Latest / Wealthy Woman Lawyer Podcast, Helping you create a profitable, sustainable law firm you love / Episode 250 From Big Law to Law Firm Owner with Margeaux Thomas

Transcript

Episode 250 From Big Law to Law Firm Owner with Margeaux Thomas · Wealthy Woman Lawyer Podcast, Helping you create a profitable, sustainable law firm you love

• 0:00
  Margeaux: Maybe three or four months. I think that first client that left and came with me, he actually worked with the firm and worked with my firm, so he kept both of us on. That made my first year, so it made a soft landing for me to have income during the first year that I didn't anticipate. So it allowed me some more space to kind of ramp up business and talk to people. And I think after going to a billion lunches and networking events, I joined every networking organization I could possibly find.
• 0:33
  I think about after three months, people started referring cases to me. They weren't necessarily in my practice area, but at that point, I was willing to take just about anything. So I was doing all types of things that I would never touch now. But, you know, I figured them out.
• 0:48
  Intro: Welcome to the Wealthy Woman Lawyer Podcast. What if you could hang out with successful women lawyers, ask them about growing their firms, managing resources like time, team, and systems, mastering money issues, and more? Then take an insight or two to help you build a wealth generating law firm. Each week, your host, Devina Frederick, takes an in-depth look at how to think like a CEO, attract clients who you love to serve and will pay you on time, and create a profitable, sustainable firm you love. Devina is founder and CEO of Wealthy Woman Lawyer, and her goal is to give you the information you need to scale your law firm business from 6 to 7 figures in gross annual revenue so you can fully fund and still have time to enjoy the lifestyle of your dreams.
• 1:35
  Now here's Davina.
• 1:38
  Davina: Hi, everyone, and welcome back to the Wealthy Woman Lawyer Podcast. My guest today is Margeaux Thomas. Margeaux is an experienced lawyer and speaker with fifteen plus years of experience representing individuals and small businesses in commercial and real estate litigation, including class action cases and numerous trials on behalf of both plaintiffs and defendants. She specializes in commercial landlord tenant disputes, business partnership disputes, and contract disputes, and has traveled throughout the country as a faculty lecturer educating more than 4,000 attorneys on business litigation issues. Margeaux is also a contributor to the American Bar Association's commercial lending treatise and has been recognized as a super lawyer rising star from 2013 to 2023 and a top lawyer for North Virginia Magazine in 2022.
• 2:28
  In addition to managing her own law firm, Margeaux has held numerous bar association positions and served on various nonprofit boards. She's currently on the board of directors for the Old Dominion Bar Association. She is the current vice chair of the Fairfax Bar Association continuing legal education committee. And in twenty twenty twenty two, she was selected to serve on the Alexandria Bar Association judicial judicial screening committee and accepted as a member of the George Mason Inn of Court. So please help me welcome Margeaux.
• 3:03
  Hi, Margeaux. Welcome to the show.
• 3:06
  Margeaux: Hello, Davina. I'm happy to be here.
• 3:08
  Davina: Good. I'm glad you're here. So I wanna you've had your law firm for a long time, and I wanna hear all about it. But before we get into that, just give us an idea. Were you somebody who always knew you wanted to be a lawyer, or was this something how did that evolve for you that you would go into the law?
• 3:26
  Margeaux: It really wasn't. I don't have a lot of lawyers in my family, so it really kinda fell into my lap. I graduated a little bit early from high school and college, and I wasn't ready to get a job. So, law school or medical school were the options at that point, and I'm not great at math. So I I never had to to law school.
• 3:49
  And, you know, I figured even if I didn't wanna be a lawyer, it would open a lot of doors to a lot of opportunities. And I think that is true of a law degree. There are a lot of people who don't practice law that have law degrees, and I just think it is this is a a great avenue to pursue. So
• 4:04
  Davina: Yeah. I agree with you. I agree with you. So where did you go when you graduated from law school? Did you know what kind of law you wanted to practice, or did you just sort of, like, you know, have some internships or fish around?
• 4:17
  Or what did you what is it that you led you to your next step?
• 4:21
  Margeaux: So while in law school, I definitely wanted to do criminal law. And I worked as a extern at the at a prosecutor's office, and I really loved it. I liked being on my feet and doing trials and getting trial experience. And I got a couple offers at the end of law school. One was to go to a larger civil litigation firm and another was to go to Miami and work in a criminal law setting.
• 4:47
  And I had a lot of loans which helped me make the decision, to go to civil, the civil route and I thought that, you know, if I got some of the loans behind me, I could always pivot. If I didn't like it, it was just a great opportunity. So, I went the civil route and I haven't turned back. I really did like it. So I've never done any criminal law since then, but that was definitely the direction that I thought that I was gonna go in out of law school, but it kinda just changes based upon the opportunities that kinda present itself.
• 5:16
  Davina: Yeah. What jobs did you have before you started your own law firm? You worked with a a larger firm?
• 5:23
  Margeaux: I worked with two larger firms, the first one for about six years and then the second one for about three, almost four years. And I did basically the same thing I do now, civil litigation, a lot of business divorces is what I call them, a lot of businesses breaking up. I represented a lot of banks in defending them against consumer claims, having to deal with credit debt foreclosure type issues. So that was the crux of it. My client was really dealing with other lawyers that worked in bigger corporations.
• 5:53
  So it wasn't dealing with individuals in a lot of cases, but I thought it gave me a lot of tools to go out on my own and kind of use those skills to help with my own. That's what I do now.
