Lessons in Leadership, Resilience and Authenticity in Law with Mediator Damien Van Brunschot - S9E28

0:00Like many lawyers, I was very much first about servicing the client and then I realised that unless I became a leader of people, I wasn't going to scale. One of the lessons that jump out at you is the importance of persistence and an open mindset in law and just keeping on going. A year ago, I set up a business as a mediator, so I specialised in conflict resolution and leadership coaching. So I've led traditional practice, but really excited by this new chapter in terms of my contribution to, I suppose, the development of skills, leadership skills in law and professional services, and also conflict resolution.

0:36On today's Legally Speaking podcast, I'm delighted to be joined by Damian Van Bronshu. Damian is the owner and principal consultant of Evolve Resolve, leveraging his own expertise in mediation and leadership coaching. He co-founded, led and scaled boutique firm MBM Legal, later Caden Boris. Damien is the former managing partner of DWF Australia from 2020 to 2024. He has been named by the Doyle's Guide as one of the best lawyers in Australia, specializing in workers' compensation and respiratory diseases. Damien is passionate about the legal space and professional services, passing on his expertise to those in the trenches.

1:15He also recently launched his own podcast, The Resolution Room. So a very big warm welcome to the show, Damien. Great to be with you, Rob. Oh, it's an absolute pleasure. And I understand we're recording with yourself in London today. And before we get into absolutely everything you've been getting up to over the years in and around the world of law, we do have a customary icebreaking question here on the Legally Speaking podcast, which is on the scale of one to 10, with 10 being very real, what would you rate the hit tv series suits in terms of its reality of the law if you've seen it i'm not an avid watcher rob uh but i've come and gone from it uh i would say two i think it doesn't it's not at all reflective of the law in australia sadly it's far less glamorous and far less exciting and far more of a discipline but it's it's good tv yeah they're justified too and with that we can move swiftly on to talk all about your real legal career and everything you're getting up to So to begin with, Damian, would you mind telling our listeners a bit about your background and career journey?

2:16Sure. Well, could that be with you, Rob? So basically, I'm an insurance lawyer by trade, so to speak. I studied in Brisbane and have been a practitioner there as an insurance lawyer and then subsequently a managing partner of DWF. Before that, I actually started a law firm with a partner that we merged with DWF. So we became the first Australian business within the DWF stable in terms of legal business. There was a claims business before. And recently, well, a year ago, I set up a business as a mediator. So I specialize in conflict resolution and leadership coaching. So I've left traditional practice, but really excited by this new chapter in terms of my contribution to, I suppose, the development of skills, leadership skills in law and professional services and also conflict resolution.

3:07Yeah, absolutely. That's a summary of 30 years. and I love it how you you were able to do that so precisely but obviously we're going to unpack some of that as we go along the journey as well let's let's go back to the the beginning part though in terms of what inspired you to get a career in law in the first place well I'm a humanities student and I think as a humanities student it's I was it was an accidental choice as these things often are I really enjoyed um history and arts and law is a humanitarian discipline and I guess I had no family in the law um but I thought this sounds like a credible way to contribute and um I didn't really enjoy studying it much but I actually weirdly enjoyed the practice of it more so that's which is a bit unusual not um so it was it was more a case of uh just a really good career that opened up lots of doors was probably my thinking at the time and a nice mix with a political science degree back in when I was 17 18.

4:01Yeah and look you went on to achieve great things so you know one of the things as part of your journey um I understand you were named one of the best lawyers in australia by the doyles guide specializing in workers compensation and indeed respiratory diseases could you share your journey of specializing in these areas with us yeah i think that was a really um i consider myself an insurance lawyer um but as is often the case you sort of follow large clients and i was fortunate enough early in my career to uh win work for a large statutory compensation insurer so does all workers compensation claims in the state in which I practice.

4:37And my career sort of tracked with that client as we grew that client and grew a team around it. And respiratory disease is just a particularly interesting and niche area of law, which I enjoyed. In Queensland, where I practiced, there was lots of problems associated with stone bench tops and silicosis. And before that, I did asbestos and mesothelioma. So that was a really great contribution that I felt I could make in terms of assisting this state fund in in advising and helping them navigate a really complex field with often lots of parties and some legal complexity so I really enjoyed that so yeah it's a sort of a when I talk when I look at my specialty in compensation I've done broad insurance work not just compensation but the workers comp was basically a feature of the largest client I had in my books which I modeled built the business around it's fair to say very entrepreneurial and when we were researching your background it was just fascinating some of the niches within niches and specialisms and complexities of what you've done that were like we just have to speak to Damien because it's really interesting and obviously going on to leading huge firms as well so I want to talk about dust diseases tribunal because that'll be the first on the show because you're selected as an expert for claims in this which is a very niche area can you tell our listeners what being part of that tribunal actually involved and are there any memorable cases over the years that you're particularly able to share with us?

