Mastering Law Firm Operations: How Strategic Retreats, Daily Huddles, and Colby Assessments Can Improve Team Dynamics and Efficiency

Law Firm Growth Podcast Episode 89: How To Build Self-sustaining Quality Control Among Your Team with Molly McGrath

Narrator: [00:00:00] Welcome to The Law Firm Growth podcast, where we share the latest tips, tactics, and strategies for scaling your practice from the top experts in the world of growing law firms. Are you ready to take your practice to the next level? Let's get started.

Jan Roos: Hey everybody. Welcome back to The Law Firm Growth podcast. I'm your host as always Jan Roos, and I am tremendously excited for my interview today. This is a returning guest in Molly McGrath. So Molly is the founder of Hiring Empowering Solutions. We've been friends for some time, when did we have our first podcast, Molly?

Jan Roos: Two years ago? Oh my gosh. Yes. Yeah. Big couple of years. Yeah.

Molly McGrath: Yeah. That's what I was going to

Jan Roos: say. Yeah. But. I've been following Molly for a super long time. Hers is one of my genuine favorite podcasts. I look forward to every single week because in the kind of time, since we've met, I've gone through a lot of stuff with growing my team.

Jan Roos: I find a lot of wisdom in what she talks [00:01:00] about. I'm super excited to, to get her cornered for the next hour to ask her some of these questions. But thanks again for coming on the call.

Molly McGrath: Absolutely. Thank you for having me. I'm always delighted and I love everything you're doing. So keep up the amazing work.

Jan Roos: Okay. Awesome. All right. So to get started, let's do a little bit of a Quentin Tarantino, jump to the action type of thing. We're talking a little bit on the pre call about your upcoming book. And I thought the title was very interesting. Fix my employees. So can you go in a little bit about the kind of conversations you've been having with clients recently and like, why that seems like something that's been resonating with the folks you're working with?

Molly McGrath: Yeah, gosh, even today, I've gotten no less than three emails that had the essence of that title. And that's the number one thing that I hear from attorneys across the country. It's not necessarily that they have bad people or what have you, but they just don't know how to manage them and lead their team.

Molly McGrath: So the lack of communication, the lack of framework and [00:02:00] systems in regards to make certain that Employees are over communicating with the clients over communicating with the attorneys and regards to where they're at with their work, what they're doing, I hear all the time from the attorneys, I have no idea what he or she does all day.

Molly McGrath: And it's not that they don't trust their employees. Just, I think that there's a big. Big massive gap in the legal space of having a system in a process and having a framework and standards for communicate over communicating with your attorney, not from a place of micromanagement but so they can have faith and confidence and To continue to delegate more to you, to give you more opportunities as an employee.

Molly McGrath: And a lot of times, greatest definition I ever heard of anxiety is the root of all anxiety is lack of information and things are happening in our businesses. But a lot of times employees are not trained on how to communicate in a way [00:03:00] that a business owner, that attorney, that your boss, whatever term resonates with you, that they have full faith and confidence of what's happening.

Molly McGrath: So they don't wake up at two o'clock in the morning and a pool of sweat.

Jan Roos: Yeah. And it's super interesting too. And I have to say one of the episodes of your podcast, that I've probably listened to about three times and sent to about everyone on my team is the stop saying that I didn't have time for it episode, which I love because you illustrate a concept because on the flip side of that, it's it's really tough for the business owner, because, you can imagine how that's received sometimes.

Jan Roos: What are you doing all day? If people ever ask that there's a space of lack of appreciation, which I think is why people don't do it. But I think, now more than ever with the climate that we have in legal for the availability of good people, we're scared about having these conversations because what if the answer is screw you, I'm out of here.

Molly McGrath: And you know what, it's all in how you frame it and it's all in your delivery. So in regards to, if you are sitting there thinking what the heck does [00:04:00] he or she do every day, especially every two weeks when you get your time sheets and sometimes people are like, what? I didn't see her do anything, but sit on her cell phone or, hang around the water cooler, what have you, what the heck is this invoice?

Molly McGrath: Whether they're in sourced or W 2 or 1099, and nobody likes feeling that way. And to your point, it's all in how you have the conversation. So I would just say, for an employer that maybe is feeling like that just take this time to do a stop, drop, and roll. It really takes time. Stock and get a standard within your practice, within your business for how to figure out what people are doing it.

Molly McGrath: But you can do it in such an empowering way that your employees will actually be grateful for the conversation. And I can go more into real quick of give people like five things of what they can do today to have that.

Jan Roos: I would love to hear that.

Molly McGrath: Yeah, absolutely. Cause I'm all about, I don't like [00:05:00] conversations.

Molly McGrath: I want just systems and how dues and bullet points. I'm a very literal systematic person. And so I appreciate that. So I would say, number one, regardless if you have one person or everybody or what have you on your team that you just stop and really say, okay, great. An easy way to start with this is to do a strategic retreat.