• 6:04
  Davina: What was the catalyst that caused you to go out on your own? I assume you're working someplace, probably making a good living, and something happened.
• 6:13
  Margeaux: Yeah. I was making great living, And it was all good. I I like the farm that I worked at and I like the people that I worked with. But, you know, there's always the thing in the back of my mind like, you know, there's something else. And, yeah, I was just looking at a lot of the people around me and they didn't seem like they were that happy after they had reached certain levels of success.
• 6:35
  And I had some traumatic experiences, a lot of people trauma can definitely get you thinking about what you wanna do and how much time you have left. And I got pregnant with twins and was on bed rest for a long time. I'm in the twins team early and they went to the NICU. I got, I had a lot of time to think about what I wanted to do while I was restrained on bed rest for a month. And, my father passed away in that same time frame, and it was so unexpected as he was relatively young.
• 7:03
  So it just kinda made me think about time and a whole new, you know, peaceful and Spanish flu.
• 7:08
  Davina: Yeah. What that that is a that is a lot of trauma to go through. I know my sister was on bed rest with twins, and they were born a little bit premature. So I know what that can that can do. And then to lose your father at the same time, I can't even imagine.
• 7:24
  What did it get you thinking about? What did you think that you could get from kind of running your own law firm that you couldn't get from working for somebody
• 7:31
  Margeaux: else? Going on the law of autonomy. I could build it the way that I wanted it to be built. There were certain things about the bigger firm model that I didn't like, and I didn't think that it was a model that could really help a lot of small business owners because there are people that fall within the cracks. Like there are smaller firms that can cater to some of the issues, but then there's the bigger firms that handle more complex issues and they have like a couple handful of attorneys who staff every case.
• 8:03
  It becomes very expensive very quickly. And I thought that if we could put together big firm attorneys who have that complex experience and be able to offer it on a more affordable level to business owners who are doing well but can't afford the big law firm model that we would be in a niche practice and we could market to the firms that we used to work with because they know that there are clients that they can't service and they wanna get those people into the hands of good attorneys. So the firms that we left have been great referral sources for the cases that we take now.
• 8:37
  Davina: Oh, that's wonderful. What do you think you did sort of nurture that relationship with that with that firm so that they would refer work to you and not perceive you as competition?
• 8:48
  Margeaux: I just I left on good terms. And they knew that I wanted to just go a different avenue and they weren't you know, I think a lot of the people there could relate to what I was doing. Think a lot of them, the thought had crossed their mind or if they had done it at some point in the past and ended up back in the big law firm model for some reason. So they were all very, most of them were very encouraging of what I was trying to do. They wanted to maintain the relationship with me.
• 9:14
  So they wanted to help me in any way that I could. And a guy that I've worked with now who hired me at the first firm that I worked with, you know, he also maintained the relationships at the firm. So that has been just great opportunity for us, not breaking bridges and and using those as opportunities.
• 9:33
  Davina: Yeah. I'm sure they also realized that the people they were referring to you were not people that were suitable for their law firm. You know, they needed a great attorney, but just not at the price point.
• 9:45
  Margeaux: Yeah. Or they had conflict, and they knew that we could handle the work. So it was a win win for both of them.
• 9:51
  Davina: So you started your law firm in 2016?
• 9:55
  Margeaux: 2016. My twins were two.
• 9:57
  Davina: Oh, wow. The terrible twos and starting a law firm. I imagine that was quite the challenge. Twins. It was.
• 10:05
  What when you started the firm, was it just you, or did you have a did you hire a staffer immediately or take somebody with you, or how did that work?
• 10:14
  Margeaux: So it's supposed to be me and a partner at the firm that I had worked with for a very long time. And very soon, right before we were supposed to leave, he decided that it wasn't feasible for him. He wanted to stay. So it ended up just being me but the whole business plan was for me to have a partner. And once I left, it was me at my dining room table with my laptop and I didn't have any staff, I didn't have an office, I didn't have any clients except for one who ended up coming with me after I left, so I didn't know that that was gonna happen.
• 10:47
  But I didn't have a book of business that I took with me. I was working on other people's pieces, so I hadn't done a lot of business development. So it was an extremely small shop, and I was very I was terrified of, entering into contract, the long term engagement because there was literally no income coming in. But I just had a belief that, you know, if I tried hard enough and talked to enough people and did enough marketing that, you know, that would change.
• 11:12
  Davina: And so how long do you think it took you to sort of get those initial clients coming in where you felt like, okay. This is going to work.
• 11:22
  Margeaux: Maybe three or four months. I think that first client that left and came with me, he actually worked with the firm and worked with my firm, so he kept both of us on. That made my first year, so it made a soft landing for me to have income during the first year that I didn't anticipate. So it allowed me some more space to kinda ramp up business and talk to people. And I think after going to a billion lunches, the networking events, I joined every networking organization I could possibly find.
• 11:55
  I think about after three months, people started referring cases to me. They weren't necessarily in my practice area but at that point, I was willing to take just about anything so I was doing all types of things that I would never touch now. But you know, figured aloud I had time I can only have one big cape. I was like, you know, if given enough time, you can figure out anything. You know, that becomes inefficient, you know, the longer you go.
• 12:20
  But at that point, I had a lot of time to figure out. So, you know, that helped me get some good reviews. That helped people refer me to other people. It just it helped me expand my network.
• 12:30
  Davina: Yeah. When I started out, I was doing door law as well. Whatever came through the door, that's what I did because I didn't know what I wanted to do. I wanted to experiment a little bit. So I think that, you know, that's kind of one of the little blessings of sort of starting on your own with just you because you do get you have that sort of flexibility.