6:01Sure the Dusto-Zees' Tribunal is I was a solicitor who did that work so basically it's a niche tribunal that was set up in Australia when James Hardy sort of exploded if you like. The New South Wales government set up a tribunal which was specialized to hear these types of cases with specialized judicial minds set up and really it was a very useful way of streamlining cases remember people with mesothelioma sometimes have eight to 12 months to live so it was a unique australian carve out and i really love being a part of it so it was really about getting quick fair expeditious hearings and it even had in place certain presumptions that broke down some of the contestability on various issues so um in terms of interesting cases I wasn't actually, I got close to running them, a lot of them settled actually which I'm grateful for because you don't want to run them unless you have to but it was a great jurisdiction and it's a very specialised unique jurisdiction in Australia and I think it's done a really good job at getting fair and quick compensation and even though it's New South Wales it often works in areas all along the east coast as the go-to jurisdiction if I can call it that.

7:23Very much so and again thank you for giving us some insight to that and just the you know again people thinking about careers in law and where there are specialization areas and things that you can getting involved with and you co-founded your own firm of the MVM Legal I believe and that was specializing in insurance fraud investigation workplace practices and mediation services. You scaled the firm and oversaw its merger, I think, too, with a global law firm such as DWF. So could you tell us the biggest lessons you've learned from building and scaling a firm? Yeah, heaps of lessons. I think one of the lessons that jump out at you is the importance of persistence and an open mindset in law and just keeping on going.

8:06Really lessons around, like many lawyers, was very much first about servicing the client. And then I realized that unless I became a leader of people, I wasn't going to scale. So I was late to that party in terms of really developing the skill set of leading and inspiring people. But lessons along the way include, you know, don't hire friends. Make sure you really, I think that's a hard lesson that some of us have learned in scale up world. Friendships were lost. The important lesson of providing a really good environment for people to prosper. the absolute centrality of culture, the importance of how you turn up as a leader to the workplace, how you shape tone and culture, and how really the greatest challenge in leadership, not so similar to parenting, is actually trying to become the best version of yourself.

8:56That was a big lesson. The importance of stepping away from a legal mindset in the sense that sometimes it holds you back as a business builder. what I'm saying by that is to build business you need to be quite experimented an experimenter in your mindset you're prepared to fail and to try things um and particularly in marketing and building a brand and of course that's the very thing that lawyers we hate to do you know we hate to fail uh are we and we are really afraid of trying things out so that was a really important lesson as well the importance of uh being open and being a bit of an experimenter in terms of trying things out in the market but really the success of the law firm um was really a feature of the people um and i guess the skills that myself and others learned about in providing a place where people could be their best prosper and perform um so yeah thanks for that question rob that we could go on forever about those lessons no it's so many nuggets you put in there you create an environment where people can not only survive but thrive and i think you make a really good point about friends and business.

10:09You know, I've made mistakes in the past myself. And, you know, my advice to people, if you're thinking of starting a business is if you're co-founding with a friend and you have the same idea, that's great. But their values and ways of going about it in business might be different to getting to that goal and whether they align with you or not. So I think that's great. And I always say when it comes to failure, I use the acronym lose. You don't actually ever lose. It's just life offering some experience. And I think if you learn from that experience and move forward, you can be super, super powerful.

10:35And like you say you have to keep testing and adapting and moving forwards and moving forward you did as a former managing partner of DWF Australia you were appointed I think around post-COVID to stabilize and lead the Australian business into its return to growth so what initiatives did you lead to ensure that the business continued to thrive in its core areas of expertise? Yeah thanks Robby that was a tough time and it's good to mention it because there's lots of good lessons out of it as well. When I took on the role, it was patched together a bit as an operation. DWF came quickly to Australia and wanted to build revenue and team.

