Making 2019 Your Best Year Ever

Ed. note: This is the latest installment in a series of posts from Lateral Link’s team of expert contributors. Cordell Parvin is a Senior Director with Lateral Link based in the Dallas, Texas office. Prior to coaching and recruiting lawyers, Cordell built a national construction law practice at an Am Law 100 law firm. Cordell is a well-known speaker, writer and blogger on career development and client development. He has made presentations to law firms and bar associations throughout the US and Canada. Cordell has published four books on career and client development. You can subscribe to his blog at http://www.cordellblog.com/, connect with him on LinkedIn, join his Facebook Page, and follow him on Twitter.

I have spent a lifetime studying why some people are very successful and why others are not. Interestingly, many of the people who are truly successful also have a great personal life and are very family oriented.  How can this be so?  Put simply they understand their priorities and use their time wisely.

I am coaching two junior partners. They are both women. They are both in about the same size firms. They both bill about the same number of hours. Christy, who has two children is incredibly successful and will become even more successful. Samantha is incredibly bright. She is a graduate of an Ivy League school. Yet, she feels overwhelmed and like she is burning out. What are these two people doing differently and how can you apply it to make 2019 your best year ever?

Attitude

It begins with attitude. We all talk to ourselves and we sometimes convey our attitude about things when we talk to others. When I meet with young lawyers I am listening to what they say to learn what they are likely saying to themselves. To borrow a quote from Winston Churchill, less successful lawyers see the problem in every opportunity and successful lawyers see the opportunity in every problem.

• Less successful lawyers frequently say: “Yes, but.” Successful lawyers say: “Sure how.”
• Less successful lawyers say: “My problem is.” More successful lawyers say: “My opportunity is.”
• Less successful lawyers say: “I need to…” More successful lawyers say: “I want to…”
• Less successful lawyers say: “I am not willing to be successful if it means…” More successful lawyers say: “I can be successful and….”
• Less successful lawyers say: “I will try my best to….” More successful lawyers say: “I will achieve…”
• Less successful lawyers find something wrong with any new idea. More successful lawyers figure out how they can use the new idea.

So, the first step to making 2019 your best year ever is to listen to your self talk and if necessary consciously make a change in what you are telling yourself.

Clear Idea of What You Want

Second, successful lawyers like Christy have a very clear idea of what they want to accomplish. They know where they want to be five years from now, maybe even 20 years from now. Having clarity on what you want to accomplish with your career actually enables you to have more time for your family. How do you suppose that happens? Put simply, lawyers with clarity on what they want to do with their career do not waste lots of time. Lawyers without clarity do waste time and frequently are spinning their wheels and frustrated by it. Clarity about what you want also gives you energy.

In my case, in 1978, I decided I wanted to be the best transportation construction lawyer in the United States. In Christy’s case, she wants to become the best long care attorney in the United States. She also has a very clear idea of what she wants to do in her personal life. One way to gain clarity on what you want is to write down what you are doing and what your life is like in five years from now.

Setting Goals

Really successful people set goals and have a plan to achieve them. Years ago, I was giving a presentation at my firm’s orientation for new partners. I was teaching them how to prepare a Business Plan. I asked how many had set goals for that year. Not one of them had set goals. It caused me to wonder why young lawyers do not set goals. Here are four reasons:

• They don’t see the value in it
• They don’t know how
• They are afraid of being criticized by someone
• They are afraid of not achieving them.

There is a quote I like. It is: Most people aim at nothing and hit it with amazing accuracy.

There are scientific studies showing that people who have written goals achieve far more than those who do not and they are happier with their careers and life. Why is that? I think it is in part because they feel they have more control of their destiny. They also are going after something. Some of you have already set goals for 2019. For those of you who have not, let me show you how to set goals you will actually achieve.

