Latest / Wealthy Woman Lawyer Podcast, Helping you create a profitable, sustainable law firm you love / 207: Danya Shakfeh | How a 10-Year Solo Scaled to Law Firm CEO in Just 6 Months

Transcript

207: Danya Shakfeh | How a 10-Year Solo Scaled to Law Firm CEO in Just 6 Months · Wealthy Woman Lawyer Podcast, Helping you create a profitable, sustainable law firm you love

• 0:00
  Danya: Unfortunately, I think like a lot of business owners in general, think, well, like you hire when you have so much work, you can't handle it. And it was just like this constant roller coaster of me doing all this work, hustling and getting all the business. And then I would get stuck doing legal work and then it would slow down. It's very chaotic. When I spoke to other lawyers and the business coaches, they're like, no, you hired to get ahead of that.
• 0:22
  And so your time is free to continue to do the marketing. So probably I waited ten years too long for actually to finally hire.
• 0:33
  Intro: Welcome to the Wealthy Woman Lawyer Podcast. What
• 0:37
  Danya: if
• 0:37
  Intro: 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. Now here's Devina.
• 1:23
  Davina: Hi. This is Devina. And before we jump into today's show, I'd like first to introduce you to some of our sponsors. Over the last four years, Noble Marketing has tracked more than two fifty law firms and discovered 60 to 80% of new client calls were generated through Google My Business and Google Ads. Basically, you need to be on Google.
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• 2:12
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• 2:51
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• 3:07
  Davina: Hi, everyone, and welcome back to the Wealthy Woman Lawyer Podcast. Today's guest is Danya Shakfeh, attorney, founder, and CEO of Motiva Law in Oak Brook, Illinois. Danya is a business strategy attorney for startups, entrepreneurs, and business owners in the Cook County area. She is the recipient of the Super Lawyer Rising Star Award for nine consecutive years, and she's had her own law firm for a decade now. So we are super excited to talk with her today about her law firm business and how she's grown it successfully.
• 3:39
  So welcome, Danya. I'm so happy to have you here.
• 3:41
  Danya: Thank you so much, Divina, for having me. It's my pleasure.
• 3:44
  Davina: Good. Good. So tell me about I always like to start out just kinda asking people what made them decide to become an attorney because I always find that really interesting how some people always knew they wanted to be a lawyer and other people kind of happened into it by accident. What's your story? Well, I wish
• 4:03
  Danya: it was glamorous, but my parents are immigrants. And my dad sat us down and said, doctor doctor lawyer lawyer. He wanted to come and see in this land of opportunity. So I mean, that's part of the story, but I've always wanted to have an impact on the world. I started off thinking I wanted to be a journalist when I was in high school, but I ended up selling on law.
• 4:26
  I initially wanted to focus more on like civil rights, especially being a minority myself. And, you know, being from The Middle East and when I was in college, we, you know, there were some wars going on. And so I thought I could have an impact and I thought I could help make world peace at any college age. I'll do. But then, you know, at some point we grow up and well, first of all, I don't think you need to be a lawyer to have an impact.
• 4:49
  But second of all, I realized that maybe I was being overly ambitious thinking that I could solve all the world's problems. Now I'm a corporate attorney, I have found that, you know, being a corporate attorney, I actually do have a lot of positive impact by helping people improve their lives. Not something that's making news, but when people have sound businesses and they have a guide and a mentor to help them start their businesses that improves their lives. And so that's how I got into law. That's why I ended up doing corporate law too.
• 5:17
  Davina: Yeah. Yeah. So when you started out, did you work for another law firm or did you know right away you were going to start your own business right out of law school? How did that come about?
• 5:26
  Danya: I definitely knew at one point I wanted to have my own business and to have my own law firm, but I graduated during the great recession around 02/2010, which was the worst time. I didn't want to be finishing school. It was so bad if remember. So it was hard to find jobs. And plus I had moved to a new state, so I was completely a fish out of water.