11:10And unfortunately, a good lesson in that is the importance of a strategic, clear underpinning, which didn't happen at the time. But there's sometimes experiments. So I had to make 80 people redundant as a decision of the global operation reasonably early so lots of lessons about being honest and transparent and doing your best to navigate that sort of difficulty and then it was about bringing us back to the core basics what made the operation successful what was the core strategic purpose of DWF what was its core cultural attributes so in a sense I became just someone who could try to weave it together to get over the uh redundancy and the market shock and to rebuild the brand as a credible place for people and careers and for clients and and that's a lot and that's not i was there for a couple of years but i was really alive to the fact that that's not a short-term process you know it takes time to do that and it takes consistency and i've left now of course but in the year that i've left they've grown again with the acquisition of the Hall & Wilcox London Markets insurance team which is a big big win so I feel that the stability that I offered in the Australian market in terms of its stability and its strategic underpinning in insurance hopefully left it in a good place to do what it's done recently and grow again so sadly I wasn't I did we did some growth but I wasn't I left before the, but I was alive to the reality that it was more, my role was about weaving it back together, getting it back to the basics and being a really solid foundation.

12:53So in that sense, it was a very important role. I mean, all businesses that succeed should really work hard on a solid foundation. and we had to go back to the drawing board at DWF as a consequence of those significant redundancies, which shut down offices, I might add, you know, on the east coast of Australia, Newcastle, Sydney and Melbourne. So it was a big change and it required a particular, I guess you could say cohesive mindset to keep the show together. Yeah, absolutely. When walls are falling down, you need to be able to stand there and, you know, really be able to have that resilience than also to be able to make good, clear decisions.

13:33And, you know, you did a great job. And, you know, I think you're being a little bit humble there because you grew the team to over 30 % following its initial right-sizing exercise. You led 160 staff members and achieved the highest employment engagement scores in the DWF global business. So, you know, there's no mean feat there. And I love that you talk very openly about having to have card conversations, having to be open, having to be transparent, and also sometimes saying, as a leader, I don't have all the answers. You know, let's try and find a way together to ideate, to try and find answers to these problems and collaborate and, you know, not necessarily put on the mask and say, I know everything.

14:07So in terms of strategies you did use to grow the firm and whilst keeping those performance rates, now you've got the benefit of hindsight. Was there one in particular that you think, yes, that was absolutely crucial or is there anything you think you wish you would have done again with hindsight and benefit? Yeah, in terms of the growth strategy, I think it's really important to be clear about what your value proposition is. I think that's really important. And I love the work of Michael Porter, who says that strategy is as much about what you don't do as what you do do. And I think that's a really important salient lesson in the DWF story.

14:43For example, the problems that went wrong were a feature of the fact that there wasn't a clear strategic underpinning. So when you build a global business in particular, you've got to be really clear about the client crossover and what areas you want to be in in a jurisdiction. So in terms of the DWF story, the strategy was to really base it around a core insurance office offering. DWF's history is 50, 60 % in insurance. It's very much got its DNA as an insurance firm. So when you're coming into a new jurisdiction, play to your strengths. I think that's another strategic lesson. Play to your strengths and be clear about where you're at in the market and why you want to do it.

15:26And in terms of the strategy around the earlier bill, before we joined DWF, the strategy when I started the business, and this is going to sound a bit trite, but the strategy was just to be open and approachable and a good place to work. because remember at the time, you know, some legal partners in Brisbane and other market had the reputation of being quite difficult and not very communicative. So the strategy was just the right cultural place to grow business and the right client alignment. But the DWF strategy, I think, in the Australian market was really about what not to do. And if you look at the mistakes made, it was trying to be all things to all people.

16:09Yeah. and I think in terms of the story of a business that's a really important lesson you know play to your strengths even in your personal life and leadership I always say to leaders because people are often interested in how do you offset some of your weakness how do you navigate it but an equally important question is just be unashamed about playing to your strengths as a person as a leader because there's a bit more bang for your buck there sometimes in playing to your strengths lean into it and our listeners we fed up of me saying it but specific is terrific the more that you can be focused and lasered in the far more successful you'll be and and again thank you for being so refreshingly open with your your journey and obviously before we come on to evolve resolve and all the great work you're getting up to i want to talk again about challenges because there will be managing partners people on the rise up to leadership within law firms listening to this and people aspiring to do so and you know you've had a whole host of challenges you know when you're managing partner of a huge firm such as DWF, particularly in Australia.

