Financially Legal is a twice-monthly podcast with accompanying articles on the financial aspects of the business of law. Host, Dan Lear, talks with law firm leaders, academics, business professionals and thought leaders to provide compelling and provocative insights at the intersection of finance, economics, and law.

Episode 45. What does it take to get a collections rate of 95% and how does that intersect with diversity, transparency, and compensation? An interview with Jim Meadows from Culhane Meadows

Posted by Dan Lear on September 7, 2022

How, if at all, do compensation, diversity, and transparency overlap? How can these competing priorities be reconciled? Jim Meadows from Culhane Meadows doesn’t have the perfect answer. But he’s giving it a solid try.

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Topics: Financially Legal Episodes, Business of Law


Episode 44. How do creativity and analytics blend to grow a contingency law firm? An interview with Lynn Bradley from The Potts Law Firm

Posted by Dan Lear on August 24, 2022

Plaintiffs' lawyers are often bold, brash, larger-than-life characters with billboards, regular TV ads, and ambition to match.

But they're also visionary creatives. They excel at building something from nothing and carving out a new and unique path for legal professionals - often where no path existed before. But that creativity needs to be leavened with stability and more strategic thinking. 

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Topics: Financially Legal Episodes, Business of Law


Episode 43. How does your firm limit write downs and write offs? An interview with Kevin Krese from Buckingham, Doolittle & Burroughs

Posted by Dan Lear on August 17, 2022

Two episodes into our four-episode series with law firm CFOs one theme that's emerged is collections. Specifically, how much money lawyers and law firms leave on the table by failing to implement processes that ensure that the firm gets paid for the work it bills out.

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Topics: Financially Legal Episodes, Business and Culture


Episode 42. What’s your firm’s “collections calendar?” An interview with Scott Shaffer from Winterfeldt IP Group

Posted by Dan Lear on August 10, 2022

One thing every law firm needs is money. And I don’t think that I’m going out on a limb suggesting that money and financial health are common elements across most successful firms. In this episode, the first of our series of interviews with law firm CFOs, we speak with Scott Shaffer of Winterfeld IP Group. We dig in with Scott on law firm collection rates, collection strategies, whether firms should refer clients to collections agencies, the firm’s tech stack and how it helps facilitate the firm getting paid, Scott's “most important financial metric,” and a bunch more.

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Topics: Financially Legal Episodes, Business and Culture


Episode 41. Can offshore virtual staffing help you grow and scale your law firm? An interview with Brett Trembly from Get Staffed Up and Trembly Law Firm

Posted by Dan Lear on March 30, 2022

What’s a lawyer doing running an offshore virtual staffing firm? Starting in 2011 Brett Trembly built a successful business law firm, Trembly Law Firm, in Miami, Florida. They now employ 30+ people and nearly a dozen lawyers. 

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Topics: Financially Legal Episodes, Business and Culture


Episode 40. What's a CRM? And what can a law firm do with it? Announcing the Gravity Legal/Lawmatics Integration with Matt Spiegel, CEO of Lawmatics

Posted by Dan Lear on March 1, 2022

On this special episode of Financially Legal, we’re announcing the launch of our integration with Lawmatics. Lawmatics is a Legal Intake Solution, Marketing Automation, and Law Firm CRM software all in one. Today they are announcing the launch of their time and billing module with Lawmatics payments powered by Gravity Legal.

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Topics: Financially Legal Episodes, Business and Culture


Episode 39. Why do lawyers struggle to get paid for the work that they do? Julie Steinbacher from Steinbacher, Goodall & Yurchak and The Million Dollar Solution

Posted by Dan Lear on February 16, 2022

Why do lawyers struggle to get paid for the work that they do? Whether it’s the low collection rates that we see in the Clio Trends Report to lawyers offering too steep a discount, to lawyers refusing to sue their clients, and on and on, “Show me the money” is definitely not the #1 mantra for many of our fellow lawyers.

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Topics: Financially Legal Episodes, Business and Culture


Episode 38. What are the roles of financial metrics and your physical workplace in the seven essential parts of a law firm? Interview #4 of 4 with RJon Robins

Posted by Dan Lear on December 8, 2021

In this, the fourth and final installment of our discussions with RJon Robins on the seven essential parts of a law firm, we move to the 5th and 6th essential parts of a law firm: physical plant and financial metrics and controls. The topic of physical plant naturally brings up the question of “whither physical law firms in the time of COVID?” We also discuss how intellectual property may be the most significant way that you can add value to your law firm. We wrap with a discussion of financial metrics and controls and the one metric that you as a law firm should be tracking. We also take a detour and talk briefly about Joe Walsh.

