Rainmaking Recommendation 242: How Many Psychiatrists Does It Take To Change A Light Bulb?

How many psychiatrists does it take to change a lightbulb?

Only one, but the lightbulb has to want to change.

I know it’s a terrible joke, but it is apropos to what I want to discuss in this very short Rainmaking Recommendation.

In the almost 20 years I have been in business, I have worked with hundreds of attorneys.  And there have been a few with whom I have not been as successful a coach as I would have liked to have been.

There are two reasons for this:

1. Sometimes I am not the best coach for a particular attorney, and
2. The lawyer was unwilling to put in the work to become the Rainmaker they say they would like to be. 

We all would like to wake up one morning with the phone ringing non-stop with our ideal clients. But this begs the question, what are you doing to make the phone ring. 

Every day I speak with attorneys who want to become Rainmakers but are unwilling to do the tasks that will allow them to build the books of business they claim they want.  I believe that I have heard every excuse they could come up with as to why they have been unable to do what needs to be done.

The world has changed.  We will never be the same as we were before March 2020.  And I hope that is true.  There are so many good things that came out of the pandemic, whether you believe it or not  (sure, many crappy things have happened too). One of them is the ability for lawyers to work remotely and have achievements doing so.  In fact, the AMLAW just announced that a “Distributed Law Firm,” i.e., entirely virtual law firm, just cracked the AMLAW 200: Congratulations to Fisher Broyles and their attorneys. 

Another has been the ability to meet people virtually from all over the world.  There are hundreds (yes, hundreds) of people whom I would never have met had it not been for the pandemic.

Still, another is the scorching lateral market in which they are paying lawyers big bucks to move their practices to another firm. 

But the most critical change has been the fact that lawyers must now take complete control of their careers.  This means you must decide whether you will be at the mercy of waiting for work to be fed to you by others or whether you are going to bring in your own business.  Because the only way you can control your legal career – whether you want to stay in the firm you are currently in or if you wish to move to a different firm or even start your own firm – you must know how to bring in your own book of business.

Many business development coaches are out there to help you, I being one, but you have to want to change what you are currently doing to what you need to do.  I may not be the right coach for you (I work with Mid-Market, AMLAW and Distributed Law firm Attorneys), but if you would like to take me up on an offer to try me out for a complimentary training session, just email me.