17:04How did you overcome them from a personal level? Were there any things that you were doing? Was it mentors? Was it meditation? What were some of the things you were doing to overcome challenges? Yeah, it's a really good question. It goes to the heart of the personal story. I know you can't divorce leadership from the personal story in life, in business. So a number of things. In about 2016 or thereabouts, I felt life was overwhelming me. and in fact I for a brief period went on anti-anxiety medication and I thought you know I don't want to do this I didn't see myself as someone who wanted this so I really revisited everything in my life in a way so yes I meditate clumsily and badly like all meditators but mindfulness is really important to me I run I keep myself healthy I engage socially I have a broad network of friends outside the law as well social engagement really matters so I think to overcome challenges it really goes to the heart of the ability to keep going and what works for you in terms of resilience but for me it was about a health and wellness story it's about making sure that you know you're going to have to manage stress so your ability to absorb and manage it and make the right decisions comes from a place in which you feel you're the best you can be now Now, it's never easy because, you know, you overwork and you're under sleep and at times we use too much alcohol.

18:24So it's never necessarily an easy journey, but certainly wellness was really important to me. And the other thing that became really important to me, and you said it well, is to be humble and appreciate that you don't have all the answers, that you're also learning. And I think people love that transparency. They like the idea of someone who may hold some level of authority and may have some clarity, you know, don't get stuck in paralysis, but at the same time doesn't pretend that he or she has all the answers and is authentic at that level. I think that builds connection and builds capacity. So that's kind of been my guiding light, so to speak, on the field of challenges.

19:04It's a very personal but important conversation. Today's episode is brought to you by Clio, leaders in legal tech and the team behind one of the most exciting AI launches this summer. Clio Duo is arriving this summer and it's already creating a stir. Built right into Clio Manage, Duo uses AI to help you draft emails, capture time, summarize documents automatically. It's smart, seamless and designed to save you hours every week. Find out more and see what Clio Duo can do for your firm at clio.com forward slash UK. now back to the show people are craving authentic human connection through being through pandemics you know recessions tough times global events world events because we're we're not we're not lawyers we're not legal podcast we're humans we're human first and i think you know we all have these these thoughts these feelings and these can't be um ignored and again thank you for sharing so openly about your your your journey um i want to talk about listing a legal business now because the you know the ongoing viability of listing legal businesses involves taking a law firm public or running it as a public listed entity could you talk us through your experience of this in regards to DWF well it's fair to say it was a failed experiment um and I think that's um that's that's a good way of looking at it but but I was a partner in support of the listing process it offered something new and different there's nothing fundamentally why listing couldn't work in a legal business if it's profitable it offers a good dividend stream it can be a really safe investment but it's not commonly embraced and it hasn't been particularly successful now is that a feature of the fact that there's not enough people doing it yes is it a feature of the fact that they're still over reliance on the partnership model probably is it a feature of the fact that because the market doesn't know how to judge a legal business because it's in a very narrow sector without a broad range of competitors so in the DWF story it was a perfect storm of factors that coalesced to make it an unsuccessful experiment i mean it's as you know it's been brought out by private equity now and taken off the market there's a hell of a lot of compliance and other costs that a business is fostered on which i think is making the list of business model even that's why you know private equity is looking at businesses that aren't listed often um because it provides that level of flexibility is it dead inverted commas as a business model for law and professional service i don't think so necessarily but i think its moment won't come for a while again.

21:30I could see hypothetically why it's still important because you get capital in, you can build quickly, you can invest, you can get external investors. So it's got some merits and upside, but unfortunately the downsides. The other thing about listing a business, which you've got to realize is that you have a perennial scoreboard on your business that might not reflect its true performance. And that can actually be really demotivating so it's like you're coaching the kids football and you turn in at half time and you're telling the kids they're playing the game of their lives but the kids are looking at you going doesn't feel like we're winning here Damien and I guess uh the reality of a listed business is you have a scoreboard i.e the the price the share price and so you've got to navigate the short-term ability in the long term and I think that causes a lot of conflict but in short compass rob uh yes i was grateful for the opportunity i thought i was open to the idea of being different and i liked it uh but it was a failed experiment in the case of dwf um is it dead forever i don't think so but i think it's time won't be for a while again yeah no and to my point life offering some experience right you just you know you go through these phases and you take things from it and by the end of the day if you don't try you never know and like you say is it dead who knows potentially not the time may come around again.

22:51So before we move from your DWF part, just sort of a wrap-up question on that. Reflecting on your time there, can you tell us what your role taught you about leadership? My role taught me the importance of authenticity in leadership. My role taught me the importance of creating space for people to be seen and heard, the importance of appreciation as a hallmark of culture. My role taught me the importance of being as transparent and clear as you can be. And by that, I mean, there are some things you can't sadly share, but the importance of, I guess at times what could feel like over-communicating and at times even I was, you're so busy at times I was criticised for not communicating and clarity of vision and purpose.