Molly McGrath: The timing's perfect. It's a beginning of a new year Q1, what have you, and really do a stop, drop and roll, so to speak, and doing all hands on deck retreat, it's a way to bring in community, collaboration, empowerment. excitement, getting people reconnected or maybe connected for the first time to your mission, your vision, your core values, things of that nature.

Molly McGrath: And then from there also, and if you already have that on deck, it's a great way to start with doing like it's. Some people have called them a SWOT analysis. And back in the past, figuring out the [00:06:00] gap from the gain, or just really figuring out, I like a very simplistic of figuring out what's working and what's not working and who's doing what to reach goal.

Molly McGrath: So that's one way to do it. A quarterly retreat. I'd highly recommend for any of your listeners. I'd be happy to give you an agenda. If you don't have one, if you already have that in the works. Make certain you have a weekly meeting with your team. And if you're, you have a professional law firm administrator or CEO or COO on deck, that's great because then it's not dependent on you as the attorney or the rainmaker, but treating it like a stakeholders meeting, everybody is, has something at stake within this company.

Molly McGrath: Listen, human beings. Will not leave you will not be offended by any questions that you ask. If it starts with her and it has tonality, if they get time, attention, and feedback, if you give that [00:07:00] consistently and persistently, your employees won't leave you. At all. So getting a weekly stakeholders meaning again I will have time to bring an agenda as well, where people are identifying their top three for the week, they're identifying what their goals are where they think they're going to get jammed up and where they need help.

Molly McGrath: And then if you do a daily huddle. And you're really quickly checking in with everyone on the team. Again, the appropriate people, you might not have the bookkeeper there. You might not have associated attorneys there, what have you, of just checking in. Okay. What are your top three for today? What top three matters?

Molly McGrath: Are you moving? Where are you at? And then the next day, how'd you do with your top three? It's not a place of shame, blame, or finger pointing, but when Susie says, my goal was to close this Smith file and send them an invoice, or my goal was to get their head of marketing or what have you, the Jones's marketing plan deployed or whatever it was, or it might be to do [00:08:00] invoicing or get my time entered into the CRM.

Molly McGrath: It makes certain that I get all my billing so the attorney, it's ready for the attorney to review on Monday or what have you and they come and they say, Okay, these are my top three goals. I only got to one, or I got to none, or I got to two. In that moment when you get deeply curious and have a safe space for it.

Molly McGrath: Again, if you have a team leader that can lead this or COO, it doesn't have to be depend on you on the attorney like, Okay. Okay, great. This is amazing information. Let's talk about what stopped you from getting to the other two. Attorney B dumped a crisis file on my desk or what have you. So and so came and asked me if I could become a witness and do this, or Susie called in sick, so I had to take over her work, what have you.

Molly McGrath: This is information that people pay attention to. Millions of dollars for every year for a business consultant. Your team is your quality control [00:09:00] team. They're showing where the loopholes are because you get on the second daily huddle and you hear again that I wasn't able to get to this is miss. It shows you where we're violating our process.

Molly McGrath: Where maybe people don't have project management and everybody's failure to plan is becoming other people's crisis. So this is a wonderful way for you to treat it on a daily basis as a strategic retreat and figure out where the loopholes are. Then when you have the weekly meeting and the daily meeting, and no more than 15 30 minutes tops.

Molly McGrath: Attorneys tell me all the time, I don't have time for that. I'm like I see the communication ping pong going back and forth in the teams and the slack in the email and everything else. And I saw your response to Susie because you're copying me or blind copy me. How long did it take you to write that email?

Molly McGrath: Because it was like 14 paragraphs long, and you were debating it and defending it and asking her 13 other [00:10:00] questions that then she has to reply to, which could have been handled in a five minute conversation, and everybody would have been very clear on what the next actions are. And where the breakdowns were.

Molly McGrath: So you do have time. You're just not spending it wisely. And in fact, if you do the daily huddle, you just gain back a tremendous amount of more time. Cause you just told me it took you an hour to write that email.

Jan Roos: Yeah, that's awesome. And I was actually, if you noticed me looking down, I was taking notes, like crazy, but I think it's such an important thing too, because it's I know a lot of the times when I call it like, the freshman year approach to operations and so on.

Jan Roos: All right, cool. I read work the system. I got my SOP. We got it made road to McDonald's let's go. But the truth is like one of the things that like that kind of stuck out to me, so it's okay, where are we breaking our process? Cause it always breaks. And that's the thing too. And I think like one of the other things I really love about this is something that comes through a lot in the podcast, which, again, like I can't say this enough times for anyone listening, highly recommended, but like such a human approach to it.

Jan Roos: [00:11:00] Because when you're writing the 14 paragraph email, there's so many assumptions built in because it's a one way conversation. And when you have the daily huddle, where people are allowed to voice things from their perspective, it's more empathetic by design because they get to see where it's coming from their perspective.

Jan Roos: And I think it's just so much more powerful when we can have that kind of a rapport as opposed to the other stuff too. But I want to say as far as the situation that you're finding, when people call you in to help consult with their situations, what do you think are the biggest mistakes?

