> 00:04:33,305 So I think Law Vision does a really nice job with round tables. 74 00:04:33,305 --> 00:04:38,196 There's a local group called the College of Legal Practice Management that speaks to. 75 00:04:38,636 --> 00:04:44,299 just the general strategic operation of a law firm versus this is how you source a vendor. 76 00:04:44,299 --> 00:04:49,212 It's more like, why would you choose this vendor and what does it do for your business? 77 00:04:49,432 --> 00:04:51,393 And when I say, what does it do for your business? 78 00:04:51,393 --> 00:04:53,985 means, how does this affect your revenue generation? 79 00:04:53,985 --> 00:05:00,598 So to me, working in operations is mostly expense management and maybe a little bit of cost savings. 80 00:05:00,619 --> 00:05:06,612 Whereas when you start working into practice management or innovation, you start looking at opportunity costs and generating revenue. 81 00:05:06,769 --> 00:05:07,089 Yeah. 82 00:05:07,089 --> 00:05:09,801 And we're going to talk about some of that. 83 00:05:09,801 --> 00:05:15,325 think there's a mindset in legal that we're going to discuss that holds the industry back. 84 00:05:15,325 --> 00:05:20,048 And, but before we do that, why don't we talk a little bit more about your journey? 85 00:05:20,048 --> 00:05:29,735 Um, you and I had a offline conversation about something completely different and I thought you were a great communicator and have a really interesting background. 86 00:05:29,735 --> 00:05:35,839 So, um, I want to explore that a little bit, like tell me about your, your transition from 87 00:05:35,843 --> 00:05:39,164 administrative to leadership roles. 88 00:05:39,164 --> 00:05:42,393 That had to have been quite the journey. 89 00:05:43,062 --> 00:05:48,386 Yes, so as I said, I jumped from paralegal to firm administrator, right? 90 00:05:48,386 --> 00:05:58,092 And at the time I was working in a mid-Atlantic firm with multiple offices and I was thinking about how can I jump into a business management role? 91 00:05:58,092 --> 00:06:07,988 So that could be practice management, it could be an office management role, anything that allows me to instead of acting as a timekeeper really... 92 00:06:07,988 --> 00:06:11,301 overseeing the fiscal performance of a facet of the business. 93 00:06:11,301 --> 00:06:20,783 And I found that in the firm I was with, I had a conversation with someone in leadership and whether I agree with the sentiment or not, it was how they felt at the time was, it's 94 00:06:20,783 --> 00:06:26,852 going to be really hard for us to sell you to our population as something other than a paralegal. 95 00:06:27,393 --> 00:06:29,388 And I think I could have proven them wrong. 96 00:06:29,388 --> 00:06:31,331 But I do appreciate the challenge of that. 97 00:06:31,331 --> 00:06:38,371 I do appreciate that it's really hard to completely shift your professional image and role, right? 98 00:06:38,371 --> 00:06:47,042 So I ended up switching to a new firm, a smaller firm that was willing to hire someone and take a chance on someone that was doing it for the first time. 99 00:06:47,801 --> 00:06:48,432 Interesting. 100 00:06:48,432 --> 00:06:55,884 so your role now, it sounds like it's innovation related at Paul Hastings, correct? 101 00:06:55,884 --> 00:07:01,017 Yes, I work in the innovation department, which has a few interesting arms to it. 102 00:07:01,017 --> 00:07:07,066 I work in the practice management vein, which most AMWA firms have practice management at this stage of the game. 103 00:07:08,128 --> 00:07:08,850 Indeed. 104 00:07:08,850 --> 00:07:10,047 Yeah. 105 00:07:10,047 --> 00:07:14,105 So Paul Hastings, are they around a thousand attorneys? 106 00:07:14,105 --> 00:07:14,526 What? 107 00:07:14,526 --> 00:07:15,437 How many? 108 00:07:15,586 --> 00:07:19,266 We are over a thousand, I think we're hovering around 1300. 109 00:07:19,306 --> 00:07:30,130 But yes, our firm has exploded and it's really exciting to be part of the upward trajectory that this firm has just climbed the Amla ranks and has hired a lot of really 110 00:07:30,130 --> 00:07:39,143 meaningful and valuable practices that I think allow us to kind of offer a diversity of our services at the top tier of the market. 111 00:07:39,143 --> 00:07:42,594 It's very exciting to walk around and be part of. 112 00:07:42,914 --> 00:07:44,897 this collaboration of all these great minds. 113 00:07:44,897 --> 00:07:50,865 I mean, I have to say I worked at a lot of firms, but it's a really inspiring place to be. 114 00:07:50,907 --> 00:07:51,467 Yeah. 115 00:07:51,467 --> 00:07:52,248 I know your firm. 116 00:07:52,248 --> 00:07:56,589 Well, we, know many people there and you guys have a great team. 117 00:07:56,589 --> 00:08:03,532 Um, well, you know, the, the term non-lawyer has been under attack recently. 118 00:08:03,532 --> 00:08:04,673 There was a petition. 119 00:08:04,673 --> 00:08:12,276 don't know if it ever, what became of it to eliminate the term from the ABA's vernacular. 120 00:08:12,276 --> 00:08:20,091 And, um, I don't have a better word for it right now, but I, and I do understand the hesitation. 121 00:08:20,091 --> 00:08:24,596 with the term, it kind of creates a little bit of a divide. 122 00:08:25,819 --> 00:08:32,907 what have been some of the challenges and opportunities as a non-lawyer in law firm leadership from your perspective? 123 00:08:33,228 --> 00:08:36,749 So I want to just full disclaimer, this is my personal perspective. 124 00:08:36,749 --> 00:08:41,440 And I think I may have some unpopular opinions about this for people in my space. 125 00:08:41,540 --> 00:08:44,721 But I don't find the term offensive. 126 00:08:45,761 --> 00:08:52,263 I do understand, as you said, why people hesitate and are reticent to incorporate into their vernacular. 127 00:08:52,458 --> 00:09:00,058 If we liken it to a medical practice, for example, do we walk into the receptionist and say, hi, non-doctor? 128 00:09:00,058 --> 00:09:04,445 And then you see your nurse and it's like, hello, non-doctor Anna. 129 00:09:04,445 --> 00:09:05,095 No, right? 130 00:09:05,095 --> 00:09:12,449 You greet this person with the necessary salutation or whatever appropriate credentials should be used in that situation. 131 00:09:12,449 --> 00:09:20,193 And I think that when I meet an RN, for example, or even a PA, I'm greeting them by their first name. 132 00:09:20,193 --> 00:09:22,174 There is no professional 133 00:09:22,408 --> 00:09:33,365 know, doctor or any sort of preface to them that signifies their credentials and maybe because the PA is emerging as a more common credential, that will change over time, right? 134 00:09:33,365 --> 00:09:35,806 Our society has to embrace that. 135 00:09:36,006 --> 00:09:38,028 I think it's similar in law firms. 136 00:09:38,028 --> 00:09:45,338 I think that there are a whole class of people like me who are cultivating and curating what they think is a very meaningful career. 137 00:09:45,338 --> 00:09:48,934 I have worked my entire career in law firms and have 138 00:09:49,174 --> 00:10:00,953 you know, dedicated my mind and my vision for myself to performing at a high level in this industry, almost to the point that I wonder at some point in my life, if it would even be 139 00:10:00,953 --> 00:10:03,445 possible for me to work in another industry. 140 00:10:03,445 --> 00:10:11,221 The culture of how I communicate, the way I carry myself, the way I communicate is tailored to kind of the population of people that I work with. 141 00:10:11,221 --> 00:10:13,292 And we are a unique kingdom. 142 00:10:13,292 --> 00:10:14,873 I always tell people that. 143 00:10:15,828 --> 00:10:23,821 But I do agree, it is driven by the model rules and like NLO and non-legal ownership and things like that. 144 00:10:25,442 --> 00:10:27,633 Do I agree that there should be a better term? 145 00:10:27,633 --> 00:10:33,071 Yes, I think that some firms have embraced business professionals or business services. 146 00:10:33,071 --> 00:10:39,147 I kind of lean on business professionals because at least it sounds like, you know, you are a senior brain. 147 00:10:39,668 --> 00:10:41,779 But yeah, it's definitely hard. 148 00:10:41,779 --> 00:10:44,570 think to the second part of your question, 149 00:10:45,198 --> 00:10:49,378 How do you integrate in a law firm when you're not a lawyer? 150 00:10:49,378 --> 00:10:59,138 think that in a role like my current role, for example, I'm supposed to be contributing to the strategic plan of a group, which is comprised of a number of different lawyers. 151 00:10:59,138 --> 00:11:02,098 How does a non-lawyer lead lawyers? 152 00:11:02,218 --> 00:11:03,398 I think that's 153 00:11:03,438 --> 00:11:04,898 is an immediate question. 154 00:11:04,898 --> 00:11:07,918 mean, when people hear that question, it's like, well, but you're not their boss. 155 00:11:07,918 --> 00:11:08,218 That's right. 156 00:11:08,218 --> 00:11:09,418 I'm not their boss, right? 157 00:11:09,418 --> 00:11:12,638 But I am trying to lead a strategic initiative, right? 158 00:11:12,638 --> 00:11:14,058 So what does that look like? 159 00:11:14,638 --> 00:11:17,178 leaders are supposed to have willing followers, right? 160 00:11:17,178 --> 00:11:19,138 John Cotter, love that. 161 00:11:19,918 --> 00:11:22,598 But they're a huge change management leader. 162 00:11:22,598 --> 00:11:26,018 If people are listening and don't know who he is, he's two really great folks. 163 00:11:26,776 --> 00:11:29,248 How do you cultivate willing followers and lawyers? 164 00:11:29,248 --> 00:11:30,769 mean, that is an art. 165 00:11:30,789 --> 00:11:33,992 And it's not something that you can just print off of a checklist. 166 00:11:33,992 --> 00:11:37,395 You need to cultivate their confidence in your abilities. 167 00:11:37,395 --> 00:11:41,517 And that's bespoke to each personal relationship, in my opinion. 168 00:11:41,753 --> 00:11:44,244 Yeah, I mean, I don't have a JD. 169 00:11:44,244 --> 00:11:54,400 have a undergrad in math and an MBA and have worked in a lot of different industries and I haven't felt challenges gaining the respect. 170 00:11:54,400 --> 00:11:57,832 I speak in front of legal audiences all the time, including this podcast. 171 00:11:57,832 --> 00:12:02,194 Most of our listeners are lawyers, not all, but many. 172 00:12:02,454 --> 00:12:11,219 And I think it's, you know, the bar is a little bit higher in terms of, you know, I think lawyers have a 173 00:12:11,697 --> 00:12:17,252 high bar in terms of their view on the profession. 174 00:12:17,252 --> 00:12:23,818 In fact, there's, you know, the whole, we're not a business, we're a profession, which I think is utter nonsense. 175 00:12:23,818 --> 00:12:24,478 You're both. 176 00:12:24,478 --> 00:12:28,071 Um, in my opinion, you can't be just a profession. 177 00:12:28,071 --> 00:12:34,527 The business of law and the practice of law are very tightly coupled and interconnected. 178 00:12:34,527 --> 00:12:36,729 And you're not, you are a professional. 179 00:12:36,729 --> 00:12:38,917 There are many other professions. 180 00:12:38,917 --> 00:12:39,708 as well. 181 00:12:39,708 --> 00:12:51,245 The definition of a profession, depending on where you read it, is that there are a heightened level of credentials and certification and ethical obligations. 182 00:12:51,245 --> 00:12:56,838 That's not unique to legal, and there's nothing special about the legal industry. 183 00:12:56,838 --> 00:13:00,940 It's no more special than the medical industry. 184 00:13:02,782 --> 00:13:05,137 Yeah, no, I think, and I... 185 00:13:05,137 --> 00:13:08,320 I've been very vocal about that and I feel pretty strongly about it. 186 00:13:08,320 --> 00:13:11,412 And if anybody wants to have that debate, we can have it. 187 00:13:11,412 --> 00:13:24,543 but I, it's, I think we got to get out of that mindset because as an industry embracing new ideas requires, you know, um, what they call Shoshin, which is beginner's mind. 188 00:13:24,543 --> 00:13:34,213 And we have to take, um, we have to take cues from other industries and how, you know, I've talked about this before, the biggest law firm. 189 00:13:34,213 --> 00:13:45,886 in the world is Kirkland and Ellis and they're, private, of course, as all us law firms are, but even if they were public, they wouldn't qualify for the fortune 500. 190 00:13:45,886 --> 00:13:52,728 There's not one fortune 500 law firm that has revenue that would qualify them for the fortune 500. 191 00:13:52,728 --> 00:13:55,249 No, what, what, and why is that? 192 00:13:55,349 --> 00:14:03,239 And I think one reason is, um, a lot of the structural elements, a lot of the cultural elements. 193 00:14:03,239 --> 00:14:07,401 that exists within, like you talked about NLO, non-legal ownership. 194 00:14:07,561 --> 00:14:15,916 That's typical big business that's in the billions of revenue typically have a different governance structure. 195 00:14:15,916 --> 00:14:24,911 They have a board of directors that sits separate, that appoints management and holds management accountable for goals and execution. 196 00:14:24,911 --> 00:14:27,913 And you don't have that in legal. 197 00:14:27,913 --> 00:14:31,614 It's in the law firm space specifically. 198 00:14:32,006 --> 00:14:37,210 I think people are held in senior leadership to certain benchmarks. 199 00:14:37,210 --> 00:14:39,811 They just don't have equity, right? 200 00:14:40,192 --> 00:14:50,339 And so at end of the day, you I recently shared this story on my LinkedIn, but I kind of told a story where I went to this BNI group on behalf of our firm at the time. 201 00:14:50,339 --> 00:14:58,524 And the gentleman who was the chair of this BNI group, I kept trying to get a forum with him so that we could present at one of these monthly meetings. 202 00:14:58,524 --> 00:15:00,974 And he said, eventually, 203 00:15:00,974 --> 00:15:05,114 He says, I want to talk to somebody who makes the business decisions for your firm. 204 00:15:06,154 --> 00:15:08,314 I know there's a number of different reasons why that happened. 205 00:15:08,314 --> 00:15:10,394 Is it because I'm young? 206 00:15:10,394 --> 00:15:11,654 Is it because I'm a woman? 207 00:15:11,654 --> 00:15:14,894 Is it because my name isn't on the door? 208 00:15:14,894 --> 00:15:16,454 It could be any of those things. 209 00:15:16,674 --> 00:15:19,914 But he sized me up and had decided that I wasn't the appropriate person. 210 00:15:19,914 --> 00:15:23,274 And I said, well, I manage the business of our law firm. 211 00:15:23,414 --> 00:15:25,854 I'm the singular, I'm the director of administration. 212 00:15:25,854 --> 00:15:26,554 I got it. 213 00:15:26,554 --> 00:15:28,954 Let me know what you want to talk about. 214 00:15:29,622 --> 00:15:32,363 And his answer was, no, I want somebody who owns the business. 215 00:15:32,363 --> 00:15:34,584 This is a business owners group. 216 00:15:34,664 --> 00:15:37,946 And so that's important to me is that they have to have equity. 217 00:15:37,946 --> 00:15:41,727 And I said, well, if we could just have a quick lesson, right? 218 00:15:41,788 --> 00:15:52,413 You will never meet someone in a law firm that's managing the business that isn't a lawyer that has equity, unless at the time you were not in Nevada or Arizona, right? 219 00:15:52,413 --> 00:15:55,564 And I said, you know, if you start a business and you... 220 00:15:55,564 --> 00:15:58,616 Let's talk about this guy over here who owns a landscaping company, right? 