• 5:45
  So that had accelerated my plan to have my own law firm. So at that time, honestly, I just found whatever work I could find. I literally put on a suit and I would go to law firms and hand on my resume. I even did that after surgery. Was walking around in a boot.
• 6:01
  So you don't know. So it was like either she's really ambitious or she's crazy. So I started taking clients pretty early on, but I did have some really cool mentors. And so that's how I ended up starting my own. So I'm really happy with having my own law firm, but it was not really the way I had plans.
• 6:14
  It was not
• 6:15
  Davina: the plan. Right? It wasn't the plan right out of the gate. Yeah. It was a scary time for people graduating during that time because there weren't jobs to be had.
• 6:23
  And so you had to get creative. And I'm sure that you showed a lot of tenacity in doing that. I can't imagine, like, hobbling down the street, handing out resumes. And in this day and age, I think that really speaks to your tenacity and your grit and all of that because I know that a lot of people complain that people don't seem to have that anymore. So it's interesting to me that you did that.
• 6:43
  When you hung your own shingle, started your own law firm, it's been ten years now. Right?
• 6:48
  Danya: Thirteen, actually. Yeah. Oh, really? Stop cutting at ten because I don't want to age myself.
• 6:52
  Davina: Yeah. Happy. Well, you're not happy with yourself when you're talking to me. I've been doing this coaching for a decade now. So I've been an attorney for sixteen years.
• 7:01
  Ten years, a decade. So I'm really eager to get in and talk with you about kind of the things that you think that you've done well and what you might do differently and the lessons we can learn because I know there are a lot of people out here who are thinking of starting their own firm or maybe they're the first years into it and they don't know if they should continue. So let's get into that. What was it like for you when you first started your law firm? How did you feel about that?
• 7:29
  Like what emotions and thoughts were going through your brain?
• 7:32
  Danya: I think in hindsight, I should have been more scared. When you don't know what you don't know, you don't realize how difficult something truly is until you're in it. So I think I was maybe overly naive. So I didn't really feel very, I think I felt very optimistic and that came crashing down pretty fast. Not in a bad way.
• 7:51
  It's not that anything bad happened. It's not what you think it is. You know, I think I thought that if you become a lawyer and the business comes to you, it's like magic or something, but that's definitely not the case. And I think there was a lot of bad advice, but I was naive, but I also felt kind of empowered to like, I can open a business. And, you know, and thankfully, like one of the nice things about being a law firm owner specifically is that the overhead is pretty low.
• 8:15
  And I know that you had a virtual business for like a law firm yourself.
• 8:18
  Davina: So, know, it's not that hard from that end. What bad advice comes to mind when you think back on that time? What do you think somebody told Jira? Because I definitely remember getting bad advice when I started.
• 8:29
  Danya: So it's kind of along those lines about clients and the business coming. So one thing that really stuck out to me is if you do it well, people will come. And I just don't think that's true. Previous generation attorneys seem to be, I think the diverse marketing, especially a lot of the marketing that we do in this day and age, even things like SEO, like you don't need to advertise, people will just come to you. It really paints a picture of, you know, having and building your own law firm as a lot easier than it really is.
• 8:59
  And let's face it. We're in the Chicago land area. There's so many lawyers. It's very competitive. It's not like we're in some small town where you're like one to five lawyers.
• 9:07
  I wish people were just honest about how hard it is to bring clients in, especially at the beginning when you're trying to establish your reputation. And then I think some other thing, not so much like verbal advice, but some of the examples I've seen, and this might have worked in the past for law firm owners, taking maybe too much variety of cases. And I have found that it's just so much easier to streamline and be confident when you are niching down. You don't have to be super niche, but, you know, I do business transactions. I'm not going to do immigration and, you know, I'm not going do like that garden variety.
• 9:38
  That might work in small towns, but I think for us, you know, I'm pretty particular about who I take just because it's just easier and more streamlined.