Jan Roos: We know what a good meeting looks like, but what are things that you see often in people's meeting structures that you think are toxic, that people might want to stop if it's something that they're doing right now?

Molly McGrath: Yeah, great question. And honestly, I'm very proud of the profession to say, it's not even necessarily that it's toxic.

Molly McGrath: It's just not effective, and it's not being ran systematically or being facilitated so what I see when I take on a new law firm that I service or fractional CEO, what have you [00:12:00] and I, my first Order is to watch their team meetings if they're having it, or any meetings that they're having that are on the books that are consistent.

Molly McGrath: I say number one, it's a lack of agenda where everybody knows what they need to do to show up prepared with the reporting, whether it be the attorneys, the paralegals, the intake coordinators, whoever it might be. So it's a lot of conversation that is based on emotions versus anchoring to data, in fact, so we spend a lot of time talking about something that should be handled in 10 minutes based on a report where we just asked powerful questions.

Molly McGrath: Number two is being led by the attorney or the business owner, and not by. I'm not saying you have to have a CEO on staff but having a team leader that's going to facilitate and lead everything for you. If the attorney, a lot of times employees will just let them derail the meeting, maybe most entrepreneurs always want to talk about marketing.[00:13:00]

Molly McGrath: So we have a one hour meeting to review cases, go through the calendar, go through client experience, go through this, and everything turns into a marketing meeting. So no one's facilitating it and watching the clock and bringing everyone back on track of where they should be at. So really it's a lot of lack of planning on everybody's part, lack of clarity and standardization on what.

Molly McGrath: This meeting is for and given people the agenda is not going to change at least the framework, the conversation and the matters that we dive into each week might change, but by and large, the framework's not going to, the agenda is not going to, and then being facilitated. Okay, great guys. We're 15 minutes into the meeting, and I know we really need to talk about that Facebook campaign, that Facebook ad to get our webinar launched.

Molly McGrath: But right now we have our marketing meeting in our, so I'm going to put that on the agenda and we'll handle that in real time, but real quick, what [00:14:00] do you need us to know from a high level? What's the bottom line? Because if somebody is not facilitating it, I wouldn't know if I'm paralegal, that this meeting should go sideways.

Molly McGrath: And we have to talk about this webinar or Facebook ad strategy for the rest of our meeting, but I'm walking out and we never got to any of my matters. The next thing you know, somebody's at my desk tomorrow screaming at me because I didn't finish blah, blah, blah. I had in my agenda for the meeting, but we never got to it.

Molly McGrath: It's a vicious psycho.

Jan Roos: Yeah. And it sounds like I could imagine like the people who are probably the more talkative or the stronger forces of personality. It's actually funny. You want to see me laughing girl. We do our team meeting on Monday and I'm like, I really shouldn't be facilitating this.

Jan Roos: Because if you're the business owner, if you're the guy whose name is on the check or the girl's names on the check, it's just no, one's going to step through to interrupt you. It's not a fair position at the end.

Molly McGrath: And especially someone like you, which I know you're highly creative, you're high quick start, you get jazzed [00:15:00] up if there's a certain topic that comes up, you're like, Oh yeah, let's keep going with this one.

Molly McGrath: But there's other people suffering in silence that maybe you don't get to their to so to your point, it really shouldn't be you and I'll, before we recorded. I told you today boy. This podcast couldn't come at a better time because I do my meetings on Monday mornings and Holly in my office, which, Holly's fantastic.

Molly McGrath: She's a high fact finder follow through. I have her lead our meetings because I can't for multiple reasons. I'll derail it. But if somebody says something where they, it ends with I don't know, or, they're not showing up prepared. I'll lose my mind and I'll blow up on the team, which is not very helpful.

Molly McGrath: And I said to you today, you're like, how's it going? And I'm like, It's a Monday and I said, and thank God for Holly, because probably my entire team would have quit today. If I really would have said what I wanted to say.

Jan Roos: Yeah. And it's interesting too. I want to dig in on this as far as this is something that I know you and I know about this too, but you mentioned a little bit about the [00:16:00] Colby index a little bit too for, so for, from, can you give a little bit of a summary for people who aren't familiar with that?

Jan Roos: And I would love to see where the conversation goes on, how you guys use that on a day to day.

Molly McGrath: Absolutely. So I've been using the Colby since the late nineties. I think I heard of it through strategic coach, a coaching program that I was involved with. And then I started, it's once you hear something, you see it everywhere.

Molly McGrath: Then I read about it, in Oprah magazine, and I saw it on like the good morning America for, it was just everywhere. So I, when I started my recruiting agency in 2008 for legal staffing, I started using it because number one, the price point's really good. It's 50 bucks an assessment. Some of these assessments that are out there, there's hundreds, if not thousands of dollars, then you got to pay a consultant to even tell you what the heck it means and to go through it.

Molly McGrath: I like Colby because the price points easy. The way to understand it is very simplistic and it doesn't change. It really measures the DNA [00:17:00] of somebody's human conditioning. When they're backed against the wall, stress is high, just got fired by a client, have a client sitting in the conference room. That's all upset because we never got back to them.