• 12:47
  But like you said, over time, if we're building a business, we do it's more efficient and probably safer if we sort of find a niche and sort of really dig down into that niche and understand it on a deep level. And for you, that was business law, contracts, things related to partner disputes, and that kind of thing. Right?
• 13:09
  Margeaux: Absolutely. Yeah.
• 13:10
  Davina: And have you worked with very many, attorneys who have split up with their partners? Have you had that experience? Okay. Good. I wanna I'd love to pick your brain about that a little bit then.
• 13:25
  Let's talk about that. Because I think one of the challenges I was very fortunate because, I had a partner at the beginning, and we had a very wonderful agreement that we wrote. And so when it came down to split up, it was super easy for us because we already had a meaty of the mind, so to speak. What do you see some of the issues that happen with lawyers who partner up and then wanna part ways? What kind of things sort of come up?
• 13:51
  Margeaux: Honestly, I don't think it's very different than a lot of the other businesses, medical practices, financial services. I mean, they're all, like, professional service companies. And, ironically, they all have a lot of the same kind of missteps or issues. Just because they're lawyers does not mean that they go out and get an operating agreement or put anything in writing or take any more precaution than any other profession would take. You would think that would be the case, but in a lot of situations, it's not.
• 14:20
  And it's usually because people are friends first. You know, they go out into partnership with people they know, like, and trust, and they don't take the precautions that they would if it was, like, a complete stranger or some, like, arm's length business arrangement. Like it's usually somebody that, you know, they don't think of on that level. So I've had law firm breakups that weren't, you know, even if they had an operating agreement, were certain things that were done just to start the business like set up the website and somebody set it up on their own GoDaddy account, for example. And then when they left the law firm, they took down the website when they left or things like that.
• 15:01
  And, you know, or there are credit cards or things that only one person is the guarantor of those cars, and it creates an issue when people wanna go their separate ways and people don't wanna contribute or, you know, income isn't coming in the way that people expected to. That creates a lot of impasse. So, you know, I I don't think it's that much different. I think lawyers may be a little bit more difficult to deal with because of their knowledge of the law and their just the personality types that make one become a lawyer can make things more difficult. They always say that lawyers are the worst clients.
• 15:36
  So, you know, that plays a part in it. But I don't think that the law firm structure is any different than any other business owner. And, you know, I tell people a lot of things because mostly our cases are in litigation. So this is when it doesn't go well. So, you know, the same things apply to most business owners.
• 15:53
  These are the please don't do these things, and you'll find yourself in a much easier position if it doesn't work out. So those tend to be the same.
• 16:01
  Davina: I I it's always interesting to me because lawyers I think a lot of lawyers don't really care if there's a contract a lot of times because they think, well, you know, I get out of a contract if there's a contract. And if there's not, oh, well, you know, like, I I you know, would I sue on it? Like, we have a different sort of perspective when we go into business because we know kind of what the cost is of actually suing on a thing. And, it's interesting. When you work for yourself, you do you know, a lot of people do start out sort of loosey goosey with things.
• 16:32
  They put things in their personal and until a business sort of evolves. You do that with two partners. That really can be messy when it's time to part ways. I always recommend the p I'm not a big fan of people, women especially, starting out getting a few years and then adding a partner because I often feel that what happens is is they're looking for somebody to sort of share the emotional the the fear, the emotional burden, and they're not really looking at it for the right business sort of reasons. What kind of things do you think are good reasons to partner with other lawyers?
• 17:11
  Margeaux: I actually think there are few. I agree with that. I think that people go into it for the wrong reasons, and it usually doesn't have to do with financial. They think that they'll share the financial burden, but I think that there are a lot of ways to shoulder the financial burden without bringing a partner and sharing any autonomy. And I think it can make decision making really difficult, especially if you have been the person who could just make the call and get it done.
• 17:36
  And now things that could be easily decided take much longer because lots of people have opinions about them, and that just creates a a drain on the business. Right? Somebody has to be the ultimate decision maker and able to move things forward. And I see so many situations where people are fifty fifty partners, and there's no person who can, you know, just get it done because of that. There's a deadlock from the beginning.
• 17:57
  And I feel like in a lot of these situations, there has to be somebody to break that. There's gotta be a mechanism where somebody can say, look, we're just gonna print out blue envelope like that. Mils over Ryan. Sorry. Instead of just going back and forth, you know, on things like that.
• 18:11
  So, you know, I assume, yeah, I've seen a lot of successful law firms that have added and expanded and grown in partnerships, but I personally am of the opinion that, you know, a lot of that can be done by adding people beneath you or, you know, adding staff to support you versus bringing in equal partners.
• 18:35
  Davina: So I agree. Yeah. I agree with you definitely. Tell me like, I also I think there needs to be a good reason to bring in a partner. And I also one of the things I see happen is too many people sort of giving away equity instead of saying you need to buy in.
• 18:49
  Like, they don't recognize the value that they've already created just having so many years in business before they bring somebody else in. But you brought up hiring people. So that was gonna be my next question. How long did it take you to sort of hire a staff person? I'm assuming you hired staff before you hired other lawyers.
• 19:05
  Margeaux: Probably a year, and I hired a legal assistant or a paralegal. He was in paralegal school at the time. And, it was interesting because he was I was like, you could just do an internship. And then he was like, you know, I need a full time job. I'm graduating and I didn't know if I was ready for that step.