• 9:46
  Davina: It's interesting to me that you said that about non advertising because it's one of the things that I've heard a lot throughout my career from lawyers who were practicing before I was practicing. And they would say, well, I just get business through referrals. And I think when they tell people that they're not sharing the whole picture. When they first started out, what did they do to get business? It's very different from an attorney who's been practicing for years, and now they just get referrals because the reason they just get referrals now is because they have years and years and years of practice and a body of work and a lot of connections and all of that.
• 10:19
  So it's not great advice to get people who are just starting their firm. Also, it used to be in the legal culture. I remember when it was considered unseemly to advertise. And
• 10:32
  Danya: Yeah.
• 10:32
  Davina: The only people who advertise were quote, unquote, ambulance chasers. You
• 10:36
  Danya: know? Yeah.
• 10:37
  Davina: And so if you were in a professional area of practice like business law, that type of thing, not consumer based, let's say, it was considered really you know, you just didn't do it because it was tacky. It wasn't whatever. We don't live in that world today. We haven't lived in that world for some time. Also, it's very different when you're with a large law firm and there are mechanisms in place for generating business that you don't have to touch because you're there doing the work.
• 11:03
  But when you're a small business owner, which is what solo lawyers are, lawyers who are growing starting out their own and then growing their firm.
• 11:10
  Danya: Right.
• 11:11
  Davina: Just like every other business, you have to have a plan for marketing and sales and all of those things and how we're gonna get business. So how did you kind of move past that advice, and what did you do instead?
• 11:24
  Danya: That's a great question. So it's not so much that I've passed the advice. It was more like I kept implementing what I thought was the right thing to do. I was doing what everybody else was doing and it was just not working. So What
• 11:36
  Davina: everybody else told you they were doing?
• 11:38
  Danya: Yeah. Plus or like what I saw them doing. Sometimes it's hard to have a conversation with other lawyers about how they bring in business, especially when it's not seen as something unseemly. I mean, you know, 2010 is very different than 2023, even though it's only thirteen years different, but we didn't have social media like we do now. So I think at that time we still had that kind of lingering.
• 11:58
  We don't mind instead of we don't market, which I mean, let's also be real. Like if you are networking, is marketing anybody who says otherwise, this is a little bit delusional, but that aside, So I was just doing what I thought or like just what I saw other people doing or I guess what people were willing to tell me. It just, it wasn't working. I was very unhappy. I was very stressed.
• 12:17
  The money was always very, you know, come and go. And one of the reasons why I wanted to have my own business is so that I can free up my time. I mean, to me, I'm buying my time and it was just not working out that way. Having small children, I was just always very stressed out. So I started to talk to other lawyers, but not people that I know personally, but just through like Facebook and online.
• 12:39
  There are so many like hidden communities of lawyers of smaller law firms who they're totally, I mean, doing so well in terms of money, but also having those goals of bringing their time up and they are so giving. And so just finding that community of people who are like minded, to be honest, I also hired a business coach as well because you know, you go to law school and at that time they almost discourage, you know, law students from going out on their own. They really were kind of pushing, you know, employment. And so like finding people who can actually guide you on how to run up, like see yourself as a business owner first. So that's how I did.
• 13:14
  So basically just banging my head against the wall until I got frustrated and found people who knew what they were doing could help me. How soon after you started your practice did you hire a coach? I'm curious. Even though I've practicing since 2010, I've had my law firm since then. I didn't get serious about growing it until my kids were a little bit older.
• 13:32
  So that was around 2020. But then my plans got derailed by COVID and I was back at home doing the e learning with my kids. So really, was in 2021 is when I hired the coach. So it's been almost two years for me.
• 13:45
  Davina: Yeah. So tell me about when you first realized that you needed to hire. Was that pretty soon after you started or was
• 13:52
  Danya: it a few years? I think I definitely waited too long. Unfortunately, I think like a lot of business owners in general, they think, well, like you hire when you have so much work, you can't handle it. And it was just like this constant roller coaster of me doing all this work, hustling and getting all the business. And then I would get stuck doing legal work and then it would slow down.