221 00:15:58,616 --> 00:16:04,641 He probably bought a lawn mower and one day went out, was mowing a few lawns and then pick up a few more neighbors and got pretty good at it. 222 00:16:04,641 --> 00:16:05,963 And then he made it. 223 00:16:05,963 --> 00:16:10,286 He hired some people, bought some more mowers and sat in the office and put the air conditioning on. 224 00:16:10,286 --> 00:16:11,227 And that was nice for him. 225 00:16:11,227 --> 00:16:12,688 He made it, right? 226 00:16:12,828 --> 00:16:16,291 Lawyers mow the lawn forever. 227 00:16:16,431 --> 00:16:17,962 It is a specialized craft. 228 00:16:17,962 --> 00:16:20,396 They hire people like me. 229 00:16:20,396 --> 00:16:25,348 to send the bills out in the air conditioning because they want to be in the front lines and I can't do that. 230 00:16:25,348 --> 00:16:28,192 I can't provide that service, right? 231 00:16:28,753 --> 00:16:30,275 And so we are a little bit different. 232 00:16:30,275 --> 00:16:32,236 Professional services firms are all that way. 233 00:16:32,236 --> 00:16:36,220 Accounting firms, doctors, hospitals, it's all that way, right? 234 00:16:36,220 --> 00:16:42,906 So I don't think law firms are unique animal in that way. 235 00:16:42,906 --> 00:16:47,410 I think the psychological components of our industry make us different. 236 00:16:47,410 --> 00:16:48,270 think... 237 00:16:48,512 --> 00:16:55,105 meaning culturally, I also think professional services firms are different than the average like sales organization, for example. 238 00:16:55,281 --> 00:16:57,631 Yeah, I see it a little differently. 239 00:16:57,631 --> 00:17:07,559 I see, you know, in a traditional publicly traded governance structure, vastly different dynamics. 240 00:17:07,559 --> 00:17:14,744 have shareholders that appoint a board of professionals, not necessarily practitioners. 241 00:17:15,205 --> 00:17:17,846 The board doesn't work in the business, right? 242 00:17:17,846 --> 00:17:24,851 So the owners are typically further removed from the day to day. 243 00:17:25,067 --> 00:17:39,075 And just the, the, the dynamics are quite different and not, not being able to, you know, give stock options to a law firm CEO who's, who isn't a lawyer, but as an amazing business 244 00:17:39,075 --> 00:17:41,536 leader that limits options. 245 00:17:41,536 --> 00:17:53,463 And, um, I think, you know, they've, what's interesting, I had somebody on the podcast, I don't know, a couple of weeks ago who in the UK and their comment was, you know, since we 246 00:17:53,463 --> 00:17:54,533 allowed, 247 00:17:54,619 --> 00:17:59,900 you know, non lawyer ownership, exactly nothing has changed. 248 00:18:00,041 --> 00:18:01,900 Now that may be true. 249 00:18:01,900 --> 00:18:11,704 I think we are, we are on the cusp of a real fundamental shift in law and it's a technology shift. 250 00:18:11,704 --> 00:18:17,245 There hasn't been a real big innovation in legal in quite some time. 251 00:18:17,245 --> 00:18:23,287 The billable hour has been firmly in place for about 50 years and the amount of 252 00:18:23,857 --> 00:18:35,747 technology that has been truly transformative around language until 2017 when Transformers and AI emerged and really kind of exploded in 2022. 253 00:18:35,767 --> 00:18:45,193 The last big, I guess, transformation was the digitization of legal records and legal research. 254 00:18:45,193 --> 00:18:52,227 You know, that was a pretty massive shift, but I, I, I, yeah. 255 00:18:52,227 --> 00:18:58,649 So, but I do see real change coming and opportunities to think about everything differently. 256 00:18:58,649 --> 00:19:10,312 know, pricing models, internal compensation models, client engagement models are all under scrutiny right now. 257 00:19:10,312 --> 00:19:20,835 And I think there's an opportunity to think about some things differently that maybe not a lawyer is the best person to evaluate and propose options around that. 258 00:19:20,835 --> 00:19:21,819 Maybe they are. 259 00:19:21,819 --> 00:19:23,693 the best, but not necessarily. 260 00:19:23,693 --> 00:19:30,145 You don't have to have a law degree to bring suggestions to the table in that conversation. 261 00:19:30,498 --> 00:19:35,592 So to your point earlier when you said, it a business or is it a service? 262 00:19:35,592 --> 00:19:39,716 Thompson writers actually begged that question in their State of the Legal Market report for this year. 263 00:19:39,716 --> 00:19:41,908 And I just saw that presentation. 264 00:19:41,908 --> 00:19:43,729 I thought it was fantastic. 265 00:19:44,310 --> 00:19:45,046 Look. 266 00:19:45,046 --> 00:19:52,061 We've all sat for the AI presentation when we talk about how AI is streamlining things and it's making things run faster. 267 00:19:52,061 --> 00:19:54,663 And what does that mean for associate development? 268 00:19:54,663 --> 00:19:54,883 Right? 269 00:19:54,883 --> 00:19:58,686 What does it mean for staffing in terms of retention or hiring? 270 00:19:58,686 --> 00:20:04,660 And so, you know, to your point, I mean, I think there is going to be a shift in the market with respect to demand. 271 00:20:04,660 --> 00:20:06,392 How many heads are you going to need? 272 00:20:06,392 --> 00:20:10,445 Does it mean that suddenly law firms will be able to engage in more legal work? 273 00:20:10,445 --> 00:20:10,755 Right? 274 00:20:10,755 --> 00:20:12,586 Because now they've freed up. 275 00:20:13,172 --> 00:20:13,982 some 276 00:20:43,375 --> 00:20:50,223 I say that and I have shared this story before because I think it bred a certain skill set. 277 00:20:50,223 --> 00:20:52,465 People put their typing speed on their resume. 278 00:20:52,465 --> 00:20:54,087 was something that was really important. 279 00:20:54,087 --> 00:21:03,077 And even as an attorney, it mattered if you could type because it was such an integral skill set for those that were coming in with the technological shift just using computers, 280 00:21:03,077 --> 00:21:03,937 right? 281 00:21:04,078 --> 00:21:10,958 You had to have cron copies of everything and everything was in paper and you had a paper file and you had to carry it to court. 282 00:21:10,958 --> 00:21:15,158 And what if you dropped something and it was a disaster in a lot of ways, right? 283 00:21:15,398 --> 00:21:19,358 Nobody cares about typing speed anymore, but the industry is still here. 284 00:21:19,438 --> 00:21:20,558 We're still all working. 285 00:21:20,558 --> 00:21:23,238 We're still delivering services and we're still doing a great job. 286 00:21:23,238 --> 00:21:32,318 And I don't think that bringing in the computer and getting rid of the typewriter, for example, hurt us in any way, even though it made us a whole lot faster. 287 00:21:32,338 --> 00:21:34,198 And 10 years later. 288 00:21:34,382 --> 00:21:40,722 I remember sitting in an office and there were 12 letters lined up on my desk that needed to be sent out. 289 00:21:40,722 --> 00:21:44,762 And I thought, oh my God, 10 years ago, I never could have sent out 12 letters, right? 290 00:21:44,762 --> 00:21:46,422 You got to send it to this person. 291 00:21:46,422 --> 00:21:47,542 You got to CC the client. 292 00:21:47,542 --> 00:21:48,922 You got to put it in the cron file. 293 00:21:48,922 --> 00:21:51,962 Like it takes time when you're doing all of that. 294 00:21:52,062 --> 00:21:55,582 This technology allowed this to be done so much faster. 295 00:21:55,582 --> 00:22:00,882 And so my note, my observation at that time was we're just doing more. 296 00:22:00,882 --> 00:22:02,062 We're not. 297 00:22:02,466 --> 00:22:03,876 hiring less people or any that. 298 00:22:03,876 --> 00:22:06,167 We're just doing more work because it's faster. 299 00:22:07,326 --> 00:22:15,300 I mean, I hate to that out loud because I think all of our industry experts are saying, well, we're going to need less associates possibly, or there might be some stagnation in 300 00:22:15,300 --> 00:22:20,871 the development of people because now they're not going to pour over a document review, right? 301 00:22:21,652 --> 00:22:25,213 I mean, I can type 120 more minutes. 302 00:22:25,233 --> 00:22:27,634 I don't think it changes my career anymore. 303 00:22:28,625 --> 00:22:30,376 Yeah, no, mean, it's fair. 304 00:22:30,376 --> 00:22:33,218 think we agree on this. 305 00:22:33,218 --> 00:22:37,750 I think the overall output of law firms is going to increase. 306 00:22:37,750 --> 00:22:45,044 The average AMLaw firm is about 1.3 million in revenue per lawyer. 307 00:22:45,445 --> 00:22:47,886 That's the AMLaw 100, right? 308 00:22:47,966 --> 00:22:53,479 a thousand attorney law firm averages around 1.3 billion in revenue. 309 00:22:53,479 --> 00:22:55,990 I think that number is going to increase. 310 00:22:56,901 --> 00:23:05,074 which is ultimately a good thing, but what's also going to increase is the amount of risk that law firms are going to be required to take. 311 00:23:05,074 --> 00:23:06,475 Like this isn't an option. 312 00:23:06,475 --> 00:23:14,598 This isn't a maybe like there, there will be a, you know, AFA, movement. 313 00:23:14,598 --> 00:23:15,769 And we've been talking about this. 314 00:23:15,769 --> 00:23:17,039 I realize for 315 00:23:17,054 --> 00:23:18,455 I think it's already here. 316 00:23:18,455 --> 00:23:20,446 keep hearing like, pricing is going to change. 317 00:23:20,446 --> 00:23:24,698 But if you talk to somebody in pricing, they're like, this is already started, right? 318 00:23:24,698 --> 00:23:28,781 Because you have clients that will say, you're not allowed to use AI on our files. 319 00:23:28,781 --> 00:23:30,131 I mean, that does exist. 320 00:23:30,131 --> 00:23:31,662 just, they don't want it. 321 00:23:31,662 --> 00:23:32,513 And that's fine. 322 00:23:32,513 --> 00:23:32,733 Right? 323 00:23:32,733 --> 00:23:37,195 So the shift is not bleeding down to every client. 324 00:23:37,195 --> 00:23:38,186 Some just don't want it. 325 00:23:38,186 --> 00:23:41,758 And others like, you have to use this for this particular phase. 326 00:23:41,758 --> 00:23:42,388 Right? 327 00:23:42,388 --> 00:23:43,649 That's happening now. 328 00:23:43,649 --> 00:23:46,230 So pricing professionals are already 329 00:23:46,230 --> 00:23:48,163 strategically dealing with that, right? 330 00:23:48,163 --> 00:23:52,830 I mean, they're not just like, no, sorry, you have to pay the billable hour, right? 331 00:23:53,180 --> 00:23:54,090 I think it's here. 332 00:23:54,090 --> 00:23:59,399 I think it will continue to change and morph and evolve, but it has begun. 333 00:23:59,399 --> 00:24:00,449 It is here. 334 00:24:00,579 --> 00:24:03,431 Yeah, no, it began many years ago. 335 00:24:03,431 --> 00:24:12,678 I mean, I remember after I got married in 2010 and we did some estate planning, that was a flat fee engagement in 2010. 336 00:24:12,678 --> 00:24:13,119 Right. 337 00:24:13,119 --> 00:24:25,248 So no, no, no doubt it has, but it is a relative, if you look at the pie chart on billable hour versus value-based, it's still a small slice. 338 00:24:25,368 --> 00:24:28,430 That slice is going to get bigger and bigger over time. 339 00:24:28,569 --> 00:24:29,471 And 340 00:24:29,471 --> 00:24:33,093 I think everybody wins in that scenario, but it is a shift. 341 00:24:33,093 --> 00:24:39,457 And in order for law firms to execute on value-based pricing, they have to take risk. 342 00:24:39,457 --> 00:24:43,839 And it's not just law firms that are maintaining the status quo. 343 00:24:43,839 --> 00:24:45,300 It's also clients. 344 00:24:45,300 --> 00:24:48,211 Clients are also very comfortable with the billable hour. 345 00:24:48,211 --> 00:24:53,234 And a lot of them saber-rattle and go, you guys haven't innovated and we've been asking for value-based pricing. 346 00:24:53,234 --> 00:24:59,073 And it's like, yeah, well, when we propose it, know, clients get 347 00:24:59,073 --> 00:25:06,565 um, antsy sometimes because it is, you know, most inside counsel started their journey on the law firm side, right? 348 00:25:06,565 --> 00:25:07,956 They've got relationships. 349 00:25:07,956 --> 00:25:10,926 They've got friends whose kids play and suck. 350 00:25:10,926 --> 00:25:16,198 Like it is very incestuous and friendly. 351 00:25:16,198 --> 00:25:17,748 It's a better way of putting it. 352 00:25:18,669 --> 00:25:24,710 so, you know, there's a strong, there's a strong relationship between the law firm world and inside counsel. 353 00:25:24,710 --> 00:25:27,501 And, um, I don't know that 354 00:25:27,825 --> 00:25:36,949 five years ago or maybe even three years ago that law firms were feeling the pressure necessary to really change what's working well. 355 00:25:36,949 --> 00:25:38,219 Like law firms do well. 356 00:25:38,219 --> 00:25:47,924 If you look at the AMLAL list and the profit per partner at the top firms, it's hovering close to $10 million per equity partner. 357 00:25:47,924 --> 00:25:49,104 That's incredible. 358 00:25:49,104 --> 00:25:50,735 That's a very successful model. 359 00:25:50,735 --> 00:25:56,549 Now, are you going to charge to go make changes to that when everybody's doing so well? 360 00:25:56,549 --> 00:26:01,510 Well, if the market's not really pushing you that hard, then the answer is probably no. 361 00:26:01,510 --> 00:26:03,365 That would be my answer anyway. 362 00:26:03,365 --> 00:26:05,669 So that is going to change. 363 00:26:05,918 --> 00:26:07,819 market is starting to push, right? 364 00:26:07,819 --> 00:26:14,794 We have clients in the industry, for example, who require that their billing be submitted through a certain billing platform, right? 365 00:26:14,794 --> 00:26:22,910 So law firms have had to rise to the challenge of hiring billing professionals that can navigate a multitude of different platforms, right? 366 00:26:22,910 --> 00:26:30,846 It's not like, oftentimes I don't feel that the law firm has the autonomy to say, okay, we use ABC platform. 367 00:26:30,846 --> 00:26:32,097 This is how we do our bills. 368 00:26:32,097 --> 00:26:34,398 And the client's like, we don't use that. 369 00:26:34,490 --> 00:26:36,932 So you can do it our way or we're not going work with you. 370 00:26:36,932 --> 00:26:47,261 So I think there is a lot of bespoke service delivery going on because just like when you go to the doctor, for example, everybody has a different medical platform. 371 00:26:47,261 --> 00:26:51,364 This one's got Athena Health, this one's got whatever, they all have different ones. 372 00:26:51,364 --> 00:26:55,437 And the customer is sitting here going, I have to navigate all these different platforms. 373 00:26:55,437 --> 00:27:00,791 I wish I could walk into my doctor's office and say, listen, I only use Athena Health. 374 00:27:00,792 --> 00:27:03,970 So if you want me to be your patient, you have to do this. 375 00:27:03,970 --> 00:27:06,091 The power dynamic is very different. 376 00:27:06,091 --> 00:27:10,553 I do feel that clients have a voice and they use it, right? 377 00:27:10,893 --> 00:27:14,545 So the technology piece, think is apt. 378 00:27:14,545 --> 00:27:17,616 There is so much that goes into service delivery. 379 00:27:17,616 --> 00:27:19,857 Some clients want AI, some clients don't. 380 00:27:19,857 --> 00:27:22,108 Some clients want a billing platform, some don't. 381 00:27:22,108 --> 00:27:25,880 Some do phase billing, some want flat fees, some want billable hours, right? 382 00:27:25,880 --> 00:27:31,148 So it becomes this negotiation, right, on the front end. 383 00:27:31,148 --> 00:27:34,329 when you start looking at how does this client want to be on boarded. 384 00:27:34,329 --> 00:27:41,052 And that's where I think business professionals come in where it's like, you don't want the attorney to feel like, and it shouldn't be restricted from the dynamic. 