Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: In order for you to help more people, you have to make more money. That's beyond. We're seeing it right now. The people that make a lot of money have sway politically. They can literally do whatever they want these days.
[00:00:09] Speaker B: What's up, everyone? We're live here at the Managing Partner podcast studio.
But today I got an awesome friend, a good contact I made this past year. Bob Simon is on the show.
Before I have him introduce himself for those that are under a rock and don't know who he is, I just want to give a shout out to my friends over at Anrion Legal. They do our phone systems here. They help a lot of our law firm clients. Awesome company. Check them out. Bob, what's up, man?
[00:00:41] Speaker A: Everything and nothing at the same time.
[00:00:45] Speaker B: You know, I live, I follow you.
[00:00:47] Speaker A: Yeah, I live in incremental time.
[00:00:49] Speaker B: You know, time, space, continuum, that's for me. I just saw Bob down in Miami for ntl and of course I follow him on all the social media platforms, stuff that he's helping his community there in California. He's all over the place. But outside of that, him just being a great person and helping his community and things like that.
He does a lot of things. And so I really want to focus this episode today on, you know, being a lawyer running a firm having success with that in itself is, is a challenge.
But then Bob's been very successful at a lot of other connected businesses and so I wanted to kind of talk about that and how maybe you all can learn from what he's done and, and, and, and do that yourself and how it all fits together. So Bob, tell us, tell us your, your quick story if you can.
[00:01:44] Speaker A: Yeah, so if possible, I'm a trial lawyer. I own an, operate a firm called the Simon Law Group, otherwise known as the Justice Team. We rebranded for that for many reasons. I have a twin brother, Brad, who's also a lawyer and he manages everything that we do. So we do everything 5050 from the law firm to the Justice Team Network, which is host of shows like Bourbon of Proof, which I do. Justice Team Network, Ladies in Law, some other ones also have justice hq, which is a high level community on a digital platform. And I can explain to you what that is. And also Attorney Share, which is a, it's like a lead generation case management, not case management, lead generation case tracking type thing. Well, not, I mean it's managing your leads and then a marketplace to be able to do that. You know, the big vision was always how do we get the cases to the best lawyer for that case. Sometimes it's you, sometimes it's not. My firm is almost all referral based, so the lawyers send us their cases to litigate or try. And so I want to create a space where it doesn't matter where you fit in the legal world. If you like to generate cases, if you like to just litigate cases, if you like to just try cases, if you like to just do, you know, community networking, community driven activism, there's a place for you in all the world too. So I'm very, very passionate about having people do what they love. That's why I started doing a bourbon talk show. You know, love drinking bourbon and BSing with my friends.
But as we are intentional, we were talking off air about you can't have this shotgun approach to the things that you're doing. You have to have infrastructure, you have to have structure, you have to have a dedicated time to do everything and you have to be able to allocate time. For me, the most important thing is with, you know, my family and being intentional about when you could do family trips, when you're home, weekends for the kids, all those things. And you can do these things and it's much easier to do it when you work for yourself, but you got to take your chance on something like that.
[00:03:42] Speaker B: Yeah, no, I love all that. And yeah, what we were talking about before we started recording is, you know, you just like me. I have multiple companies. I have someone that is in charge, that runs that, you know, is, is taking lead on that on each thing that I got going on. Instead of trying to do all these things yourself, like Bob's running around like crazy already. But put someone in charge, delegate. Give someone that that responsibility.
Today's episode is brought to you by Answering Legal. Now to switch my company Array Digital over to Answering Legal. And it's made my life a whole lot easier. If I can't get to the phone, their 247 virtual receptionists take the call and take them through a full intake process so we never miss new business again.
Now Answering Legal has been at this for more than a decade and they specialize in answering phone calls for law firms like yours.
They even have a brand new easy to use Apple and they integrate with all the top legal softwares and platforms.
So from our listeners today, we actually have a special deal of a 400 minute free trial offer of Answering Legal services that you can try out by going to answeringlegal.com array. You can also call 631-437-4803 and use special code Daisy that's my last name. D A I S E Y so go check them out and let's get back to the show.