• 14:13
  It's very chaotic. When I spoke to other lawyers and the business coaches, they're like, no, you hired to get ahead of that. And so your time is free to continue to do the marketing. So probably I waited ten years too long for actually to finally hire. I hired actually someone for the first time, like an actual employee, just maybe a little over a year ago.
• 14:34
  So it hasn't been that long. And now we're at four people and it's a contractor. Yeah. So tell
• 14:41
  Davina: me about the four people on your team. What did they do? What are their positions?
• 14:44
  Danya: So the question is me, you know, I'm a lawyer. I do see myself first and foremost as the business owner. And then I have my assistant. She's fantastic. She is in office and she helps me with my emails and she takes calls and schedules consultations.
• 15:01
  And she's kind of my right hand. She's great. I recently hired an associate as well just a little over a month ago. And so, you know, it took me my time. And then I have, you know, like a marketing manager as well through an agency and she actually helped write my blog posts and do my videos.
• 15:16
  And she actually helped me get me on this podcast. Then I have an outsourced paralegal as well for some of that overflow work.
• 15:22
  Davina: So tell me how you think your life has changed since you put together a team
• 15:27
  Danya: that was pretty fast. It's really terrifying because you become responsible for other people when you hire employees. I mean, for me at least it is a responsibility. So at first I was very scared, you know, like you want to do right by people as an employer, you don't want to harm anyone. And so, you know, scared like, am I going to have enough work?
• 15:44
  Will I run out of money? And then it does get really scary for like the first few months when things don't go as planned. Like it's still learning curve for me. I have to learn how to manage people. I want to make sure that we have the proper procedures in place, that I'm communicating my needs to them properly.
• 15:59
  I don't want to blame my employees if something goes wrong right away. I got to make sure that I'm doing what I'm supposed to do. But now like things have stabilized. It's amazing, Divina. It's like, I feel a little bit more at ease, especially that I have children.
• 16:12
  It's like, I'm a lot less stressed. It comes with other stresses, but in general, it's nice that I'm not wearing 10 hats anymore. I'm only wearing two or three and it's very nice.
• 16:21
  Davina: What are the ages of your children out of curiosity? Because you've mentioned them a few times.
• 16:25
  Danya: I just want to
• 16:26
  Davina: give people a sense of how old they are.
• 16:28
  Danya: They're six, nine, and 11. Six, nine,
• 16:31
  Davina: and 11. Okay. So they're elementary age then. Yeah. Okay.
• 16:35
  Yeah. So probably have busy with a lot of activities and things like that. Yeah. That's your second full time job there. So we were talking about hiring these people and it just like, now you're starting to feel sort of that sense of ease.
• 16:48
  Let me ask you how you decided who to hire first.
• 16:52
  Danya: I actually hired my marketing person first because I was struggling a lot with that. So I was trying to make videos and write contents because I needed to bring in the business. It was kind of more like what was stressing me out the most? Where was I getting stuck the most? And I want to offload that.
• 17:08
  Shortly after then I hired my assistant because as a business owner, it's not the highest and best use of your time to be answering emails and phone calls and doing those admin tasks. And so once I got that was a game changer. It's really just where am I going to see the growth the fastest and what's stressing me out the most.
• 17:26
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• 18:00
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• 18:13
  Davina: I think that's a great place to start is what is stressing me out the most that I can get help with and I can let go of. Because I also think we have to be willing to let go of these things that we're asking people to help us do. And a lot of times, there are areas of our practice where we're not ready to let go of yet. And oftentimes, I find for women law firm owners who are trying to grow, one of the last sort of things they hang on to is the legal work and not hiring lawyers and really sort of dragging their feet. The ones who I think tend to be more successful are the ones who can overcome that more quickly and start hiring lawyers.
• 18:52
  What emotions did you go through? What thoughts did you have around hiring a lawyer?
• 18:58
  Danya: You know, I think part of our training in law school and our legal culture is that we want to be the best lawyer. Have, like lawyers have some of the biggest egos. Like we tie our identity to the legal work that we produce. So that was probably something I just really had to let go. I had to make a decision.