23:35And I guess another lesson to weave it all together is what we spoke about, Rob, which was the importance of a solid strategic underpinning. What did you say? Specific is terrific. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, there you go. So that's kind of, they're some of the key lessons that jump out at me. And I guess for anyone on a leadership path, and I hope a lot of our listeners are, it is a tremendous opportunity to learn a lot about yourself and what makes you tick and what's important to people. So I think it's a terrific part of the process. And as lawyers, we often don't give it enough thought and attention because we're too busy in the world of servicing clients and being a lawyer.

24:18Doing the doing. Doing the doing. As Mentor says, grow as you go, right? And I think it's so important. And I just want to hammer this point home because a lot of people sort of hear me say the same thing time and time again on the show about certain things. But it's so true. If you confuse people, you lose people. If they don't understand what they're doing or your clients don't understand what you're doing, then forget it. You're going to be irrelevant. It's not going to work. And when it comes to communication, it's better to be clear than it is to be clever. Forget the corporate masking. Just direct people.

24:44be clear and they'll appreciate it. It may not be what they want to hear, but it's what they need to hear. And I feel like sometimes people try to over confuse, try to be wishy-washy. If you can be clear rather than trying to be clever, you'll be a lot more trust from clients and indeed your people. So I love that. That is so true. And let's talk quickly about that trust. Trust is at the paramount of client relationship and workplace relationship. And that's a game of clarity, as you say, and it develops over time. I love the notion that trust is like a reputation. It can be lost fairly quickly, but it's built over time and it's built through very much clarity and doing what you say you're going to do.

25:23Let's stick with some advice from you though, because you've shared a lot about your story thus far and you've been able to grow a boutique firm and led a global one. What advice would you give to lawyers considering maybe the shift from traditional practice to management and ultimately entrepreneurship? I think they're very different skill sets and I think it's important that people embrace the creativity of an entrepreneurial life even in law and I'm a big believer in I mean for me my story in law was one of entrepreneurship as much about law and interestingly enough I really enjoyed my stint at DWF but it wasn't for me being part of a bit you know and here I am again on the startup story so for me entrepreneurship is important feature of my life story probably as much as being a lawyer is in many ways but they're very different skill sets I mean first of all you've got to obviously develop the skills technically to be a good lawyer but the skill of building business and being an entrepreneurship being an entrepreneur is a very different skill and it's really about meeting the market and understanding the market and building capacity around you um and um and that's it that's a terrific but a difficult story and it's not for every and it's not for everyone and that's okay it's not everyone no and i think that's an important point isn't it because you you'll see online as well you know this that and the other go and do this go and do that but some people maybe are fantastic within an organization that's right entrepreneurs and can be highly successful and go out and create and just thrive off having that little bit more support system or structure around them.

27:01But those who do choose to go out there and do it, obviously, you know, good luck to them, I say. And with that, we should talk about Evolve Resolve, because you've been leveraging 20 years of experience in mediating disputes and claims. And now, as you mentioned at the intro piece, coaching to support the difficulties that come with corporate leadership and indeed organizational development. So please, could you tell us a little bit more about Evolve Resolve? Thanks, Rob. A good opportunity. so basically it's twofold it's a mediation leadership coaching and program business um i've just had the privilege i'm sitting here with you talking in a very warm london day but i've just been to harvard for a mediation intensive which was a terrific experience to broadly miss a mediation has it has its heart conflict resolution and it's a lot more applicable to leadership than you would think because it's the ability to really understand various perspectives and understand people and what motivates them that goes to the heart of good leadership.

27:58So in a sense, if you look at what Evolve Resolve was due, the broad compass that weaves it all together, if you like, is conflict resolution. So in much of my coaching work, I talk with leaders about how to manage people, how to bring out the best in people, how to have the hard conversations, how to motivate and inspire people. And of course, the mediator's role as a senior lawyer is getting practitioners often, but not always. I do workplace and other disputes to try to see if there's any common ground, to see what we can agree on, narrow the issues potentially, and hopefully if circumstances permit, achieve a resolution.

28:35So the business is, I'm not sure if it's a business that is as capable of scaling as a law firm because it's very much, mediation is very much a personal services offering. It's very much about your expertise and position, but the leadership coaching is um perhaps something that we can and programs is something that we could look to over time um the the other key issue in leadership in the market i'm in is convincing lawyers in particular that they that they should they need and should pay for this help uh which is as much the challenge as having the conversations and you know i always when when it comes to things like this i always try to get people to frame it in a sporting context you look at any successful tennis player, any successful golfer, they've always had a coach.