385 00:27:41,052 --> 00:27:51,156 I don't want to, I don't mean to say that, but there's something to be said for having a different person negotiate those terms for you when possible so that it doesn't poison 386 00:27:51,156 --> 00:27:52,907 your working relationship. 387 00:27:53,047 --> 00:27:53,807 Right? 388 00:27:53,807 --> 00:28:00,670 So I think that's the other value of people that work in law firms that are not lawyers, because you can take that 389 00:28:00,758 --> 00:28:03,819 mean, procurement in any other industry is the perfect example. 390 00:28:03,819 --> 00:28:06,551 You hire a vendor, you're like, sorry, I can't negotiate the rates. 391 00:28:06,551 --> 00:28:07,961 That's my procurement guy, right? 392 00:28:07,961 --> 00:28:11,883 And immediately the sales guy goes there and that difficult conversation happens. 393 00:28:11,883 --> 00:28:19,057 But when the service delivery happens, that person on the ground, that boots on the ground person maintains the integrity of the positivity of that relationship. 394 00:28:19,057 --> 00:28:22,669 Same thing happens in HR with, with job offers, right? 395 00:28:22,669 --> 00:28:30,075 It's, you know, the hiring manager in big organizations rarely is the one negotiating salary and, you know, benefits. 396 00:28:30,075 --> 00:28:31,855 It's usually HR. 397 00:28:31,856 --> 00:28:37,699 So yeah, I think that, that, that model, that model works well. 398 00:28:37,780 --> 00:28:44,424 So, um, tell me a little bit about like mindset in problem solving. 399 00:28:44,424 --> 00:28:48,447 So, you know, you not coming as a JD, 400 00:28:48,881 --> 00:29:00,137 Do you bring a mindset, perspective, et cetera, to evaluating whatever business problem that may exist? 401 00:29:00,137 --> 00:29:03,158 Is that a fair assessment? 402 00:29:05,234 --> 00:29:09,394 So I'll answer with kind of a story because I think it illustrates things well. 403 00:29:09,454 --> 00:29:16,094 But when I started my program at GW, the program director, his name was Carl Leonard. 404 00:29:16,094 --> 00:29:20,074 He's the retired managing shareholder of Arnold & Porter. 405 00:29:20,074 --> 00:29:22,074 No, excuse me, sorry, MOFO. 406 00:29:22,674 --> 00:29:25,674 And we had this first day exercise. 407 00:29:25,674 --> 00:29:27,274 So we all walked in and sat down. 408 00:29:27,274 --> 00:29:29,854 And he's like, all right, I'm going to pick two people at random. 409 00:29:30,214 --> 00:29:31,254 Nikki Corson. 410 00:29:31,254 --> 00:29:32,790 I'm like, OK. 411 00:29:32,790 --> 00:29:39,572 And then another person who I won't name just because I don't want to shout out her name without her permission. 412 00:29:39,572 --> 00:29:40,612 But she's fantastic. 413 00:29:40,612 --> 00:29:42,733 And she's an administrator in Oregon. 414 00:29:43,693 --> 00:29:45,414 And he says, OK, this is the fact pattern. 415 00:29:45,414 --> 00:29:46,994 You guys are having an event in this room. 416 00:29:46,994 --> 00:29:47,504 What do you think? 417 00:29:47,504 --> 00:29:50,775 And I'm like, he's like, Nikki, go. 418 00:29:50,775 --> 00:29:52,025 I said, well, hold on. 419 00:29:52,025 --> 00:29:54,616 Like, I don't even know this guy's name yet, right? 420 00:29:54,816 --> 00:29:56,567 Very uncomfortable, unsettling. 421 00:29:56,567 --> 00:29:58,157 I'm in a public setting. 422 00:29:58,157 --> 00:29:59,477 I don't know anyone in the room. 423 00:29:59,477 --> 00:30:01,658 And it feels very performative. 424 00:30:01,846 --> 00:30:03,217 And I said, well, I have a few questions. 425 00:30:03,217 --> 00:30:04,449 And he's like, no, no questions. 426 00:30:04,449 --> 00:30:05,530 Just tell me what you think. 427 00:30:05,530 --> 00:30:07,371 Can you host an event in this room? 428 00:30:07,532 --> 00:30:09,374 my, this is awkward, right? 429 00:30:09,374 --> 00:30:12,126 I said, well, you know, there's 30 people in this room. 430 00:30:12,126 --> 00:30:16,490 I don't know how big your event is, but if you want to have like a conference here, no, you can't have it in this room. 431 00:30:16,490 --> 00:30:17,421 It's not big enough. 432 00:30:17,421 --> 00:30:18,241 And. 433 00:30:18,444 --> 00:30:24,565 I have to cross the path of the speaker to go to the bathroom here, which I've identified pretty quickly, but I haven't spent a lot of time in here. 434 00:30:24,565 --> 00:30:28,219 I don't know where you would put food or beverages. 435 00:30:28,360 --> 00:30:30,291 It looks like these tables aren't on casters. 436 00:30:30,291 --> 00:30:31,832 I don't know what kind of setup you want. 437 00:30:31,832 --> 00:30:34,423 The projector looks super old, maybe broken. 438 00:30:34,423 --> 00:30:35,744 You don't have a smart board. 439 00:30:35,744 --> 00:30:41,207 Like, I just don't think you have the full capabilities of this room to host a meaningful meeting. 440 00:30:41,868 --> 00:30:46,710 know, parking was a problem and I'm explaining why I don't think this room is a good fit. 441 00:30:46,742 --> 00:30:50,544 At the time, I was finishing up the tenure of my paralegal career. 442 00:30:51,085 --> 00:30:55,939 This other person gets her turn and she stands up and tells me how great it is. 443 00:30:55,939 --> 00:31:02,722 well, the afternoon light can shine in at two o'clock and kill the afternoon slump and I think you could put a buffet back here. 444 00:31:02,722 --> 00:31:11,920 And I love that we have a dry erase board because it'll keep people moving and thinking and she's telling me why this room is so great and all the opportunities. 445 00:31:12,661 --> 00:31:14,642 So having said that, 446 00:31:14,858 --> 00:31:20,040 He says, does anybody notice a difference between the two testimonies we've heard here basically? 447 00:31:20,040 --> 00:31:22,310 And everyone laughed and said, Nikki's a negative Nancy. 448 00:31:22,310 --> 00:31:29,862 And then when I saw how she presented, I felt like, God, I was terrible, right? 449 00:31:30,083 --> 00:31:32,203 Total imposter syndrome, by the way. 450 00:31:33,183 --> 00:31:36,964 And he said, okay, neither answer was wrong. 451 00:31:37,025 --> 00:31:38,985 Nikki is trained as a legal mind. 452 00:31:38,985 --> 00:31:42,486 She is trained to identify problems and solve them. 453 00:31:43,586 --> 00:31:46,508 Southern person is trained to identify opportunities. 454 00:31:46,508 --> 00:31:48,970 She manages the business side of a law firm. 455 00:31:48,970 --> 00:31:53,072 If you want to work in this industry, you have to think like both. 456 00:31:53,273 --> 00:31:56,195 So when you ask me how I approach problems, I can't help it. 457 00:31:56,195 --> 00:32:04,161 think my integral response, my innate response is to go, well, this part sucks, right? 458 00:32:04,161 --> 00:32:05,462 I can't help it. 459 00:32:05,462 --> 00:32:08,844 But I am immediately pivoting to go, but how can I make it better? 460 00:32:08,844 --> 00:32:09,505 Right? 461 00:32:09,505 --> 00:32:11,866 So it's not just, it's bad. 462 00:32:12,096 --> 00:32:15,059 It's, I've identified this problem and I need to fix it in advance. 463 00:32:15,059 --> 00:32:20,844 And so when you present something to an attorney, they're immediately going to see all of the weaknesses with your plan. 464 00:32:20,844 --> 00:32:29,452 And so you better be prepared to explain why those weaknesses are not reflagging or how you've already solved them before they even launch. 465 00:32:30,353 --> 00:32:33,244 Yeah, I can't remember if we talk, I referenced Dr. 466 00:32:33,244 --> 00:32:46,490 Larry Richards work quite a bit and he has studied the traits of lawyers for at least 30 years, probably longer and tens of thousands of lawyers he has assessed. 467 00:32:46,630 --> 00:32:58,615 And there are four personality traits that lawyers score well above the general population, skepticism, autonomy, urgency, and abstract reasoning. 468 00:32:59,039 --> 00:33:03,623 and they score lower on sociability, resilience, and empathy. 469 00:33:03,824 --> 00:33:12,293 So what you just described aligns perfectly to the picture that Dr. 470 00:33:12,293 --> 00:33:14,735 Larry Richard paints, I think. 471 00:33:14,896 --> 00:33:15,887 it's real. 472 00:33:15,887 --> 00:33:25,350 mean, if you work, I've probably met thousands of attorneys at this point in my career and everyone's a little bit different, but I think generally speaking, I didn't appreciate 473 00:33:25,350 --> 00:33:29,832 until I was more seasoned in my career that again, we are a unique kingdom. 474 00:33:29,832 --> 00:33:32,353 Not every industry operates this way. 475 00:33:32,353 --> 00:33:35,254 You know, when you get invited to a party, 476 00:33:35,468 --> 00:33:38,028 you probably just check your calendar, right? 477 00:33:38,028 --> 00:33:41,651 yeah, I'm going to go to this party or a networking event, right? 478 00:33:41,651 --> 00:33:47,003 I cannot tell you how many times I've generated an invitation and the lawyer says, well, who's going to be there? 479 00:33:48,964 --> 00:33:49,964 And it's OK. 480 00:33:49,964 --> 00:33:54,586 There's nothing wrong with that question, but it tells you where their frame of mind is. 481 00:33:54,946 --> 00:34:03,730 And so I just think learning the cultural dynamics of law firms and their communication styles is kind of integral to the success. 482 00:34:04,014 --> 00:34:13,907 And I don't want to say that people that haven't worked in law firms can't do it because they can, but I have also seen when someone comes in and they're like kind of senior in 483 00:34:13,907 --> 00:34:20,638 their career and they're coming, you know, I don't know, sports, right? 484 00:34:20,779 --> 00:34:21,599 They're not ready. 485 00:34:21,599 --> 00:34:25,170 They don't see these power dynamics and the politics of it. 486 00:34:25,170 --> 00:34:28,621 And I think that part is a crash landing usually. 487 00:34:28,621 --> 00:34:30,141 And then it levels up, right? 488 00:34:30,141 --> 00:34:32,852 People figure it out, but it is very different. 489 00:34:33,031 --> 00:34:33,531 Yeah. 490 00:34:33,531 --> 00:34:48,331 And another dynamic is that I think is a little bit unique with lawyers is how finely tuned their understanding of opportunity cost of time is, right? 491 00:34:48,331 --> 00:35:01,471 Like if they're $1,200 an hour, that's a very quantitative number on what an hour, what the opportunity cost is of that hour. 492 00:35:01,471 --> 00:35:01,959 So 493 00:35:01,959 --> 00:35:04,839 And they are under immense pressure. 494 00:35:04,999 --> 00:35:12,139 I thought 2,000 hours of billable quota was high. 495 00:35:12,139 --> 00:35:14,979 I've seen it as high as like 2,700. 496 00:35:15,259 --> 00:35:18,338 I've heard rumblings of 3,000. 497 00:35:18,338 --> 00:35:28,759 That is absolute insanity because to bill 40 hours in a week, which would be if you had a two week vacation, that's 40 hours a week for 50 hours in a year. 498 00:35:28,939 --> 00:35:31,313 In order to do that, you're 499 00:35:31,313 --> 00:35:33,634 probably work in 60 hours, right? 500 00:35:33,634 --> 00:35:37,186 Because there's all sorts of activity that doesn't get billed. 501 00:35:37,266 --> 00:35:48,333 And you know, another concept tying back to what we were talking about a minute ago with the billable hour, the billable hours, a little bit of, of mushy concept, the amount of 502 00:35:48,333 --> 00:35:52,715 write-offs that law firms experience is significant. 503 00:35:52,715 --> 00:35:57,238 So there's this, this game of, you know, ping pong that happens. 504 00:35:57,238 --> 00:35:59,431 You send the bill, you get, 505 00:35:59,431 --> 00:36:06,571 push back, you make adjustments, you send it back and like, are you really getting $1,200 an hour? 506 00:36:06,571 --> 00:36:07,531 Well, 507 00:36:07,741 --> 00:36:12,954 Different firms have different ways of quantifying the metrics of what counts as billable hour, right? 508 00:36:12,954 --> 00:36:14,937 Some firms quantify. 509 00:36:15,218 --> 00:36:16,829 non-client billable time. 510 00:36:16,829 --> 00:36:18,471 It depends on where you work, right? 511 00:36:18,471 --> 00:36:28,059 could be e-time, could be pro bono, could be, you know, if you have some sort of leadership role within the firm, every firm does that a little bit differently. 512 00:36:28,059 --> 00:36:31,532 And then some firms quantify those hours before write downs, right? 513 00:36:31,532 --> 00:36:38,116 And some firms kind of separate the distinction between write downs and write offs, some merge them as one concept. 514 00:36:38,617 --> 00:36:39,558 And then 515 00:36:40,410 --> 00:36:46,014 How does that impact, for example, if a client negotiates a discounted on the front end? 516 00:36:47,055 --> 00:36:48,706 You then also write off time, right? 517 00:36:48,706 --> 00:36:59,994 These are all pricing discussions, which I will not, you know, opine on, but there are some very real, you know, complexities to getting the bills out and then how they are 518 00:36:59,994 --> 00:37:02,746 measured for timekeepers. 519 00:37:02,971 --> 00:37:03,271 Yeah. 520 00:37:03,271 --> 00:37:05,212 And it's not unique to legal. 521 00:37:05,212 --> 00:37:10,194 Every professional services company seems to measure realization a little bit differently. 522 00:37:10,315 --> 00:37:13,096 And you got to kind of do what makes sense, right? 523 00:37:13,096 --> 00:37:17,718 Like some firms don't place a heavy emphasis on professional development. 524 00:37:17,718 --> 00:37:20,780 Other firms count it as a billable hour. 525 00:37:20,780 --> 00:37:24,341 So it really just depends on the culture of the firm. 526 00:37:25,802 --> 00:37:28,333 One thing I wanted to make sure we talk about 527 00:37:28,739 --> 00:37:29,850 is personal branding. 528 00:37:29,850 --> 00:37:32,802 And I think you've done a pretty good job of that. 529 00:37:32,802 --> 00:37:44,902 And I think our audience would be interested in learning, from you and what you've done as a working mother in this industry and navigating your personal brand. 530 00:37:44,902 --> 00:37:47,535 Like, can you say a few words about that? 531 00:37:47,598 --> 00:37:48,558 Sure. 532 00:37:48,898 --> 00:37:57,538 So I had a very near and dear colleague to me tell me a couple years ago, you're doing great, but what is your story? 533 00:37:57,858 --> 00:37:58,398 Right? 534 00:37:58,398 --> 00:37:59,218 What is your story? 535 00:37:59,218 --> 00:38:00,698 And I'm like, what do you mean, what's my story? 536 00:38:00,698 --> 00:38:03,758 I go to work, I do my job, I get my paycheck and I move on. 537 00:38:03,758 --> 00:38:04,238 Right? 538 00:38:04,238 --> 00:38:06,398 And he's like, no, it's not that simple anymore. 539 00:38:06,398 --> 00:38:06,938 Right? 540 00:38:06,938 --> 00:38:15,278 If you want to grow in leadership, people need to be able to connect to you very quickly in a way that's authentic to you because otherwise it's not believable. 541 00:38:15,638 --> 00:38:16,538 And 542 00:38:16,896 --> 00:38:19,507 And it really has to synthesize who you are. 543 00:38:21,267 --> 00:38:26,169 If you don't already follow him, William Washington is the CFO over at Baker McKenzie. 544 00:38:26,169 --> 00:38:35,131 And he's never told me what his personal brand is, but I think he does a really fantastic job illustrating how an introvert can be successful in the C-suite. 545 00:38:35,412 --> 00:38:38,653 And I look at that, and I'm like, well, what makes me different? 546 00:38:38,653 --> 00:38:40,146 What's my story? 547 00:38:40,146 --> 00:38:43,014 I have four children under the age of seven. 548 00:38:43,362 --> 00:38:47,184 That is a challenge for anyone, not just someone who works. 549 00:38:47,324 --> 00:38:57,410 And I find myself, I am proud of myself that I still get up five days a week and do this job and I'm still a mom and I don't have a nanny, right? 