• 19:17
  Do I want to be an attorney or do I want to be a business owner? And so we had to go through that first and really just make that choice. Once you do it, it's like, I love a lot of the law, but I'm actually happy to be out of my daily grind of the legal work. And so I can focus on growth of the actual business. And so I'm still having an impact, but I don't have to actually read the contract myself and review that.
• 19:43
  So now you have a team. What do
• 19:44
  Davina: you think one of the biggest challenges is for you and your next growth area that you're working on in terms of that? You mentioned managing.
• 19:54
  Danya: So far management hasn't been too bad, but I also have to credit myself. You really have to break down your ego when you hire people and be okay with receiving constructive feedback from your employees. And sometimes it kind of hurts you like, oh, I worked so hard, you know? And someone didn't like the way I sent this or did that. So that's first and foremost is just having things in place will make that process a lot easier of hiring and managing.
• 20:18
  So, so far it hasn't been too bad, but I'm relatively not managing a team of 10. And then the next challenge though, is to have more streamlined business developments. I think too, is that again, seeing yourself as a business owner first and terms like business development, we didn't learn in law school. So that's where I'm at. It's just like, can I hire someone who can even help with consultations?
• 20:40
  Because not all law firms even have lawyers doing consultations. So that's kind of my next phase is to really even offload some of that marketing and sales part of the business. Yeah. Yeah. That's great.
• 20:52
  Going back to your marketing and you kind of
• 20:54
  Davina: got this advice that, you know, build it and they
• 20:57
  Danya: will come and you realized at some point that that's not how it works. What did you do to start being more proactive and systematic in growing your law firm? So I found first and foremost that marketing to businesses is so different than marketing to consumers. It's a lot of experimenting on my part. I've spent a lot of time most recently, especially since I'm bringing on a team and I'm not doing the actual legal work and, you know, and like managing my own email is to focus more on relationships.
• 21:31
  Sometimes the world seems so loud, like you go on LinkedIn and it's just like this constant feed or Facebook. So I'm focusing now on how to stick out in a way, but also like build relationships. And so, you know, meeting with potential referral sources and not just to get business, but to give business as well. The people that you receive business from are not necessarily the people that you give business to. So, so it's like you give, and then you get it from somewhere else.
• 21:56
  It becomes like a circle. So that's why marketing now is really focusing on relationships and referrals right now. Yeah. Also like a lot of content too and videos, but first and foremost, the actual, you know, like building up relationships has been
• 22:08
  Davina: And building those relationships, are you using social media to do that? Or were you doing kind of in person things or kind of what was your approach?
• 22:15
  Danya: All of it. All You of know, I think you have to be seen in more than one place to really get credibility, especially if you're marketing to businesses. People like to have an attorney who has a reputation. And so I created a Facebook group, you know, it's open to everybody. It's really geared towards business owners and just providing business tips.
• 22:34
  I do post on social media, on Instagram and YouTube, but I find that it's more complimentary to my in person networking. So like if I have lunch with someone and they see me on LinkedIn and they see me on Instagram, it becomes like, you know, those like multiple touch points is how you build those relationships. Yeah. I am curious. You and I
• 22:58
  Davina: talked about that you being a Muslim woman starting a law firm business has also come with its unique challenges, and there are probably benefits there as well. Can you talk about that a little bit? And do you ever sort of use that in your marketing strategy and your positioning? So when I first started, I tried to
• 23:16
  Danya: be someone that I'm completely not. I thought, okay, well, here are the lawyers that we see on TV. Here are the lawyers that are on the covers of magazine. And you try to almost pretend that you can be, you know, a middle aged white man. There's nothing wrong with middle aged white man, but it's just, obviously I'm not a middle aged man.
• 23:31
  For a while, I think I actually lost my own identity because trying to be somewhere like, okay, well I need to have mahogany deaths and for people to take me seriously. It's so superficial, it's just like, okay, well, if that's what looks like it's working for them, and if I want to be taken seriously, I'm going to adopt that persona. And then I have found that just over time, it's so draining, first of all, to be someone that you're not. And honestly, it just didn't work. You can see that I have a blue background.
