Watch the YouTube version of this episode HERE
In this episode of the Maximum Lawyer Podcast, co-hosts Tyson Mutrux offer invaluable advice for young lawyers. Tyson shares 14 essential tips he has learned throughout his career, emphasizing the importance of building genuine relationships, giving grace, and understanding one's worth.
Even though these are rapid-fire tips, we hope that you feel encouraged and take something away that you can apply to your law firm and life today. The overarching theme in this episode, is to guide young lawyers in effectively navigating their careers and embracing the challenges of the legal profession. Listen in and be encouraged.
02:51 - Tip 1: Give Grace
03:50 - Tip 2: Build Relationships
04:57 - Tip 3: Have Difficult Discussions
05:57 - Tip 4: Make Yourself Indispensable
06:45 - Tip 5: Find Your Passion
07:42 - Tip 6: It's Okay to Start Over
08:42 - Tip 7: It's Okay to Leave the Profession
09:36 - Tip 8: Being a Lawyer Isn't Your Identity
10:27 - Tip 9: Avoid Being a Bulldog
11:22 - Tip 10: Embrace the Difficulty
12:11 - Tip 11: Let Them Doubt You
12:49 - Tip 12: Don't Give Free Advice
14:08 - Tip 13: Don't Discount Your Fees
15:37 - Tip 14: Know Your Worth
Tune in to today’s episode and checkout the full show notes here.
(upbeat music) - Run your law firm the right way. - The right way. - This is the Maximum Lawyer Podcast. - Maximum Lawyer Podcast. - Your hosts, Jim Hacking and Tyson Mutrics. Let's partner up and maximize your firm. - Welcome. - To the show. - Welcome back to another episode of the Saturday podcast. My name's Tyson Mutrics, and today I've got a really good one. It's for young lawyers, this is advice for young lawyers, but I will tell you much of this will apply to the majority of attorneys, maybe all attorneys, but this one, I do want to speak directly to young lawyers because sometimes we get misguided advice, sometimes we get bad advice, but these are 14 tips that I've learned over the years. There's probably more things I could talk about. I'm going to go through fairly quickly. I may do separate episodes on each of these just so you know I can expand on them, but I'm going to go through these fairly quickly because I think it's important. Before I do get into this though, I want to remind everyone that I would love to hear from you. This is another episode that I'm recording from Charlotte for the quarterly mastermind, and it's one of these things where I'm recording these because they're on my mind. That's why I'm doing it right now. They're on my mind. I had a few extra minutes I want to talk about them, but I've had several people come up to me and mention a Saturday episode. Or even in the actual, some of the hot seats, they said, "Hey, well, you said this on the Saturday episode." So then they apply it to the situation, which I think is really, really cool. Same thing comes with, you text me. I love to hear those comments. It's so cool to hear, and so it just shows me that I want to make sure we're providing value and that you're getting a lot from this. And by you letting me know that it lets me know if I'm on the right track, and if I'm not on the right track, tell me, text me, say, "I don't agree with you on this one." And here's why, and if you convince me, guess what? I'll record another one saying, "I got this text message from such and such," and they said these things to me and it's changed my mind. And you know what? I might even do an episode if I disagree with you, but I just love to hear from you and I want to make sure we're providing the absolute best material for you that helps you with your practice. That being said, I want to jump into this episode. That way we can spend a little bit of time on it. Like I said, this is going to be, it's going to kind of rapid pace 'cause these are short episodes and there's 14 of these, so let's go through them as quickly as possible. Number one is maybe one of the hardest ones you'll do. It's give grace, okay? I was a hard charging lawyer at the beginning and I really wanted to just go, go, go, and be aggressive. That is not the right approach, okay? Give grace, you're going to appreciate it when you need it. And luckily, luckily, I want to have a really good mentor and Eli Hadowski at the firm I worked for at the very beginning. And then the other thing is, I also luckily encountered some attorneys on the other side very early that gave me grace. And so giving grace is one of those things where it's an investment, okay? Giving grace is an investment, trust me, because someday you'll need it and when they return the favor, you're going to appreciate it. The next one is don't network, build relationships. You'll get this idea, I'm just going to go around and I'm going to meet with all these different people and I'm going to have coffee with this person and drinks with that person or I'm going to go to these networking events. I have a pretty big problem with networking events. I don't want you to network, I want you to build relationships. Building relationships is the way that you build, a firm that you want. If you want a bunch of referrals, you build relationships. You do not build a network, okay? Now, you want a network of relationships, not a network of people 'cause that's not going to do a lot for you. You can know a lot of people. I wouldn't even call it a network. That's just a bunch of people that you have their names in your phone. You want to be able to have relationships with these people, so build relationships. Focus on that. All right, the next one I want to get to is have the difficult discussions as quickly as you can. There will be times where you had that really difficult conversations, whether that's with a client or an opposing attorney or your spouse or a really good friend. It doesn't really matter. And those things will eat at you and they'll eat at you and they'll eat at you. And what you'll find is the vast majority of the time, it's not going to be nearly as bad as what you are playing out in your mind. And it's probably like 95% of the time. It is far better for you, far less painful for you, by the way. You think about the pain. Instead of you losing sleep for months and months, you just get it out of the way this week. Get it out of this week today, okay? Make