550 00:38:57,410 --> 00:39:04,685 And I raise my kids and I work my job and I'm not always great at everything, but that's my story, right? 551 00:39:04,685 --> 00:39:06,596 It's such a big part of my life. 552 00:39:06,596 --> 00:39:10,282 And I shy away from being like a mom. 553 00:39:10,282 --> 00:39:16,026 influencer per any say because I think everybody has to walk this path very differently. 554 00:39:16,642 --> 00:39:21,272 I used to, when I first started having children, kind of hide my family life. 555 00:39:21,272 --> 00:39:26,306 I I I felt like people would think, oh, she's scatterbrained. 556 00:39:26,306 --> 00:39:31,000 I can't tell you how many times I'd forget something pregnant and somebody would say, oh, mom brain, don't worry about it. 557 00:39:31,000 --> 00:39:31,760 Right. 558 00:39:31,760 --> 00:39:34,042 And I felt like there was this 559 00:39:34,474 --> 00:39:39,285 in this intrinsic doubt for someone's abilities because they have young children. 560 00:39:39,285 --> 00:39:40,718 It doesn't have to be that way. 561 00:39:40,718 --> 00:39:42,039 It doesn't, in my opinion. 562 00:39:42,039 --> 00:39:49,063 So in the last few years, I have been very forward about my home life and how I have children. 563 00:39:49,063 --> 00:39:51,719 And yesterday we had scarlet fever, right? 564 00:39:51,719 --> 00:40:01,350 I I just let it all out because I think it tells people where I am in my life and it allows them to give grace when it's necessary. 565 00:40:01,644 --> 00:40:08,320 But also, I think it normalizes that people can work and have little kids and still do the job well. 566 00:40:08,517 --> 00:40:08,927 Yeah. 567 00:40:08,927 --> 00:40:10,848 What about like some of the soft skills? 568 00:40:10,848 --> 00:40:22,511 think EQ is something that I don't know, has a bit of a, is a bit of a mixed bag in terms of perception in legal. 569 00:40:22,511 --> 00:40:32,614 And I really see that skillset, if you will, or those capabilities in the future playing a very big role. 570 00:40:32,614 --> 00:40:36,555 Um, especially as automation starts to 571 00:40:37,243 --> 00:40:39,527 chip away at what lawyers do. 572 00:40:39,527 --> 00:40:43,613 really think emotional intelligence is an important dynamic. 573 00:40:43,613 --> 00:40:45,185 What are your thoughts on that? 574 00:40:45,390 --> 00:40:49,330 I don't think EQ is fostered mostly in the workplace. 575 00:40:49,330 --> 00:40:50,250 I really don't. 576 00:40:50,250 --> 00:40:56,570 I think that it starts when you're little and you consider how your actions and your words impact others. 577 00:40:56,570 --> 00:41:01,050 I think you learn it as you're a teenager and you watch how others perceive you. 578 00:41:01,130 --> 00:41:08,070 I think when you're in your 20s and you're dating and socializing, you're reading the room and choosing who you're with. 579 00:41:08,070 --> 00:41:12,290 I think that's just something that's learned well over your lifetime. 580 00:41:13,142 --> 00:41:23,725 I do think that culturally when people come into a workplace, they need to learn how to apply that skill and understand again, power dynamics, politics, professional 581 00:41:23,725 --> 00:41:24,625 interactions. 582 00:41:24,625 --> 00:41:32,228 And there's lots of resources available to people about how to present yourself in a professional way. 583 00:41:32,228 --> 00:41:39,310 It kills me when I get on a Webex with somebody and they're in a hoodie, you know, sitting on their couch. 584 00:41:41,090 --> 00:41:41,820 partner, it's fine. 585 00:41:41,820 --> 00:41:43,311 You've already made it, right? 586 00:41:43,792 --> 00:41:52,537 But if you want to make it in your career and you're just getting started, it's really important to send the message that people can trust you and that you are a consummate 587 00:41:52,537 --> 00:41:53,638 professional. 588 00:41:53,638 --> 00:41:58,551 I think the way that you present yourself outwardly is very important. 589 00:41:58,551 --> 00:42:01,943 I mean, the whole like fake it till you make it situation, right? 590 00:42:01,943 --> 00:42:05,865 I wore a black suit for the first 10 years of my career every day. 591 00:42:06,045 --> 00:42:07,066 Every day. 592 00:42:07,372 --> 00:42:12,927 because I felt like I needed to look that severe for people to take me seriously, right? 593 00:42:14,188 --> 00:42:18,632 I just think it's such a big part of growing your career and growing the... 594 00:42:20,654 --> 00:42:22,334 the image that people have of you. 595 00:42:22,334 --> 00:42:28,773 In my years in law firms, I've been counseled on the color of my lipstick and told like that it's too bright. 596 00:42:28,773 --> 00:42:31,054 People can't take you seriously like that. 597 00:42:31,054 --> 00:42:34,234 Or, you know, the color of your hair, that's not natural. 598 00:42:34,234 --> 00:42:35,954 It's so distracting. 599 00:42:35,954 --> 00:42:36,734 Right? 600 00:42:36,754 --> 00:42:39,214 These are things that have been told to me. 601 00:42:39,214 --> 00:42:42,794 And I think also as a woman in the workplace, it's even harder, right? 602 00:42:42,794 --> 00:42:44,314 Your dress is too short. 603 00:42:44,314 --> 00:42:44,614 Right? 604 00:42:44,614 --> 00:42:47,714 I'm looking at, I can barely see my kneecaps, right? 605 00:42:47,714 --> 00:42:51,108 Or when you go as a timekeeper, when you go to try 606 00:42:51,361 --> 00:42:55,084 You know, your heels can't be over a certain height, no engagement rings. 607 00:42:55,084 --> 00:43:07,354 Like there's all sorts of just kind of important things that might sound archaic, but at the same time, sending the message of professionalism, and I'm not suggesting that people 608 00:43:07,354 --> 00:43:18,242 should, you know, tamper down their authentic image, but there's a difference between a backyard barbecue and working in a professional services company, right? 609 00:43:18,331 --> 00:43:22,798 Yeah, I feel like the pendulum has swung a little bit too far in the casual direction. 610 00:43:22,798 --> 00:43:24,201 I'm pretty middle of the road. 611 00:43:24,201 --> 00:43:27,516 know, um, yeah, I do a podcast here. 612 00:43:27,516 --> 00:43:29,950 I'm wearing jeans and an info dash shirt. 613 00:43:29,950 --> 00:43:33,415 Sometimes I'll wear shorts and an info dash and my wife makes 614 00:43:33,415 --> 00:43:37,497 with weathercast attire when you are on a video. 615 00:43:37,497 --> 00:43:38,217 No problems. 616 00:43:38,217 --> 00:43:43,580 But you look professional, and I think that's the image that you're sending, right? 617 00:43:44,601 --> 00:43:59,170 If we had done this podcast and you were sitting on the couch in your hoodie, What are we telling people about how serious we take this topic or this speaker or this audience even, 618 00:43:59,170 --> 00:43:59,687 right? 619 00:43:59,687 --> 00:44:00,747 Yeah, a hundred percent. 620 00:44:00,747 --> 00:44:03,887 I do think there is a, there is a balance to be struck there. 621 00:44:03,887 --> 00:44:04,267 Right. 622 00:44:04,267 --> 00:44:07,227 I used to also, I spent 10 years in financial services. 623 00:44:07,227 --> 00:44:08,807 I worked for bank of America. 624 00:44:08,887 --> 00:44:11,147 Uh, before that I was at Microsoft. 625 00:44:11,287 --> 00:44:12,227 Huh? 626 00:44:12,767 --> 00:44:13,147 Yeah. 627 00:44:13,147 --> 00:44:14,547 I was in Charlotte. 628 00:44:14,547 --> 00:44:26,527 I had many roles, but, um, one of them was a internal auditor and, we were doing anti money laundering, evaluating anti money laundering controls in the different lines of 629 00:44:26,527 --> 00:44:29,847 business at bank of America in the late two thousands, which 630 00:44:30,326 --> 00:44:34,227 AML was a really big deal and it still is, I'm sure. 631 00:44:34,227 --> 00:44:42,067 But, um, I used have to wear a suit and tie every day and did that for years and thought it was cool at first, you know? 632 00:44:42,067 --> 00:44:44,067 Um, Oh, I get to look at this cool new tie. 633 00:44:44,067 --> 00:44:54,007 I get to wear, I'll tell you what, like I'd say about six, eight months in, you know, in trips to the dry cleaners and you know, I'm big, I'm big. 634 00:44:54,007 --> 00:44:55,847 I'm like six, five to 70. 635 00:44:55,847 --> 00:44:56,871 So I have 636 00:44:56,871 --> 00:44:58,571 I can't buy something off the rack. 637 00:44:58,571 --> 00:44:59,851 I got to buy a custom suit. 638 00:44:59,851 --> 00:45:05,671 The amount of time and money that I spent in my wardrobe just didn't make sense. 639 00:45:05,671 --> 00:45:13,571 Um, so I do think that there's a balance to be struck there between, yes, let's create the right image, but I really enjoy now. 640 00:45:13,571 --> 00:45:26,151 And even my beginnings in, um, in legal, I used go to conferences and you know, jacket, no tie, but button down, um, slacks. 641 00:45:26,413 --> 00:45:35,435 Oxford's and now I wear polos and I like it a lot better. 642 00:45:35,435 --> 00:45:39,160 It's much more comfortable, especially if you're standing on your feet all day. 643 00:45:39,160 --> 00:45:41,646 So I've been glad to see a little. 644 00:45:41,646 --> 00:45:44,506 wear, people need to wear suits on airplanes, right? 645 00:45:44,506 --> 00:45:47,146 Like the world has changed and I fully appreciate that. 646 00:45:47,146 --> 00:45:51,386 I'm not suggesting everyone needs to wear a three piece suit with a pocket watch to work. 647 00:45:51,546 --> 00:45:56,166 I actually remember when law firms started discussing tie or no tie. 648 00:45:56,186 --> 00:45:57,246 Do you remember that? 649 00:45:57,246 --> 00:45:59,726 And it was like, but do we really need it? 650 00:45:59,726 --> 00:46:05,806 And then headshots started coming out with no tie and it was like, you know, I remember that shift. 651 00:46:05,806 --> 00:46:07,446 And so, 652 00:46:08,078 --> 00:46:10,298 this is also generational, right? 653 00:46:10,298 --> 00:46:11,618 It can be generational. 654 00:46:11,618 --> 00:46:21,698 And I think that's the other piece that's like a big part of the workforce that we haven't touched on and certainly don't have time to, but there are four different generations in 655 00:46:21,698 --> 00:46:23,298 the workforce right now. 656 00:46:23,298 --> 00:46:33,278 And if you grew up wearing a suit in an airplane and you're still in the workforce, your expectations of people are very different than somebody who just joined. 657 00:46:34,638 --> 00:46:36,018 That's hard. 658 00:46:36,888 --> 00:46:39,416 Bridging that gap is a big deal, so. 659 00:46:40,059 --> 00:46:43,902 Well, um, this has been a very refreshing and fun conversation. 660 00:46:43,902 --> 00:46:53,589 I, it is off the beaten path, but these are all really good topics and things that I know our audience thinks about. 661 00:46:53,589 --> 00:47:02,875 So, um, I really appreciate you, engaging, before we wrap up, how do people find out more about you? 662 00:47:02,875 --> 00:47:04,886 Are you active on LinkedIn? 663 00:47:04,886 --> 00:47:09,046 What's, what's the best way for someone to get in touch and learn more about you? 664 00:47:09,046 --> 00:47:10,506 Yeah, thank you. 665 00:47:11,107 --> 00:47:13,047 I am active on LinkedIn. 666 00:47:13,047 --> 00:47:16,588 I lead with I'm a mom on my profile, so you can't miss me. 667 00:47:16,989 --> 00:47:20,010 But yeah, it's Nikki Corson, K-O-R-S-O-N. 668 00:47:20,010 --> 00:47:24,791 So please feel free to reach out if you want to connect further or talk about this. 669 00:47:25,012 --> 00:47:28,003 And Ted, this actually was fun, so I appreciate the opportunity. 670 00:47:28,003 --> 00:47:31,909 And I look forward to listening in. 671 00:47:31,909 --> 00:47:32,801 Yeah. 672 00:47:32,801 --> 00:47:38,711 And I'll be, I'll be in your neck of the woods at some point this year. 673 00:47:38,711 --> 00:47:40,424 I know we have a DC conference on the schedule. 674 00:47:40,424 --> 00:47:42,237 We're doing like over a dozen. 675 00:47:42,358 --> 00:47:45,583 So hopefully we can get together in person and say hello. 676 00:47:46,025 --> 00:47:47,003 awesome. 677 00:47:47,163 --> 00:47:47,794 Well, good stuff. 678 00:47:47,794 --> 00:47:49,808 Well, thanks for joining. 679 00:47:49,808 --> 00:47:53,414 We're on a Friday morning here, so enjoy your weekend. 680 00:47:53,414 --> 00:47:56,958 And I look forward to the next conversation. 681 00:47:58,021 --> 00:47:59,362 All right, take care. 00:00:04,470 Nikki, thanks for joining me this morning. 2 00:00:04,470 --> 00:00:06,307 Hi Ted, how are you? 3 00:00:06,395 --> 00:00:09,151 I'm doing good trying to stay warm here in St. 4 00:00:09,151 --> 00:00:09,551 Louis. 5 00:00:09,551 --> 00:00:14,871 It's, um, we've been on a crazy cold streak, so it's not pleasant outside. 6 00:00:14,956 --> 00:00:16,198 Yeah, thank you for having me. 7 00:00:16,198 --> 00:00:19,354 This is the warmest moment I've had in three weeks. 8 00:00:19,354 --> 00:00:25,305 In DC, we are also struggling with ice, which apparently is rocket science for the roads. 9 00:00:25,305 --> 00:00:27,668 So I sympathize. 10 00:00:27,759 --> 00:00:28,940 I hear you. 11 00:00:29,160 --> 00:00:29,571 Yeah. 12 00:00:29,571 --> 00:00:32,613 Well, let's start with, with an introduction. 13 00:00:32,613 --> 00:00:38,889 You've got a different background than my typical guest, which I think is refreshing. 14 00:00:38,889 --> 00:00:46,266 You know, we are not an AI show, but it seems like we talk about AI constantly and it's nice to mix things up. 15 00:00:46,266 --> 00:00:49,249 And we have a cool agenda today. 16 00:00:49,249 --> 00:00:52,942 That's going to be a little bit off that topic, which I think is great. 17 00:00:52,942 --> 00:00:54,323 Um, 18 00:00:54,767 --> 00:00:57,051 So yeah, so you have an interesting background. 19 00:00:57,051 --> 00:01:02,689 Why don't we start with you just taking a couple of minutes and telling us who you are, what you do and where you do it. 20 00:01:02,894 --> 00:01:03,735 Sure, sure. 21 00:01:03,735 --> 00:01:05,065 No, I'm really happy to be here. 22 00:01:05,065 --> 00:01:07,567 I know I'm a little bit of a tweak from your normal guest. 23 00:01:07,567 --> 00:01:10,579 I hope I don't scare away your loyal followers. 24 00:01:11,360 --> 00:01:12,441 But yes, you're right. 25 00:01:12,441 --> 00:01:16,204 My background is a little bit of a tweak from the normal guest. 26 00:01:16,204 --> 00:01:24,310 I have climbed the ranks in what I would call business services in law firms for the last 20 years in a myriad of different roles. 27 00:01:24,310 --> 00:01:28,193 Fun fact, I started as a receptionist once upon a time. 28 00:01:28,453 --> 00:01:29,313 And 29 00:01:29,486 --> 00:01:36,486 I started at a law firm because I needed a job and it was posted in the newspaper and I thought, okay, I'm, you know, 20 years old. 30 00:01:36,486 --> 00:01:37,266 I'm going to do this. 31 00:01:37,266 --> 00:01:38,706 I'm going to do this thing. 32 00:01:38,706 --> 00:01:46,766 And I still remember interviewing in a black suit and a neon green t-shirt under it thinking I was just so slick. 33 00:01:46,766 --> 00:01:58,086 And I got this job and even to date, the partner that I worked with at the time said she plucked me from obscurity and trained me how to be a legal secretary, which 34 00:01:58,190 --> 00:02:00,591 call a legal assistant depending on where you work. 35 00:02:00,771 --> 00:02:11,637 And I fell in love with litigation very quickly, loved working in the space, really enjoyed the fast pace and all those things, and quickly found that my career needle moved 36 00:02:11,637 --> 00:02:13,398 over the years very quickly. 37 00:02:13,398 --> 00:02:16,750 So I got a paralegal certificate, I became a timekeeper. 