In this episode, Steve Fretzin and Amy Gardner discuss:
- Mistakes lawyers make with their time.
- Taking the initiative to learn the things that you did not learn in law school.
- Solutions to getting your time under control.
- Track your time and see if you’re actually spending the time where you want to be.
Key Takeaways:
- Building relationships is not something that can happen when you try and do it faster.
- Take the time on the things that matter.
- Look at your to-do list – What can you eliminate? What can you automate? What can you delegate? What can you trade?
- Be open to new ideas and bring in people with a fresh perspective. You never know where you’re wasting time that you didn’t even realize was being wasted.
“Start viewing Saturday and Sunday as extensions of your week. I’m not saying do more work on Saturday and Sunday; I’m saying go into the weekend with a plan. When you do that you can be much more intentional with how you’re spending those two days a week, rather than just using them as the recovery time. And that really helps you build a more full life.” — Amy Gardner
Connect with Amy Gardner:
Website: apochromatik.com
Email: Amy@Apochromatik.com
LinkedIn: linkedin.com/company/apochromatik
Amy’s LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/amygardner
Twitter: twitter.com/apochromatik
Facebook: facebook.com/apochromatik
Sign up at http://www.aposignup.com/btl for a FREE 30-minute consultation!
Referenced Episode:
Episode 181 Keith Sbiral: https://www.fretzin.com/keith-sbiral-delegation-for-success/
Thank you to our Sponsors!
Legalese Marketing: https://legaleasemarketing.com/
Moneypenny: https://www.moneypenny.com/us/
Connect with Steve Fretzin:
LinkedIn: Steve Fretzin
Twitter: @stevefretzin
Facebook: Fretzin, Inc.
Website: Fretzin.com
Email: Steve@Fretzin.com
Book: The Ambitious Attorney: Your Guide to Doubling or Even Tripling Your Book of Business and more!
YouTube: Steve Fretzin
Call Steve directly at 847-602-6911
Show notes by Podcastologist Chelsea Taylor-Sturkie
Audio production by Turnkey Podcast Productions. You’re the expert. Your podcast will prove it.
FULL TRANSCRIPT
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
lawyers, clients, people, automate, babysitter, deadline, hear, automations, day, work, law firm, spend, books, tasks, law, business, steve, partner, hours, strategies
SPEAKERS
Amy Gardner, Narrator, Steve Fretzin, Jordan Ostroff
Amy Gardner [00:00]
To start viewing Saturday and Sunday as extensions of your week, and how you’re going to plan your time, and I’m not saying do more work on Saturday and Sunday, I’m saying go into the weekend with a plan because when you do that, all of a sudden, you can be much more intentional with how you’re spending those two days a week, rather than just using them as the recovery time not only helps you build a more full life
Narrator [00:26]
you’re listening to be that lawyer, life changing strategies and resources for growing a successful law practice. Each episode, your host, author and lawyer coach, Steve Fretzin, will take a deeper dive, helping you grow your law practice in less time, greater results. Now, here’s your host, Steve Fretzin.
Steve Fretzin [00:48]
Hey everybody, welcome to be that lawyer. I am Steve Fretzin, your host and if you’ve been listening to the show, you know it is all about being that lawyer, someone who’s confident organized and a skilled Rainmaker. Know if you’re sick of hearing that from me already. But it’s, it’s it’s getting into your psyche, I know it, we’re seeping through. And listen, it’s all about learning little tips and tricks and ideas and strategies and tactics, and cetera, et cetera, to get your game to the next level. So that you can practice law and have the life that you’ve always dreamed about control, freedom, etc. Having your own clients is one of the keys. However, very tough to do. If you’re not really a manager of time, if you’re not mastering your time and figuring out how to, you know, open up gaps to get the business development and the marketing done. And I’m gonna introduce my guest, Amy in a moment. I do want to thank our sponsors, legalese marketing, who helps me with my marketing website, law Maddix, social media newsletter, while you name it, graphics, all that jazz. And of course, mani pedi, who is doing the live chat on my website, they also do virtual reception for law firms. So you’ll hear more about them later, in AMI submitted a quote, which is fantastic. It’s I don’t need time, what I need is a deadline. That’s Duke Ellington. I wasn’t I was surprised when I saw that at Duke Ellington. But welcome to the show. And thanks for submitting that quote.