Molly McGrath: All the things that happen in every business, how you will take action. When you're backed against the wall, so it measures your hard wiring your operating software, and 26 questions 50 bucks very quickly, and it doesn't change I took my first 124 years ago and I was convinced minds change because I've grown, I've evolved, my roles change, I own businesses, sold businesses, versus I was an employee when I took it, and it hasn't changed one iota.

Molly McGrath: So it's tried, tested, proven. It's just like you can get coaching and training and what have you, but at the end of the day, When things are the, hitting the fan, so to speak, where you will go. So measures four different areas of how people are high fact finders [00:18:00] or their strong follow through. So the high fact finders are people that need to know the beginning, the middle, the end, and the why before they will take any action.

Molly McGrath: High follow throughs, which are your production cops or your professional nags, which. Every single law firm and every entrepreneur needs a high follow through standing next to them, which I'm a high follow through I lead in eight. Everybody tells me I'm a pain in the butt. And, that's my job. I'm really great at it.

Molly McGrath: And then the next one is a quick start. So that's you. That's a, attention they what Colby says is that your entrepreneurs true entrepreneurs which I think the last time I saw only 1 percent of the population is a true entrepreneur they could start a new business every single day as long as they Have to manage it.

Molly McGrath: And so you, from, knowing you, your ideation, you get excited when an idea comes, you're really, phenomenal at that. And you, there's, you can take an [00:19:00] idea from P and turn it into an empire. And get it rocking and rolling naturally without a skill set with what have you I bet you, if you look back on your life you like my goodness, what you've accomplished with nothing is probably extraordinary and then you have your high implementers, which are not I don't love that term that Colby uses, but.

Molly McGrath: Because in the business world, it means something very different to us. But from the Colby perspective, those are your creative, your graphic designers, people who want to go to the proverbial dark cellar two o'clock in the morning, not talk to anyone, not need any human action interaction. And then they come out and their genius is presented in a tangible.

Molly McGrath: Here's the database management software. Here's the brochure. Here's the, what have you. But they're not traditionally in whole, a huge need of collaboration.

Jan Roos: Okay. And that's super it's funny. Cause I'm trying to think I haven't pulled up recently. Like I'm at least a seven. I think I [00:20:00] might be an eight on the yeah, I think I'm like a seven.

Jan Roos: Three unfollowed through, but I also say, I really appreciate it. But I always say too, with with my team too, just like I'm the zero to 80 percent guy, y'all can take it from 80 to a hundred, but I'm good for that first week and then you guys could take it from there, otherwise it's going to. But to that point, it's and the other thing too I'm sure you're familiar with Gino Wickman and the whole visionary integrative thing.

Jan Roos: Cause it's I think there's a, An interesting map that like probably is a little bit more simplistic view of it. I discovered Colby before I discovered that whole organization, but one of the things I wanted to ask you about there's two, the first one is. I found in the first couple of years of us hiring, I naturally resonated more with people that were close to me and a Colby.

Jan Roos: And I don't know if that's the best way to grow a business. So how do you approach the challenges that might come with finding people that are a little, what Colby diverse perhaps, or I don't know what the right term would it be? Cause you know it's not easy naturally to do.

Molly McGrath: Absolutely. [00:21:00] And I'm a huge fan of EOS and rocket fuel, just to put a huge exclamation point on that, especially with the integrator visionary, what have you, but in a law firm, we also have the production people, right?

Molly McGrath: So I love that question that you asked so much, because write the job description and figure out the needs that you have. And then the idea, there is an ideal Colby for each. position. So I would recommend that you have a high follow through or somebody that has that fact finder follow through support you with the hiring process.

Molly McGrath: Because to your point, you're going to get totally attracted and excited about people that you. Think and act like you, but it might not be the best fit. So for example, if you have somebody at the front of the house, answering your phones and take things to that nature, you need someone with a high follow through to your point, you have a two.

Molly McGrath: So your right [00:22:00] hand person needs to have at least a five or higher. And that's what I love about what Colby says. There's four different quadrants, the highest numbers in the driver's seat. The second highest number, again, if it's a five or higher is in the passenger seat, then the next number, if it's five or higher is in the backseat, the next two numbers, if it's below a five.

Molly McGrath: It's not even in the vehicle, in the trunk, it might be in the trunk. If it's a four, if it's a three or two, it is roadkill on the

Jan Roos: side. Yeah. Okay. That's awesome. And then basically super quick tactical question. At what point do you usually introduce this in the hiring process? Is this something after you've got a couple of lead candidates or when are you usually running people through the Colby?

Molly McGrath: Yeah, so great question. I have my clients take it so I can understand theirs. Whoever's involved in the hiring and the training process, take it so I can see where theirs is and where I need to match it up. When I have strong candidates that I present [00:23:00] to the law firm and we get hop on a zoom meeting or they come into the office, depending on the makeup of your practice, they like them.

