How to Build and Scale a Fast-Growing Law Firm: Lessons from an 8-Figure Entrepreneur, RJon Robins | The Big Success Podcast

0:00What do you want in this world because it's actually easier to get what you want than it is to get what you'll settle for You'll go get it. You'll go do it. You'll go make it happen. Arjon Robbins, he's the man living with no apologies, no excuses, no regrets. I went home that day and decided what would happen if I just made no more excuses. And bam, my income literally tripled right there. I've lost count of how many businesses I've taken to multiple seven and into the multiple eight figures. Arjon Robbins is going to take us on a journey today from his story of failure right through to massive success.

0:33Understanding your success the Arjan Robbins way. Arjan, what is your definition or version of success? The definition that we use in our business starts with the premise that your business is there to serve your life. Your life is not there to serve your business. And so we define a successful business as a business that's serving you in at least three ways. One, it has to serve you financially, has to give you enough income to live the way you want to live, which I can circle back to that in a minute because I pose this question to tens of thousands of entrepreneurs. Some of the most highly educated people on the planet, and they almost universally misunderstand that question to their great detriment.

1:23But number one is the business has to serve you financially and give you enough income to live the way you want to live, not the way you're willing to settle for, not based on all the things you can do without, not I only need this or I don't need that. It's how do you really want to live your life financially? Second is the business has to serve you personally. Make millions of dollars a year, but you've got no life. You don't have any time, energy to enjoy the fruits of your labor. I don't consider that to be a successful business. And third is you got to be able to make a positive impact on the world.

2:01If your business is not going to help you make a positive impact on the world in some way, shape or form. I've worked with too many thousands and probably into the tens of thousands of business owners to this point. I know from experience that if your business isn't serving you in at least these three ways, it's just not going to work for you. And so that's where our definition of a successful business comes from. So let's circle back to that first point then around the financials. What is the question you ask everyone? So this is how I normally present the question. I normally say, I'm going to ask you a question, and I'm going to tell you explicitly the question I'm not asking you.

2:47And then inevitably, every single time I do this, and we're talking about for the last 15 years, I've been standing in front of audiences and clients and mastermind groups and you name it. Almost everyone always answers the question that I'm specifically asking them not to answer. So the question that I'm not asking you is, what can you get by on? I'm not asking you for a list of what you can do without. I'm not asking you for what you'll settle for. I'm not asking you for all the things you can make do with. I'm asking you, how do you want to be living your life? What home do you want to provide for your family?

3:33What car do you want to be driving? What kind of vacations do you want to be taking? What kind of domestic services do you want to employ? What kind of education do you want to provide your children? What do you want? Because the way you make a profit and the way you make money in this world is by adding value to people's lives. And so if I want to live in a home that costs$5 million versus I want to live in a home that costs$500 ,000, I have to help 10 times more people. I have to create 10 times more value in this world to afford the$5 million home versus if I'm just willing to settle for living in the$500 ,000 home.

4:24So it's really about focusing on what do you want in this world because it's actually easier to get what you want than it is to get what you'll settle for. Why? Why? Because I love this subject and I think it's really important. Why is it easier to get what you want than what you'll settle for? Because you're inspired, because you're motivated, because you're driven, because you'll take all your excuses and you'll shove them up your ass. You'll go get it. You'll go do it. You'll go make it happen because I want it. Oh, you know what? That doesn't really motivate me. I could take it or leave it.

4:59I don't really care. Whatever. I'm not going to be willing to push myself and cut through all the bullshit to get what I'm about. But if I really want it, I'll rise. It'll cause me to vibrate at a higher frequency. It'll cause me to be more resourceful, more determined, more creative, more innovative, more committed. It'll force me to be a better version of myself to get what I want. And since getting what I want requires me to help more people, there's a lot more people who are better off when I get what I want than everyone who is not better off when I just settle for what I can get by with.