[00:05:34] Speaker A: Delegate. Trust but verify, right? It's the old Reagan phrase, trust but verify. But I do agree on that. I think tech platforms allow us to be able to track things better. We use task management tools in certain the companies so I can have eyes in to see. We have one called Asana. I can see what tasks people are working on. We have in all my companies I have at least one 30 minute meeting a week just for high level stuff. What's going. Because you know, these are your companies, it's your vision, it's your capital. Usually you're the one that's also investing and taking the risk. You just want to make sure that the people you select are executing the vision that things are happening, that the wheel is moving. Whether it's a law firm, I try to tell our lawyers is try to move the wheel on, on, on every case that you're working on. Every other week do something right. Same thing with the companies. We have to make sure the thing is moving forward. So at the top, I like to think of myself as like parent company of everything. I have with me my own virtual assistant executive assistant that she keeps me on track, lets me know what's coming up on calendar, that day, next week, next month, six months from now, eight months from now. It keeps me on tasks with goals and I do a once a week meeting with her to make sure that we're on task and that we're not missing anything. Yeah. And the rest is, you know, you can have a lot of systems. I think if people have a really good CRM, could be anything. If you know where all your data is going and you have your contact list, there's many things you could do from there. And that's one thing I wish I knew. When I started my firm, you know, for 15 years ago now, tracking all that stuff used to be just spreadsheets and word docs.
[00:07:04] Speaker B: Right.
[00:07:05] Speaker A: So now it's a lot easier. A lot easier.
[00:07:07] Speaker B: Yeah. We use Asana Slack, all the tools out there for sure. And leveraging those tools, you know, a lot of them have a lot of, you know, a lot more than when you start. It's, you know, you might just be, you know, scratching the surface. But yeah.
[00:07:23] Speaker A: And a lot of those tools, by the way, you can get trained virtual assistants or EAs that know those systems. Right. That are certified in a lot of those things and they were certified in like my case management system Too Right. So it was very easy just to literally come in and know and understand the systems because you have to realize if you're a business owner, you're not going to be in like the details every single day. It's impossible. You absolutely cannot. Now you have to have a high level overview of it. And you know, I'm big now in recording all the meetings that we do, running it through some systems. So I get a high level summary barrel. All the meetings people had even though I wasn't there.
[00:08:02] Speaker B: Note takers and stuff like that, that'll give you like a summary and action items. And you said you would do this. And here's a checklist. You know, it's impressive to see what's out there now to leverage.
[00:08:13] Speaker A: Yeah. But it's, I mean, I mean I do do a lot of stuff. Like I think, you know, I generate a lot of my businesses from social media. People would blow people's mind. I mean and I come from a place of just education, a little bit of fun, a little bit of just like we're going to disrupt things. And then the ones that work very well, like the reels that pop, I'll usually target change them into targeted ads that will then target those buckets that I'm always in front of. And you know, we talk about attorney share business to business lawyers, just HQ lawyers, my law firm lawyers referring U.S. cases. Right. People watching Bourbon approved. Just team network lawyers. So I can turn any one of those things into digital ads and target and retarget those lawyer audiences. So that's why people feel like they see me all the time while it's intentional and, and it's actually not that expensive because if you're doing targeted ad spend on social media, it's not that expensive at all. And the ROI to me is huge. So yeah that's. And I, I'm enjoying more the activism stuff lately. People always ask me, when are you running for office? And I was like, you gotta give me a few more years, man. But I really enjoy like we were sifting through people's properties in Altadena yesterday with a crew. We had like 30, 40 volunteers. And it was just, it's just special, man. Like when you just give somebody a hug that lost everything, that's sometimes all that they need. Finding like that old watch while it's burned, it has a story to it. Right.
And just you know, creating general awareness. So I think that's where the elevation I'd like to go there eventually is to do that most of the time because I really, really enjoy it and it's rewarding.
But to do that you have to have the infrastructure, right? You have to have your generals in place, your leadership and then the accountability and then track it 100%.
[00:09:49] Speaker B: I mean, I think that's the ultimate, you know, ultimate goal. Why we do this and, and why we go off and you know, just to give back, to be able to do those things. You want to be with your family, to do things in your community. I mean that's, that's ultimately what we're trying to get. Or if you don't think you're trying to get there, when you get older, you're going to realize that's, that's where you'd rather be putting your time, energy.
