Practice Management

In my heyday of pursuing the big dream there was an older attorney in Texarkana, Texas named Buddy Britt who like to tell people, "Chuck is like the farmer who says 'I don't want to own all of the land, just the land next to mine'".

When you think about it, that's pretty funny.  My goal as a young attorney was empire building.  Back then you probably could not open a newspaper, phone book, mail, or turn on a TV without me soliciting you to consolidate and lower your debts if your were in financial trouble.  I have always been friendly to my fellow lawyers, but I have to admit that down deep I wanted to out do them.  I wanted to be on top.

When I talk to lawyers today that try to explain to me why they need support staff and an associate and this great new space, and a bunch of cases they cannot themselves handle, I know that they have not gotten empire building out of their minds.  They deny it, but I know the warning signs because I have lived it.

It is a vice really.  It is a corruption of virtue at least to some small extent.  Maybe it is a mental stew of most vices when you think about it.  Lust or the non-use of temperance.  Cowardice or the non-sue of courage.  Folly or the abuse of wisdom.  Venality or the non-use of justice.  All I can say is that it exist in all of us to some degree, and with trial lawyers maybe more so.  You have to ask why we do such things, and most often it is really nothing more than a certain type of pride or idolatry of self.

I really do not mean this to be a religious lesson, or to suggest that the Third Wave represents some type of sanctifying grace, or that empire building is somehow a habit inclining one to sin.  But, I have to wonder as I read about the exploits of Bernie Madoff and Allen Stanford of late if they suffered from the same thoughts of empire building that possess so many?  I have to think so.

It is the process of THINKING BIG that we so promote in this world of ours.  But, I am here to tell you that thinking big is not necessarily the same thing as being big.  If you equate it as such, then I would encourage you to do as I do and begin thinking small.  It helps.

I guess I have been in a self-imposed, self-therapy trying to escape the THINK BIG mentality for a decade, and I no longer think I need to own a practice area, or have the most cases, or the most offices, or the biggest cash flow, or the most associates and staff to lord over.  I do not need it, and I know I do not need it because having done it I know it does not work as predicted.

Does everybody have to know who you are?  Only those in need of your unique services need to know.  Unlike the comedy Cheers, not everyone needs to know your name.

Here are some of the things you learn at the top.  Cash flow is not the same thing as the money you take home or money in your pocket.  Rapid growth always leaves you strapped for cash.  The larger your organization, the less time you have to do the things you really care about.  The larger the practice, the larger the liability.  The bigger you are, the harder you hall.  The last point maybe an old saying, but it has meaning.  You need to know your chances of success, no matter how good you are at what you do, is only about 20% in the THINK BIG world.  Those are still odds you might want to accept, but the reality is that failure is not a concept, it is a hard, painful reality.  There is not an 20% chance you will not succeed in the long term.  There is an 80% chance your life will be devastated if you fail.

I am not saying to be a monk.  I am advising you to be practical.  I am not saying to not have an ego.  I am advising you to keep it in check.  Remember nobody likes a swashbuckler, especially if it is an attorney.  The attorney's life is not a movie, and in real life nobody likes a rough, noisy and boastful swordsmen.  People like people, not characters.  When you think BIG of yourself and for yourself, you are thinking you want to be a character, a swashbuckler.

Growing up in Texarkana I knew this pharmacist that walked to and from work at his pharmacy each day.  The family had one well used car, which was not driven much.  His home was small and simple.  The lights were rarely on when at home.  The family rarely ate out.  His family had no debt to speak of.  No flash.  One son went on to be an eye doctor and the other a lawyer.  When the humble pharmacist passed on it turned out he was rich.  He left his children a wealth of money, investments and property.  As they say in Texarkana, "Who would of thunk it."

My point is that he succeeded by thinking small.  He did not need the biggest pharmacy in town.  He did not need the shiniest car, or the biggest house, or to fill the prescriptions of everybody in town.  He needed to nothing more than to do the best he could do with the little that he had.  And, that turned out to be much more than enough.

Along the way in my life I lost that lesson.  It is a lesson that is as old as history itself.  Do not kill more than you can eat.

Thinking small is the process of focusing on what is really important to achieve all that we reasonably need with as little effort, overhead, long term commitment, flash, and consumption as possible.  It really is about function over style.  It is not a race to the bottom, just like it is not a race to the top.  It is a race to success without the trappings of vice.  It is the realization that being a little bit more humble, a little more meek, does not mean you cannot succeed.

Give it some thought.