Molly McGrath: They have the emotional intelligence, they have the energetic fit, Communication fit things to that nature. Then when they're like, I want to make them an offer, then I introduce the Colby to them. I've had firms in the past that wanted me to have the Colby because the Colby is not be all in and all, but then I'd run the Colby and they'd fall in love with their Colby.

Molly McGrath: So using your example, I would say, They're your two follow through and you need an executive assistant and they have an eight follow through and you get excited, but you're a high quick start implementer and you're like, okay, great. They fit, give them an offer. No. There's Colby's only one thing.

Molly McGrath: And I lately started coupling strength finder from Gallup. So the Gallup strength finder with that, because that's a personality test and it matches very well. Cause you could have some shortfalls [00:24:00] within your Colby based on the ideal Colby for a job description, and then bring in the personality test.

Molly McGrath: If you went to Colby and again, just for our listeners that might be exercising or have you listening to us, it's K O L B E. com. And the specific assessment that we are talking about is. The a as an apple, there's many different assessments that Colby offers. The a assessment is what we're talking about.

Molly McGrath: And Colby can put you through right fit and take a job description. There's many different things that company offers as additional service for anyone who really wants to dive in. But I like it, the personality test, cause I'll tell you. Early on, people would say, okay, my paralegal is leaving.

Molly McGrath: She's going to have a baby or her husband's moving across country. She's a rock star. I want to clone her. They have to have this Colby. I early on would do that. And then I present the candidate and have the exact same Colby as the paralegal that [00:25:00] was their favorite person in the world. But there was just something off.

Molly McGrath: And I'm like you have to bring in the personality side of that, how people communicate because Colby is a communication tool, but you also, I like matching the Gallup strength finder. Again, the reason I picked this it's 19 bucks. People are usually budget conscious. And I think coupling the two for what?

Molly McGrath: 50 plus 20, 70 bucks or give or take, it's pretty insignificant for a good return on investment.

Jan Roos: Yeah, I was gonna say too, I'm able to laugh at this because it was long enough ago, but I've definitely had to make, let's just say some hiring decision that costs more than 70 with the wrong person. But to your point, Molly, it was like, it's so funny because I get latched on a client.

Jan Roos: So to get, this is one of the reasons I had to get myself out of like a lot of the hiring process, because I'm terrified. What if I go give them the test? It's not what I wanted to hear. It's I just got, I get bought it. I fall in love too quickly, but this is something that I've been thinking about a little, another couple of questions about this.

Jan Roos: So [00:26:00] we all know about the kind of the classic model where you have the visionary founder, but every once in a while we've run into people and it's weird because just by nature of what we do in marketing, it tends to attract those people a little bit more, but there are people that I've found that have been successful.

Jan Roos: That are a little bit more of that kind of integrator type to start. So do you have any experience with like how those firms would grow in a way that's different than the classic one with a visionary type for a situation.

Molly McGrath: So clarify the question a little bit, just so I make sure you understand it.

Jan Roos: Yeah. So I was going to say, so for like your classic, high quick start front of house gregarious person. I feel like that's almost the default narrative for who to hire first and second and third. Yep. Do you know any and we've seen a couple people where it's been almost like the back of house person first, they've done quite well, but I feel like it's a narrative that doesn't get discussed.

Jan Roos: So what is like building a firm look like differently when you're not. That sort of visionary high quick start type person.

Molly McGrath: Yeah. The great question in rocket field, they even talk about, and I've hired a bunch of EOS [00:27:00] guys on my podcast. Since I really started diving into it, you don't necessarily have to have a visionary high quick start.

Molly McGrath: to have a successful business, but you will never have a successful business without a strong integrator. And I've always felt that, you can be a law firm owner. A lot of attorneys actually aren't visionaries. They aren't high quick starts and they have very successful law firms. And so then they feel like, all right.

Molly McGrath: I don't love marketing. I'm not good at it. How many times do you hear that from attorneys? I'm terrible at marketing. I don't know marketing. I need a marketing person. I need a visionary. I need someone. And then they start writing all these checks and to different, agencies and what have you things in nature.

Molly McGrath: Cause they're like, just please somebody do it. Cause I don't know how to do it. And I don't want to do it. And then from there, They have the absence of that integrator. You and I know this and what I mean by that, there's no reporting. [00:28:00] So this is a kind of joke between business outsource marketing and consultants, especially in the legal space is that, Oh, you're sending me all these garbage leads or, I spend all this money with you, especially for a marketing agency or what have you, and nobody, I have no, no one's hired me and you're like, what's happening on the intake? Are people actually following up with these leads? Let me see your reporting from initial lead coming in to the follow up that occurred to get them to book a consultation and it's crickets. They don't have the KPIs. They don't have the internal reporting. We can furnish all the reporting from a marketing perspective, from a dashboard perspective, but that's lead generation.

Molly McGrath: The biggest piece of it is really the follow up to have the KPIs and things of that nature. So I believe the most important position you hire is that integrator, somebody who could take that off you because attorneys get overwhelmed. They're like, [00:29:00] you're talking voodoo. You're asking me these questions.