38 00:02:16,750 --> 00:02:20,941 I really thrived on the idea of having the respect of the lawyers. 39 00:02:20,941 --> 00:02:22,752 I really thought that I needed... 40 00:02:22,752 --> 00:02:24,593 elevation in order to earn that. 41 00:02:24,593 --> 00:02:28,986 And so I became a paralegal and started contributing in different ways. 42 00:02:29,087 --> 00:02:33,370 And then after a few years of that, I thought, okay, well, how can I manage the business? 43 00:02:33,370 --> 00:02:33,600 Right? 44 00:02:33,600 --> 00:02:37,142 Because that seems like where the real seat at the table is. 45 00:02:37,142 --> 00:02:42,336 And I would really like to be behind the scenes instead of sitting on this side of the table. 46 00:02:42,516 --> 00:02:50,822 And so I went back to school and got a master's in law firm management and started managing a smaller IP boutique and 47 00:02:51,446 --> 00:02:52,407 ran the full gamut. 48 00:02:52,407 --> 00:02:54,478 I I tried HR and facilities. 49 00:02:54,478 --> 00:02:55,849 I managed the IT department. 50 00:02:55,849 --> 00:02:59,752 And that's kind of where I found myself listening to you. 51 00:03:00,486 --> 00:03:01,824 And I did that for a few years. 52 00:03:01,824 --> 00:03:04,315 And then I got picked up at an AMWA firm. 53 00:03:04,436 --> 00:03:11,401 And I managed a giant office of 300 people and then eventually emerged into a global new business strategy role. 54 00:03:11,401 --> 00:03:16,825 So it has been quite the organic growth journey, but I've really enjoyed it. 55 00:03:16,946 --> 00:03:17,966 And 56 00:03:18,338 --> 00:03:25,316 I think generally just having that breadth of experience allows me to look at firms from a number of different lenses. 57 00:03:25,607 --> 00:03:26,727 Interesting. 58 00:03:26,867 --> 00:03:33,847 So just out of curiosity, mean, are you familiar with the ALA? 59 00:03:33,996 --> 00:03:35,931 Yes, I was a member for many years. 60 00:03:35,931 --> 00:03:39,921 Yeah, I would assume that your role kind of aligns with their mission. 61 00:03:39,921 --> 00:03:41,185 Is that accurate? 62 00:03:41,494 --> 00:03:48,638 I think when I was managing the offices on what we call operations of a law firm, yes, my current role actually sits in innovation. 63 00:03:48,638 --> 00:03:53,711 And I work on a little bit of a different, in a little bit of a different capacity. 64 00:03:53,711 --> 00:03:55,612 But yes, the ALA was fantastic. 65 00:03:55,612 --> 00:04:04,767 think it's, membership is targeted towards law firm, call them administrators, the DOOs, the operations folks, right? 66 00:04:04,767 --> 00:04:08,309 But when you start turning into business strategy or 67 00:04:08,438 --> 00:04:17,852 maybe the fiscal analytics of the performance of a practice or something like that, you start leaning into different organizations that support those professional initiatives 68 00:04:17,852 --> 00:04:18,818 differently. 69 00:04:18,818 --> 00:04:20,676 It doesn't devalue the ALA at all. 70 00:04:20,676 --> 00:04:22,258 I think they're fantastic organization. 71 00:04:22,258 --> 00:04:25,002 I still keep in touch with a lot of my colleagues there. 72 00:04:25,256 --> 00:04:29,090 So what organizations really align to your current role? 73 00:04:29,314 --> 00:04:33,305 So I think Law Vision does a really nice job with round tables. 74 00:04:33,305 --> 00:04:38,196 There's a local group called the College of Legal Practice Management that speaks to. 75 00:04:38,636 --> 00:04:44,299 just the general strategic operation of a law firm versus this is how you source a vendor. 76 00:04:44,299 --> 00:04:49,212 It's more like, why would you choose this vendor and what does it do for your business? 77 00:04:49,432 --> 00:04:51,393 And when I say, what does it do for your business? 78 00:04:51,393 --> 00:04:53,985 means, how does this affect your revenue generation? 79 00:04:53,985 --> 00:05:00,598 So to me, working in operations is mostly expense management and maybe a little bit of cost savings. 80 00:05:00,619 --> 00:05:06,612 Whereas when you start working into practice management or innovation, you start looking at opportunity costs and generating revenue. 81 00:05:06,769 --> 00:05:07,089 Yeah. 82 00:05:07,089 --> 00:05:09,801 And we're going to talk about some of that. 83 00:05:09,801 --> 00:05:15,325 think there's a mindset in legal that we're going to discuss that holds the industry back. 84 00:05:15,325 --> 00:05:20,048 And, but before we do that, why don't we talk a little bit more about your journey? 85 00:05:20,048 --> 00:05:29,735 Um, you and I had a offline conversation about something completely different and I thought you were a great communicator and have a really interesting background. 86 00:05:29,735 --> 00:05:35,839 So, um, I want to explore that a little bit, like tell me about your, your transition from 87 00:05:35,843 --> 00:05:39,164 administrative to leadership roles. 88 00:05:39,164 --> 00:05:42,393 That had to have been quite the journey. 89 00:05:43,062 --> 00:05:48,386 Yes, so as I said, I jumped from paralegal to firm administrator, right? 90 00:05:48,386 --> 00:05:58,092 And at the time I was working in a mid-Atlantic firm with multiple offices and I was thinking about how can I jump into a business management role? 91 00:05:58,092 --> 00:06:07,988 So that could be practice management, it could be an office management role, anything that allows me to instead of acting as a timekeeper really... 92 00:06:07,988 --> 00:06:11,301 overseeing the fiscal performance of a facet of the business. 93 00:06:11,301 --> 00:06:20,783 And I found that in the firm I was with, I had a conversation with someone in leadership and whether I agree with the sentiment or not, it was how they felt at the time was, it's 94 00:06:20,783 --> 00:06:26,852 going to be really hard for us to sell you to our population as something other than a paralegal. 95 00:06:27,393 --> 00:06:29,388 And I think I could have proven them wrong. 96 00:06:29,388 --> 00:06:31,331 But I do appreciate the challenge of that. 97 00:06:31,331 --> 00:06:38,371 I do appreciate that it's really hard to completely shift your professional image and role, right? 98 00:06:38,371 --> 00:06:47,042 So I ended up switching to a new firm, a smaller firm that was willing to hire someone and take a chance on someone that was doing it for the first time. 99 00:06:47,801 --> 00:06:48,432 Interesting. 100 00:06:48,432 --> 00:06:55,884 so your role now, it sounds like it's innovation related at Paul Hastings, correct? 101 00:06:55,884 --> 00:07:01,017 Yes, I work in the innovation department, which has a few interesting arms to it. 102 00:07:01,017 --> 00:07:07,066 I work in the practice management vein, which most AMWA firms have practice management at this stage of the game. 103 00:07:08,128 --> 00:07:08,850 Indeed. 104 00:07:08,850 --> 00:07:10,047 Yeah. 105 00:07:10,047 --> 00:07:14,105 So Paul Hastings, are they around a thousand attorneys? 106 00:07:14,105 --> 00:07:14,526 What? 107 00:07:14,526 --> 00:07:15,437 How many? 108 00:07:15,586 --> 00:07:19,266 We are over a thousand, I think we're hovering around 1300. 109 00:07:19,306 --> 00:07:30,130 But yes, our firm has exploded and it's really exciting to be part of the upward trajectory that this firm has just climbed the Amla ranks and has hired a lot of really 110 00:07:30,130 --> 00:07:39,143 meaningful and valuable practices that I think allow us to kind of offer a diversity of our services at the top tier of the market. 111 00:07:39,143 --> 00:07:42,594 It's very exciting to walk around and be part of. 112 00:07:42,914 --> 00:07:44,897 this collaboration of all these great minds. 113 00:07:44,897 --> 00:07:50,865 I mean, I have to say I worked at a lot of firms, but it's a really inspiring place to be. 114 00:07:50,907 --> 00:07:51,467 Yeah. 115 00:07:51,467 --> 00:07:52,248 I know your firm. 116 00:07:52,248 --> 00:07:56,589 Well, we, know many people there and you guys have a great team. 117 00:07:56,589 --> 00:08:03,532 Um, well, you know, the, the term non-lawyer has been under attack recently. 118 00:08:03,532 --> 00:08:04,673 There was a petition. 119 00:08:04,673 --> 00:08:12,276 don't know if it ever, what became of it to eliminate the term from the ABA's vernacular. 120 00:08:12,276 --> 00:08:20,091 And, um, I don't have a better word for it right now, but I, and I do understand the hesitation. 121 00:08:20,091 --> 00:08:24,596 with the term, it kind of creates a little bit of a divide. 122 00:08:25,819 --> 00:08:32,907 what have been some of the challenges and opportunities as a non-lawyer in law firm leadership from your perspective? 123 00:08:33,228 --> 00:08:36,749 So I want to just full disclaimer, this is my personal perspective. 124 00:08:36,749 --> 00:08:41,440 And I think I may have some unpopular opinions about this for people in my space. 125 00:08:41,540 --> 00:08:44,721 But I don't find the term offensive. 126 00:08:45,761 --> 00:08:52,263 I do understand, as you said, why people hesitate and are reticent to incorporate into their vernacular. 127 00:08:52,458 --> 00:09:00,058 If we liken it to a medical practice, for example, do we walk into the receptionist and say, hi, non-doctor? 128 00:09:00,058 --> 00:09:04,445 And then you see your nurse and it's like, hello, non-doctor Anna. 129 00:09:04,445 --> 00:09:05,095 No, right? 130 00:09:05,095 --> 00:09:12,449 You greet this person with the necessary salutation or whatever appropriate credentials should be used in that situation. 131 00:09:12,449 --> 00:09:20,193 And I think that when I meet an RN, for example, or even a PA, I'm greeting them by their first name. 132 00:09:20,193 --> 00:09:22,174 There is no professional 133 00:09:22,408 --> 00:09:33,365 know, doctor or any sort of preface to them that signifies their credentials and maybe because the PA is emerging as a more common credential, that will change over time, right? 134 00:09:33,365 --> 00:09:35,806 Our society has to embrace that. 135 00:09:36,006 --> 00:09:38,028 I think it's similar in law firms. 136 00:09:38,028 --> 00:09:45,338 I think that there are a whole class of people like me who are cultivating and curating what they think is a very meaningful career. 137 00:09:45,338 --> 00:09:48,934 I have worked my entire career in law firms and have 138 00:09:49,174 --> 00:10:00,953 you know, dedicated my mind and my vision for myself to performing at a high level in this industry, almost to the point that I wonder at some point in my life, if it would even be 139 00:10:00,953 --> 00:10:03,445 possible for me to work in another industry. 140 00:10:03,445 --> 00:10:11,221 The culture of how I communicate, the way I carry myself, the way I communicate is tailored to kind of the population of people that I work with. 141 00:10:11,221 --> 00:10:13,292 And we are a unique kingdom. 142 00:10:13,292 --> 00:10:14,873 I always tell people that. 143 00:10:15,828 --> 00:10:23,821 But I do agree, it is driven by the model rules and like NLO and non-legal ownership and things like that. 144 00:10:25,442 --> 00:10:27,633 Do I agree that there should be a better term? 145 00:10:27,633 --> 00:10:33,071 Yes, I think that some firms have embraced business professionals or business services. 146 00:10:33,071 --> 00:10:39,147 I kind of lean on business professionals because at least it sounds like, you know, you are a senior brain. 147 00:10:39,668 --> 00:10:41,779 But yeah, it's definitely hard. 148 00:10:41,779 --> 00:10:44,570 think to the second part of your question, 149 00:10:45,198 --> 00:10:49,378 How do you integrate in a law firm when you're not a lawyer? 150 00:10:49,378 --> 00:10:59,138 think that in a role like my current role, for example, I'm supposed to be contributing to the strategic plan of a group, which is comprised of a number of different lawyers. 151 00:10:59,138 --> 00:11:02,098 How does a non-lawyer lead lawyers? 152 00:11:02,218 --> 00:11:03,398 I think that's 153 00:11:03,438 --> 00:11:04,898 is an immediate question. 154 00:11:04,898 --> 00:11:07,918 mean, when people hear that question, it's like, well, but you're not their boss. 155 00:11:07,918 --> 00:11:08,218 That's right. 156 00:11:08,218 --> 00:11:09,418 I'm not their boss, right? 157 00:11:09,418 --> 00:11:12,638 But I am trying to lead a strategic initiative, right? 158 00:11:12,638 --> 00:11:14,058 So what does that look like? 159 00:11:14,638 --> 00:11:17,178 leaders are supposed to have willing followers, right? 160 00:11:17,178 --> 00:11:19,138 John Cotter, love that. 161 00:11:19,918 --> 00:11:22,598 But they're a huge change management leader. 162 00:11:22,598 --> 00:11:26,018 If people are listening and don't know who he is, he's two really great folks. 163 00:11:26,776 --> 00:11:29,248 How do you cultivate willing followers and lawyers? 164 00:11:29,248 --> 00:11:30,769 mean, that is an art. 165 00:11:30,789 --> 00:11:33,992 And it's not something that you can just print off of a checklist. 166 00:11:33,992 --> 00:11:37,395 You need to cultivate their confidence in your abilities. 167 00:11:37,395 --> 00:11:41,517 And that's bespoke to each personal relationship, in my opinion. 168 00:11:41,753 --> 00:11:44,244 Yeah, I mean, I don't have a JD. 169 00:11:44,244 --> 00:11:54,400 have a undergrad in math and an MBA and have worked in a lot of different industries and I haven't felt challenges gaining the respect. 170 00:11:54,400 --> 00:11:57,832 I speak in front of legal audiences all the time, including this podcast. 171 00:11:57,832 --> 00:12:02,194 Most of our listeners are lawyers, not all, but many. 172 00:12:02,454 --> 00:12:11,219 And I think it's, you know, the bar is a little bit higher in terms of, you know, I think lawyers have a 173 00:12:11,697 --> 00:12:17,252 high bar in terms of their view on the profession. 174 00:12:17,252 --> 00:12:23,818 In fact, there's, you know, the whole, we're not a business, we're a profession, which I think is utter nonsense. 175 00:12:23,818 --> 00:12:24,478 You're both. 176 00:12:24,478 --> 00:12:28,071 Um, in my opinion, you can't be just a profession. 177 00:12:28,071 --> 00:12:34,527 The business of law and the practice of law are very tightly coupled and interconnected. 178 00:12:34,527 --> 00:12:36,729 And you're not, you are a professional. 179 00:12:36,729 --> 00:12:38,917 There are many other professions. 180 00:12:38,917 --> 00:12:39,708 as well. 181 00:12:39,708 --> 00:12:51,245 The definition of a profession, depending on where you read it, is that there are a heightened level of credentials and certification and ethical obligations. 182 00:12:51,245 --> 00:12:56,838 That's not unique to legal, and there's nothing special about the legal industry. 183 00:12:56,838 --> 00:13:00,940 It's no more special than the medical industry. 184 00:13:02,782 --> 00:13:05,137 Yeah, no, I think, and I... 185 00:13:05,137 --> 00:13:08,320 I've been very vocal about that and I feel pretty strongly about it. 186 00:13:08,320 --> 00:13:11,412 And if anybody wants to have that debate, we can have it. 187 00:13:11,412 --> 00:13:24,543 but I, it's, I think we got to get out of that mindset because as an industry embracing new ideas requires, you know, um, what they call Shoshin, which is beginner's mind. 188 00:13:24,543 --> 00:13:34,213 And we have to take, um, we have to take cues from other industries and how, you know, I've talked about this before, the biggest law firm. 189 00:13:34,213 --> 00:13:45,886 in the world is Kirkland and Ellis and they're, private, of course, as all us law firms are, but even if they were public, they wouldn't qualify for the fortune 500. 