Over the next two minutes list 10 things you want to achieve in 2019. Leave some space in between each item. They should be specific and measurable, so you will know if you achieved them. They might be:

• Bill ____ hours
• Originate $____
• Obtain ____ new clients
• Expand existing business with ______
• Speak at ____ industry meetings
• Write ______ articles and get them published
• Contact_____ law school classmates
• Meet with ____ contacts
• Add_____ to my web page bio

Here are some goals I had in 1999:

• Originate $3 Million in business
• Bill 1800 hours
• Speak at 6 construction industry meetings
• Visit 8 construction clients
• Write the second edition of my Transportation Construction Claims Book
• Conduct 4 in-house client workshops
• Conduct 3 workshops on Innovative Contracting
• Have a client roundtable meeting in Dallas

Now that you have written down 10 goals, go back through and prioritize them. In other words, decide which is the most important and so forth. Next, I want you to answer why achieving each goal is important to you. Here is the reason to do that. If you do not have a good answer to the why question, then your goal will be like a New Years resolution that you give up on achieving the first time there is a roadblock You have to have a good answer to the why question to motivate you, energize you and cause you to have the discipline and commitment to achieve the goal.

Now that you have answered the why question, write down any obstacles you have to achieving the goal. The obstacles can be internal or external. In my experience most of them are internal. In other words, I have to do something different than I have been doing. My greatest obstacle was usually staying focused and not wasting time.

Now that you have identified obstacles, identify any people who can help you achieve your goal. Here is an interesting thing to consider. When you are not taking responsibility for your career success, no one wants to help you. But, when you are taking responsibility for your success, you will find people who do want to help you, both inside and outside your firm.

Now, I want you to write down as many actions as you can think of to achieve your goal.

Using one of my goals as an example, For my goal of conducting 4 in-house workshops I needed to:

• Determine which clients
• Identify a topic that would give them value
• Prepare written materials
• Prepare presentation materials
• Establish dates and locations (at client’s facility or elsewhere)
• Conduct the workshops

Okay, so make your list of activities you will do to achieve your goal.

Now, that you have your list, I want you to write down for each goal something you can do in the next week to get started. We need for the train to get out of the station.

Let’s stop there for a minute. I urge you to write down your goals and develop a plan of activities to achieve them, If you do, I can tell you from first-hand experience, you will more likely achieve them. So, you have made the first step to achieving your own definition of success.

Getting Better

Really successful people are constantly getting better. Tiger Woods was, and maybe is again, a great example.

Several years ago, he was interviewed by Ed Bradley on 60 Minutes. Ed Bradley asked Tiger Woods why he had completely changed his golf swing when he was the number one golfer in the world. Tiger Woods answered: “I knew I could get better.”  There is a commonly heard phrase that if you are not getting better, you are actually getting worse.

That has never been more true for lawyers than it is today because there are so many changes going on in our profession. In my top 10 tips I suggest that you take one area of your practice to focus on getting better. It might be communication skills, drafting skills, a particular legal topic. When I pick that one area I find every book I can on the topic, read articles, attend CLEs, listen to CDs and actually practice what I am trying to learn.

So, what do want to do in 2019 to improve your skill? What is the one area that you want to focus on?

Reading Books/Articles on Success, Client Development

In addition to improving my skills as a lawyer, I have always been an avid reader of books I thought would improve my skills on client development, help me use my time more effectively, leadership, teamwork and a variety of other topics. At my old firm, we had a group who would read the same book and we had people assigned to discuss chapters and give practical examples of how what was in the chapter could be applied.

I learned long ago a way to read business books. I first skim the book. In that process I decide what is important that I want to go back and read in detail.

Use Your Time More Effectively

Time is our most valuable resource and we cannot afford to waste it. If you have a clear idea of what you want in your career, have goals and have decided what you want to learn in 2019, you are well on your way to not wasting time because you can see whether a potential activity advances you towards your goals or not.