• 23:57
  Like that's my office. I made my office, it's blue and white and gray. It's pretty modern. I have marble in there too. And so at one point, with the help of some other lawyers who also do things differently, I can't say that I'm the first person, but just to own my own identity and not be shy and be who I am, not just in terms of my ethnic background, but my personality, my quirks, maybe my odd sense of humor or whatever it is.
• 24:19
  And I had found that, so like there are lawyers like me and there are potential clients like me. And you cast your end of the person as you are and your people will find you. I found that to be more effective. And you know, if I was on this podcast ten years ago, probably would have been like, I really want to talk about my identity, even though it's obvious. It's like an elephant But in the now I'm like, yeah, let's talk about it.
• 24:40
  You know, I am who I am. I always ask people why they choose me. And there are people who say, I want to work with a minority. I want to work with a woman. I've even heard people say, you wanna get something done, you hire a female.
• 24:51
  So I have
• 24:52
  Davina: a client who she is Christian and she actually uses that in her marketing. She's so aligned with that identity. And one of the things that I've always learned is that the more powerfully attractive we are, the more we're repelling. And so we shouldn't shy away from repelling people and really say, who am I? Who am I as a person, and who do I wanna attract, and who do I wanna work with?
• 25:16
  And a lot of people could think that's very limiting. I'm always talking about men and comparing sort of the situation for men and situation for women, and there are a lot of men who will probably be very turned off by that. And I in fact, I've had people write nasty grams to me because they don't like what I say about what I call the white men 50 club or white men 60 club now that I'm closer to 60 to 50. But there are so many people out there who strongly identify with what I'm talking about that I become that person for them. And that gives me an opportunity to work with people that I love to work with and wanna serve.
• 25:49
  Right? It really is important to be exactly who we are because there's so many people out there who need attorneys that are exactly a match for who we are. Right? Yeah. And also there are people who need their world expanded a little bit.
• 26:04
  And then also we serve that purpose as well. Do you have this idea of, like, big firm, or do you have a certain size in mind? What is it that you're looking for your law firm to do specifically for you in terms of the life that you're creating?
• 26:20
  Danya: I'm not sure about size because I've never been around where I am. So I don't know like if I would be happy at, you know, x amount or X employees, but I ultimately I want to create a business that serves me, not the other way around, you know, like you have a lot of business owners who are slaves of businesses when it really should be the other way around, as I'm sure, you know, I want to create a machine. Runs without me. I can travel with my kids. I can sleep better at night.
• 26:45
  Just something that works for me and gives me my time and my freedom. Yeah. So important. Of course,
• 26:52
  Davina: every parent at every stage says my kids are the same. They need me more than ever. It's interesting talking with parents of teenagers. Parents of teenagers will say my kids need me more than ever. And often we think when we have younger kids that our kids will be more independent at that age.
• 27:08
  But really, truly, when you're growing a family and that's important to you, that's a big part of who you are. Having a law firm business that can function in your absence is huge. Or maybe even for those who just wanna be absent from it or who have, like me, I'm in a generation where I have parents in their eighties. And so I'm looking at what those years are gonna be like and what I need to support me during that time. So there's you're right.
• 27:32
  There's so much more to what you want out of your business besides a dollar figure or a certain number of people. What I've always shared with my clients is redundancy. Like, you think yourself, oh, I've hired a lawyer. I'm good. And really what you're wanting is to create some redundancy because if a lawyer leaves, then you're back to square one.
• 27:52
  And so that's kind of my advice to people is think in terms of redundancy. If any one of us is pulled out, is there somebody else on the team? Is there some other way that that job can function? Because if you're trying to create sort of this wealth generating machine, ultimately, that's what you're looking to sort of put together. Tell me about the services that you provide for your clients.
• 28:14
  I know you said you're a corporate lawyer, but give us a little idea. You know, a lot of people define that differently, but talk to me about the type of ideal client for you.