Amy Gardner [02:10]
Thanks for having me. I’m glad to be back talking with you again.
Steve Fretzin [02:12]
Yeah, to time you and you and Keith really dominating the fee that lawyer space, which is good, because you too, are you too are of another caliber. So it’s great to have you back. So tell me about that, quote. Sure. So
Amy Gardner [02:25]
I think the quote is, I don’t need more time, what I need is a deadline. And I think that we we’ve all heard that these theories about how time expands or our tasks expand to fill all the time that we have for them. And I think that’s really true. And certainly I know, when I was working on a brief, if I had two weeks to work on a brief, that brief would take much more time than if I had two days to work on a brief and not always with a marked difference in quality, right? Some of these things, we just allow ourselves to spin our wheels, and we can spend an awful lot of time thinking about doing something. And only once we have a deadline on the calendar, do we then move into that action phase?
Steve Fretzin [03:04]
Yeah, and I think that’s just across the board. I mean, if I need to write an article, if I need to put together a list of my strategic partners, which I’m in the process of doing in writing them and going through that type, it just isn’t going to happen without putting it in the calendar, setting a deadline and getting it knocked out. It just isn’t.
Amy Gardner [03:21]
Absolutely. You know, one of the things that I do to give myself deadlines is I have an accountability, buddy. And so on Tuesday mornings, I check in with him. And so that that creates another false deadline. And certainly we have team meetings on Mondays, you know, there are lots of things you can do. If you’re solo, or you’re working on tasks that don’t have definite deadlines, like your strategic partner list, you can create some so that you’ll give yourself that to get it done.
Steve Fretzin [03:45]
Yeah. Right on right on the money there. So let’s talk a little bit about your background. You’re the co founder of apochromatic. With Keith spiral and YouTube have been just amazing partners to me and, and just helping the legal community on on so many levels. But your background is unique. So give a give a little bit of a flavor of that. And then we’ll go into our topic today, which is why lawyers suck at time management. I think that’s what you told me.
Amy Gardner [04:10]
Something like that. Yeah. So I graduated from Luther College and before Iowa and spent two years working on political campaigns in Iowa. I had double majors in English and poli sci. So did the first thing that you are naturally inclined to do with those work in politics. And then the second thing, went to the University Chicago Law School, graduated from there and went straight into working at SCAD in Chicago as a litigator, did not quite six years. It’s got in Chicago, and then from there, went to underwriting and Harris, which is now a big gobbled up by Nixon Peabody was an associate and then partner they’re doing litigation, lots of IP litigation, actually, which I think probably would have given my science teachers in high school hives if they had known that. And then left unready after I made partner to become the Dean of Students back at the University of Chicago Law School and when I was back at the law At school, I spent a lot of time working on Professionalism and Leadership among law students, and partnered with a number of law firms on that, because they’re really supportive of those efforts. And I kept hearing from these law firms. Boy, we need this for our lawyers, and realize that there really is this need, among lawyers, both for one on one career help which we provide career development and career transition coaching, and small group masterminds, as well as these larger issues of helping people work more effectively with their teams, either in small firms, large firms or in house counsel teams.
Steve Fretzin [05:32]
Yeah, and I mean, let me let’s just explore one thing, before we move into our main topic today, which is, you know, the saying that I hear constantly, which is Tuesday never taught me this in law school. So that could be time management that can be business development, marketing, social media. So two questions. One is, how much of that should be taught in law schools versus the typical curriculum? And how necessary is that for people coming through and out of law school to have some of those basic level skills?