• 19:24
  And it was, you know, one of the best decisions I could have made. He was a bartender prior to being going to paralegal school and boy, did he have a way of creating relationships with people. I mean, everybody loved him, you know? And it was amazing how he could You know, he knew more about the people in my office building that I had walked up every day in a very short amount of time. And I mean, really paid off.
• 19:51
  Those relationships really mattered and ended up with us getting more work and him expanding the firm and I didn't You know, the only thing I regret about that is at some point he was like, I need way more money. Right? And I was like, well, you are the first person that came across my debt. I heard that the first person. It was basically like, whatever you can offer, I will take.
• 20:10
  There was no long interview process. I didn't have steps. I didn't call any references. He ended up being amazing. So I thought, well, it couldn't be Denmark.
• 20:17
  I thought he could set you to be shoes. I mean, it wasn't that hard. You you were the first person, right? You're the first resident. And so I was like, no.
• 20:24
  I was like, I'm ready to pay that even though you're great. You know, I think maybe it's time for us to go our separate ways. And boy, did I realize how difficult it is to find good people. Once I did that, I was like, the next person wasn't order of qualified in the field that he was. And I think I just underestimated that completely.
• 20:45
  And to this day, I mean, hiring has been kind of like a chilly peel. Like it's very hard to get people that have the same values and, you know, you align and you click with communicate well when you have the same expectations. I mean, it's just it's always been difficult for me to find that. When I find it, I know it, but, you know, it's hard to to see that in an interview, which I feel like is very artificial. Yes.
• 21:07
  Know, people can portray them in a lot of the ways that they are in that situation.
• 21:12
  Davina: Right. I you're not alone in that because I have conversations with clients and women law firm owners all the time that that it is a struggle right now. And I think there's some things going on. There's sort of shifts in our culture that are going on, in the corporate world that are affecting all sort of business owners owned down the line, social media, the messages that are put out there about what the expectations of an employee should be. All of that's changed for sure.
• 21:37
  And I think that's really impacted a lot of law firms. And I think it's also one of those things that's always the challenge of small business owners is how to get the right people at the right time and also know that there are people who are gonna leave, and we have to replace them. You we're no longer in a culture where people work someplace for thirty years. So if you're gonna have your law firm for ten, twenty, thirty years, how long are gonna have it? What are the odds of getting somebody who's gonna be with you?
• 22:09
  You may want one or two loyal employees that stay with you a long time. But I think that's one of the skills you have to develop is sort of being adept at at hiring. And then when somebody leaves, moving on quickly emotionally from that experience. And that's where I see a lot of people kind of get bogged down is, like, beating themselves themselves up, up, beating beating the the other other person person up because this we had to part weight. They weren't a good fit or whatever.
• 22:35
  And the lesson you learned is that culture fit, you know, value they is worth coming up with a way to give them more money. You know? For sure.
• 22:46
  Margeaux: During my life in the hard way.
• 22:48
  Davina: Yeah. Yeah. So we all have those lessons to learn. Your after he left and you hired other people, how many people, how many staffers did you hire before you finally hired another lawyer to work for you?
• 23:05
  Margeaux: Probably three or four. But I got into this routine of hiring people who were out of college and they were like paralegal legal assistants and they ended up going to law school. And, you know, I at first was like, that's wonderful. These people, you know, have decided to follow this path but I, at that point, invested a year or a year and a half training somebody who had no legal experience and then they would bleed. And then the next person I would say, are you going to law school?
• 23:34
  It's like, nah, I, you know, I just got out of college and I don't wanna go to law school and then like three months later, they'd be like, yeah, I'll find a law school then looks like, you know, it's gonna happen. And I'm just like, you know, this is great for them, but it's bad for me because it causes this, you know, consistent, you know, training and and I'm not retaining the people because they all kinda wanna go to school or they don't know when they start and then they're like, oh, this is great. And then they decide to build that path. And, you know, that was a hard, you know, it's probably like a Keps 22 because you want people to go to the next level, but, you know, it creates a huge strain on my resources to bring in people and train them for them to leave after you even do that. So Yeah.
• 24:13
  That is difficult. And I think that that's just the demographic of people coming out of college right now. They're not exactly sure what they wanna do. Right? So it's hard to even ask them, but it's not like they're being untruthful.
• 24:24
  So I think I married maybe three or four people before I hired an attorney. Actually, think I hired a contract attorney who ended up working pretty much part time or, you know, she was involved in the day to day of the cases, but wasn't like a one off type of thing. And that was a great relationship. But, you know, there were some conflicts about There were some conflicts that are hurdles that we couldn't get past about, you know, how many hours she could work. And it just It was difficult because we had formed a really good friendship and we couldn't work out the business dynamics of how that would work.
• 25:07
  So, she ended up leaving and that was the huge loss because, you know, at this point- as a small law firm owner, I feel like it's a pyramid and it's so shallow. Like you could lose one person and be back to square one so quickly. And, you know, that's how I felt when I lost the legal assistant at the beginning. Like now I'm back to answering the phone, but I've been, you know, it's been great for, you know, two years and now he left and there's no backup. Like, it's just all back to me.
• 25:32
  Right. And, you the same thing happened with the attorney. I wasn't drafting any, you know, no first draft. You know, I was just looking at things, making final edits. I was saving, you know, ten, twenty hours a week by having somebody do that.
• 25:46
  And then one day she's like, you know, I gotta go. And she left. And I was like, I have no backup plan. Right? And it takes it could take three, six, nine months to find somebody to replace that role.