I think when we're younger, I mean.
[00:10:14] Speaker A: Like, yeah, your legacy is important for your kids and family. So I say like, are people, are your kids or other people remember that 5 million dollar case that you did one time? Probably not, but they're going to remember stuff like helping people in the community. Your kids are going to know did they show up for your, your school play? Right? That's the stuff they're going to remember. So I think people need to be intentional with what, what core memories or what things people will remember you for or what your kids will remember of you and, and don't worry about those other things outside of your control. Like I always say I, that we watch a lot of, I mean, I have three daughters, I mean watch a lot of Disney cartoons. So like there's all these songs in my heads at all time. But I always, always think about the Let It Go song from, from Frozen. Right. You know, first of all, I have to like tune out. I see some very bad stuff in our industry and I just have to say, you know, let it go. Conceal, don't feel right. Just do not put that emotion into it and then let it go with like, let go of having things. You have to control up every single thing. Cause you won't like, don't stress about shit that is not under your purview. There's always going to be a solution.
Unless it's an absolute emergency and things are literally, you know, going up in smoke. Like there's a solution, there's time. Take a step back, let it go. Don't obsess over this problem. Right?
[00:11:30] Speaker B: And guarantee there'll be another problem around the corner.
[00:11:34] Speaker A: Dude, that's what I say. I could find a way to work every single hour of every day. Like I could find some problem to solve and do it.
[00:11:40] Speaker B: But yeah, yeah, you gotta focus. You gotta, you know, whatever. You can't impact everything. So, yeah, that's a good way to think and live. And you'd be a lot less stressful if you can get that mindset for sure.
So. Yeah, that's awesome.
Well, I was also. I, I, you know, saw Bob down at Lo Gr. First time I met him in person. And great event, by the way. If. If you haven't gone, you better get your ticket. Yeah, well, I got a little sticker Bob right here.
[00:12:10] Speaker A: Dude. It's fine. My wife has one. She has her computer over here. I didn't even know they were doing that. It's pretty funny. No, but it's like we're trying to like Lottie girls, another big thing that we do. And it's a lot of work, man. I mean, we'd like a thousand attendees, but you gotta juggle speakers, a lot of egos, obviously. You gotta take care of a lot of folks. And it's hard. And I just want to put on a good product. And this year I wanted people to like. I want to create this thing where people can kind of bring their.
Their group there. So it's like, if you have a big mastermind, why not just do your thing there and we take care of the stuff around it?
And then I'm just working on like, I look tonight I'm going to political sporting event. And I could tell you the. You'll probably see because I'll take a picture with one of the artists that I'm trying to get. He'll be with me that I'm trying to get for La Gro. So we'll see if I can like, will this into existence.
[00:12:59] Speaker B: I'll be checking my Instagram later to see what.
[00:13:02] Speaker A: What's up.
[00:13:03] Speaker B: No, you. You guys just. You did such a good job with that event. And again, for attorneys listening, obviously, awesome event to go to, to connect, to learn, also to have fun and. And not be so uptight. And it's just a really big platform.
[00:13:20] Speaker A: Why we started to do Lottie Gras is I was always so frustrated, even though on leadership at every single bar. Like I'm the chair of ethics for the, like the local LA one like all. And we were never. These large bar orgs were never giving the opportunity to speak and let people do their thing. It was always just the same people talking about the same stuff. So we said, what if we can create a world where it's like a choose your own adventure. You get in there, you can present you can do your thing. We'll make it fun, we'll make it different and make it more about networking. So, like, the reason why I try to pick a location where everybody's in the same location all the time and you can't go off site is we want people to be in the room with each other constantly. I've had so many people tell me about the business deal that they met somebody, met their spouse there at Lottie gr. Right. Like, this is the stuff that I like to hear and see. And this is. We just wanted to be totally disruptive. I mean, like with the Justice HQ platform, it's like a bigger scale of it is where any lawyer can go in there, create their own event, create their own small group discussion they can work with. Vendors can do it too. Vendors can go in and create all of these things too and have it all under one place. There's a place where they can just reserve office space. Like a. It's like Airbnb feel where people, other lawyers can list their office space. They could just go show up. People could charge. I never charged for people to work for my office spaces because I like to be in the mix with other folks. But like, I wanted to create this world where there was no barrier for any good legal professional, vendor, staff, lawyer to do whatever they want.