Amy Gardner [06:01]
I think it’s really critical. I mean, I often say that when I graduated from University of Chicago Law School, I was really well equipped to write a brief thanks to some great practical classes offered by our clinical faculty. And being in the clinic, I was equipped to actually do an argument in court, those sorts of things that I literally did not know where the Daley center was, and had to sit there and like, find it, figure out how to get there, right. So as somebody went to law school, and then was practicing in Chicago, kind of a problem. So I do think that these are critical skills. I think that some law schools do a great job, Greg miracIe, who is a dean at the University of Illinois, he and I have talked a lot about this. And he was able to take some of what we were doing at the University of Chicago for the first draft of a class that he offers now in Illinois, and many years later, it’s evolved well beyond what we were doing. But Greg Murphy is certainly somebody at Illinois who’s doing a lot of these things. But I think, frankly, it kind of doesn’t matter. Because if you’re a lawyer, spent all this time and money to go to law school, you owe it to yourself to figure out and to learn the strategies that you need to be successful as a lawyer. I mean, you don’t have to read. Although, of course, you should start with Steve’s books. You don’t have to read all of Steve’s books on business development, you can call up Steve and join one of his roundtables, right? You have the resources available to you. And you owe it to yourself and your clients in your career to do the things and not just lament the fact that law school didn’t teach you how to do them.
Steve Fretzin [07:28]
Yeah, but I think I think now more than ever, there’s more resources, whether it’s books, podcasts, like this videos, etc. And if somebody recognizes that, that business development and in building a client base and building a network is a critical thing, you don’t have to spend a lot of a lot of money on it upfront, I think you can spend the first four or five years as a lawyer really honing that skill, but on the side, start studying and start taking seriously the concept that you’re going to need your own clients. And you might want to get ahead of the game on developing relationships and developing some networking skills, you know, in keeping in touch with people is a very basic level skill. And then you can hone it later, when when you become a good lawyer, you know, you can step in and start working with someone like you or myself or Keith to, you know, take things to another level. But I think I think, you know, even just getting started somewhere is better than not at all.
Amy Gardner [08:21]
I, one of the partners I worked for AT SCAD. And often said, no one will ever care more about your career than you do. And I think lawyers have to get out of a mentality of assuming that the employer will provide or the law school will provide and just say, all right, where am I? Where do I want to go? And what is one little thing I can do today to get started? Right. And that might be they, you know, they read the Chicago Daily level, it’s an article or, you know, they they watch a video on YouTube. Right, right. Lots of little things you can do to get started.
Steve Fretzin [08:48]
Yeah, exactly, exactly. So let’s talk about lawyers that are in their own practice either at a big firm, midmarket solo doesn’t really matter. But they’re continually making mistakes as it relates to how they split their time between the billable hour and business development, marketing and, and other administrative and tasks that they may have. So what are the biggest mistakes that they make with their time that they may they may not even be aware of?
Amy Gardner [09:16]
So one big mistake I see lawyers make all the time is we buy into this hustle fallacy. And so we think we have to do more and do it faster. And as long as we just do more and more and more and faster, faster, faster, we will get the results we want. And the reality is, is that sure that works if you are you know folding laundry maybe right like there are certain things where that’s going to work
Steve Fretzin [09:39]
for FedEx driving. Yes.
Amy Gardner [09:43]
To get their bonus for going fast. Yes, yes. But if you are trying to build relationships and grow book, you’re not gonna get anywhere by saying, Oh, I’ve got seven minutes for coffee today. Right? Like that’s not it’s not going to work. Yeah. And if you are trying to, you know, concoct a great art argument for court, you’re not going to have a better result by saying, Oh, I’m going to talk faster, right. And I’m going to try to book three, three in a row. So it’s really this sense of if I think it comes from a good place, right? It comes from lawyers wanting to get great results from their clients, grow their firms, all those things are good. But when we buy into this sense that everything has to just be done more and faster, it sets us up for burnout, it sets us up for bad results on everything we’re doing. It’s just not healthy.