190 00:13:45,886 --> 00:13:52,728 There's not one fortune 500 law firm that has revenue that would qualify them for the fortune 500. 191 00:13:52,728 --> 00:13:55,249 No, what, what, and why is that? 192 00:13:55,349 --> 00:14:03,239 And I think one reason is, um, a lot of the structural elements, a lot of the cultural elements. 193 00:14:03,239 --> 00:14:07,401 that exists within, like you talked about NLO, non-legal ownership. 194 00:14:07,561 --> 00:14:15,916 That's typical big business that's in the billions of revenue typically have a different governance structure. 195 00:14:15,916 --> 00:14:24,911 They have a board of directors that sits separate, that appoints management and holds management accountable for goals and execution. 196 00:14:24,911 --> 00:14:27,913 And you don't have that in legal. 197 00:14:27,913 --> 00:14:31,614 It's in the law firm space specifically. 198 00:14:32,006 --> 00:14:37,210 I think people are held in senior leadership to certain benchmarks. 199 00:14:37,210 --> 00:14:39,811 They just don't have equity, right? 200 00:14:40,192 --> 00:14:50,339 And so at end of the day, you I recently shared this story on my LinkedIn, but I kind of told a story where I went to this BNI group on behalf of our firm at the time. 201 00:14:50,339 --> 00:14:58,524 And the gentleman who was the chair of this BNI group, I kept trying to get a forum with him so that we could present at one of these monthly meetings. 202 00:14:58,524 --> 00:15:00,974 And he said, eventually, 203 00:15:00,974 --> 00:15:05,114 He says, I want to talk to somebody who makes the business decisions for your firm. 204 00:15:06,154 --> 00:15:08,314 I know there's a number of different reasons why that happened. 205 00:15:08,314 --> 00:15:10,394 Is it because I'm young? 206 00:15:10,394 --> 00:15:11,654 Is it because I'm a woman? 207 00:15:11,654 --> 00:15:14,894 Is it because my name isn't on the door? 208 00:15:14,894 --> 00:15:16,454 It could be any of those things. 209 00:15:16,674 --> 00:15:19,914 But he sized me up and had decided that I wasn't the appropriate person. 210 00:15:19,914 --> 00:15:23,274 And I said, well, I manage the business of our law firm. 211 00:15:23,414 --> 00:15:25,854 I'm the singular, I'm the director of administration. 212 00:15:25,854 --> 00:15:26,554 I got it. 213 00:15:26,554 --> 00:15:28,954 Let me know what you want to talk about. 214 00:15:29,622 --> 00:15:32,363 And his answer was, no, I want somebody who owns the business. 215 00:15:32,363 --> 00:15:34,584 This is a business owners group. 216 00:15:34,664 --> 00:15:37,946 And so that's important to me is that they have to have equity. 217 00:15:37,946 --> 00:15:41,727 And I said, well, if we could just have a quick lesson, right? 218 00:15:41,788 --> 00:15:52,413 You will never meet someone in a law firm that's managing the business that isn't a lawyer that has equity, unless at the time you were not in Nevada or Arizona, right? 219 00:15:52,413 --> 00:15:55,564 And I said, you know, if you start a business and you... 220 00:15:55,564 --> 00:15:58,616 Let's talk about this guy over here who owns a landscaping company, right? 221 00:15:58,616 --> 00:16:04,641 He probably bought a lawn mower and one day went out, was mowing a few lawns and then pick up a few more neighbors and got pretty good at it. 222 00:16:04,641 --> 00:16:05,963 And then he made it. 223 00:16:05,963 --> 00:16:10,286 He hired some people, bought some more mowers and sat in the office and put the air conditioning on. 224 00:16:10,286 --> 00:16:11,227 And that was nice for him. 225 00:16:11,227 --> 00:16:12,688 He made it, right? 226 00:16:12,828 --> 00:16:16,291 Lawyers mow the lawn forever. 227 00:16:16,431 --> 00:16:17,962 It is a specialized craft. 228 00:16:17,962 --> 00:16:20,396 They hire people like me. 229 00:16:20,396 --> 00:16:25,348 to send the bills out in the air conditioning because they want to be in the front lines and I can't do that. 230 00:16:25,348 --> 00:16:28,192 I can't provide that service, right? 231 00:16:28,753 --> 00:16:30,275 And so we are a little bit different. 232 00:16:30,275 --> 00:16:32,236 Professional services firms are all that way. 233 00:16:32,236 --> 00:16:36,220 Accounting firms, doctors, hospitals, it's all that way, right? 234 00:16:36,220 --> 00:16:42,906 So I don't think law firms are unique animal in that way. 235 00:16:42,906 --> 00:16:47,410 I think the psychological components of our industry make us different. 236 00:16:47,410 --> 00:16:48,270 think... 237 00:16:48,512 --> 00:16:55,105 meaning culturally, I also think professional services firms are different than the average like sales organization, for example. 238 00:16:55,281 --> 00:16:57,631 Yeah, I see it a little differently. 239 00:16:57,631 --> 00:17:07,559 I see, you know, in a traditional publicly traded governance structure, vastly different dynamics. 240 00:17:07,559 --> 00:17:14,744 have shareholders that appoint a board of professionals, not necessarily practitioners. 241 00:17:15,205 --> 00:17:17,846 The board doesn't work in the business, right? 242 00:17:17,846 --> 00:17:24,851 So the owners are typically further removed from the day to day. 243 00:17:25,067 --> 00:17:39,075 And just the, the, the dynamics are quite different and not, not being able to, you know, give stock options to a law firm CEO who's, who isn't a lawyer, but as an amazing business 244 00:17:39,075 --> 00:17:41,536 leader that limits options. 245 00:17:41,536 --> 00:17:53,463 And, um, I think, you know, they've, what's interesting, I had somebody on the podcast, I don't know, a couple of weeks ago who in the UK and their comment was, you know, since we 246 00:17:53,463 --> 00:17:54,533 allowed, 247 00:17:54,619 --> 00:17:59,900 you know, non lawyer ownership, exactly nothing has changed. 248 00:18:00,041 --> 00:18:01,900 Now that may be true. 249 00:18:01,900 --> 00:18:11,704 I think we are, we are on the cusp of a real fundamental shift in law and it's a technology shift. 250 00:18:11,704 --> 00:18:17,245 There hasn't been a real big innovation in legal in quite some time. 251 00:18:17,245 --> 00:18:23,287 The billable hour has been firmly in place for about 50 years and the amount of 252 00:18:23,857 --> 00:18:35,747 technology that has been truly transformative around language until 2017 when Transformers and AI emerged and really kind of exploded in 2022. 253 00:18:35,767 --> 00:18:45,193 The last big, I guess, transformation was the digitization of legal records and legal research. 254 00:18:45,193 --> 00:18:52,227 You know, that was a pretty massive shift, but I, I, I, yeah. 255 00:18:52,227 --> 00:18:58,649 So, but I do see real change coming and opportunities to think about everything differently. 256 00:18:58,649 --> 00:19:10,312 know, pricing models, internal compensation models, client engagement models are all under scrutiny right now. 257 00:19:10,312 --> 00:19:20,835 And I think there's an opportunity to think about some things differently that maybe not a lawyer is the best person to evaluate and propose options around that. 258 00:19:20,835 --> 00:19:21,819 Maybe they are. 259 00:19:21,819 --> 00:19:23,693 the best, but not necessarily. 260 00:19:23,693 --> 00:19:30,145 You don't have to have a law degree to bring suggestions to the table in that conversation. 261 00:19:30,498 --> 00:19:35,592 So to your point earlier when you said, it a business or is it a service? 262 00:19:35,592 --> 00:19:39,716 Thompson writers actually begged that question in their State of the Legal Market report for this year. 263 00:19:39,716 --> 00:19:41,908 And I just saw that presentation. 264 00:19:41,908 --> 00:19:43,729 I thought it was fantastic. 265 00:19:44,310 --> 00:19:45,046 Look. 266 00:19:45,046 --> 00:19:52,061 We've all sat for the AI presentation when we talk about how AI is streamlining things and it's making things run faster. 267 00:19:52,061 --> 00:19:54,663 And what does that mean for associate development? 268 00:19:54,663 --> 00:19:54,883 Right? 269 00:19:54,883 --> 00:19:58,686 What does it mean for staffing in terms of retention or hiring? 270 00:19:58,686 --> 00:20:04,660 And so, you know, to your point, I mean, I think there is going to be a shift in the market with respect to demand. 271 00:20:04,660 --> 00:20:06,392 How many heads are you going to need? 272 00:20:06,392 --> 00:20:10,445 Does it mean that suddenly law firms will be able to engage in more legal work? 273 00:20:10,445 --> 00:20:10,755 Right? 274 00:20:10,755 --> 00:20:12,586 Because now they've freed up. 275 00:20:13,172 --> 00:20:13,982 some 276 00:20:43,375 --> 00:20:50,223 I say that and I have shared this story before because I think it bred a certain skill set. 277 00:20:50,223 --> 00:20:52,465 People put their typing speed on their resume. 278 00:20:52,465 --> 00:20:54,087 was something that was really important. 279 00:20:54,087 --> 00:21:03,077 And even as an attorney, it mattered if you could type because it was such an integral skill set for those that were coming in with the technological shift just using computers, 280 00:21:03,077 --> 00:21:03,937 right? 281 00:21:04,078 --> 00:21:10,958 You had to have cron copies of everything and everything was in paper and you had a paper file and you had to carry it to court. 282 00:21:10,958 --> 00:21:15,158 And what if you dropped something and it was a disaster in a lot of ways, right? 283 00:21:15,398 --> 00:21:19,358 Nobody cares about typing speed anymore, but the industry is still here. 284 00:21:19,438 --> 00:21:20,558 We're still all working. 285 00:21:20,558 --> 00:21:23,238 We're still delivering services and we're still doing a great job. 286 00:21:23,238 --> 00:21:32,318 And I don't think that bringing in the computer and getting rid of the typewriter, for example, hurt us in any way, even though it made us a whole lot faster. 287 00:21:32,338 --> 00:21:34,198 And 10 years later. 288 00:21:34,382 --> 00:21:40,722 I remember sitting in an office and there were 12 letters lined up on my desk that needed to be sent out. 289 00:21:40,722 --> 00:21:44,762 And I thought, oh my God, 10 years ago, I never could have sent out 12 letters, right? 290 00:21:44,762 --> 00:21:46,422 You got to send it to this person. 291 00:21:46,422 --> 00:21:47,542 You got to CC the client. 292 00:21:47,542 --> 00:21:48,922 You got to put it in the cron file. 293 00:21:48,922 --> 00:21:51,962 Like it takes time when you're doing all of that. 294 00:21:52,062 --> 00:21:55,582 This technology allowed this to be done so much faster. 295 00:21:55,582 --> 00:22:00,882 And so my note, my observation at that time was we're just doing more. 296 00:22:00,882 --> 00:22:02,062 We're not. 297 00:22:02,466 --> 00:22:03,876 hiring less people or any that. 298 00:22:03,876 --> 00:22:06,167 We're just doing more work because it's faster. 299 00:22:07,326 --> 00:22:15,300 I mean, I hate to that out loud because I think all of our industry experts are saying, well, we're going to need less associates possibly, or there might be some stagnation in 300 00:22:15,300 --> 00:22:20,871 the development of people because now they're not going to pour over a document review, right? 301 00:22:21,652 --> 00:22:25,213 I mean, I can type 120 more minutes. 302 00:22:25,233 --> 00:22:27,634 I don't think it changes my career anymore. 303 00:22:28,625 --> 00:22:30,376 Yeah, no, mean, it's fair. 304 00:22:30,376 --> 00:22:33,218 think we agree on this. 305 00:22:33,218 --> 00:22:37,750 I think the overall output of law firms is going to increase. 306 00:22:37,750 --> 00:22:45,044 The average AMLaw firm is about 1.3 million in revenue per lawyer. 307 00:22:45,445 --> 00:22:47,886 That's the AMLaw 100, right? 308 00:22:47,966 --> 00:22:53,479 a thousand attorney law firm averages around 1.3 billion in revenue. 309 00:22:53,479 --> 00:22:55,990 I think that number is going to increase. 310 00:22:56,901 --> 00:23:05,074 which is ultimately a good thing, but what's also going to increase is the amount of risk that law firms are going to be required to take. 311 00:23:05,074 --> 00:23:06,475 Like this isn't an option. 312 00:23:06,475 --> 00:23:14,598 This isn't a maybe like there, there will be a, you know, AFA, movement. 313 00:23:14,598 --> 00:23:15,769 And we've been talking about this. 314 00:23:15,769 --> 00:23:17,039 I realize for 315 00:23:17,054 --> 00:23:18,455 I think it's already here. 316 00:23:18,455 --> 00:23:20,446 keep hearing like, pricing is going to change. 317 00:23:20,446 --> 00:23:24,698 But if you talk to somebody in pricing, they're like, this is already started, right? 318 00:23:24,698 --> 00:23:28,781 Because you have clients that will say, you're not allowed to use AI on our files. 319 00:23:28,781 --> 00:23:30,131 I mean, that does exist. 320 00:23:30,131 --> 00:23:31,662 just, they don't want it. 321 00:23:31,662 --> 00:23:32,513 And that's fine. 322 00:23:32,513 --> 00:23:32,733 Right? 323 00:23:32,733 --> 00:23:37,195 So the shift is not bleeding down to every client. 324 00:23:37,195 --> 00:23:38,186 Some just don't want it. 325 00:23:38,186 --> 00:23:41,758 And others like, you have to use this for this particular phase. 326 00:23:41,758 --> 00:23:42,388 Right? 327 00:23:42,388 --> 00:23:43,649 That's happening now. 328 00:23:43,649 --> 00:23:46,230 So pricing professionals are already 329 00:23:46,230 --> 00:23:48,163 strategically dealing with that, right? 330 00:23:48,163 --> 00:23:52,830 I mean, they're not just like, no, sorry, you have to pay the billable hour, right? 331 00:23:53,180 --> 00:23:54,090 I think it's here. 332 00:23:54,090 --> 00:23:59,399 I think it will continue to change and morph and evolve, but it has begun. 333 00:23:59,399 --> 00:24:00,449 It is here. 334 00:24:00,579 --> 00:24:03,431 Yeah, no, it began many years ago. 335 00:24:03,431 --> 00:24:12,678 I mean, I remember after I got married in 2010 and we did some estate planning, that was a flat fee engagement in 2010. 336 00:24:12,678 --> 00:24:13,119 Right. 337 00:24:13,119 --> 00:24:25,248 So no, no, no doubt it has, but it is a relative, if you look at the pie chart on billable hour versus value-based, it's still a small slice. 338 00:24:25,368 --> 00:24:28,430 That slice is going to get bigger and bigger over time. 339 00:24:28,569 --> 00:24:29,471 And 340 00:24:29,471 --> 00:24:33,093 I think everybody wins in that scenario, but it is a shift. 341 00:24:33,093 --> 00:24:39,457 And in order for law firms to execute on value-based pricing, they have to take risk. 342 00:24:39,457 --> 00:24:43,839 And it's not just law firms that are maintaining the status quo. 343 00:24:43,839 --> 00:24:45,300 It's also clients. 344 00:24:45,300 --> 00:24:48,211 Clients are also very comfortable with the billable hour. 345 00:24:48,211 --> 00:24:53,234 And a lot of them saber-rattle and go, you guys haven't innovated and we've been asking for value-based pricing. 346 00:24:53,234 --> 00:24:59,073 And it's like, yeah, well, when we propose it, know, clients get 347 00:24:59,073 --> 00:25:06,565 um, antsy sometimes because it is, you know, most inside counsel started their journey on the law firm side, right? 348 00:25:06,565 --> 00:25:07,956 They've got relationships. 349 00:25:07,956 --> 00:25:10,926 They've got friends whose kids play and suck. 350 00:25:10,926 --> 00:25:16,198 Like it is very incestuous and friendly. 351 00:25:16,198 --> 00:25:17,748 It's a better way of putting it. 352 00:25:18,669 --> 00:25:24,710 so, you know, there's a strong, there's a strong relationship between the law firm world and inside counsel. 