• 25:57
  And, you know, that's been difficult to to plan for that. You know, you want to retain the talent, you also wanna have some kind of cross training or other people that can step in in those situations. And you have to grow to a certain level to obtain that, which is difficult. So, you know
• 26:12
  Davina: Yeah. I'm a huge advocate of hiring attorneys as fast as you can and hiring more than one for that built in redundancy because it really isn't until you get three other attorneys besides you where you kind of have a little bit more redundancy. So if somebody leaves and somebody's out sick, you still have somebody there. You know? That is definitely the case.
• 26:34
  You recently hired another associate. How did that go? What did you what were you looking for in that associate? And what do you think you did different in your hiring process now than maybe you've done in the past?
• 26:47
  Margeaux: Well, previously, I hired somebody out of I hired an associate before who was out of law school. And we we called them, like, empty bucket, full bucket, middle bucket kind of people and there was no training. And I feel like you really learn to be a lawyer while practicing law and I found that that was gonna be extremely not profitable for a very long time while that person was coming up to see it. So I was like, I need to hire somebody who straight out the gate can do the work. Like, I can hand over these cases so I can get back to market because that's what I love to do.
• 27:18
  Right? So that was the criteria. You got to be a civil litigator. You got to have the experience. You got to be able to either be licensed here or be able to waive it immediately.
• 27:27
  Like, I've got cases packed stacked up that I need to be able to get you. So I need a full bucket person. I know that I'm gonna have to pay more money for that. And that is hard to swallow but I'm like, this is gonna be more profitable for me than paying somebody half as much who doesn't have the skill. And I made the mistake of hiring entry level people for a long time just to save money because it's scary at how much a full year's cost.
• 27:48
  Right? So on this hire, was like, I'm not gonna compromise that. I just I I I can't be part time. I can't have somebody who's like, you know, I can't do it today. This isn't the day I work.
• 27:57
  It's litigation. So, you know, I need to have somebody here all the time who I can rely upon, who can do the work. So I'm gonna have to figure out a way to make that work. And that was one of them. And another lesson that, you know, I've kind of learned or have I would say a skill I haven't quite honed that I think is really important.
• 28:15
  So I have a brother who owns a business and he constantly, like, evaluating people around him to fill role in his business. Right? He is a great recruiter himself. Right? He's always thinking about what skill does this person have that could possibly fit into this thing that I'm building.
• 28:31
  Right? So he is recruiting people without recruiting them over the long term. Know, he's talking to people about you know, this possibility, a job that he doesn't even have yet before he has them open, you know Wow. Down the line. And I am not that person.
• 28:45
  Like, I have a recruiter that I pay to go out and find complete strangers. He has never hired a complete stranger. Everybody that he hires, he knows them. They're at the competitor, you know, or they're, you know, at the dentist office and they're a great protest person. And he has the skill to to figure out who these people are and kinda just, you know, appeal to them over a long period of time so that when he needs them, he can tap into the potential that he has already identified.
• 29:10
  And I think that that is
• 29:12
  Davina: That is brilliant.
• 29:13
  Margeaux: Because then you're not, you know, relying upon a recruiter, these people that you don't know. He already knows that they can do the work. He already knows that they're doing it well. He already knows that they have an alignment, and he's just convincing them to, over time, just small little nuggets over time that that pay off for him. And it's very different than the model that that that I do, but I think it's a better model.
• 29:34
  Davina: Yeah. What is the nature of his business?
• 29:36
  Margeaux: He is the founder of a nonprofit. It's called Automotive Training School. They provide, training to youth to get into the automotive industry.
• 29:47
  Davina: Oh, I that's wonderful. I and I love that you brought that up because I think that's so critical. We we don't we think to ourselves marketing constantly being out talking to people about our business to get clients, but we never think about using that same model to cultivate a team. And that's really what he's doing. He's he's taking the marketing model of constantly networking and talking to people, not just to get business, but also to get employees, the people who and that really is like, really being a visionary leader and and attracting people to your movement.
• 30:30
  So you're either attracting them as a client or a vendor or as an employee, but you're attracting people to a movement. He's a very visionary kind of thinker, which I think is is the challenge for a a lot of law firm owners. We start out as lawyers, as technicians, and we're not thinking as visionary leaders of a business. It could be any business that we have. We're business owners.
• 30:52
  Right? We don't do that as lawyers. And I think that's really the part that comes into play in transitioning as you grow. You start to develop those skills and realize, oh, hey. Wait a minute.
• 31:03
  I'm not just a lawyer. I need to be thinking like a business owner, and we could definitely look to other business models to help us see things that we normally would not see. So have you since you've sort of observed that about him, have you started to try to adopt that kind of mentality?
• 31:20
  Margeaux: I'm trying. You're trying. It doesn't come as easily as marketing about keeping the client because I feel like I can sell my services. I'm good at them. I feel confident in them.
• 31:32
  I have a lot of passion behind what I do. I feel that about bringing in people, but I'm not I haven't got to the point where I'm doing that on the level that he is, trying to identify talent in other areas that are just around me. I'm kind of oblivious to it in some ways. Like I'm just at the networking to think about, you know, who am I gonna meet here? What are the potential relationships?
• 31:57
  I'm not thinking about, you know, who are the lawyers in this room that could potentially come to my team and ask, Like, I don't think about it. I have to consciously make you know, think about that. He does it without
• 32:07
  Davina: I think you're not alone in that. Let me tell you. I talk to lawyers all the time. You're not alone in that, but I think it's a great idea. You are I think what happens with lawyers too
• 32:21
  Margeaux: first of
• 32:21
  Davina: all, a lot of people are lawyers first. So they're always thinking about the cases of business. How do I get cases? How do I get cases? They're not thinking as a business owner.