Steve Fretzin [10:29]
Yeah, I think faster is is sort of the number one, you know, issue in how mistakes are made. The other one that I would throw into the into the mix is, is doing too much and taking on too many roles. And I’m not gonna say delegation and get into a whole, you know, that’s a whole other subsection of, of time management. But the idea that they’re doing everything, they’re the administrator, they’re the marketing, they’re the biller, they’re this, they’re the that. And how many hats can you really wear and get away with? I don’t think you can wear more than maybe three hats.
Amy Gardner [11:00]
Yeah, I think one of the certainly this is where we should do the plug that everyone should listen to kids episode.
Steve Fretzin [11:05]
Right back from April. Yeah,
Amy Gardner [11:08]
yes. There you go get get on that right away. But I do you think that we also have lots of things on our to do list that just shouldn’t be there? Right. So I often tell clients, take your to do list and look at first, what can you eliminate, right, because frankly, if you just keep copying something over from day to day, at this point, you’re not going to get it done, or do you really need to write no one has passed out because you didn’t get that thing done months later, after telling yourself to do it. So at some point, just let it go. So first is to eliminate it, then is to look at what you can automate. Because there are lots and lots of things that you can automate, I was just talking with Bridget for my copy about how you can automate your records retrieval, right, like there are lots of things that you can automate. And then the third thing is to look at whether some of the things on your to do list can be delegated. And then something that I often recommend, and that I use a lot is if I have something on my to do list that I’m putting off, I will then trade it with someone else. And so that might be with your significant other that might be with a colleague, might be with your kids, look at ways you can get somebody else to do for you that’s on your to do list. And stop thinking about it as my to do list is like it’s not written in stone, often, there are things that you can eliminate, automate delegate, or trade to take some of the pressure off.
Steve Fretzin [12:26]
And the thing I would add about about to do lists, and this is a great one from from the famous walhampton, he’s been on the show a couple of times time mastery is you know, not everything on your to do list is is has the same import, it’s, you know, there are things that are 10 out of 10 need to get done must get done have to get done. And there’s a bunch that are or maybe not to your point, Amy. So what can we you know, put at the top of the list and knockout and what can we defer delegate get rid of drop whatever and not deal with, because at the end of the day, you know, we’re they’re not all created equal. So the other thing I want to mention is is and I’m just shifting gears back to something you said a moment ago, what do you think are like the top two or three automations that lawyers should be looking into when they want to do necessarily shameless plugs for specific companies, although we can because we have you know those tendencies and but what are the kind of the two or three automations that you feel like are game changers for lawyers that are maybe running their own show?
Amy Gardner [13:28]
So I do think that it depends on the lawyer in terms of what they dread. Right? So Michael Hyatt talks a lot about what’s in your drudgery zone. And so there are things like there are things that if you love going to the grocery store forever, or for example, then you probably Instacart setting up automatic Instacart orders may not be a great thing for you, because you’re losing something you enjoy, right? On the other hand, for many of us, you know, automating some of those life tasks, whether it’s, you know, having a dry cleaner, always come on a certain day to pick things up or your grocery order or whatever that can be helpful. I do think, to you look at what needs to be done more than, say twice a month. And what’s what the payoff is. So if it’s something where, you know, you have to do something twice a month, it takes you five minutes a time, that’s gonna be different deal than us example of records retrieval, right? How long does it take you to get medical records? Right? How long does it take your team to get medical records, that might be a good thing to outsource. I also want to make the point to that. I don’t think a lot of lawyers realize how many of their colleagues and other lawyers have figured out ways to automate and delegate some of these tasks. So for example, I have a client who is a partner at a major law firm in Texas. And he and his wife hired a virtual assistant to do some of their personal tasks. And that’s something that he’s not advertising, right. The only reason I know what it’s because I suggested it to him has Yeah, working on his, you know, his career development and his rest of his life. And so I I think some of it is that sometimes we have this shame around getting help, whether it’s through automation or delegation. And I know that the people that you’re across the table from at the negotiation, they probably are using some of these resources. And there’s no shame in that. I mean, I have clients who have people who come in and do all their cooking once a week. Yeah, right. And that’s not something they’re, they’re advertising, but that’s sort of automating their meal prep.