Molly McGrath: I don't even know what a KPI is. I hear that a lot. I don't know what a lead is. I don't know what a PNC is. I know what the Potential client is, and I'm like that's what it is. But you ask all these words and it's not to talk over them or to dominate, to make you feel uneducated about the term using this example of marketing, and this is why you need somebody other than you.

Molly McGrath: I'm not saying you have to go hire a CEO, COO, or big law firm integrator, or whatever professional law firm administrators, new term people are throwing around there. No, you can have the person that's answering your phone if they have a strong follow through. They can be your integrator, like start there until you can get your data and you can have your KPIs and you know the state of the union on your people, your [00:30:00] process, your production and your profitability, then you can start outsourcing vision and things to that nature.

Jan Roos: Yeah, this is an awesome segue to Molly, because I wanted to talk about this. It's interesting. Cause when I've noticed like the firms that we've run into that are really in a great shape before we ended up getting there, there was almost always, sometimes this is the same person, but they absolutely need to have somebody who can manage all of these projects.

Jan Roos: And I've dealt with, this is a really tough situation for anyone who's listening to this, this is what it ends up looking like for an outsource service provider. So it's like. When we get brought in as one of five initiatives that quarter, and you can't get ahold of the guy because he's on with other, one of the other four projects, and then all of a sudden we were like, we're way delayed on what we ended up having as far as timelines, because we can't get the resource, something like that.

Jan Roos: I'm like. That's what happens when you don't have the integrator connecting all the dots. So there's absolutely somebody who can turn that energy into something. And I think that's like the integrator role, but also, and it's awesome. And it's the same person, the rockstar intake [00:31:00] person who can pay like, who can tee up the consultation.

Jan Roos: And I've always when I talk to this like with clients about this, I'm like, look. You might think that you're the quarterback, but you're the wide receiver. You're not getting any footballs that are not thrown by the person that's answering your phone. And I feel like it's a position that people are, not giving a lot of respect to, but it can be such a huge lever.

Jan Roos: And I know for a fact that you've. Plays some fantastic people who do both. So I wanted to ask you about what your thoughts about how people can find somebody for this, broadly, is this something that makes more sense as a hire to place or somebody to uplevel within the firm or like, how do you think about getting that in place for the firms that you work with?

Molly McGrath: It could be someone that you go out and hire, or it could be somebody in your firm that you can uplevel. And it's a beautiful opportunity to go and sit down with your team and your strategic retreat, your weekly team meeting, what have you and say, Hey, we understand that the most important position in this law firm is the [00:32:00] receptionist for lack of better term or client service coordinator intake coordinator, because if they don't do a great job, they're the director first impressions.

Molly McGrath: Think about the businesses that you call and within 20 seconds, if you're even going to continue interacting with them based on how you were greeted and treated on that initial call. So you can share this with your team, share your vision, share what you're thinking out loud and say, if anyone's interested in moving into this position, put time on my calendar.

Molly McGrath: Let me know. Let's talk about it and see. It might be someone internally a lot of times it is, especially when it comes to up leveling to marketing coordinator, or things of that nature, your receptionist that's been answering your phone for two years is a perfect person to upgrade into your marketing coordinator, I'm not saying that the running Facebook ads but they're coordinating all that initiative and it could be a great opportunity.

Molly McGrath: Because, side note. This is why I do [00:33:00] recruiting and the unemployment rate in the legal space is 0. 9 percent right now. Wow. Unemployment rates insane. And when I talk to people like, tell me why you're on the phone with a recruiter, like what's not working in your current job in a hundred percent, the time is there's no future opportunities.

Molly McGrath: And it crushes my heart because I know there's opportunities in these businesses. The visionary or the entrepreneur or the team leader is not taking the time to constantly remind the team of the path of growth they're on, the opportunities that are there. So if you are first share with your team, it's easier to recruit within and get people to up level and move into that.

Molly McGrath: If you're going outside and you're going to start recruiting and placing ads and things of that nature, really make certain. That your ads paint the picture, do not run ads. It's a receptionist. [00:34:00] Because you're going to get a bunch of bottom feeders and unqualified and then you're going to say there's no good people out there like subject lines King, think of it like running an ad or an email campaign think of the stuff that you we all get emails in our inbox, which ones do we open up.

Molly McGrath: The ones that catch our attention or jar us a little bit. So right now in the unemployment rate and the shark infested waters of trying to find candidates to even find them to even get on the phone with you, it's going to be, you're going to have to jar them. Your ads can have to be way different.

Molly McGrath: Paint the picture of what your culture looks like, what your law firm looks like, and make sure you have a really strong subject line. So for. Somebody who's doing intake or answering the phones or booking appointments like a client service coordinator is one of the best ads that we have running right now for that position, because it communicates so much more than a booking appointments are being.

Molly McGrath: Quote unquote, [00:35:00] just a receptionist. And I'll say this as a really big, bold statement. When you are looking for this position, you cannot look at what the fee is, what you're going to pay this person. Cause people still have stuck in their mind. All I can get a receptionist for 15 bucks a month, right? I driving by my local McDonald's yesterday.