• 28:23
  Danya: So I like to say that I make deals, not break deals. I see myself as a deal maker. So I help people buy and sell businesses. And so like mergers acquisitions, or they start businesses, or if they wanna buy into a franchise. I love working with entrepreneurs with a vision of growth.
• 28:39
  So people kind of like me who want to create a system or a business that works for them. So I help them write their contracts, but I also just as part of my business startup services or the business growth services is I do provide a lot of, you know, business advice as well, you know? So if I'm writing a contract for our clients and that contract is like a service contract for their customers, I talk about numbers and I guide them and see, you know, like, are you being profitable? So she's like, I can get a sense of their profit margins. And I'd like, hey, you know, maybe you're not charging enough.
• 29:13
  And so having those conversations, a lot of clients actually find that valuable as well. So they're not just getting legal advice, but actual, like, real world business advice. Because I have business coaches and I've learned so much. I'm like, why can't I pass that on to my clients? And so those are the services that
• 29:26
  Davina: I provide. You know, anybody listening has done business law, I'm sure could tell you that it's so needed. And also how many advisors do small business owners have? Usually, they've got their CPA, and if they're lucky, they've got a lawyer. And so being able to impart as much to them and sort of offer things that are nonlegal advice that also will help them as business people.
• 29:47
  It's a wonderful asset to your clients. Is there a certain type of vertical industry or size client that you like to work with? Yeah.
• 29:55
  Danya: So people in the trucking industry, I do have a lot of clients in the food industry and just like, you know, like general services, I think those are the top three. I tend to avoid healthcare just because, you know, it has its own regulation. It's really niche that there are lawyers who only practice that. And so I tend to avoid those, but you know, I take most industries In terms of size, you know, I'm a startups, but they do need to have a vision for growth. Otherwise people with like two, three, four employees, I start with that and just, you know, on its way up.
• 30:26
  Right.
• 30:27
  Davina: Right. So what are two pieces of advice to other women law firm owners who are on the path a little bit behind you trying to grow, trying to do things? What would you tell them? What would be good advice that you would give them?
• 30:40
  Danya: I guess I'll start with like, don't try to do it all. I think as women, we put so much pressure on ourselves to want to be the best at everything. I'm not sure where that comes from, maybe TV or social media, who knows, but it's okay if something's not perfect. So for example, I'm pretty open that I don't like to fill my own laundry. I just don't have the time, you know, and you know, have my kids and I have my business and it's just, you know, like there's no badge or award for doing everything perfectly.
• 31:06
  There really isn't. And so it's okay if things are a little bit imperfect, as long as it gets done, then it's fine. We want to do things well, we have standards, but this idea of having it all and doing it all, I think we need to just take off that pressure a little bit. And then the second thing too, is also to really delegate, you know, delegate whatever you can. I mean, delegate pretty much everything now and I love it.
• 31:29
  And it kind of goes back to this need of wanting to show that we are good at everything and you don't have to be. Like you can be good at managing and you can be good at choosing the people to be where you need them in your life. And that's fine too. So I think those are the two pieces of advice that I would give to someone who was in my position a few years ago.
• 31:50
  Davina: I was speaking with a woman law firm owner recently who has been doing things by herself for a number of years, and she's making a lot of money doing it, but she is at a point where she really, really, really overworked and out of capacity to the point where she's struggling to find time to hire people. Mhmm. Did you have that experience where you were working so much and you were like, how am I going to fit hiring people in when I have all this work that I'm doing? And what did you do to sort of shift that mindset? So I went to that was
• 32:24
  Danya: me about maybe months ago. My team was sledging. I had my assistant, but I've really needed to get out of legal work because I became such a bottleneck for myself and for my clients as well. And I thought the same thing too. Like, I don't even have time to hire.
• 32:38
  I think it was just to just do it. Cause first of all, it's going to take time to find the right candidate. Second of all, the way that my business, as I was mentioning before, it's in roller coaster. So I would have these production crunches where I'm just like, I'm so overwhelmed with work. I'm up to like 2AM in the morning, you know, doing work.