those difficult decisions or have those difficult discussions very, very quickly. You want to make difficult decisions quickly too, if you can, but it's another topic. The next one, number four, make yourself indispensable. So if you're working for a firm, you provide them as much value as you can, okay? As much value as you can, you make yourself indispensable, but or and, okay, so and get as many clients as possible, okay? Bring in as many clients as possible. If you don't do that, you are dispensable. Providing a lot of value to your employer. I really, and you might think, well, this is, you're biased 'cause you're a law firm owner. No, no, no, no, no. I did this whenever I worked for a firm. Whenever I applied, I wrote my cover letter and my resume was all targeted towards that firm, showing how I would provide value to them. I viewed them almost as if they were a customer, okay? That's how I viewed it. I think employees should do the same thing. If you really want to make yourself indispensable, that's how you do it, right? You want to be able to make it where they can't fire you, okay? They can fire you, but you want to make it where they're, it's gonna be really painful if they do. So you provide them a ton of value and you bring as many clients as possible. And you do that and they're not gonna be able to fire you. It's gonna give you a lot of power because you have leverage, okay? If you want leverage as an employee, that's how you get it, make yourself indispensable, provide a ton of value and get as many clients as possible. Number five, find what you're passionate about and do that, okay? This one, I'm wavering a little bit over the last couple years after hearing from people like Eric Weinstein. He, he's a, I think he's a professor at Harvard is where he is. I know he's a professor, he was on the Chris Williamson podcast, but he was talking about, because we, you know, as Americans, we talked about, you know, follow your passion. But something he has talked about is, do what you're really, really good at and learn to become passionate about it, right? And so when I say follow your passion, I kind of mean that, okay? I kind of mean that. And either way, this is gonna lead me to number five. If you can't, if you don't find that passion or if you find that the thing that you thought you were passionate about, you're not passionate about and you're, or you're not good at it, because if you, if you think you're passionate about something, or if you are passionate about something and you start it and then you're not good at it, you lose your passion for it. And that's part of why Eric Weinstein talks about this, is that find something you're good at and learn to become passionate about it. And so if we go on to the next one, if you don't do that and you're not passionate about it, it's okay to start over, all right? Whether you start a law firm or you work for firm or whatever, or as a lawyer, it's okay to start over again. It's okay, no one will judge you for it. And actually, you know what? Most people will praise you for it. Congratulations, you want good for you? That's fantastic, good for you for moving on or figuring something else or finding what you want to do or finding what you want that you love, whatever it is, but you will be praised for doing it. You will not be criticized, so just know that. The next one, it's okay to leave the profession. All right, there are a lot of people that, how do I say this? There are a lot of people that have ended their lives, okay? Because they're lawyers and they hated it, okay? This is a profession that just isn't for everybody. And that's not a bad thing, it's just not a bad thing, it's just not for everybody. And so if you find that this is not what you want to be doing, who cares, go do something else? It's okay, it's easy for me to say at this point, but honestly, I wouldn't care myself. Who cares what your parents think? Who cares what your friends think? If they truly love you and care about you, they don't want you to be miserable. They want you to be happy, right? And we can talk about happiness in another podcast 'cause it's not really a destination, but we'll talk about it in another podcast. But they want you to be happier and they want you to be able to seek happiness, but at least at the care bench and they love you that they do. And if they don't, then don't care about them. Who cares what they think? And so it's okay, it's okay to start over and it's okay to leave a profession. Number eight, being a lawyer isn't who you are, okay? It's what you do, it's not who you are. And sometimes we wrap ourselves too much in it, starting at Christopher Nicklase in the other day. And we were talking about how a friend of his kind of puts it on almost as a cloak of armor. It's a really dangerous thing. If you say I'm going into court and I got my suit onto my coat of, it's sort of this armor that I've got on. I'm okay with that, but if you wrap yourself in it every moment of your life, that's a dangerous thing. So be very careful about that. Number 10, you don't wanna be a bulldog as a lawyer, okay? I'm just telling you right now. Guess what, people hate bulldogs and they're not effective. Okay, so the thing with this, if someone's a jerk, do you, are you gonna give them what they want? No, not necessarily. Do you think a judge is gonna want to give you what you want if you're a jerk? Nope, not at all. And they'll find every reason that they can to not rule in your favor. It's a human nature thing. This isn't something, may not even be conscious, okay? So I'm not saying that, oh, I don't like you, so I'm gonna automatically rule against you. No, no, no, it's a, it's a human nature thing. Subconsciously, they're gonna be like, (laughs) they're crazy, they're trying to find a way to really screw you up, it's what it's gonna be. Other than saying the same thing works with clients. You know, don't be a bulldog to your client and don't make them think you're a bulldog 'cause this is not an effective technique. But other opposing counsel, while I was talking about giving grace, right? Just wait, you become a bulldog. I know bulldogs, it guess what? They're on a list of mine and they will never get a favor from me. You need that discovery