5:42Love it. Buddy, where in your story or in your life did you choose that success was going to be your performance standard from now on? You know, I don't know that I've ever consciously made that choice. I think that what I have chosen in my life is I don't want to get to the end of my life and feel like I didn't become the best version of myself that I could be. and so you know maybe that's driven me to be quote-unquote successful or have a successful life but to me it's all about just discovering my full potential well where did you let's go back to and I love your theory on excuses I want to expound on that did that come out through your own life through work things how did you get to that well firstly maybe explain to everyone your theory on accepting excuses and stuff.

6:47And then we'll get into how you got to it. First off, you know, what does they say? My name is Arjun Robbins. I am an excuse maker. I'm an recovering excuse maker. Right. We all make excuses sometimes. Right. And I think that's important to acknowledge because there's so many people out there who stand on stages and they get microphones put in front of them and they start acting like they're this perfect specimen of a human being who's just somehow broken free of making excuses. You know, we're not robots, we're people. So, okay. So it goes like this.

7:292006, my wife became very, very ill and she's now fully recovered. So I don't need to hear any condolences because everything's great. But back in 2006, she became very, very ill. And I had failed to follow my own advice about creating a systems driven business. I had settled for just having a practice that depended on me to do everything. And so when she became sick, I had to make a very difficult but very simple choice. The simple choice was, obviously, I'm going to make her a priority, right? Because you can always make more money. You can always build a new business. You can always get a new house.

8:14You can always get more stuff. You can't replace a person. So I took care of her because we didn't have enough income at the time to hire someone to help take care of her. And to make a very long story short, we went broke. So in 2008 or 2009, we lost our house to foreclosure. There were weeks where I was literally scrounging to buy money to buy groceries. And that's not an exaggeration. I mean, when you see what I put on my website and what I write about and my social media and whatever, that is the opposite of an exaggeration. It was actually worse than what I talk about publicly because, you know, I'm not like trying to scrounge around for sympathy and that's kind of beside the point we were what i call first world broke right i also want to acknowledge that we were first world broke we weren't third world broke my wife is from the third world i know the difference so but we lost our house to foreclosure we were broke we were struggling we literally scrounging for grocery money that whole story is true and and i had this perfect story i had this perfect excuse about why i was broke right I had the story about my wife was sick.

9:29I'm this superhero who took care of her. And aren't I a great husband? And aren't I a great person? And blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Meanwhile, I'm freaking broke, right?

9:41And I end up going to a workshop with one of my mentors, a guy by the name of David Nagel, brilliant guy. And I'm in David's workshop, and I'm broke. And I'm listening, and I'm listening, and I'm listening. And finally, it hits me that the reason I'm broke is because I make too many excuses. And so I went home that day and decided what would happen if I just made no more excuses for like even just a month. And bam, my income literally tripled in right there. so i'm out doing all these speeches and i'm talking to i mean just probably hundreds and hundreds maybe even thousands of entrepreneurs um people who had so much more going forward than i did at the time and um they just got excuse after excuse after excuse anyway i i come back from one of these speaking gigs i was on the road for a few weeks and my wife and i finally are making enough money that we could like upgrade our lifestyle and buy some decent furniture, which to give you an idea of how broke we were, that meant a trip to Ikea.

10:48That was a massive up-level for us, right? So we're there at Ikea and, you know, we're eating the meatballs in the cafeteria and I'm just kind of talking to her about my weeks on the road, talking to hundreds and hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of entrepreneurs and all the excuses. And I'm just I wish I could just grab them and shake them and say, take all your excuses and shove them up your ass. And my wife, being very, very brilliant and very, very creative, she grabs one of those little Ikea pencils and she scribbles out T-A-Y-E, T-A-Y-E, A-S-T-U-Y-A, Astuia. T-A-Y-E, Astuia, take all your excuses and shove them up your ass.

11:32And that became a rallying cry. And every time I was afraid to do something, and every time I was procrastinating, and every time I was feeling sorry for myself, and every time I was, you know, whatever, she would just say, which you have to imagine that being said with a heavy Argentinian Spanish accent and a real badass attitude, right? And that became a rallying cry. Take all your excuses and shove them up your ass. Your choices are yes or yes. These are your two options. You find a way to get it done or you find a way to get it done. Do you want it bad enough to make it happen? If you do, there's always a way.