Jordan Ostroff [15:22]
Yeah. legalese marketing is not your traditional marketing vendor. Instead, we’re a true fractional cmo that helps you save time and spend your money the right way to build a practice of your dreams. We help through the entire process, from customizing your intake system to driving leads, and even getting more reviews afterwards, schedule your free call at legalese marketing.com.
[15:45]
Hi, I’m Steph from Moneypenny. We’re trusted by leading law firms and attorneys to answer calls virtually professionally and brilliantly. Our high tech receptionist service enables us to route calls to your team’s wherever they’re working. And even recognize and prioritize calls based on whether they’re a repeat caller, a new client or a VIP. Claim your exclusive partner rates and Free Trial by quoting Fretzin today.
Steve Fretzin [16:14]
So I think personally, on the personal side, and the business side, there’s a lot of stuff that can be outsourced that can be automated, the one that really has clicked for me more, maybe more than any has been integrations with law Maddix. And in my acuity scheduling system, where now I’ve got specific links, follow up links, networking links, client scheduling links, podcast links, that automatically take people to my calendar, they fill out a form based on the type of meeting and like all the back and forth of let’s get together a me and how about grabbing lunch, or let’s grab a zoom, and then you tell me dates, and then I tell you dates and we go back and forth, if you’re doing that three, four times a day with different people, clients and others, that can take a half an hour or more a day, in some cases an hour, and then the back and forth, and the follow up and remembering. So that that automation alone, for me has been a game changer. And I know that there’s a lot of different I mean, I was at the ABA tech show all these different automations for doc review and ediscovery. And even I had milestones on here talking about how in a personal injury case, they have automations that that give updates to their clients, to your clients about how the case is, well, that’s gonna save a lot of not only time, but also the potential challenge of why haven’t you communicated with me? What’s going on in the case? While because I’m busy and I forgot.
Amy Gardner [17:32]
Right? That’s not the client wants to hear they were forgotten because the lawyers doing more important, right,
Steve Fretzin [17:36]
or sorry about that, and how many times you’re gonna apologize. So I think it’s just so critical to automate everything we can I mean, even I’ve got this remarkable too. And I’ve been advertising this on my show for I don’t know, a year plus now. No kickbacks from them at all. Very disappointing. Yes. But I mean, I used to have posted notes everywhere, I used to have files everywhere. I have nothing, there’s nothing around, I have nothing around it. And it’s amazing because that that automation, that technology has been an absolute blessing in how I keep organized and how I backup all my files and my client information. So anyway, off on a tangent, Amy. But you know, I think I think we’re on the same page that we just need to look at solutions to get to get our time under control.
Amy Gardner [18:23]
So and I think a great way to go about that is just asking people that you work with, I heard about remarkable, actually, from someone on a networking meeting, and she was talking about it. Stacy Khan is a big fan. Yeah. And so I think some of it is just asking, so you are also running a law firm, what is making it easier for you, you are also an associate at a big law firm? How are you? What are the things that you find most helpful for you? Because when people have figured out some of these things are usually happy to share. And it makes it easier for all of us. Right? And you may not adopt every single thing that someone suggests, but it gets you thinking about Hmm, I wonder if maybe I could use a virtual assistant? Yeah, maybe I could get rid of some of the post it notes all over the place.