We have slack communities in there with as well. But I mean, there's nothing stopping somebody. Be like, you know what? I want to do a small group discussion on effective digital marketing. And I'm going to run a monthly session. Go ahead and set it up right? See who shows up. See if a vendor wants to sponsor it. Maybe here and there. Now you have all of this that people are paying thousands of dollars a month for masterminds or access. Now you have it nationally for like, I think those are like 400 bucks a month.
[00:15:11] Speaker B: Yeah, I was just checking that out actually.
[00:15:13] Speaker A: But it makes looks like whenever these vendors, I'm like, they're like, wait, I get all this. Like, yeah, dude, like, we want every. Because since it's built on a digital, like it's a tech platform, it's so much easier to scale if the people that are driving it, these are like the really good folks that are just empowering themselves to set their own thing up. You want to do a happy hour? Do it, promote it. We'll promote it for you. Push it out to all the members and try to get excitement for it. Maybe vendors will want to sponsor it, but this is how you really like disrupt everything. If you give the tools to People that were always told no to.
Right. Here you go. Right. Let's see what happens.
[00:15:47] Speaker B: So no. Freaking awesome. I mean, and yeah. Bad at law degree, like, you know, was it kind of got a ticket last minute, came there as a. Just an attendee and didn't know much about it. Didn't know you yet, really. But on the app, it's like, I'm going to make a managing partners podcast. How many guests do I have here that were on my show? And then, like, set up a happy hour on site.
It was awesome. Everybody showed up and we got to hang out and connect, and it was. It was such a cool experience. And then everyone's like, hey, did you go around San Diego and, like, check out? No, I never left the property. Airport to the property, back to the airport. And I had a blast. You know, I was there for four or five days. So it was. It was. It was freaking awesome.
[00:16:33] Speaker A: I think I was. I signed your.
Your High west bottle that we had.
[00:16:38] Speaker B: There for a lot of bourbon. You signed two. Because I came back the next night and got another one.
[00:16:43] Speaker A: That's. Really.
[00:16:44] Speaker B: Neither one of them came home with me because.
[00:16:46] Speaker A: No. I tried to get the smaller ones so people could, like, just bring them, but I ended up drinking the whole thing because it was. They're only like, half the regular bottle size, so it's. You could take down the whole thing, no problem.
[00:16:55] Speaker B: Well, they fit in your back pocket really nicely.
[00:16:57] Speaker A: Yes, they did.
[00:16:58] Speaker B: Of course, I was sharing them. I'd go find, like, some attorney friends or whatever and just be like, here you go. So, yeah, they didn't last very long, but really cool. I like that a lot. So. Yeah, so. So you're doing all these things, you're making impacts in all kinds of places, and they're all connected. They're. I think that's the biggest thing. Like, you're not off. It's easy as an entrepreneur to get distracted, to want to try other things outside of what. What, you know, what your real focus is. I think that can, in some cases be okay, like real estate or some things like that that I do. But it can also be a big distraction, and it can derail kind of the progress that you've made with your main business.
So.
[00:17:42] Speaker A: Yeah. And I mean, like, we own real estate, too. Some of our office buildings we own. Right. My brother and I, you know, real property. But I think it's important for people that if you start to have success, that you start to understand or hire what we call home offices, people that can talk to you. About tax strategy, stuff you could do with, you know, terrible trust, things you could do with property. That will be very helpful for people, but also be helpful for you to protect and grow. Right. Because you, in order for you to help more people, you have to make more money. That's beyond. We're seeing it right now. The people that make a lot of money have sway politically. They can literally do whatever they want these days. So you have. That is a tool to be able to have access to help more people on scale. You should be looking into those types of things.
Get into mentorship groups. I tell people I don't care if it's a text chain to start, but get in the room with people that you want to be like them or there and then, and then let that grow.
[00:18:35] Speaker B: So yeah, 100%, man. Yeah, I've always told you like that I've talked to some like young lawyers or like, not young lawyers, but solo lawyers.