12:12The universe would not give you the idea and the inspiration and the hunger and the drive and the desire if there wasn't a way to make it happen. I just love I every time you tell that story I just say yep I can I can just feel myself in that moment and I can feel it that it just is that thing so what about excuses for others and from others what do you mean by excuses for others and from others you know I and I'll use me as an example, I have at times in business accepted other people's excuses, allowed them to give me excuses, allowed them to underperform. And something you said one time, Arjan, was...

13:01So you lied to them. Yeah. You lied to them. Yes. That's what it is. When you accept an excuse from someone, when you recognize that someone's giving you an excuse and you accept it, you're lying to them. You are misleading them. You are leading them to the incorrect conclusion that what they're saying makes sense, that what they're saying is acceptable, that what they're saying meets your standards. That's what happens when you accept an excuse from someone. That word there is very important. I want you to expand on that, that it meets your standards. When you said that, the first time I heard it, it was like, Oh, like stabbed through the heart.

13:43Yeah. I'm lowering my standards to their excuses. Goals are what we aspire to. Standards are what we tolerate, right? So if you have a goal of, I don't know, X and you tolerate Y lower than X, then that is in fact what your standard is. Look at the lowest thing you tolerate in any area of your life, and that is, in fact, what your standards are. Look, your home. I am assuming your home is clean and well-kept. You know there are people whose homes are a disgusting pigsty. Yes. Right? The person whose home is a disgusting pigsty has lower standards of cleanliness and orderliness than you or me. Right?

14:36And your standards might be higher than mine. Maybe I'm willing to walk past my closet and my clothes aren't all folded and put away perfect. And you are not willing to do that. So you'll stop and fold your clothes and put them away. I don't know. I've never seen your closet. But the point I'm trying to make is the lowest thing you tolerate in your life, in any area of your life, As painful and excruciating and annoying and frustrating as it may be, that is a reflection of your standards in that area of your life. And so when you tolerate some bullshit from someone, when you tolerate an excuse from someone, you are demonstrating what your real standards actually are.

15:27Is it as easy as just saying I need to move to not accept excuses? Or is there a process to getting yourself across that line? So, Brad, I don't know about you, but I don't like to eat saliva from strangers. Do you? No. No, neither do I, right? Which is why I don't call the server at the restaurant on their excuses. Because I don't want them to spit my food, right? I don't call the crazy person on the street on their bullshit because I don't want to get beat up. This is why I'm saying this idea that people are supposed to be perfect and you never tolerate anything from anyone and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

16:08It's unrealistic. In reality, we have to navigate a challenging world filled with challenging people, many of whom we're not really that committed to or necessarily interested in their full potential. Right. And so it's easier to just let someone get away with an excuse because what am I going to do? Challenge the server on on their excuse. This is a person I'm never going to see again in my life. They don't work for me. They're not related to me. They're not my friend. I'm never going to see them again in my life. I don't need to go challenging, challenging, challenging, challenging everyone because it makes life difficult.

16:48Challenge the people you care enough about to hold them to standards. Well, hey there, and thanks for listening. I've noticed that 78 % of you are brand new, which means you haven't hit the subscribe button yet. By subscribing, you help us bring on even better guests, better quality content, and serve you better with even more podcasts. So please hit that subscribe button. It only takes a second. It makes a huge difference. If you support us, we're going to support your success and help you achieve big success together. Buddy, you pointed out something also about the need to be right and how often we can kill our business by our need to be right.

17:29Where did you learn that and how does that, and maybe teach it so everyone else understands it, please? Right. So first, I got to I got to acknowledge that I learned that from David Nagel, who learned that from Bob Proctor, who learned that from whoever taught it to him. Right. I didn't make this up myself. I just. I'm the kind of person I like to give credit. You know, it's frustrating when people don't give credit anyway. So where did I learn this from? I'm sorry. Where what is it? What is the need to be right? Well, you want me to do a little experiment and give you a taste of it? Love it. This is a bigger, longer conversation, but this is the gist of it.