Steve Fretzin [19:05]
There’s also a bunch of Facebook groups for lawyers too. So you know, you can ask questions and get a large group of 510 1000 attorneys, you know, responding on things. You’re like, Oh my God, I didn’t even know that technology existed. And here’s a bunch of people raving about it, and how much time it saved them. Well, you know, that’s gonna change your life, possibly, you know, if you can, if you can execute on it and install it, and you know, and use it. Let me ask you, though, out of everything that you kind of work on with attorneys. Is there one strategy for overwhelmed attorneys that helps them get their time under control? Maybe more than anything else?
Amy Gardner [19:41]
I think Well, we already talked about looking at your to do list with a critical eye and thinking through what do I really need to be doing on this list? I think another thing is that’s really helpful and I know this is gonna sound nuts and people are going to be ready to throw, I don’t know, tomatoes at their iPhone or whatever. so hear me out. And that’s to track your time and I think as a attorneys always think, Oh, I took my time, right and I do in six minute or 15 minute increments. But the reality is, is that study after study after study shows that we don’t really know where our time is going. And so looking at where your time is actually going, particularly in the non work hours, but even during the day time hours, can really help you see, where you could be saving some time and what you don’t need to be doing. I actually have done this, I’ve, for years, I did this with my team, and I supervise nine different people. And at one point, I may have shared it to you in the past, Steve, I found that multiple people out of those nine, were checking the mail multiple times each day. Yeah, and checking the mail was a project that resulted like it required going across the building. And you know, it’s like a 20 minute task. And there were days where I had an hour of team time was being taken by checking the mail, which was totally unnecessary, right. So some of it is you see these things where you know, the proverbial check in the mail kind of stuff is going on. But also it helps you I think, feel more control in your and over your time. And Laura Vander cam has done research on this had 1000s 10s of 1000s of people do it. And she inevitably finds that we underestimate how much we sleep, we overestimate how much we work, all kinds of things about how we view time, we can figure out a little off by by doing this exercise of tracking your time for one.
Steve Fretzin [21:18]
Yeah, so So you take a piece of paper, you write it at the top, you know, 7am at the bottom, 7pm. And you just track what you’re doing every 15 minutes and find yourself shopping on Amazon, you find yourself, Oh, I’ve got a scheduled haircut, or I’ve got to go, you know, I’m going to do the mail or, you know, whatever it is you’re doing, you realize there might be an hour or two a day, maybe even more, that’s completely ridiculous as it relates to being productive. And I try to get my clients to focus on two things, billing hours, and growing business. And I feel like if it’s outside of those two things, a lot of it can be you know, knocked on or or put away or given away or whatever. Because
Amy Gardner [21:58]
I would Yeah, I would just add that. And you really want to go until you go to bed. Right? Because Okay, I have a client where just the other day I had to do this exercise. And, um, he is the managing partner of, I would say probably at 500 Lawyer law firm, right. So this is somebody who has a lot of responsibility, and discover that he’s watching about his estimate was that he thought he watched about one hour of TV a day. Turns out, he’s watching more like three. And that is not bad, if that is how he wants to spend his time. But when his concern is he doesn’t have time for his hobbies and things you’d rather be doing. Discovering that you’re watching 21 hours of TV a week can be eye opening. So it’s not to judge yourself, it’s just to see is this is this where I want to be spending my time am I putting in enough time to do the billing that I want to do and to do the client development and the rest of life? I want to be doing?