353 00:25:24,710 --> 00:25:27,501 And, um, I don't know that 354 00:25:27,825 --> 00:25:36,949 five years ago or maybe even three years ago that law firms were feeling the pressure necessary to really change what's working well. 355 00:25:36,949 --> 00:25:38,219 Like law firms do well. 356 00:25:38,219 --> 00:25:47,924 If you look at the AMLAL list and the profit per partner at the top firms, it's hovering close to $10 million per equity partner. 357 00:25:47,924 --> 00:25:49,104 That's incredible. 358 00:25:49,104 --> 00:25:50,735 That's a very successful model. 359 00:25:50,735 --> 00:25:56,549 Now, are you going to charge to go make changes to that when everybody's doing so well? 360 00:25:56,549 --> 00:26:01,510 Well, if the market's not really pushing you that hard, then the answer is probably no. 361 00:26:01,510 --> 00:26:03,365 That would be my answer anyway. 362 00:26:03,365 --> 00:26:05,669 So that is going to change. 363 00:26:05,918 --> 00:26:07,819 market is starting to push, right? 364 00:26:07,819 --> 00:26:14,794 We have clients in the industry, for example, who require that their billing be submitted through a certain billing platform, right? 365 00:26:14,794 --> 00:26:22,910 So law firms have had to rise to the challenge of hiring billing professionals that can navigate a multitude of different platforms, right? 366 00:26:22,910 --> 00:26:30,846 It's not like, oftentimes I don't feel that the law firm has the autonomy to say, okay, we use ABC platform. 367 00:26:30,846 --> 00:26:32,097 This is how we do our bills. 368 00:26:32,097 --> 00:26:34,398 And the client's like, we don't use that. 369 00:26:34,490 --> 00:26:36,932 So you can do it our way or we're not going work with you. 370 00:26:36,932 --> 00:26:47,261 So I think there is a lot of bespoke service delivery going on because just like when you go to the doctor, for example, everybody has a different medical platform. 371 00:26:47,261 --> 00:26:51,364 This one's got Athena Health, this one's got whatever, they all have different ones. 372 00:26:51,364 --> 00:26:55,437 And the customer is sitting here going, I have to navigate all these different platforms. 373 00:26:55,437 --> 00:27:00,791 I wish I could walk into my doctor's office and say, listen, I only use Athena Health. 374 00:27:00,792 --> 00:27:03,970 So if you want me to be your patient, you have to do this. 375 00:27:03,970 --> 00:27:06,091 The power dynamic is very different. 376 00:27:06,091 --> 00:27:10,553 I do feel that clients have a voice and they use it, right? 377 00:27:10,893 --> 00:27:14,545 So the technology piece, think is apt. 378 00:27:14,545 --> 00:27:17,616 There is so much that goes into service delivery. 379 00:27:17,616 --> 00:27:19,857 Some clients want AI, some clients don't. 380 00:27:19,857 --> 00:27:22,108 Some clients want a billing platform, some don't. 381 00:27:22,108 --> 00:27:25,880 Some do phase billing, some want flat fees, some want billable hours, right? 382 00:27:25,880 --> 00:27:31,148 So it becomes this negotiation, right, on the front end. 383 00:27:31,148 --> 00:27:34,329 when you start looking at how does this client want to be on boarded. 384 00:27:34,329 --> 00:27:41,052 And that's where I think business professionals come in where it's like, you don't want the attorney to feel like, and it shouldn't be restricted from the dynamic. 385 00:27:41,052 --> 00:27:51,156 I don't want to, I don't mean to say that, but there's something to be said for having a different person negotiate those terms for you when possible so that it doesn't poison 386 00:27:51,156 --> 00:27:52,907 your working relationship. 387 00:27:53,047 --> 00:27:53,807 Right? 388 00:27:53,807 --> 00:28:00,670 So I think that's the other value of people that work in law firms that are not lawyers, because you can take that 389 00:28:00,758 --> 00:28:03,819 mean, procurement in any other industry is the perfect example. 390 00:28:03,819 --> 00:28:06,551 You hire a vendor, you're like, sorry, I can't negotiate the rates. 391 00:28:06,551 --> 00:28:07,961 That's my procurement guy, right? 392 00:28:07,961 --> 00:28:11,883 And immediately the sales guy goes there and that difficult conversation happens. 393 00:28:11,883 --> 00:28:19,057 But when the service delivery happens, that person on the ground, that boots on the ground person maintains the integrity of the positivity of that relationship. 394 00:28:19,057 --> 00:28:22,669 Same thing happens in HR with, with job offers, right? 395 00:28:22,669 --> 00:28:30,075 It's, you know, the hiring manager in big organizations rarely is the one negotiating salary and, you know, benefits. 396 00:28:30,075 --> 00:28:31,855 It's usually HR. 397 00:28:31,856 --> 00:28:37,699 So yeah, I think that, that, that model, that model works well. 398 00:28:37,780 --> 00:28:44,424 So, um, tell me a little bit about like mindset in problem solving. 399 00:28:44,424 --> 00:28:48,447 So, you know, you not coming as a JD, 400 00:28:48,881 --> 00:29:00,137 Do you bring a mindset, perspective, et cetera, to evaluating whatever business problem that may exist? 401 00:29:00,137 --> 00:29:03,158 Is that a fair assessment? 402 00:29:05,234 --> 00:29:09,394 So I'll answer with kind of a story because I think it illustrates things well. 403 00:29:09,454 --> 00:29:16,094 But when I started my program at GW, the program director, his name was Carl Leonard. 404 00:29:16,094 --> 00:29:20,074 He's the retired managing shareholder of Arnold & Porter. 405 00:29:20,074 --> 00:29:22,074 No, excuse me, sorry, MOFO. 406 00:29:22,674 --> 00:29:25,674 And we had this first day exercise. 407 00:29:25,674 --> 00:29:27,274 So we all walked in and sat down. 408 00:29:27,274 --> 00:29:29,854 And he's like, all right, I'm going to pick two people at random. 409 00:29:30,214 --> 00:29:31,254 Nikki Corson. 410 00:29:31,254 --> 00:29:32,790 I'm like, OK. 411 00:29:32,790 --> 00:29:39,572 And then another person who I won't name just because I don't want to shout out her name without her permission. 412 00:29:39,572 --> 00:29:40,612 But she's fantastic. 413 00:29:40,612 --> 00:29:42,733 And she's an administrator in Oregon. 414 00:29:43,693 --> 00:29:45,414 And he says, OK, this is the fact pattern. 415 00:29:45,414 --> 00:29:46,994 You guys are having an event in this room. 416 00:29:46,994 --> 00:29:47,504 What do you think? 417 00:29:47,504 --> 00:29:50,775 And I'm like, he's like, Nikki, go. 418 00:29:50,775 --> 00:29:52,025 I said, well, hold on. 419 00:29:52,025 --> 00:29:54,616 Like, I don't even know this guy's name yet, right? 420 00:29:54,816 --> 00:29:56,567 Very uncomfortable, unsettling. 421 00:29:56,567 --> 00:29:58,157 I'm in a public setting. 422 00:29:58,157 --> 00:29:59,477 I don't know anyone in the room. 423 00:29:59,477 --> 00:30:01,658 And it feels very performative. 424 00:30:01,846 --> 00:30:03,217 And I said, well, I have a few questions. 425 00:30:03,217 --> 00:30:04,449 And he's like, no, no questions. 426 00:30:04,449 --> 00:30:05,530 Just tell me what you think. 427 00:30:05,530 --> 00:30:07,371 Can you host an event in this room? 428 00:30:07,532 --> 00:30:09,374 my, this is awkward, right? 429 00:30:09,374 --> 00:30:12,126 I said, well, you know, there's 30 people in this room. 430 00:30:12,126 --> 00:30:16,490 I don't know how big your event is, but if you want to have like a conference here, no, you can't have it in this room. 431 00:30:16,490 --> 00:30:17,421 It's not big enough. 432 00:30:17,421 --> 00:30:18,241 And. 433 00:30:18,444 --> 00:30:24,565 I have to cross the path of the speaker to go to the bathroom here, which I've identified pretty quickly, but I haven't spent a lot of time in here. 434 00:30:24,565 --> 00:30:28,219 I don't know where you would put food or beverages. 435 00:30:28,360 --> 00:30:30,291 It looks like these tables aren't on casters. 436 00:30:30,291 --> 00:30:31,832 I don't know what kind of setup you want. 437 00:30:31,832 --> 00:30:34,423 The projector looks super old, maybe broken. 438 00:30:34,423 --> 00:30:35,744 You don't have a smart board. 439 00:30:35,744 --> 00:30:41,207 Like, I just don't think you have the full capabilities of this room to host a meaningful meeting. 440 00:30:41,868 --> 00:30:46,710 know, parking was a problem and I'm explaining why I don't think this room is a good fit. 441 00:30:46,742 --> 00:30:50,544 At the time, I was finishing up the tenure of my paralegal career. 442 00:30:51,085 --> 00:30:55,939 This other person gets her turn and she stands up and tells me how great it is. 443 00:30:55,939 --> 00:31:02,722 well, the afternoon light can shine in at two o'clock and kill the afternoon slump and I think you could put a buffet back here. 444 00:31:02,722 --> 00:31:11,920 And I love that we have a dry erase board because it'll keep people moving and thinking and she's telling me why this room is so great and all the opportunities. 445 00:31:12,661 --> 00:31:14,642 So having said that, 446 00:31:14,858 --> 00:31:20,040 He says, does anybody notice a difference between the two testimonies we've heard here basically? 447 00:31:20,040 --> 00:31:22,310 And everyone laughed and said, Nikki's a negative Nancy. 448 00:31:22,310 --> 00:31:29,862 And then when I saw how she presented, I felt like, God, I was terrible, right? 449 00:31:30,083 --> 00:31:32,203 Total imposter syndrome, by the way. 450 00:31:33,183 --> 00:31:36,964 And he said, okay, neither answer was wrong. 451 00:31:37,025 --> 00:31:38,985 Nikki is trained as a legal mind. 452 00:31:38,985 --> 00:31:42,486 She is trained to identify problems and solve them. 453 00:31:43,586 --> 00:31:46,508 Southern person is trained to identify opportunities. 454 00:31:46,508 --> 00:31:48,970 She manages the business side of a law firm. 455 00:31:48,970 --> 00:31:53,072 If you want to work in this industry, you have to think like both. 456 00:31:53,273 --> 00:31:56,195 So when you ask me how I approach problems, I can't help it. 457 00:31:56,195 --> 00:32:04,161 think my integral response, my innate response is to go, well, this part sucks, right? 458 00:32:04,161 --> 00:32:05,462 I can't help it. 459 00:32:05,462 --> 00:32:08,844 But I am immediately pivoting to go, but how can I make it better? 460 00:32:08,844 --> 00:32:09,505 Right? 461 00:32:09,505 --> 00:32:11,866 So it's not just, it's bad. 462 00:32:12,096 --> 00:32:15,059 It's, I've identified this problem and I need to fix it in advance. 463 00:32:15,059 --> 00:32:20,844 And so when you present something to an attorney, they're immediately going to see all of the weaknesses with your plan. 464 00:32:20,844 --> 00:32:29,452 And so you better be prepared to explain why those weaknesses are not reflagging or how you've already solved them before they even launch. 465 00:32:30,353 --> 00:32:33,244 Yeah, I can't remember if we talk, I referenced Dr. 466 00:32:33,244 --> 00:32:46,490 Larry Richards work quite a bit and he has studied the traits of lawyers for at least 30 years, probably longer and tens of thousands of lawyers he has assessed. 467 00:32:46,630 --> 00:32:58,615 And there are four personality traits that lawyers score well above the general population, skepticism, autonomy, urgency, and abstract reasoning. 468 00:32:59,039 --> 00:33:03,623 and they score lower on sociability, resilience, and empathy. 469 00:33:03,824 --> 00:33:12,293 So what you just described aligns perfectly to the picture that Dr. 470 00:33:12,293 --> 00:33:14,735 Larry Richard paints, I think. 471 00:33:14,896 --> 00:33:15,887 it's real. 472 00:33:15,887 --> 00:33:25,350 mean, if you work, I've probably met thousands of attorneys at this point in my career and everyone's a little bit different, but I think generally speaking, I didn't appreciate 473 00:33:25,350 --> 00:33:29,832 until I was more seasoned in my career that again, we are a unique kingdom. 474 00:33:29,832 --> 00:33:32,353 Not every industry operates this way. 475 00:33:32,353 --> 00:33:35,254 You know, when you get invited to a party, 476 00:33:35,468 --> 00:33:38,028 you probably just check your calendar, right? 477 00:33:38,028 --> 00:33:41,651 yeah, I'm going to go to this party or a networking event, right? 478 00:33:41,651 --> 00:33:47,003 I cannot tell you how many times I've generated an invitation and the lawyer says, well, who's going to be there? 479 00:33:48,964 --> 00:33:49,964 And it's OK. 480 00:33:49,964 --> 00:33:54,586 There's nothing wrong with that question, but it tells you where their frame of mind is. 481 00:33:54,946 --> 00:34:03,730 And so I just think learning the cultural dynamics of law firms and their communication styles is kind of integral to the success. 482 00:34:04,014 --> 00:34:13,907 And I don't want to say that people that haven't worked in law firms can't do it because they can, but I have also seen when someone comes in and they're like kind of senior in 483 00:34:13,907 --> 00:34:20,638 their career and they're coming, you know, I don't know, sports, right? 484 00:34:20,779 --> 00:34:21,599 They're not ready. 485 00:34:21,599 --> 00:34:25,170 They don't see these power dynamics and the politics of it. 486 00:34:25,170 --> 00:34:28,621 And I think that part is a crash landing usually. 487 00:34:28,621 --> 00:34:30,141 And then it levels up, right? 488 00:34:30,141 --> 00:34:32,852 People figure it out, but it is very different. 489 00:34:33,031 --> 00:34:33,531 Yeah. 490 00:34:33,531 --> 00:34:48,331 And another dynamic is that I think is a little bit unique with lawyers is how finely tuned their understanding of opportunity cost of time is, right? 491 00:34:48,331 --> 00:35:01,471 Like if they're $1,200 an hour, that's a very quantitative number on what an hour, what the opportunity cost is of that hour. 492 00:35:01,471 --> 00:35:01,959 So 493 00:35:01,959 --> 00:35:04,839 And they are under immense pressure. 494 00:35:04,999 --> 00:35:12,139 I thought 2,000 hours of billable quota was high. 495 00:35:12,139 --> 00:35:14,979 I've seen it as high as like 2,700. 496 00:35:15,259 --> 00:35:18,338 I've heard rumblings of 3,000. 497 00:35:18,338 --> 00:35:28,759 That is absolute insanity because to bill 40 hours in a week, which would be if you had a two week vacation, that's 40 hours a week for 50 hours in a year. 498 00:35:28,939 --> 00:35:31,313 In order to do that, you're 499 00:35:31,313 --> 00:35:33,634 probably work in 60 hours, right? 500 00:35:33,634 --> 00:35:37,186 Because there's all sorts of activity that doesn't get billed. 501 00:35:37,266 --> 00:35:48,333 And you know, another concept tying back to what we were talking about a minute ago with the billable hour, the billable hours, a little bit of, of mushy concept, the amount of 502 00:35:48,333 --> 00:35:52,715 write-offs that law firms experience is significant. 503 00:35:52,715 --> 00:35:57,238 So there's this, this game of, you know, ping pong that happens. 504 00:35:57,238 --> 00:35:59,431 You send the bill, you get, 505 00:35:59,431 --> 00:36:06,571 push back, you make adjustments, you send it back and like, are you really getting $1,200 an hour? 506 00:36:06,571 --> 00:36:07,531 Well, 507 00:36:07,741 --> 00:36:12,954 Different firms have different ways of quantifying the metrics of what counts as billable hour, right? 508 00:36:12,954 --> 00:36:14,937 Some firms quantify. 509 00:36:15,218 --> 00:36:16,829 non-client billable time. 510 00:36:16,829 --> 00:36:18,471 It depends on where you work, right? 511 00:36:18,471 --> 00:36:28,059 could be e-time, could be pro bono, could be, you know, if you have some sort of leadership role within the firm, every firm does that a little bit differently. 512 00:36:28,059 --> 00:36:31,532 And then some firms quantify those hours before write downs, right? 513 00:36:31,532 --> 00:36:38,116 And some firms kind of separate the distinction between write downs and write offs, some merge them as one concept. 