18:10Our need to be right comes from a wounded place. It typically is a defensive, protective mechanism designed to protect us from pain, from fear, from insecurity. Right? So usually what happens is when we're little, when we're young, we have an experience where either we're made to feel shame for being wrong or we feel fear because someone who we love and depend upon is wrong. And so we get it wired in our little brains, you know, in our little baby brains, you know, and by baby, I mean a little kid. We get it wired in our little brains as little kids that the way that I can protect myself from ever feeling this way again is to be right.

19:03And if I can just be right, be right, then I never have to feel that way again. You get what I'm saying? All right. So this has all kinds of problems in business. It creates all kinds of problems in business, right? Right. Because what starts to happen is let's talk. There's seven main parts of every successful business. And we can just go through one at a time until you tell me you got the point and then I'll stop. Right. Because I could go on with this forever. But let's just talk sales. Right. A prospect tells you they don't want to buy what you're selling, except most people have a big time need to be right.

19:51so it's not enough for them to just say, no, I don't want to buy what you're selling. They have to be right about not wanting to buy what you're selling. And so what that comes off as is they make you wrong, right? You're wrong for thinking I should buy this. You're wrong for thinking I should be willing to pay that price. You're wrong for thinking I need this. You're wrong for thinking this is a good product or a good service because I need to be right about not wanting it. Now, if you also have an unchecked need to be right, this is what sales is like, right? Who can overcome the other one, right?

20:35Because now you're going to make the prospect wrong for not wanting to buy it. And you're going to make them wrong for not wanting to pay it. And it just becomes a battle. All right. Now let's talk about how this shows up in staffing all the time. I have over 100 full-time employees in just one of my companies. If I need to be right, I mean, I would go around making everyone wrong. You know, you're wrong for making that mistake as opposed to you're human for making that mistake. And who's to say it's even a mistake? Maybe you just found a new way of doing things that's better than the way I thought you should do.

21:18But if you've got a need to be right, then you're never going to be willing to consider the possibility that there's a better way to do things than what you figured out. If you've got a big time need to be right, you're never going to be willing to just hear the objections or the questions or the concerns that another person is telling you when they're explaining themselves. If you've got a big time need to be right, you're going to just be fighting all these little skirmishes that don't matter. All right. So I said I would do a little experiment. Ready? All right. We're doing an experiment. It does not matter.

21:54There are no consequences whatsoever to this exercise. You clear about this? Got it. We're clear about this. All right. Now, I want you to just let me be right about what I'm about to say. Okay. What's going to happen? Probably if you're anything like the thousands of people I've done this exercise with one by one by one by one. Almost everyone has the same reaction. Almost everyone has the same experience. It's going to be a subtle little tickle inside of you that you might not be able to name, but you'll feel it. You'll recognize it. You ready? Got it. You see this marker? Uh-huh. This marker is green.

22:42Can you agree with me? Can you just let me be right? This marker is green? Sure. Arjan, you're correct. You see, you can't even say it with a straight face. I know. I know. It's like when I'm watching you teach about that stuff, I'm thinking, yeah, my daughter does that. I wonder where she learned that from. She does what? Being right. The whole thing. It's like, yeah, yeah. We teach it to our kids. Right. So the idea is to let go of the need to be right. Right. And this isn't a mind trick. This isn't like a, well, you know, I know what's real. And so I don't have to fight over it. it's like literally like a zen place where you literally just let go it just doesn't matter yeah i i throw the words in my own vocabulary if isn't that interesting because uh i go back to buckminster fuller taught us the world lives in threes up down middle you know black white gray so it's it's impossible for there to be right wrong if you understand the world lives in threes so a whole different thing.