29:22They've always had someone there to help them, to get the best out of them, to guide them, to give them that nugget of wisdom. And I think it's the same in your career. It's the number one thing you invest the most amount of time in, the amount of hours in your whole life doing. You should be at your sharpest throughout. And leadership is so, so important. And the work that you're doing is so, so important. And let's talk about a key area then, because the ongoing work that you're doing is a voice for professional services leadership. So what obstacles do you often face when in leadership and in a managerial position that you've seen time and time again that you want to get out there for, again, for people listening to this that might be in those situations?

30:00Yeah, I think one of the largest obstacles you face is just the time pressures that you face. It's often in the relentlessness of, say, legal services where the incentives are such that you have to meet very key client demands and expectations and you don't have the time you need to dedicate yourself to the bigger picture, the strategic picture, the business development, the people development and you get stuck in a comfort zone because the clients pay the bills and you think that that's where you need to be but actually where you really need to be is not in that space necessarily or not just solely in that place so most of the obstacles you have with people in the law is just the relentless nature of and the the high financial pressure means that they often put on the back burner really important issues that will actually go to the heart of them succeeding um so it's kind of the paradox that you need to confront uh the very thing the old you know the whole thing in leadership is what gets you here won't get you there so that book that marsh i think marshall Goldsmith, I can't remember, wrote.

31:08And it goes to that heart that what gets you there, the good technical client problem solved, people often stop there and plateau there. And so what I'm trying to help people with is understand that it's a separate skill now to become a legal leader, that those skills you develop as a technician, albeit important, aren't at the heart of what it takes to motivate and bring people with you. A good example is amongst lawyers, I think another obstacle is a tendency towards perfectionism, which can spill over to micromanagement of people, which will demotivate people around you quite significantly.

31:45So, yeah, those are some of the key obstacles that I face. And it goes back to the point that I made in my leadership work. It's about convincing people, inverted commas, that they do need this help. And the analogy makes a good one. We, you know, all teams have really important coaching and we have mentors. What we often need is sometimes the importance of a mentor outside your organization. I've certainly had mentors and friends outside of law more in business. In fact, I've actively sought them out because that's been, my curious mindset has been more about, I've dealt with a lot of great lawyers.

32:21I know what that looks like. But my curiosity has been more about what does good business leadership look like? What does building a business look like? So coaching is really a great skill in that space for people just to be reflective a bit and get out of the hurly-burly, get out of the day-to-day and to take a bird's-eye view of their life, their career and their story. And I love that word curiosity. It's so important. And having that growth mindset. And I talk a lot about your 360 board of directors and your horizontal and vertical mentors, people beneath you, to the side of you, above you, different areas, different sectors, bringing different opinions because you can formulate a view.

32:58And you might just get a nugget from wisdom from outside of the legal world that just could actually transfer nicely into, we talk about transferable skills, but transferable mentors, all of that I love. And you're right, the comfort zone is good, but nothing ever grows there. And as I always say to people who can scale their business or go to a new level, new level, new devil, you have to expect that there's going to be new things you need to overcome. and challenges your way. And you're touching on it there that there's new skills that need to be acquired as you go on this journey. So in your experience, what are the top three traits needed to be a strong leader?

33:27Okay, first of all, it's important to know who you are. So don't try to be anything who you're not. I think people respect your authenticity and you're building trust. So this notion that you need to be charismatic and extroverted, it's not actually true necessarily. You can build credibility and trust. So I think really important to know who you are. secondly is to uh be open to change and really understand what motivates yourself and people around you and i'm just going to throw a third out there which i think is consistent with the first uh and that's to play to your strengths and to bring people with you that are better and smarter at you in the areas that you are weak and make sure they have a voice at the table and they're around and not only a voice but they're around the table to begin with which is an equally important factor.

34:12So yeah, those are the three that just jump out at me in this conversation, Rob. And they're so important, aren't they? If you can just get comfortable with being uncomfortable and being your true authentic self, because maybe you haven't been in the world of work because you feel like you've needed to put on this. I think you'll connect with people on such a different level. And, you know, aside from all of this stuff that you've been doing, you know, running huge law firms running businesses you still find time which impresses me to give back to the community so in 2022 and 2023 you also run the london and new york marathons i believe raising over twenty thousand dollars for projects you also volunteer for non-profit organizations so please tell us more about your volunteering role and your reason for giving back to the community yeah thanks rob Bob, you've done your research.