extension. No, sorry, not happening. Yeah, we'll file a mushroom capel. That's it, we'll send golden rule letter and we're gonna file a mushroom capel. We're gonna make you work for it. Your client's gonna be pissed off at you. So instead be a fox, okay, you wanna be a fox. You don't wanna be a bulldog. A fox is smart, a fox is clever. A fox is, in my mind, it's someone that will give you grace, okay, that's what you wanna be. You wanna play the long game, okay? Bulldogs is short game. There's lots of games. You play the short game, you're gonna have a short profession, okay? Or not a very successful one, be a fox. The next one is this profession is hard. It's supposed to be, embrace it, okay? The sooner you can embrace it being hard, the better, okay? Enjoy it being hard. You don't want it to be easy. You don't. You want this to be hard. There's a reason why you're a professional, okay? You're a professional, there's a reason for that. It's a hard thing, not everybody can do it, embrace that. Number 11, let them doubt you. This is a great one for me. Let them doubt you. Get that chip on your shoulder, okay? That is their weakness, okay? Let them doubt you, that's their weakness. Let them think that you're not gonna be successful. And then lean in and dominate, okay? Let them doubt you. Who gives a shit if they do? Go do your thing and go dominate. Don't give free advice. Don't give free advice. You'll be abused for it. Your family members, your friends. They will just eat at you and eat at you and eat at you. I understand the occasional, hey, you know, what if I get a traffic ticket, what should I do? Go hire a traffic lawyer. They're gonna help you out with that. But don't get free legal advice. It diminishes your value, okay? Which leads to the next one. Don't discount your fees either. Again, diminishes your value. Oh, well, I wanna discount. We don't discount our fees, okay? We have a very, very firm rule in our firm. We don't lower our fees. But there are two exceptions to that, okay? Or I guess there's really one exception to that. We will lower our fee if we are, you know, get a settlement and just not enough insurance money available, but there's a lot of bills and maybe there's issues with liability. So with a lean statute, there's a formula and everything. But if we're gonna get more based on all the settlement distribution that our client, we don't do that. We don't take more than our client. So we have one rule about lowering fees. We will lower it so that we don't get more than our client. There's an exception to that. That's why I was getting to it with exception. There's one exception to that. And that's this. If the client doesn't take our advice and settles a case for less than what we think they should and they kind of rush in the process, I will not lower my fee. That's how much we believe in this. Like, and there's a lot of attorneys that will, they just cut their fee, cut their fee, cut their fee. I had a defense attorney the other day. And this is part of the reason why. She says, well, you can just cut your fee. And I said, we don't cut our fee. I had an attorney a couple of months ago. Well, you can just cut my fee. That's not something I do. And I just told both of them. You don't cut your fee. You're not gonna cut your fee. I'm not cutting my fee. It's gonna, it diminishes my value. It diminishes the value that we provide. So don't cut your fee. If it, just because they ask for it, it doesn't mean you should give it to them. Don't cut your fee. It diminishes your value and it'll just keep happening to you. And especially if you're an injury firm, if they know that you're just gonna cut your fee, just keep low balling you. And guess what, your settlement values will keep going lower and lower and lower. And that means your fees keep going lower and lower and lower, okay? These are algorithms too. So they'll be tracking all this data. The last one I wanna get to is know your worth. And this is related to what we were just talking about. If you're working for a firm and they're abusing you, by what I mean by that is, I don't wanna overuse that word. If they are taking advantage of you, leave. Just start your own firm. Go to another firm. Someone that's gonna pay you what you're worth, okay? Now, that doesn't mean that you should overestimate your worth because we've had plenty of associates or applicants that they wanna an outrageous amount of money for not knowing jack shit. And that is to me, that shows me your naivete that you are not very realistic. And if you're not very realistic about your expectations, we're gonna have a difficult working relationship. And I understand some inexperienced things like that. And I also understand that there may have been some job candidates over the last few years beginning have been getting some really terrible advice about salaries, but there is a ridiculousness element to it. That being said, if you have the skill set, if you know that you can add a lot of value to the firm or if you're a law firm owner, if you know as a law firm owner, you're gonna do a really good job in a case, know you're worth, and this goes back to, there's no low in your fees, okay? You're gonna do a great job. You know, you're gonna do better than the other firm out there that you're competing against. Know you're worth, stick to your guns, and charge what you need to charge, okay? Whether you're an employee or a law firm owner. Get paid, what you need to get paid. All right, that's the last one I have for you. That's all we have for today. What a reminder everyone to give me a text. Shoot me a text, I'd love to hear from you. I love hearing all the texts I get all the time. Get them all basically every day at this point. So make sure you keep shooting me a text. I'd love to hear from you. Even if you're just calling a text and say hi, I'd love to hear from you. 314-501-9260 is the texting line, so I would love to hear from you. Until next week though, remember that consistent action is the blueprint that turns your goals into reality. Take care, see everybody. Thanks for listening to the Maximum Lawyer Badger. Stay in contact with your host and to access more content. Go to maximumlawyer.com. Have a great week and catch you next time. (upbeat music) (upbeat music)