• 32:54
  Then I go to the office and then like look at my numbers and bring all these hats. And then so, because there is that lag and I knew that there was going to be like a famine period coming, the way that it had aligned was when I did hire the person, things did get slow. And so I used that opportunity to properly onboard her and get everything in writing in terms of the procedures. So there isn't really like any magic advice except to just do it.
• 33:18
  Davina: I do think that is good advice. So taking advantage of the ebb and flow because we know the fee spamming cycle happens. The ebb and flow happens in business. We have times where we're really busy, and then we have times where we're like, oh my god. Is work gonna come in?
• 33:32
  You know, what am I gonna do?
• 33:33
  Danya: This is all gonna fail. My phone line working.
• 33:35
  Davina: Somebody told me a long time ago, and I try to remember this, is that this is a gift from the universe. This is a gift that I have this long moment right now because that gives me a chance to breathe. It gives me a chance to catch up with things. It gives me a chance to think, get clarity, have that quiet time to think about the future and the plans, and all of that. So those lulls are as much of a gift as those really busy overproductive periods.
• 34:01
  And I love your advice about just do it, and this is something that it's really hard for people to see until they're on the other side of it.
• 34:09
  Danya: Yeah. Absolutely.
• 34:10
  Davina: That if you just do it, rip the Band Aid off, sort of force yourself. It's kinda like staying up all night to prepare for a trial or prepare for a test or whatever those hard times that you had to just gut it out and do it. It's not forever. If you get your mentality around that and say, I know if I do this thing, it is going to really dramatically change my business and the trajectory of my business. So I think that just do it is we're gonna steal it from Nike.
• 34:36
  It's great advice.
• 34:37
  Danya: Yeah. You can't go around it. You can't go over it. You can't go under it. You really just have to go through it.
• 34:43
  Right? That's really it.
• 34:44
  Davina: Yeah. I love that. I love that. Any final thoughts before we wrap up today?
• 34:48
  Danya: No. I just want to thank you again for having me. I have listened to your podcast before. It's really cool. And I love that you just call it like the wealthy woman lawyer, that it's okay for women to say that they want to make money.
• 35:00
  It's okay to say I like wealth. It's not just about the money, but to just have an open conversation, just put money out there is not an evil or bad thing. I love the title of it.
• 35:09
  Davina: Yeah. It's such a fact of life. It is money is such an absolute fact. We deal with money every day in our lives. Yeah.
• 35:15
  And I think there's been a lot of we've been taught to not discuss it, to not talk about it, especially in the way I grew up. It was considered I use that word unseemly and Gammon is considered, you know, taboo to discuss money. And the generation who raised me were the silent generation. So there you go. It's between boomers or between the greatest generation and boomers.
• 35:34
  This is silent generation. And they don't talk about money and they don't talk about, you know, certain things. Right? And so I just really wanted to give women a place to do that and is about so much more than money. It's about what you articulated earlier, which is options.
• 35:49
  I mean, you have free time freedom. You have more options if you have more resources. It's just a fact of life. So I'm so glad that you came on today and discussed this because I know your story is gonna probably inspire a lot of other women law firm owners listening to this podcast. I appreciate you being here and sharing with me.
• 36:05
  Why don't you
• 36:05
  Danya: tell us how we can connect with you, find you on your socials and your website, all that stuff? So the best way to call it is (630) 517-5529. And then my email too is my first name, daniamotivallaw dot com. And all my socials are going to be Motivallaw or Motivabusinesslaw. So on Instagram, it's Motivabusinesslaw.
• 36:28
  And then you can just also find me on LinkedIn with my name. That's pretty easy to
• 36:31
  Davina: get ahold of. Great. Great. So we always leave those links in the show notes so people can just click on there if they want to reach out to you. And I so appreciate you being here and sharing your experience, Danya.
• 36:41
  Danya: It has been lovely. Thank you for having me.
• 36:48
  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 wealthywomanlawyer.com to learn more about how we help our clients create wealth generating law firms with ease.