• 32:28
  But, also, I think there's a fear for a lot of law firm owners in hiring and paying. Like, I can't afford to pay the people that I really need. Like you were talking about, you know, I just said, I'm throwing caution to the wind. I'm hiring this person because I know that I can't have a trainee anymore. I need an experienced person.
• 32:48
  And I think that is what keep instead of, you know, like, you could be thinking, well, over the next three years, I'm gonna need three or four experienced people. I better be on the lookout for them now before I'm desperate for them. Right? That's that's a lot of and I think that's very common for lawyers because we're thinking in terms of today, not in terms of as business owners where we think of, okay, what's the vision three to five years from now? And I need to be preparing for that.
• 33:15
  You know? So I love that your I love that your brother that you shared your brother's story with us because I think that's gonna help a lot of people's change their kind of thinking around that. So when you went through and you hired your recent associate, you were looking for somebody experienced, and you were determined to make that happen. What kind of I'm sure there was sort of fear around how am I gonna pay this person. What kind of thought process did you go through to figure out and math did you go through?
• 33:43
  We don't we don't like math. I know. But what math did you go through to say, this not only do I need to do this, but this makes good sense to do it, like the return on investment piece of it.
• 33:59
  Margeaux: You know, I I'm reluctant to say it was more of a gut feeling than it was a math problem. Good thought. But starting this firm was more of a gut feeling than how do I figure out how am I gonna pay my mortgage? You know, I just was like, I will figure it out. And I feel the same way about this.
• 34:17
  Like, I have more work than I can do. I have clients who are willing to pay for it. I feel like I'm a good marketer and I could bring in more work if I was dedicating more time to doing more marketing than this. You know, I was very reluctant to hire my first legal assistant because like many people, think, do I have enough work for a full time person? And as soon as that person got there, I realized how much work I could give them and how many things I could take off my plate to open it up.
• 34:41
  And I haven't went back to not having a legal assistant since that was the first year. So I feel like, you know, the first one is always the hardest. And I was like, you know, I just gotta get somebody in here. And I've had people in the past who I, you know, saw how profitable it was and how much easier my life became and how I got to focus on the things that I really wanted to do. So I was like, you know, I just gotta find that person again.
• 35:03
  And this time, it's not only this person, but I gotta look past them. I gotta find, you know, a couple people so that I can ensure that I'm not back to square one, you know. It's not about having one, it's about having a couple. So Yeah. I have to look at the bigger picture here.
• 35:17
  This this is the smaller step to a much bigger picture. So when I think about it like that, if you look further ahead at what you're building, the immediate step doesn't seem as large and overwhelming. So, you know Like a reason. It's lot of gut and thinking, I guess. But No.
• 35:33
  I agree with you
• 35:34
  Davina: about that. Looking further ahead really changes the picture today for you when you say, well, what is it that I really want this law firm to do for me? What do I ultimately want it to do for me? Well, then that's a no brainer that we have to hire people. If ultimately, I want time freedom.
• 35:49
  You know? I want and you've seen it. You get a taste of that when you hire and then somebody goes and you're like, oh, crap. I'm starting over. It's that it makes your vision bigger when you when you see that.
• 36:01
  It pushes your limits. I think that law firm ownership is sort is just an evolution. Like, we become the person. We don't start out the person. If somebody hands you the keys to a million dollar business when you first go out on your own, you'd be like, oh my god.
• 36:15
  I don't know how to do so you really evolve and grow into that. All of this experiences help you realize, oh, I need to reach a little further, reach a little further, reach a little further. Right?
• 36:26
  Margeaux: Yeah.
• 36:27
  Davina: Has that been your experience?
• 36:28
  Margeaux: Yeah. I mean, I I feel like I'm afraid of just being stagnant and being too comfortable. Like, that's always something that kinda concerns me. I feel like, you know, starting this law firm is definitely like being on a roller coaster and going down and feeling that gut feeling. I feel like if I'm not pushing that envelope, then I'm not moving in the right direction.
• 36:48
  And I knew that this was going to be a week, but I felt very confident that I can make it work. So that was really the basis for the decision and put a lot of time into interviewing. I mean, the process took many, many, many months of figuring, you know, trying to find the right fit because I know I can tell anybody that the cost of making that wrong decision on the wrong person is way more than you would think. Right? So I spent a lot of time in the front end on, you know, talking about what I need and there were multiple interviews from different people on different days.
• 37:23
  Like, we've gotta make sure this is the right fit, you know, and this is what you want and this is something that you're gonna buy into. So I I found
• 37:31
  Davina: Yeah. And I think it's wonderful that you didn't jump in because I think a mistake that a lot of people make is I'm desperate. I need to jump in and hire that first person I interviewed. And it sounds like you took your time to really find the right fit because now you know how important that is.
• 37:48
  Margeaux: Yeah. It it took time. And it's been I spent a lot of money, you know, hiring a recruiter to find that as well. So, you know, there's that cost. You know?
• 37:56
  I don't I need that to work. So, you know, the more strategic I can be about it, the better. I'm a big believer in personality, you know, like this profile, you know, I rely a You know, I wanna see how well we're gonna work together. I know my personality very well. So I know what personalities work with my personality.
• 38:15
  So, that's what I'm looking for. You know?
• 38:19
  Davina: What what went into your decision to hire a recruiter? Did you make attempts to sorta go the usual route that you hear a lot of people talk about and then it just wasn't fruitful?