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Topics: Financially Legal Episodes, Business and Culture


Episode 37. What is the role of profit in your law firm? An interview with Brooke Lively from Cathedral Capital

Posted by Dan Lear on November 17, 2021

Have you ever considered the role of profit in a law firm? No, I mean, really thought about what it is, why it exists, whether it should be a part of your firm, and/or how to grow it. If so, then this episode is for you.

Brooke Lively is the founder and CEO of Cathedral Capital. Her mission is simple: make law firms more profitable. And she’s written a book for lawyers all about it: From Panic to Profit.

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Topics: Financially Legal Episodes, Business and Culture


Episode 36. What are the roles of people and production in the seven essential parts of a law firm? Interview #3 of 4 with RJon Robins

Posted by Dan Lear on November 10, 2021

In this, our third installment of our discussions with RJon Robins on the seven essential parts of a law firm, we explore the 3rd and 4th essential parts of a law firm: production and people. As a reminder, in episode #1 we discussed the seventh and final part of a successful law firm, the owner and in episode #2 we talked about sales and marketing.

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Topics: Financially Legal Episodes, Business and Culture


Episode 35. What is the role of marketing and sales in the seven essential parts of a law firm? Interview #2 of 4 with RJon Robins

Posted by Dan Lear on October 27, 2021

In this, the second installment of our discussions with RJon Robins on the seven essential parts of a law firm, we dig in on the first and second essential parts of a law firm: sales and marketing. As a reminder, in interview #1 we discussed the seventh and final part of a successful law firm, the owner.

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Topics: Financially Legal Episodes, Business and Culture


Episode 34. What is the role of the law firm owner as one of the seven essential parts of a law firm? Interview #1 of 4 with RJon Robins

Posted by Dan Lear on October 20, 2021

Is law a business or is it a profession? Are law firms like other businesses? Are they different? How different? 

RJon Robins is the CEO and Founder of How To Manage a Small Law Firm, the largest provider of fractional executive (CEO, CFO, COO) services for small law firms in the country. I’ve known about How To Manage a Small Law Firm for a number of years. I first attended and spoke at one of their quarterly meetings a few years back, when I was working for Avvo. I’ve since attended a couple of other meetings and spent more time with RJon. 

 

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Topics: Financially Legal Episodes, Business and Culture


Episode 33. How can you test and deploy new technology inexpensively and securely at your small law firm? An interview with Christian Lang from Reynen Court

Posted by Dan Lear on October 13, 2021

Small law firm owners may not be familiar with the terms "docker," "container," or "Kubernetes." They may even be a bit fuzzy on the definition of “the cloud.” But most firms know that, along with significant opportunities, new technologies often present security risks, interoperability challenges (will this system work with my other systems? And/or will my staff be open to using/willing to use this tech?) and, most relevant for the Financially Legal audience, significant costs in terms of time and money to vet, test, and deploy.

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Topics: Financially Legal Episodes, Business and Culture


Episode 32. How can you get started with financial management at your law firm? An interview with Chelsea Williams from Core Solutions Group, Inc

Posted by Dan Lear on September 22, 2021

We all know the cliches and the tropes: Lawyers are terrible business people, lawyers went to law school to avoid math, law firms aren’t businesses, etc . . . . 

Many of these statements are true in some pretty fundamental ways. But they’re also really damaging. Even if we take the most mission-driven do-goodery lawyer in private practice the simple facts remain that (a) they can’t help others if they, themselves, can’t survive financially, (b) they can’t help others very well if they’re constantly scrimping, saving, cutting corners, working late, and losing sleep due to financial issues, and (c) they’ll help more people with a larger law firm.

Superaccountant-to-law-firms extraordinaire, Chelsea Williams, has the remedy. Combining her dozen-plus years of accounting experience with the eye that she’s trained on legal in the form of her company, Core Solutions Group, Inc, which provides tax, accounting and cash management services exclusively for lawyers and law firms, Chelsea’s developed a course called “Law Firm Money Mastery” that’s designed to help all small firm lawyers - but particularly those just getting started up to those with $1M in annual revenue - to not only get their financial houses in order but to help them figure out how to make the money in their law firms work for them.