And yeah, I don't really want to grow or you know, just I'm all about helping people. And, and I had like. It was like a civil rights lawyer out of Florida one time. It was like she was nicest she could be. She's like, I just want to help people. I don't want to grow, I don't want to do marketing, I don't want to do all this stuff. And, and I forgot why we were talking to her, but.
And I said, you know, that's great. You want to help people. You're like, you're awesome. What you do, you've helped a lot of people. But what if you could impact more people? Like, you need to get in front of more people. Like more people need your help. Um, and I could tell that, you know, there's a click moment in her mind where she was like, oh, I didn't think about it.
[00:19:26] Speaker A: And here's where. Take a step further is you could help all those people that are looking for access to justice, but you can also help all those other lawyers that don't know how to source those cases. And now you're there working under your firm or independently. We do a lot of fee sharing and co counseling kind of mantra of attorney share. So now you're helping a lot of people on scale and you're helping those other lawyers get access to the cases they never otherwise would be able to. And you're doing it in a partnership fashion. Right. And that's how I think you really disrupt and change things because you have, you have people doing what they love to do and easily getting in front of those consumers, those clients that they want to serve. And I think that's the evolution. We're going to see this on a massive scale. 20, 25 and 26. With, you know, you're seeing it with, with, you know, you're, you're in the agency marketing world, right. You're, you see this, right? You see it, you see all the, it's going to get even more granular and it's.
Yeah, it's going to be very interesting because you know, we're going to see intake change.
[00:20:21] Speaker B: We just will. I just got off a call with a girl at this intake and intake consulting for law firms and just showing me some crazy stuff with AI and, and I tell lawyers all the time, listen, people aren't comparing your law firm to the last law firm they hired for their accident. It's probably their first experience. Hopefully they're compared to Uber Domino's instant gratification information.
They want to be handheld to the process.
And so yeah, things are changing so rapidly with how you handle your clients intake experience.
There's a lot more you need to be looking at these days and things are moving fast, so very fast.
[00:21:03] Speaker A: So yeah, I think the world of these large call center.
[00:21:10] Speaker B: Yeah, so there's a lot of, a lot of change coming to us for sure. We see across the board with what we do too.
And more leads is not always the problem with a law firm. It's usually not the problem. It's how they handle those leads and talk to those people and the, the, the language they use and you know, it's the worst day of that person's life potentially when they're calling and how are you going to handle that?
And then make them an advocate on the other side. Referrals, reviews.
[00:21:39] Speaker A: And that's the thing is, you know, we have so many people out reaching out to us that are affected by the fires here locally.
And I tell, you know, I talked to a lot of people myself, but when they talk to like, you know, people pick up the phone at our offices that you have to leave with empathy. Like people lost everything, ask how are you doing? How can we help? And that's it, right? You can. Yeah, we could probably figure out their, you know, help them read their insurance policies for free and do all that analysis, but just check on them and see how they're doing because like we have housing resources, you know, access to goods or whatever that they need, that that's maybe what they're looking for.
But they're. Yeah, exactly. This is what you need to Train your people on. I think that's going to be the extension of your firm, obviously. But this is where you need to spend a lot of your training.
[00:22:22] Speaker B: 100. 100. Could agree more.
[00:22:24] Speaker A: First point of contact.
[00:22:26] Speaker B: Well, Bob, I wanted to kind of end with the, you know, the Bourbon Proof podcast and couple questions. One, what is, you know, I guess what are some of the things like you coming up with the podcast? You guys talk about some. Some awesome topics and things like that. But I saw you just had Jefferson Fisher on. But what can people expect if they want to tune into Bourbon approved this year and also want to know what your favorite bourbon is?