• 38:30
  Margeaux: Yeah. The first attorney I hired, I just was in on a Facebook group, and she was like, I'm looking for some work. And it ended up working out. I didn't pay a recruiter a dollar. It was wonderful, you know, but it's it's not always that easy.
• 38:42
  You know, sometimes there are people around you in your circle and, you know, it works out, but I knew that I needed someone and I had sent out emails. I posted on LinkedIn and I hadn't found anybody. I mean, it was either sitting around and hope somebody walked through the door or hire somebody to go out and find somebody because I really needed them. So, you know, I had worked with this recruiter in the past for legal assistance and paralegal, so I knew she was good And I knew she would she would understand what I was looking for, and she does a lot of great screening. At the very beginning, I used to do all the training myself.
• 39:14
  I would go through all these resumes with hours and hours and hours and then pick the wrong person. So, you know, I I value her opinion. I feel like she was very good at, you know, picking up on cues of, you know, people may get she taught me a lot about interviewing me, honestly. She made me a much better interviewer. So yeah, it was kind of a no brainer.
• 39:35
  I mean, I I couldn't find it throughout my network or, you know, I haven't found it yet. Oh, yeah. So
• 39:41
  Davina: It's wonderful that you recognize that, probably through this experience, that you're not the best person for every job in your business. And I think that's a mistake that a lot of people make is, like, I'm the best person for every job in my business. I'll do it all. If I just had more time, I could do it all. And then you start to get into it, you realize, well, maybe this isn't my strong suit or my skill set.
• 40:02
  I mean, I've always told people, like, first of all, bookkeeping is a no go for. I have to have a bookkeeper. I love to look at the financials, but I don't like to line the numbers up like little soldiers at all. And I worked as a bookkeeper in college, so I know for sure that I don't wanna do But when it comes to interviewing people, I tend to find something good with every person I talk to. That's just like my personality and my nature.
• 40:25
  And and so it was very important for me to find somebody who, a colleague, who that is their skill set and their strength and say, hey. You know, can you help me out with this? Because I just like everybody. And then I would hire and I would hire people that I liked usually because there was something that was like me that I liked. You know?
• 40:45
  Like, we had this and what I needed was somebody for my weaknesses to compensate, and then I gravitated toward that. So I think that's the, really good advice. I think it's a challenge for a lot of people to find how did you find your recruiter? Was it because there are there are recruiters, and then there are recruiters. Like, there are recruiting companies that may not be as helpful as the person that you hired in sort of asking the right questions and things like that?
• 41:17
  Margeaux: So it was I asked a colleague, and he was like, I strongly recommend this person. They charge on a flat rate. So it's not a percentage of what you're paying them. And I like that from the get go because, you know, it can get very expensive when you're talking about percentages. I'd like to know upfront and the price goes up, you know, you're negotiating and then they want more money and then you're paying more recruiters so you're hit it, you know, before you know it, the price of the recruiter is dull.
• 41:45
  And I was like, I wanna know on day one what I'm gonna pay. And she was like, that's the only way I work and I like that. But, you know, I just wanna say he made a really good point about recognizing our weaknesses and a lot of attorneys feel like we're great at everything. And I've spent a lot of time thinking about things that I don't like to do or I'm not great at doing. And the key is to put people in positions that are better and I see they're better at it than me.
• 42:06
  The bookkeeper is better than me. I have a operations person who've done you know, all types of administrative processing. That's not my strong suit. Like, I don't like to think about the 15 steps to get it, you know, the printer working and document that. Yeah.
• 42:20
  I would never get that written down. If you left it to me, we would have no process manually. She's good. Right? She her brain thinks in that way, and I can recognize that she's better than that.
• 42:30
  Better than me than that. And I you know, that's the goal. Hire attorneys that are better attorneys, you know, so that I can build the firm that I want. And, you know, I like market. That's what I like to do.
• 42:40
  That's, you know, what I wanna spend my time doing. And the more people I can hire for the thing it's easy when it's things you don't like or aren't good at. They hate us to give away things you actually do like to delegate sellers to get more time.
• 42:51
  Davina: But Yes.
• 42:52
  Margeaux: I feel like, you know, the bottom level of bookkeeping, I mean, you couldn't I look so happy to give away bookkeeping. I can't do it. Yeah.
• 43:00
  Davina: No kidding. No kidding. And I think you make a a point too about and I think this is a sticking point for a lot of people. It makes people, it makes sense to people to say, oh, yeah. I get rid of something like bookkeeping or I get rid of something like scanning or answering my phone or something like that.
• 43:16
  Where we get bogged down is something that we are good at, but it's not the highest and best use of our time. So we're good at drafting or we're good at this type of law or we're good at but if we're trying to grow a business, we may need to get a lawyer who wants who just wants to work as a lawyer to do this work so we can go out and be the rainmaker and the visionary and the CEO and the creator of our business. And I think that is a challenging thing for a lot of people because I think we get comfort in sort of it's easy to do that be in that familiar place. And I'm not going to think about strategizing or growing the business or hiring people because it's uncomfortable. It's hard.
• 43:58
  I'm just gonna come in today, and I'm just gonna do the work that's on my desk. Did you have
• 44:02
  Margeaux: that nice feeling? Yeah. I absolutely have that experience. You don't feel like you've accomplished anything. You spend the whole day doing non billable work.
• 44:09
  Right? So like, wasted my whole day, feel that all the time. I've been talking to my recruiter. I did a, you know, send a seminar off that I'm gonna be given at an annual conference for the Maryland Bar. Like all of these like, you know, amorphous things that will likely bring in work, but they're not tangible.