Steve Fretzin [22:46]
Yeah. And I want to reference an article that I wrote in the Chicago Daily law bulletin in April that essentially was saying, like, I’m talking to a client named Ryan, and he has so much business coming in. And this is happening to a lot of lawyers right now. absolutely overwhelmed with the number of of new clients in business that’s happening billable hours. And then where does the business development come in? And I said, Alright, Ryan, I know you missed the class. No problem. Let’s talk, let’s take 15 minutes. And let’s talk about what’s going on with all this business. Well, what I identified is that a, he’s trying to learn a new area of law, because he has business coming in in an area that he doesn’t focus on. That was stupid, and that had to go. So he immediately agreed with me and said, Yeah, who can I who can I farm this out to because I’m not going to learn, you know, real estate law on, you know, the 10 hours, and it’s going to take to even scratch the surface. Another thing we figured out is when you’re busy, raise your rates. If you’re not getting any pushback on your rates, and you’re at 375 an hour, move it to 400 Guess what, still no push back. And now you’re making an extra 25 an hour for all these hours that you’re billing. And, you know, again, if you’re a good lawyer, you got to understand what you’re really worth and what the value is and what the rates in the marketplace are. And the other one was delegation, you know, he was doing a ton of estate planning work. That was low level paralegal work. So I connected him with a paralegal outsourcing paralegal resource. And he’s in the works to try to find a good paralegal and he can handle a full time, because he has that much work that he’s doing, that he really shouldn’t be doing. It’s really low level, document review type work. So this is the kind of stuff that we have to look back and reflect on when you track your time, all the things that you that you probably shouldn’t be doing, especially if you’re an experienced attorney.
Amy Gardner [24:35]
Absolutely. And I think that you raise such a good point too, which is I often use the expression which I did not come up with to be clear to a worm and horseradish, the world is horseradish, and we get so in the muck of our day to day that when you have somebody like a Steve Fretzin come in and look at it. You can say like, Well, Ryan, no, don’t spend 10 hours learning a new area of law that you’re not even interested in and only one client for whatever the case is right? So you can be so helpful to have somebody else so whether Have that again as an accountability buddy or somebody else or a paid resource, then it can be really valuable. There’s a book that I really like called drop the ball by Tiffany de feu, and it is about her career and as well as time management, and she gives the example of she used to spend whenever she was getting a babysitter for her two kids, she would call a babysitter, wait to hear back, call the next babysitter, wait to hear back. And so it could take her days to line up a babysitter for Saturday night, versus her husband took it over. And he did a group text with six babysitters and said, hey, you know, I need a babysitter for Friday night, seven o’clock paying this much. First one to respond gets the work. Yeah. And it’s because he came in with a different approach, right? You didn’t assume that needed to be done this way. And all of a sudden getting babysitters much easier. So some of it is being open to new ideas and bringing in help but people with fresh perspective.
Steve Fretzin [25:53]
Yeah, that’s, that’s great. And again, you know, we all just have to get creative with how we do things today. Now more than ever, because the world is changing and evolving, and we need to stay stay in front of it as best we can. So kind of like wrapping things up a little bit before we get to Game Changing books, any kind of final thoughts or tips or ideas on how to be efficient with with time management time, mastery.
Amy Gardner [26:19]
I think the one key thing is to remember, again, it’s not about just trying to do more and faster. Why are you doing these things, you’re trying to build a business, you’re trying to build a life, whatever it is you’re trying to do. That’s really the aim. And by just throwing more on your to do list and trying to do it more quickly, you’re not going to get there. So really look at what you’re doing, what you need to be doing, what you don’t need to be doing. And then again, look get on top of where your time is going. And then one last strategy that I think can be a game changer to as if we often. And I see this all the time with busy lawyers, we schedule five days of the week. And then Saturday and Sunday, we just throw in leftovers, right, the leftover work and maybe I’ll go to the kids soccer game, and oh, yeah, I should meal plan, whatever it is, instead, start viewing Saturday and Sunday as extensions of your week and how you’re going to plan your time. And I’m not saying do more work on Saturday and Sunday. I’m saying go into the weekend with a plan. Because when you do that, all of a sudden, you can be much more intentional with how you’re spending those two days a week, rather than just using them as that recovery time. Yeah. And that really helped you build a more full life.