[00:22:57] Speaker A: Oh, wow. Well, I mean, look, man, it was always just, let's have a few drinks with friends and explore, like who they are, learn their story. You know, we had some fantastic guests on. We're actually trying to get people want us to travel and do it on location now for a lot of folks. So I think we're going to go to D.C. here in a couple of months. There's a lot of folks up on the hill that I know that I think would be very, very fantastic guests. I mean people actually writing the law would be great for Bourbon approved. You know, give them a few drinks and ask some hard questions. Like I asked the lawyer that represented O.J. after a couple shots. We were doing tequila that episode because he likes tequila. After a couple, I just had him drink the last one. I say, so did O.J. do it? And man, it was the best episode we ever did. I mean he went into detail on everything and it was great favorite bourbon. So I'm a huge whistlepig Boss hog. This one, their annual Release. That's my A1. I will drink that all day, every day. Um, yesterday I was drinking Weller Foolproof. I'm a big Weller guy, but Foolproof is my favorite of that line. So that's what I was having yesterday. I like high proof bourbons that don't sting too much.
Friend of mine sent me an E.H. taylor, the green label one. It's like 66, which I do love. And it does not sting because you could have like one of those and just feel good. Yeah, but some of them, you drink it, you can feel it. I mean, it's like terrible. It's like you can't even finish it. No, I'm more of a rye guy. And then higher proof bourbons, usually that are each in some sort of sweeter cast, but if you go to Angels Envy Rye, they do it and tastes like frigging maple syrup. That's 50% alcohol. Everybody says that they don't like whiskey.
Stock always is. Yeah, it was funny. Like, yesterday at the volunteer event, a lawyer showed up and he handed me a bottle of bourbon. It was a boo rye from High West. And he was like, I've been waiting to give this to you. I was like, dude, this is awesome. Thank you. You know?
Yeah, just. I mean, it's. It's a connective tissue for me, right? I mean, this is. I'm a storyteller at core, and I like telling stories about bourbon. But it reminds me a trigger pattern.
[00:25:00] Speaker B: Of that person that I shared it.
[00:25:02] Speaker A: With who gave me the bottle.
[00:25:03] Speaker B: I do a bourbon exchange every year. And yeah, I'm right there with you. But remember that there was that law firm there in California. They had a table at. At Lo gr.
And they. I won their bottle of bourbon and it was like a really sweet one. It was made with like. I'll let you try it. Remember that? It was. It was not my style. It was like super chai. Yeah.
[00:25:29] Speaker A: Oh, no, it was the chai.
Yeah. Interesting. So you know what I did with that one is I ended up getting a bottle that was Singleton Triber. Did that one for San Diego. Who. I love those guys. He ended up sending me a bottle of that and I had a. This. I got it right around Christmas. So I did a.
It was a chai. It was like a chai whiskey, and I mixed that with like this gingerbread, like liqueur.
[00:25:56] Speaker B: I couldn't sit there and get.
It was good, but I tried it out. It was good. But yeah, it's like a Christmas cookie or something there that you made. So I'll try anything, you know, once.
[00:26:10] Speaker A: It's way tried twice. It's the. You know, I'm at the point now if I don't even, like, I take a sip of whiskey and I don't like it. I just pour it out. Like, I'm not even gonna, like, waste time, calories.
[00:26:20] Speaker B: I like that you're in that spot. So, Bob, I appreciate you coming to share. You know, you're. You're up to so many things. So anyone listening, just go connect with Bob. Follow him on Instagram or LinkedIn.
He's also super approachable. He's been super nice to me and obviously taking time out of his day to join me on the show. So I appreciate it. But, yeah, connect with Bob. Follow him. Check out Lordy gr. And I'm sure if you got any questions, he's happy to connect.
[00:26:51] Speaker A: Yeah, just go to. @planetfunbob. Planetfunbob on Instagram and I will likely hit you back pretty quickly. But no, I truly believe that. Why would you not help everybody unselfishly, right? I mean the more folks you help, the more that they may help you eventually but the more they're helping other people, which is important and then they remember that. And you know, I, I never like those lawyers or those humans that just try to hoard all the knowledge and the information because they think it's some sort of secret sauce they can never give away. Man, screw that.
[00:27:20] Speaker B: Yeah, dude, I appreciate it.
[00:27:23] Speaker A: So yeah, man, thanks for having me on.
[00:27:24] Speaker B: Appreciate caps event, I'm sure. Everyone go check Bob out. Go follow him. Have a great day.
Enjoy running your law firm. Help people out, don't worry about the problems. And a lot of great tips here from Bob today. So we'll see you soon. On the next episode.