• 44:25
  I didn't work the third number out of. I didn't write it on the time card. I didn't speak to a third number of clients. Like, it it has a whole liveship. And I used to for years think I just I did I did nothing today.
• 44:35
  I did Yeah. One minute of And
• 44:38
  Davina: it feels like it's nothing. It's that and then you're beating yourself up going, I did nothing because I didn't bill something to a client. But if you have a lawyer who's doing that, that's the whole point of it. So you don't you don't have to do that. You know?
• 44:51
  You're doing those things that are have higher value because you're bringing in that work that you can then hire another lawyer to to do. Yeah. That's a great lesson. That's a great lesson. Tell me.
• 45:02
  So you hired somebody to do, to handle your operations for you. But how how for how long had you been in business before you did that? And and do you it was, like, kind of an office manager, or did you go write for chief operations officer? Or what did you what did you who did you bring in? Like, what type of person?
• 45:21
  Margeaux: So I'm sure I went the nontraditional route. But I actually hired a legal assistant who I was having a a conversation with, and she was like, you know, I think I'm doing good at being a legal system but I think I could add more value here. And you know, I think me being not a client facing would be more value because I could offer the process part, the operations, the back end part that will make things more efficient. And these are some databases that I think that you should look at in order to make yourself more efficient. And, you know, this is how we could structure this.
• 45:55
  And I was it's just little stuff all the time. She was you know, like people would example was, you know, we closed for a week at Christmas. And she was like, you know, we can make that automated. These are the things we're gonna do when we close. You know?
• 46:06
  So this is the motivating The lefty people like that. Yeah. And all of y'all, like, thought of it. I'd never thought about
• 46:13
  Davina: Especially come somebody that comes to you and said, I think I can add more value. Like, I love that she that you have somebody on your team who says, I think I can add more value if we do this or that or the other. I mean, wouldn't we love to have ten, twenty, 30 employees who had that mindset, that they're constantly thinking about the value, you know, of your business and the value they could bring that's different from what you bring? So that's fantastic. So you court sort of evolved that position from a legal assistant position into something more.
• 46:44
  Margeaux: Yeah. I never had an office manager. And I could tell you talk about weaknesses. Like, the administrative things that go into Moraine office were never my struggle. Like there's just so many bar memberships and you know, they were lapsing and insurance here and this lease there and like I couldn't keep, I couldn't wrap my head around it.
• 47:03
  Like there was just so much of that and I knew that I needed an office manager at some point. I didn't know exactly when I needed When she said that, I was like, the light just came on, you can keep all of these things alive. And then she's like, all right, here's our administrative calendar. My practice insurance comes up for renewal every year at the same time, right? And every year, I would be on the week before about practice insurance and I'm like trying to get quotes and I'm like, what do I do?
• 47:28
  And then, you know, like, you can be planning for that six months in a day. It doesn't need to be a last minute thing, but it was with me because, you know, I had so many other things on my plate. So having a calendar that kinda lays that out, like, all the renewal are structured. They're all at the same time. Giving somebody a credit card so they could pay anything, so they stay and it's not on me, you know?
• 47:47
  Yes. It's a huge weight off my shoulder. There was just a lot of responsibility that, you know, I was happy to to delegate and to somebody who wanted to do it, does good at it, you know, that it just didn't happen over
• 48:00
  Davina: him. Well, you're a you are a sought after speaker, and you're a member of multiple bar associations and in a court. And so I imagine that is a lot to to keep up with plus getting speaking engagements and and all of these kinds of things and and keep it up on top of everything on the calendar in addition just to the cases. Right? So I I can imagine that that that was a huge help and probably a real turning point for you in your business.
• 48:27
  Margeaux: Yeah. I think we're still in the transition phase of getting her into that, and bringing our intake person into more of a legal assistant role. So it certainly isn't done yet, but I see the vision and I think the staff see it too. So, you know, hopefully get there soon. But I'm excited about it.
• 48:47
  Davina: Yeah. I'm excited for you. So we need to end. But before we do, why don't you tell us a couple things? One is what advice you could leave us with the other women law promoters who are on a journey similar to yours who may be behind you in the journey?
• 49:01
  And then also tell us how we can connect with you if we wanna contact you.
• 49:07
  Margeaux: What is my advice? You know, I think we all have this entrepreneurial spirit that got us down here in the first place, And I think that it's good to tap into that, you know, and not let that fire or, you know, ability to look past the fear kind of die when we get to a place of comfort and things are kind of, you know, it's easy when things are just chaotic and you don't know where the next case is gonna come from. But then when you get to a point where it's kinda steady, you know, it's easy to to let that go. So, you know, climb the next mountain and use that fear of the motivator. So Yeah.
• 49:42
  That's my advice. So I am all over LinkedIn. I'm on there very frequently. So look me up Thomas Law Office or Margeaux Thomas on LinkedIn. I'd love to connect with any of your viewers there.
• 49:54
  My website is thomaslawplc.com. And, yep. I agree.
• 50:01
  Davina: Thank you. We'll have those links in the show notes for anybody who is looking for them. And, Margeaux, thanks so much for being here. I really enjoyed our conversation.
• 50:08
  Margeaux: Thank you.
• 50:10
  Intro: If you're ready to create more of what you truly desire in your business and your life, then you'll want to visit us at Wealthy Woman Lawyer dot com to learn more about how we help our clients create wealth generating law firms with ease.