514 00:36:38,617 --> 00:36:39,558 And then 515 00:36:40,410 --> 00:36:46,014 How does that impact, for example, if a client negotiates a discounted on the front end? 516 00:36:47,055 --> 00:36:48,706 You then also write off time, right? 517 00:36:48,706 --> 00:36:59,994 These are all pricing discussions, which I will not, you know, opine on, but there are some very real, you know, complexities to getting the bills out and then how they are 518 00:36:59,994 --> 00:37:02,746 measured for timekeepers. 519 00:37:02,971 --> 00:37:03,271 Yeah. 520 00:37:03,271 --> 00:37:05,212 And it's not unique to legal. 521 00:37:05,212 --> 00:37:10,194 Every professional services company seems to measure realization a little bit differently. 522 00:37:10,315 --> 00:37:13,096 And you got to kind of do what makes sense, right? 523 00:37:13,096 --> 00:37:17,718 Like some firms don't place a heavy emphasis on professional development. 524 00:37:17,718 --> 00:37:20,780 Other firms count it as a billable hour. 525 00:37:20,780 --> 00:37:24,341 So it really just depends on the culture of the firm. 526 00:37:25,802 --> 00:37:28,333 One thing I wanted to make sure we talk about 527 00:37:28,739 --> 00:37:29,850 is personal branding. 528 00:37:29,850 --> 00:37:32,802 And I think you've done a pretty good job of that. 529 00:37:32,802 --> 00:37:44,902 And I think our audience would be interested in learning, from you and what you've done as a working mother in this industry and navigating your personal brand. 530 00:37:44,902 --> 00:37:47,535 Like, can you say a few words about that? 531 00:37:47,598 --> 00:37:48,558 Sure. 532 00:37:48,898 --> 00:37:57,538 So I had a very near and dear colleague to me tell me a couple years ago, you're doing great, but what is your story? 533 00:37:57,858 --> 00:37:58,398 Right? 534 00:37:58,398 --> 00:37:59,218 What is your story? 535 00:37:59,218 --> 00:38:00,698 And I'm like, what do you mean, what's my story? 536 00:38:00,698 --> 00:38:03,758 I go to work, I do my job, I get my paycheck and I move on. 537 00:38:03,758 --> 00:38:04,238 Right? 538 00:38:04,238 --> 00:38:06,398 And he's like, no, it's not that simple anymore. 539 00:38:06,398 --> 00:38:06,938 Right? 540 00:38:06,938 --> 00:38:15,278 If you want to grow in leadership, people need to be able to connect to you very quickly in a way that's authentic to you because otherwise it's not believable. 541 00:38:15,638 --> 00:38:16,538 And 542 00:38:16,896 --> 00:38:19,507 And it really has to synthesize who you are. 543 00:38:21,267 --> 00:38:26,169 If you don't already follow him, William Washington is the CFO over at Baker McKenzie. 544 00:38:26,169 --> 00:38:35,131 And he's never told me what his personal brand is, but I think he does a really fantastic job illustrating how an introvert can be successful in the C-suite. 545 00:38:35,412 --> 00:38:38,653 And I look at that, and I'm like, well, what makes me different? 546 00:38:38,653 --> 00:38:40,146 What's my story? 547 00:38:40,146 --> 00:38:43,014 I have four children under the age of seven. 548 00:38:43,362 --> 00:38:47,184 That is a challenge for anyone, not just someone who works. 549 00:38:47,324 --> 00:38:57,410 And I find myself, I am proud of myself that I still get up five days a week and do this job and I'm still a mom and I don't have a nanny, right? 550 00:38:57,410 --> 00:39:04,685 And I raise my kids and I work my job and I'm not always great at everything, but that's my story, right? 551 00:39:04,685 --> 00:39:06,596 It's such a big part of my life. 552 00:39:06,596 --> 00:39:10,282 And I shy away from being like a mom. 553 00:39:10,282 --> 00:39:16,026 influencer per any say because I think everybody has to walk this path very differently. 554 00:39:16,642 --> 00:39:21,272 I used to, when I first started having children, kind of hide my family life. 555 00:39:21,272 --> 00:39:26,306 I I I felt like people would think, oh, she's scatterbrained. 556 00:39:26,306 --> 00:39:31,000 I can't tell you how many times I'd forget something pregnant and somebody would say, oh, mom brain, don't worry about it. 557 00:39:31,000 --> 00:39:31,760 Right. 558 00:39:31,760 --> 00:39:34,042 And I felt like there was this 559 00:39:34,474 --> 00:39:39,285 in this intrinsic doubt for someone's abilities because they have young children. 560 00:39:39,285 --> 00:39:40,718 It doesn't have to be that way. 561 00:39:40,718 --> 00:39:42,039 It doesn't, in my opinion. 562 00:39:42,039 --> 00:39:49,063 So in the last few years, I have been very forward about my home life and how I have children. 563 00:39:49,063 --> 00:39:51,719 And yesterday we had scarlet fever, right? 564 00:39:51,719 --> 00:40:01,350 I I just let it all out because I think it tells people where I am in my life and it allows them to give grace when it's necessary. 565 00:40:01,644 --> 00:40:08,320 But also, I think it normalizes that people can work and have little kids and still do the job well. 566 00:40:08,517 --> 00:40:08,927 Yeah. 567 00:40:08,927 --> 00:40:10,848 What about like some of the soft skills? 568 00:40:10,848 --> 00:40:22,511 think EQ is something that I don't know, has a bit of a, is a bit of a mixed bag in terms of perception in legal. 569 00:40:22,511 --> 00:40:32,614 And I really see that skillset, if you will, or those capabilities in the future playing a very big role. 570 00:40:32,614 --> 00:40:36,555 Um, especially as automation starts to 571 00:40:37,243 --> 00:40:39,527 chip away at what lawyers do. 572 00:40:39,527 --> 00:40:43,613 really think emotional intelligence is an important dynamic. 573 00:40:43,613 --> 00:40:45,185 What are your thoughts on that? 574 00:40:45,390 --> 00:40:49,330 I don't think EQ is fostered mostly in the workplace. 575 00:40:49,330 --> 00:40:50,250 I really don't. 576 00:40:50,250 --> 00:40:56,570 I think that it starts when you're little and you consider how your actions and your words impact others. 577 00:40:56,570 --> 00:41:01,050 I think you learn it as you're a teenager and you watch how others perceive you. 578 00:41:01,130 --> 00:41:08,070 I think when you're in your 20s and you're dating and socializing, you're reading the room and choosing who you're with. 579 00:41:08,070 --> 00:41:12,290 I think that's just something that's learned well over your lifetime. 580 00:41:13,142 --> 00:41:23,725 I do think that culturally when people come into a workplace, they need to learn how to apply that skill and understand again, power dynamics, politics, professional 581 00:41:23,725 --> 00:41:24,625 interactions. 582 00:41:24,625 --> 00:41:32,228 And there's lots of resources available to people about how to present yourself in a professional way. 583 00:41:32,228 --> 00:41:39,310 It kills me when I get on a Webex with somebody and they're in a hoodie, you know, sitting on their couch. 584 00:41:41,090 --> 00:41:41,820 partner, it's fine. 585 00:41:41,820 --> 00:41:43,311 You've already made it, right? 586 00:41:43,792 --> 00:41:52,537 But if you want to make it in your career and you're just getting started, it's really important to send the message that people can trust you and that you are a consummate 587 00:41:52,537 --> 00:41:53,638 professional. 588 00:41:53,638 --> 00:41:58,551 I think the way that you present yourself outwardly is very important. 589 00:41:58,551 --> 00:42:01,943 I mean, the whole like fake it till you make it situation, right? 590 00:42:01,943 --> 00:42:05,865 I wore a black suit for the first 10 years of my career every day. 591 00:42:06,045 --> 00:42:07,066 Every day. 592 00:42:07,372 --> 00:42:12,927 because I felt like I needed to look that severe for people to take me seriously, right? 593 00:42:14,188 --> 00:42:18,632 I just think it's such a big part of growing your career and growing the... 594 00:42:20,654 --> 00:42:22,334 the image that people have of you. 595 00:42:22,334 --> 00:42:28,773 In my years in law firms, I've been counseled on the color of my lipstick and told like that it's too bright. 596 00:42:28,773 --> 00:42:31,054 People can't take you seriously like that. 597 00:42:31,054 --> 00:42:34,234 Or, you know, the color of your hair, that's not natural. 598 00:42:34,234 --> 00:42:35,954 It's so distracting. 599 00:42:35,954 --> 00:42:36,734 Right? 600 00:42:36,754 --> 00:42:39,214 These are things that have been told to me. 601 00:42:39,214 --> 00:42:42,794 And I think also as a woman in the workplace, it's even harder, right? 602 00:42:42,794 --> 00:42:44,314 Your dress is too short. 603 00:42:44,314 --> 00:42:44,614 Right? 604 00:42:44,614 --> 00:42:47,714 I'm looking at, I can barely see my kneecaps, right? 605 00:42:47,714 --> 00:42:51,108 Or when you go as a timekeeper, when you go to try 606 00:42:51,361 --> 00:42:55,084 You know, your heels can't be over a certain height, no engagement rings. 607 00:42:55,084 --> 00:43:07,354 Like there's all sorts of just kind of important things that might sound archaic, but at the same time, sending the message of professionalism, and I'm not suggesting that people 608 00:43:07,354 --> 00:43:18,242 should, you know, tamper down their authentic image, but there's a difference between a backyard barbecue and working in a professional services company, right? 609 00:43:18,331 --> 00:43:22,798 Yeah, I feel like the pendulum has swung a little bit too far in the casual direction. 610 00:43:22,798 --> 00:43:24,201 I'm pretty middle of the road. 611 00:43:24,201 --> 00:43:27,516 know, um, yeah, I do a podcast here. 612 00:43:27,516 --> 00:43:29,950 I'm wearing jeans and an info dash shirt. 613 00:43:29,950 --> 00:43:33,415 Sometimes I'll wear shorts and an info dash and my wife makes 614 00:43:33,415 --> 00:43:37,497 with weathercast attire when you are on a video. 615 00:43:37,497 --> 00:43:38,217 No problems. 616 00:43:38,217 --> 00:43:43,580 But you look professional, and I think that's the image that you're sending, right? 617 00:43:44,601 --> 00:43:59,170 If we had done this podcast and you were sitting on the couch in your hoodie, What are we telling people about how serious we take this topic or this speaker or this audience even, 618 00:43:59,170 --> 00:43:59,687 right? 619 00:43:59,687 --> 00:44:00,747 Yeah, a hundred percent. 620 00:44:00,747 --> 00:44:03,887 I do think there is a, there is a balance to be struck there. 621 00:44:03,887 --> 00:44:04,267 Right. 622 00:44:04,267 --> 00:44:07,227 I used to also, I spent 10 years in financial services. 623 00:44:07,227 --> 00:44:08,807 I worked for bank of America. 624 00:44:08,887 --> 00:44:11,147 Uh, before that I was at Microsoft. 625 00:44:11,287 --> 00:44:12,227 Huh? 626 00:44:12,767 --> 00:44:13,147 Yeah. 627 00:44:13,147 --> 00:44:14,547 I was in Charlotte. 628 00:44:14,547 --> 00:44:26,527 I had many roles, but, um, one of them was a internal auditor and, we were doing anti money laundering, evaluating anti money laundering controls in the different lines of 629 00:44:26,527 --> 00:44:29,847 business at bank of America in the late two thousands, which 630 00:44:30,326 --> 00:44:34,227 AML was a really big deal and it still is, I'm sure. 631 00:44:34,227 --> 00:44:42,067 But, um, I used have to wear a suit and tie every day and did that for years and thought it was cool at first, you know? 632 00:44:42,067 --> 00:44:44,067 Um, Oh, I get to look at this cool new tie. 633 00:44:44,067 --> 00:44:54,007 I get to wear, I'll tell you what, like I'd say about six, eight months in, you know, in trips to the dry cleaners and you know, I'm big, I'm big. 634 00:44:54,007 --> 00:44:55,847 I'm like six, five to 70. 635 00:44:55,847 --> 00:44:56,871 So I have 636 00:44:56,871 --> 00:44:58,571 I can't buy something off the rack. 637 00:44:58,571 --> 00:44:59,851 I got to buy a custom suit. 638 00:44:59,851 --> 00:45:05,671 The amount of time and money that I spent in my wardrobe just didn't make sense. 639 00:45:05,671 --> 00:45:13,571 Um, so I do think that there's a balance to be struck there between, yes, let's create the right image, but I really enjoy now. 640 00:45:13,571 --> 00:45:26,151 And even my beginnings in, um, in legal, I used go to conferences and you know, jacket, no tie, but button down, um, slacks. 641 00:45:26,413 --> 00:45:35,435 Oxford's and now I wear polos and I like it a lot better. 642 00:45:35,435 --> 00:45:39,160 It's much more comfortable, especially if you're standing on your feet all day. 643 00:45:39,160 --> 00:45:41,646 So I've been glad to see a little. 644 00:45:41,646 --> 00:45:44,506 wear, people need to wear suits on airplanes, right? 645 00:45:44,506 --> 00:45:47,146 Like the world has changed and I fully appreciate that. 646 00:45:47,146 --> 00:45:51,386 I'm not suggesting everyone needs to wear a three piece suit with a pocket watch to work. 647 00:45:51,546 --> 00:45:56,166 I actually remember when law firms started discussing tie or no tie. 648 00:45:56,186 --> 00:45:57,246 Do you remember that? 649 00:45:57,246 --> 00:45:59,726 And it was like, but do we really need it? 650 00:45:59,726 --> 00:46:05,806 And then headshots started coming out with no tie and it was like, you know, I remember that shift. 651 00:46:05,806 --> 00:46:07,446 And so, 652 00:46:08,078 --> 00:46:10,298 this is also generational, right? 653 00:46:10,298 --> 00:46:11,618 It can be generational. 654 00:46:11,618 --> 00:46:21,698 And I think that's the other piece that's like a big part of the workforce that we haven't touched on and certainly don't have time to, but there are four different generations in 655 00:46:21,698 --> 00:46:23,298 the workforce right now. 656 00:46:23,298 --> 00:46:33,278 And if you grew up wearing a suit in an airplane and you're still in the workforce, your expectations of people are very different than somebody who just joined. 657 00:46:34,638 --> 00:46:36,018 That's hard. 658 00:46:36,888 --> 00:46:39,416 Bridging that gap is a big deal, so. 659 00:46:40,059 --> 00:46:43,902 Well, um, this has been a very refreshing and fun conversation. 660 00:46:43,902 --> 00:46:53,589 I, it is off the beaten path, but these are all really good topics and things that I know our audience thinks about. 661 00:46:53,589 --> 00:47:02,875 So, um, I really appreciate you, engaging, before we wrap up, how do people find out more about you? 662 00:47:02,875 --> 00:47:04,886 Are you active on LinkedIn? 663 00:47:04,886 --> 00:47:09,046 What's, what's the best way for someone to get in touch and learn more about you? 664 00:47:09,046 --> 00:47:10,506 Yeah, thank you. 665 00:47:11,107 --> 00:47:13,047 I am active on LinkedIn. 666 00:47:13,047 --> 00:47:16,588 I lead with I'm a mom on my profile, so you can't miss me. 667 00:47:16,989 --> 00:47:20,010 But yeah, it's Nikki Corson, K-O-R-S-O-N. 668 00:47:20,010 --> 00:47:24,791 So please feel free to reach out if you want to connect further or talk about this. 669 00:47:25,012 --> 00:47:28,003 And Ted, this actually was fun, so I appreciate the opportunity. 670 00:47:28,003 --> 00:47:31,909 And I look forward to listening in. 671 00:47:31,909 --> 00:47:32,801 Yeah. 672 00:47:32,801 --> 00:47:38,711 And I'll be, I'll be in your neck of the woods at some point this year. 673 00:47:38,711 --> 00:47:40,424 I know we have a DC conference on the schedule. 674 00:47:40,424 --> 00:47:42,237 We're doing like over a dozen. 675 00:47:42,358 --> 00:47:45,583 So hopefully we can get together in person and say hello. 676 00:47:46,025 --> 00:47:47,003 awesome. 677 00:47:47,163 --> 00:47:47,794 Well, good stuff. 678 00:47:47,794 --> 00:47:49,808 Well, thanks for joining. 679 00:47:49,808 --> 00:47:53,414 We're on a Friday morning here, so enjoy your weekend. 680 00:47:53,414 --> 00:47:56,958 And I look forward to the next conversation. 681 00:47:58,021 --> 00:47:59,362 All right, take care. -->