Molly McGrath: 19 and 50 cents to work at McDonald's. Yeah. So what I find for law firms is they still have stuck in their mind. They could find a receptionist for 15 bucks, 17 bucks, what have you. My 16 year old is a hostess at a barbecue joint. She's a junior in high school making 1750 an hour. So from a way of perspective, it's not the fee.

Molly McGrath: It is a cost if you don't invest in people because a lot of times they're like any quote unquote just a receptionist or just an intake or somebody just to pick up the phone [00:36:00] and book an appointment. Dude, that is the definition of sales, like if they don't do a good job your job as the attorney is irrelevant because you got nobody to meet with.

Molly McGrath: So you get what you pay for. And if somebody really fully wholly understands that role and has it in their bones, in their blood, in this day and age, you're going to have to pay them 20 an hour or more.

Jan Roos: Yeah. It's interesting too. It's this is something that was impressed to me when I was starting out right after school, I went into sales.

Jan Roos: And one of the things that my first manager's always said is like. You look at most companies, the highest paid person other than the CEO is usually the top salesperson in law firms. It's usually the low, the pro answering the phones is the lowest paid person typically, and it's just so crazy. And there's so many parallels with this from like the ad stuff too.

Jan Roos: And one of the things I'm always telling with clients is yeah, you're going to get price shopped if you're not putting distance between you and the competition. And it's the same thing on the hiring side too. If it's receptionist. At firm a versus receptionist for at firm B. Yeah. [00:37:00] Why not go for the one that has the highest dollars per hour?

Jan Roos: So people are creating this problem, but yeah, if it's client service director with, the McGrath law firm, and we were trying to do this in the world and this and that, then not to say you should pay them lower, but you're going to be less vulnerable to that kind of pressure if you're creating a better experience for them at the end of the day too, but I think it's so important.

Jan Roos: And you also remind me of something that's been on my mind a little How should people think about when to hire from a financial perspective? I've heard this old chestnut thrown out a bunch the, Hey, you have six months worth of salary type thing, but like the right hire is going to create money.

Jan Roos: So how do you encourage people that you're working with to have that conversation internally about the finances to to get a new hire on the team? Yeah,

Molly McGrath: I would say first and foremost, the finances have nothing to do with it, to your point, build it and they will come and you will create the money.

Molly McGrath: I always tell people when they say to me I don't really have the revenue right now to hire this position. I'm like, Yeah, but I've been on the phone with [00:38:00] you for an hour, which if you do the billable hour of how much money you're losing by being on the phone with me completely complaining and frustrated that everything's delegated back up to you.

Molly McGrath: Nobody cares as much as you do. You're working 19 hours a week. You're, somehow magically created 19 hours a week and you haven't slept in four months. Right there is why you should hire. So it's, where do you hold your value? Is it in your frustration level, your stress level? Because now we know more than ever.

Molly McGrath: I can't tell you how many times I open up Facebook or social media, and I don't mean to breathe fear in the room, but where I see somebody dropped out of a heart attack that should not have. And, because their stress level and they're perfectly healthy, what have you, that's one of the contributing factors.

Molly McGrath: So if you're never seeing your family, you're completely stressed out all the time, still don't have the money that you want to have in the bank based on whoever told you how much you [00:39:00] had to have in the bank. And that's your indicator. When your frustration is high, you are running a massive risk of the rest of your employees leaving.

Molly McGrath: for listening. Or not closing a client because you think you're not bringing that energy in the room. You're bringing that energy in the room. And the greatest definition of money that I ever heard by my mindset coach. And now it's everywhere with all these money books of, you're a bad ass at making money and all these different money books that are out there.

Molly McGrath: Money is energy. That's it, period. So if you are frustrated and you are feeling like you own a job and you are feeling like, you have to do the work of you're paying other people to do work and you're not getting a paycheck at the end of the month and at the end of the day. If you are feeling a high level of frustration, it's time to hire period.

Molly McGrath: Whether it's in source, outsource, W2, 1099, don't care. I would say [00:40:00] to you, get a whiteboard, get an old school legal pad. And there's a psychology to taking pen and paper. Not type it on the computer and write down, just keep that notebook with you everywhere you go. And next year bed at 2 AM. When you wake up, do we call this miss back?

Molly McGrath: Are we going to get fired by this client? And that's the biggest, people think entrepreneurs are all about worried about money. In my experience, it's not true. Our greatest fear is getting fired by clients. And so I think that's what I tell people when they call me. And I have, I see it so often.

Molly McGrath: I'm not ready to hire. I can't afford it. We have you, but I'll get a phone call. I'll see someone pop up on my calendar. I'm like, okay, last time I talked to him was eight months ago. And I'm going to pretty much play the recording of our conversation that we had eight months ago. And word for word, it's identical.

Molly McGrath: Like you're actively choosing this because it's fear. Because if you hire someone to do the things that you feel like [00:41:00] are beneath you, which are administrative stuff, paralegal stuff, when you're an attorney, etc. Really the root cause is that you're afraid because if you no longer can hang on to a certain Story that you're busy, important and stressed out, and you have freed up time.