Look at the circle in your handout materials. It has 168 in the middle. That represents the number of hours in a week. I want you to make a rough sketch pie chart. The first piece of the pie is how many hours you sleep. If you sleep 8 hours a night, that would be 56. I sleep less than that and you may as well. The next piece of the pie is the number of hours you work a week that are billable. You might record 40 billable hours a week. If so fill in that number. If it takes you longer because you have to write off time, then put down the higher number. The next piece of the pie is your non-billable time you are using to invest in your career. This could be firm administrative activities, time you plan to spend for your development, time you plan to spend for client development.

When I was a young lawyer, I tried to spend at least 10 hours a week investing in my career. So, I would have 10 on my pie chart. If I slept 56 hours a week, billed 40 hours a week, spent 10 hours a week on my career, that would leave 62 waking hours for my personal life including being a good father, husband and son, exercising, being involved in my church and community and any other personal activity. I like to tell lawyers that how well they plan and execute the 10 hours a week they invest in their career will determine the quality of their career and how well they plan and execute the 62 waking hours of personal time will determine the quality of their life.

Stephen Covey suggests that we have four quadrants of activities:

1. Urgent and Important
2. Not Urgent, but Important
3. Urgent, but not Important
4. Not Urgent and Not Important

The real key for a successful career and for a fulfilling life is to focus on the quadrant 2 activities.

Christy is doing that. She plans based on her priorities and she plans her personal time, and her career investment time the same way she plans her billable time.

Let’s look at her calendar for December.

Keep in mind that you have to make choices both in your non-billable investment activities and in your personal time.

Pareto’s Principle-The 80/20 Rule

I coached many outstanding young partners and associates. Some worked to a frazzle on client development activities and did not determine what were the important activities.

‘Focus, focus, focus” and take my word that “less can be more.”

In the early 1900s a gentleman by the name of Pareto did a study in Italy and found that 20 percent of the people owned 80 percent of the wealth. That led to many others finding the same principle applied to their own field. There are a variety of ways this might apply to us. It might be that 20 percent of our clients produce 80 percent of our fees. It might be that 20 percent of our time spent on client development might produce 80 percent of our business. The point is simple

Face Time

Don’t let email, text, and social media replace face time. Get out from behind your desk and go visit your clients and referral sources.

Why Should I Hire You

I want you to pretend for the moment that I can refer business to you. I want you to provide me with the information I need to recommend you to a potential client. In 25 words or less tell me about you, your practice, what makes you unique, and why a client should hire you.

How to Stand Out in Any Crowd

When I practiced law, I subscribed to a magazine “Selling Power.” As you would expect, it is for salesmen and sales managers. Yet, in each and every issue, I found something of value to lawyers.

In an issue I read years ago, the cover story was “How to Stand Out in Any Crowd.” Seth Godin talks about marketing, change and work. I was fascinated by the article and plan to apply some of Godin’s points myself.

According to the article Seth Godin likes to give things away and has built his career on it. I have long advocated that lawyers find things of value to give away. Whenever I write an article, I am anxious to give it away.

When Godin wrote his first book, he offered a third of its contents online at no charge. He got 175,000 responses requesting the free third of the book. Most of the 175,000 who received the free third of the book clicked the link built into the page and bought it, making it a year long best seller. Guess what I am planning to do with the three books I have written.

Later in the article, Godin talks about three kinds of people. I will put it in the context of clients:

1. Clients who don’t need the services you or your firm offer.
2. Clients who need the services you or your firm offer, but are using another lawyer or firm.
3. Clients who are ignoring you.

Godin says you can’t market directly to the second and third group. “Instead, have them come to you.” How do you suppose you can get them to come to you? Godin suggests you have to create something “remarkable.”

I like to tell young lawyers that I owe a great deal of my success to one sales principle. I frequently created something remarkable, was first to market and I gave it away. For example, I have two books on my law firm web page that potential clients can download at no charge.

I urge you to implement some of the ideas and let me know what you are doing to make 2019 your best year ever.

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