Steve Fretzin [27:28]
And I don’t know if if I came up with this. Probably I stole it. But did you have the week or the week have you? Right, and I I’m gonna take credit that I made that up, but I’m sure I didn’t sounds good to me. Yep, I’ll trademark that today. Amy, that book that you had submitted to me, I think it’s 168 hours. And is that by your friend Laura Vander cam
Amy Gardner [27:50]
Yeah, I wish you were my friend. But yeah, Laura Vander cam has some great books. She started off a lot of them were really focused on women, particularly moms. But I have found great strategies from her books for really any anybody who’s busy. And she has several that are newer as well. One of her newer ones is called the new corner office. But she has she has a great strategies and all of her books, and they’re great to listen to on Audible while you do other things, too.
Steve Fretzin [28:16]
Yeah, at the end of the day, you know, like I said, Do you have the week or the week have you, you know, we we learn how to be marketers or we learn how to be lawyers, we learn how to be dentists, you know, whatever the profession is, but we’re not learning how to be great time managers or great time master masters. And I think the problem with that is that it’s hard to then do the job or profession that you want to do when you really have no when you’re just winging it all the time. So that’s really why these books and what you and I do and what Keith does, so critical because we can’t get to the to the good stuff, until we get other things under control and start dictating how things are going to be. And that’s challenging, but it is a learned skill. It’s not something people are born with, for sure.
Amy Gardner [29:00]
No, and I think you have to just appreciate that your life and your business are worth that investment of time and resources whether it’s you know, picking up on a Steve’s books or picking up an alarm and or Guinness books, whatever the topic is, or working with a coach or someone else, you really are worth it. And you don’t have to live in this frenzied stressed out state you can be a successful lawyer and still not arrive to meetings stressed out and sweaty and panicky.
Steve Fretzin [29:25]
But get get the help. That’s the that’s the real the real thing. I mean, anything you want to be great at doing. There’s someone that has already done it, there’s someone that’s better than you that can help you along the way whether that’s coming out of a book or an individual person or videos that you watch, there’s there’s you just have to be interested in it and then you have to know that it’s something that’s going to benefit you if you put the time in and focus. Amen people want to get in touch with you to learn more about your business apochromatic Or about you know, just as to, you know, reach out to you for help, what’s the best way for them to get in touch
Amy Gardner [29:58]
or so on LinkedIn is great. And if you message me on LinkedIn, actually, we do have a time tracker, I can send you if you want to use that. And I’d be remiss to if I didn’t mention that we do have a series of roundtables for folks who lead teams, and where we talk about things like the last executive roundtable session was really focused on conflict in the workplace. And if you lead a team are interested in that you can sign up for an invitation at apo signup.com/forum. Because we curate those to make sure it’s a great discussion. So if that’s something you’re interested in, check that out. But we’re always glad to connect on LinkedIn and provide whatever resources I can.
Steve Fretzin [30:32]
Yep. And we’ll have more information about Amy in the show notes. Amy, thanks so much for being a two timer on my show. I mean, that in the nicest jacket or like, someone actually inquired about that, I think it might be a five time or like seven out live or something. But I’m gonna have to do this for a long time before I get someone to five. But, you know, listen, always a pleasure. You’ve been nothing but gracious and thoughtful, and a great friend and a great partner, for me and for my legal community. So thanks again. Just so appreciate you.
Amy Gardner [31:02]
Yeah. Thank you. Yeah, they’re fantastic. So it means a lot coming from you know,
Steve Fretzin [31:07]
all right. Listen, this love fest. Hey, everybody, listen, thank you for spending time with me and I, again, if you didn’t get a couple of good takeaways and some next steps, you’re probably sleeping through the show. This is an opportunity for you to really be reflective and go back and look at how you’re managing your time how you’re managing your practice your firm, and really take seriously that without a plan. It’s a plan to fail there you heard it. Be well be safe. Be that lawyer. We’ll talk again soon. Take care everybody.
Narrator [31:41]
Thanks for listening to be that lawyer, life changing strategies and resources for growing a successful law practice. Visit Steve’s website fretzin.com. For additional information, and to stay up to date on the latest legal business development and marketing trends. For more information and important links about today’s episode, check out today’s show notes