Molly McGrath: Now you have to uplevel. Now you have to do the things that you signed up to do as a rainmaker, as an attorney, what have you, and you're not sure how to do it. It's uncomfortable, it's unknown, what have you. So you keep.

Jan Roos: Yeah, it's super interesting too, because it's I think you reminded me of something and I think there's like a pretty obvious connection sometimes, especially with a revenue generating position, like a great intake person where it's okay, cool.

Jan Roos: If you're, your appointments book go from 25 to 50%, that's more money. But, In terms of the energy costs too, like that's insane. The other thing too, like from what we see, and I, we help a lot of people out with how they're closing their consultations. Good luck hitting a 90 percent close rate.

Jan Roos: If you're worried about how much you're going [00:42:00] to be letting the next client that's even something that would be considered a cost center and most clients, it's just like that can also. Become a profit center. If you really think about it, it's so true. It's just there's so many choices that people make.

Jan Roos: And I don't even want we don't have time to get into the all the mental hangups that people do to prevent themselves from success. But I think sometimes it's like one of those things too. You always hear about. All these entrepreneur stories was like, they ended up having their first kid and then magically all the money found in a place.

Jan Roos: If people can take the time to bet on themselves, a lot of the times the higher can be that next big step, but you really have to have the faith that you're going to keep it to it. I'm like, I can't think of any situation. I want to say it's rare to hear the situation like, yeah, I decided to really bet on myself.

Jan Roos: And then I just, yeah, I just had to drop it after even if you don't see the path right there, sometimes you have to take that leap of faith and hiring scary as heck, but when you get the right one, it's such a multiplier.

Molly McGrath: Oh my goodness. Absolutely. Said. And it is true. The time to hire is when you're not ready.

Molly McGrath: There has to be. Tony Robbins always said, [00:43:00] fear is the best motivator. And especially when you invest with people like you, that you are helping them with intake and what have you. And even when you use that story, if you think you don't have the money, I'm even using your example that you're using.

Molly McGrath: Think about this. You think you don't have the money you're having initial consultation that might be worth let's say 8, 500 right, you're about to walk in there, and you go to grab a glass of water before you go into this hour long consultation whether in a zoom room or traditional conference room, and you're getting your glass of water and the receptionist comes up to the water cooler, and just tells you all this complaint that we just got from an employee.

Molly McGrath: a client that's upset and when they could have went to a paralegal had you had a paralegal or they could have went to an attorney or a legal assistant and then now you can't unhear that and you're bringing that into the conference room before you even open up your mouth the [00:44:00] perspective clients see everything on your face i can tell and when i walk into zoom rooms i'm like Oh boy.

Molly McGrath: Yeah. They just got in. I'm like, hang on. What was the conversation you had with me before you hopped in the zoom room? And then when I hear it, I'm like, yep, that's why you need to hire a buffer.

Jan Roos: Yeah. Oh man. Molly. We're getting to the end of the hour. I really, honestly we could definitely, we could talk about this all day, but I want to be a respect that we had booked.

Jan Roos: I'm loving this. If anyone else is loving this, what's the best way to get in your world?

Molly McGrath: Absolutely. So a few things I am coming out with my new book, fix my employees. That's going to be out in May, 2022. And for anyone who would like a free copy of that, please send me an email at Molly at hiring and empowering.

Molly McGrath: com. And then just put case feel in the subject line. And I was to go ahead and send you a copy of the book.

Jan Roos: All right. Awesome. And then also super recommend the podcast and the email us as well.

Molly McGrath: Yeah, absolutely. Easy ways. Just go to our website, hiringandempowering.com and just [00:45:00] opt in and subscribe every Tuesday.

Molly McGrath: We drop a new podcast, chock full of tips and techniques and strategies for your employees as well as the employer to get you all on the same playing field. And every Thursday we drop a blog and we've been blogging consistently every week since 2008. Bye.

Jan Roos: Oh, really? I didn't know it went that back that far.

Jan Roos: That's super impressive. What's that?

Molly McGrath: Thank you.

Jan Roos: I got the COVID COVID time warp. That's anywhere between 12 and 18 years. But no, that's awesome. And yeah, like I said to you guys, it's like one of the reasons I think it's so important to focus on this stuff. You cannot do this on your own point blank.

Jan Roos: And if you look at the real grades, read any of the biographies of the Richard Branson's of the world, it's all that, they're the biggest people at the end of the day, it's the ability to control other people. Cause you can't learn it all, but if you know how to pick people, and you know how to manage them, you'll be on your way to. Not having to figure this all out on yourself, which should be something to shoot for. But Molly, thanks again so much for coming on the show and for everybody else. I will see you [00:46:00] guys next Tuesday at 8 AM Eastern on the Law Firm Growth Podcast.

Narrator: Thank you for listening to the Law Firm Growth Podcast.

Narrator: For show notes, free resources, and more, head on over to casefuel.com/podcast Looking forward to catching up on the next episode.