23:50I want to touch on something that, you know, when you look at, well, one of the things that you do great is you teach the marketing side of any business, and you talk about the systemic approach to marketing. Firstly, why a systemic approach to marketing? I think that's an important distinction that people could benefit from. There's two kinds of organizations, right? Let's back up and say, I made reference to this. There's seven main parts of every successful business. There's also seven main parts of every unsuccessful business. The seven main parts are marketing, sales, production, people, physical plant, financial controls, and you, the owner of the firm, all of which should be in service of your financial goals, your personal goals, and your professional goals.

24:38Seven main parts. there's two different and there's no organization not even a not-for-profit organization there is no organization that can survive without marketing and sales every organization depends on marketing and sales even if it's an organization within another company you still have to market and sell it to the other departments or the board of directors or the donors or whoever there's always marketing and sales going on. Now there's two different kinds of organizations. One organization, which these are the fun organizations. These are the exciting organizations. These are the like the superhero, look at me organizations.

25:20Those are the sales driven organizations, right? This is where people are lauded for their heroics to be able to close the sale and overcome the objection, and go to great lengths and do all these amazing heroic stuff. The other kind of organizations are less exciting, not a lot of room for heroism. These are the marketing-driven organizations, right? So think about the difference between the firefighters and the engineers, right? The firefighters get to ride on the flashy trucks. They get the sirens. They get to slide down the pole. They get to like wear the fancy hats. Everyone celebrates them when they do the heroic stuff that firefighters do.

26:10Yeah? But wouldn't it be better if the engineer built the building that didn't catch fire in the first place? We don't. So there's organizations that are run by firefighters, sales organizations. I prefer to invest in and I prefer to own and operate businesses that are built by engineers. I don't want there to have to be a bunch of heroics. I want the marketing and the sales to be nice and boring. The most profitable kind of sales are boring, predictable, dependable, reliable. I can project my revenue 12, 18 months in advance because I know exactly how it's going to go. I want the marketing to attract all the right people.

27:07I want the marketing to repel and protect me and protect my staff and demonstrate some respect for the wrong kinds of prospects. I want the marketing to pre-educate the prospect before they get to my sales team. I want the marketing to precondition the prospect before they get to my sales team. I want the marketing to answer all of the questions and concerns for the prospect before they get to my sales team. I want the marketing to bring the prospect to the right place at the right time, in the right quantity, in the right frame of mind so that the sales process can be nice and boring. But that's not how most people run their businesses.

27:52Most people neglect the marketing and then they cover it up and clean it up and fix it and save the day with heroics. uh you you once did a great speech around that with finances where did you have a cash crunch because of uh not looking at your financials or did you have or the other way around what is it about business people that well certain business people that they don't look at their financials and get to know what's really going on i'm a recovering i didn't look at my financials person So, look, my undergraduate degree is in communications, law, economics and government. I don't have an MBA.

28:37I don't have a finance degree. I don't have a business degree. No one ever taught me how to read, interpret, understand a financial statement. I basically had to teach myself how to read a financial statement. And I have learned how to read a financial statement in a very different way than is taught in school. So the way that most accountants and CPAs and finance people are taught to read and interpret and understand a financial statement, that's a way to read, interpret, and understand a financial statement. But it's not the only way. Right. So in Zen and the art of motorcycle maintenance, they talk about the instructions for building a barbecue.

29:31And, you know, there's there's any number of ways to assemble the barbecue, but they had to write one set of instructions. And so one engineer sat down and said, this is going to be our agreed way of putting together a barbecue. But it's not necessarily the only way. It's not even necessarily the best way. It's just the way that we decide to write down because we can't give you a set of instructions to say here's 87 different ways to write. So the point I'm making is I think the reason why a lot of business owners take a lot of heat and suffer a lot of abuse because they don't read financial statements.

30:13And they don't read financial statements because it's painful and uncomfortable and intimidating and scary and confusing. and a lot of the reason why it's so painful and scary and intimidating to read the financial statements is because the way they were taught to read the financial statements does not come naturally to a lot of us. It's not, I don't remember if it's left brain or right brain, but it's the other side of the brain that I don't operate from the way that's taught in business school. But when you look at a set of financials, there's two parts to the financials. There's the numbers and the notes.