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Topics: Financially Legal Episodes, Business and Culture


Episode 31. BONUS EPISODE: Does sales make you uncomfortable? A 'friendscast' episode with Jaimee Hall

Posted by Dan Lear on June 9, 2021

One of my lawyer mentors once told me “if you don’t like to sell, don’t be a CEO.” Many solo lawyers set out to make a difference or have an impact - not to be a CEO. But whether you want to call them CEOs or managing partners, or partners, or business owners - the fact remains that they are heads of their respective businesses - effectively, they are “CEOs.” And if you want to be a CEO, you need to get comfortable with selling.

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Topics: Financially Legal Episodes, Business and Culture


Episode 30: What can a law professor and his student teach you about law practice? Tyson Mutrux and Jim Hacking - Lawyer Community Miniseries - Episode #4

Posted by Dan Lear on May 25, 2021

What started as conversations between two friends - actually a law professor and his student - evolved into a movement. Maximum Lawyer boasts a 5000 member Facebook group, over 200 hours of podcast content, two sold-out conferences, a paid community, and a course to help lawyers and firms grow. Oh, and did I mention that the prof and his former student both have successful law firms in their own right? Jim Hacking, the law professor, and Tyson Mutrux, the former student, are the leaders of Maximum Lawyer. Listen on to hear how they're helping lawyers to build strong, resilient practices.

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Topics: Financially Legal Episodes, Business and Culture, Lawyer Communities


Episode 29: Are lawyers entrepreneurs? An interview with Stephanie Everett from Lawyerist - Lawyer Community Miniseries - Episode #3

Posted by Dan Lear on May 19, 2021

The founder of the Lawyerist website, Sam Glover, once told me that he started Lawyerist because he was mad at a practice management company and wanted a place to complain. He gave birth to a technology blog that’s morphed into a large and well-known online legal destination. But Lawyerist is way more than a website. Through freely available web content, its free-to-join Insider program, and the paid Lawyerist community, Lawyerist Lab, Lawyerist provides ongoing strategic and tactical advice to budding lawyer-entrepreneurs.

In this installment in our Lawyer Communities series (see a summary of the series and our broad takeaways here) we dig in to understand how all the pieces of the Lawyerist puzzle fit together and whether it’s a community you might want to be a part of.

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Topics: Financially Legal Episodes, Business and Culture, Lawyer Communities


Episode 28: Has this community of lawyers solved what's wrong with social media? An interview with Keith Lee and Jeremy Richter from LawyerSmack - Lawyer Community Miniseries - Episode #2

Posted by Dan Lear on May 12, 2021

If you’ve been even mildly paying attention over the last, well, year but even the last few years, you’ve watched as social media has become a challenging environment to navigate. And this comes from someone who is very bullish on technology in general and even social media in specific.

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Topics: Financially Legal Episodes, Business and Culture, Lawyer Communities


Episode 27: Is the key to unlocking law firm economic success between your ears? An interview with Allison Williams from Law Firm Mentor - Lawyer Community Miniseries - Episode #1

Posted by Dan Lear on May 5, 2021

Here on Financially Legal we often focus on the nuts and bolts of finance and economics but, often, the biggest obstacles to economic and business success are not financial or even business-related but mental.

In this episode, we dive in on mindset - and we’re doing it with someone who thinks about this deeply - Allison Williams is a Business Coach for Solo Law Firm Owners at Law Firm Mentor. She’s also the CEO and Founder of a multimillion-dollar law firm, the Williams Law Group.

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Topics: Financially Legal Episodes, Business and Culture, Lawyer Communities


Episode 26: Should you shift credit card fees to your clients?

Posted by Dan Lear on April 23, 2021

What if I told you there was a tool that could automatically increase your firm revenue by 1%? What about 2%? What about 3%? What about even half a percent? (if you’re not great at doing math on the fly, for a firm that grosses $1,000,000/year, one half a percent is $5000).

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Topics: Financially Legal Episodes, Business and Culture


Episode 25: Is delegation just a fancy word for "giving permission?" An interview with Lindsey Corbin from delegate.legal

Posted by Dan Lear on March 31, 2021

There’s probably no principle more important to growing and scaling a law firm than delegation. Whether it’s identifying the tasks that need to be done, teaching and coaching others to do them, or simply letting go, you’ll be hard-pressed to grow your legal business if you can’t delegate. If you’ve ever wondered how delegation might work in your firm and how to get started, this episode is for you.

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Topics: Financially Legal Episodes, Business and Culture


Episode 24: What is Zapier and what can you do with it? Host Dan Lear discusses how Zapier can extend the power of the web

Posted by Dan Lear on March 19, 2021

If you’ve ever wondered how to tie together different systems in your law practice, you need to know about Zapier.

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Topics: Financially Legal Episodes, Business and Culture


Episode 23: Can you build a law practice representing criminal defendants and abuse survivors? An interview with Judie Saunders

Posted by Dan Lear on March 3, 2021
 

Judie Saunders doesn't take the easy way.  

 

Whether you're talking about her efforts to go to law school as the child of immigrants, her chosen practice area that combines criminal defense and representation of abuse survivors, or the lengths to which she's gone to build a consumer friendly law firm using technology, Judie's all in.

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Topics: Financially Legal Episodes, Business and Culture


Episode 22: Should you build your own law practice management system? Host Dan Lear explores the frontier of law firms building custom tech

Posted by Dan Lear on February 17, 2021
 

It seems like every time you turn around some company is offering a new practice management solution. We tried to count them recently and got tired after about a dozen.

 

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Topics: Financially Legal Episodes, Business and Culture


Episode 21: SPECIAL EPISODE: What's the legal liability in this GameStop situation? And who, if anyone, is to blame? An interview with Jake Walker from Block and Leviton

Posted by Dan Lear on February 1, 2021
 

This episode of Financially Legal is a departure from our usual. Normally we talk about law, economics, and even finance as applied to the practice of law. Today, we’re talking about one specific legal issue that has some financial underpinnings. Specifically, the GameStop short squeeze.

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Topics: Financially Legal Episodes, Business and Culture


Episode 20: How do you build a “cloud-based” law firm? An interview with Tim Parlatore and Elana Bertram of Parlatore Law Group

Posted by Dan Lear on January 28, 2021
 
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Topics: Firm Financials, Financially Legal Episodes


Episode 19: Should you have a law firm CFO? An interview with Kenna Valentine from the e2e

Posted by Dan Lear on December 9, 2020

“I was told there’d be no math.” It’s a common joking refrain for law students and even practicing lawyers. “I went to law school to help people,” so many lawyers tell me. But a firm needs to pay for you  - and itself - in order to keep helping people. Let’s face it: law firms are businesses. And the better a firm runs, the more people it can help. So understanding the finance and economics of a legal services business is crucial. That’s where Kenna comes in. 

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Topics: Firm Financials, Financially Legal Episodes


Episode 18: How do you get started with a subscription legal services offering? An interview with Allen Rodriguez of One400

Posted by Dan Lear on October 28, 2020

Allen Rodriguez is a legal product development strategist who has been serving the legal industry for over 18 years. He’s currently the Founder and CEO of the law innovation agency One400. Before that he was the Director of Attorney Services at LegalZoom, where he helped LegalZoom figure out their, now very successful, subscription and lawyer-assisted offerings. He got his start in the legal sector running operations at the Los Angeles County Bar Association’s Lawyer Referral Service.  

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Topics: Financially Legal Episodes, Subscriptions


Episode 17: How do clients decide to hire a law firm? And how can decision science help you in your practice? An interview with Nika Kabiri of Kabiri Consulting.

Posted by Dan Lear on October 15, 2020

Nika Kabiri is a JD, a PhD, a decision science consultant, teacher, and writer. If that’s not enough for you, just know she’s a rock star. Previously Nika was the Director of Strategic Insights at the online legal marketplace Avvo. Whether through market research, tireless and effective advocacy, or her amazing public speaking skills in that role Nika helped Avvo and the legal industry better understand the legal consumer.

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Topics: Financially Legal Episodes


Episode 16: Could you be an outsourced general counsel? An interview with Beth Lebowitz from Auxana and Nimbus Legal

Posted by Dan Lear on September 29, 2020

Subscription-based outsourced fractional general counsel sounds like a mouthful, but it’s not really that complicated. A fixed monthly fee for part of a lawyer’s time offering business advice to a company. The examples of a variety of different types of subscription offerings in our recent five-part series on subscription legal services is all the evidence you need. Beth Lebowitz believes that this outsourced general counsel model is as good for lawyers as it is for clients. In fact, she’s so committed to it that she’s founded both a law firm, Nimbus Legal, and a marketplace/community, Auxana, around the model.

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Topics: Financially Legal Episodes, Payment Methods ,Subscriptions


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