2151 - Achieving Financial Freedom with Tips from The Wealthy Woman Lawyer Davina Frederick

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1:05With us right now, it's Davina Frederick. Davina, you are the host of the Wealthy Woman Lawyer podcast. That's your brand as well. Your website is wealthywomanlawyer.com. And you are a law firm business coach. Well, Davina, it's great to have you. Thanks for having me, Josh. I'm excited to be here. Yeah. And as we get started, I always love just kind of finding out what people are into. I love geeking out on stuff. I don't know if you're watching any great TV shows or movies recently, reading anything that's good or hobbies that you're really passionate about. Well, a hobby I'm really passionate about is hiking.

1:44You and I were just talking about that. I just moved. I moved all the way from Florida to Colorado a year ago, lived in Florida my whole life and moved to Colorado for the purpose of hiking more and more outdoor activities. I know people think that's crazy to move from Florida to get more outdoor activities, but I really liked the cold more than I liked the hot. So I did that. And then as far as TV shows, it's funny you asked because there's a couple that I've been watching lately. One, I don't know if anybody's been watching paradise, but I love paradise. It is a, it is a great show and very, we don't know what's going to happen.

2:21The world has ended and people are living underground and it's, it's really good. but it stars James Marsden is the president of the United States. Well, I love James Marsden. Yes. Well, if you haven't watched this, you will really love this show. And then the other one is Zero Day. I don't know if you, Robert De Niro's new show, Zero Day. Oh, yeah. I've already binged on that and watched it. I love Robert De Niro. So that was a great show. Yeah. Great. Well, two, I've just added to my watch list on tracked. So, which I don't know if you track what you, what you watch. My wife and I probably, you know, at any given time, we probably have like, you know, three to eight shows going on concurrently.

3:06Sometimes we'll hold, you know, it's like right now we're on a break from BoJack Horseman, which we love. And, but, you know, cause I've gotten so much into Hell on Wheels, which is, you know, kind of the railroad and that sort of thing, which is an older show. So, but yeah, so, but I, you know, I have to track what we're watching, like what episode we're on and, you know, so anyway, I've just now added those two to my cue, Davina. Well, let's talk about the work that you do. I'm absolutely curious on what you do as a law firm business coach, because my experience is that there are a lot of attorneys that are fantastic at the law and maybe not amazing at business.

3:47You are exactly right. I was just reading a statistic this morning, in fact, that lawyers don't make, most lawyers don't make over half a million dollars a year. And I think there's a lot of misinformation out there about lawyers making a lot of money. But the majority of lawyers, if you don't go work for big law, you don't work for the government, you work for yourself. And a lot of solo attorneys are making$50 ,000 to$100 ,000 a year in personal income. And I see that as a problem. And so my mission is really to help in particular women law firm owners, hence my brand, Wealthy Woman Lawyer, to scale their law firm businesses so they get over that seven-figure market revenue and they're able to take home that half million or more in annual income.

4:33And I do that. Scaling the law firm is not just about that financial piece, but that financial piece helps them take better care of their family and really do the things they love. And most of them tell me they love international travel and they love to spend time with their kids. And, you know, so if you're locked into a solo business, you are working 24-7, as most of the people on this podcast probably know, right? You're working around the clock. And so what I'm helping them do is see a bigger vision of a business separate from them. So they are not intertwined with their business 24-7. And so they can take better care of their families and they can create high paying jobs, more high paying jobs in the community.

5:14They can contribute more to causes that they love. And really, they can have a greater impact in the community by the number of clients they can serve. When you're a solo lawyer, maybe with one or two staff people, you're limited in the number of clients that you can serve. And so what I'm really doing is bringing to them the vision of what if we transform this solo practice into a law firm business where you've hired other lawyer, you set up systems, you set up a marketing system to bring you a steady flow of clients. And then you have the time freedom to come and go from that business and it would still generate wealth even in your absence.

5:52So you're not burning yourself out in the process. So that's kind of my mission for what I do with Wealthy Woman Lawyer. Well, imagine, sorry. There, I hit a little cough button. Very professional of me. So Davina, let's imagine that we are speaking to a room of exceptional women lawyers. If we were to identify maybe two or three biggest pieces of advice, we don't have to get too detailed on this, but if you were to identify, you know, two or three things that you said, listen, if all you did was just really buckle down and focus on these two things, you would see a significant life upgrade. Anything come to mind?

6:42Oh, yes, absolutely. So I have worked with men and women, and I know that for a lot of women that I work with, doing everything yourself and some men doing everything yourself is the problem. high achieving people will get there by putting in all the work. And I think when we want to get next level in a business, we really have to stop trying to do everything ourselves. So delegation is a huge one. And a lot of people don't really know how to delegate. They say, I'm delegating, or I'm trying to delegate, but then they're still checking and grading papers is what I call it. They're coming back and revisiting and everything has to have their touch before it leaves their hands.

7:24And so that's a huge one. But the real key to that is hiring other lawyers. I see so many lawyers go out and start their own law firm business and they hire staff, but they have fear around hiring other lawyers. And the fear comes from a couple of places. One, how will I pay them? I'm scared to death that I won't be able to pay them if I hire them. So that keeps me from hiring them. And I have a couple of tips for that. And then the other thing is they don't want other lawyers to see their mess. So they feel like they got to get their systems in place before they hire other lawyers. They feel like they're going to be judged by other lawyers coming in, maybe because every lawyer I think has some little bit of insecurity about us when they call it practicing law.

8:09We never perfect it. We're always learning something new. It's a very challenging career. And so feeling like other people, we might invite other people in and then they judge us on being how we are as a lawyer or how we are as a business owner. So those are just a couple of things. The third thing I would say is really once this I've noticed and I've added to my program, once you begin to hire other lawyers and you hire staff and now you have a pretty good sized team, you think we think that we sort of come out of the womb ready to lead and manage people with no training and no experience in it.

8:46And it's like, I'm just going to automatically, I went to law school to learn how to be a lawyer. I studied business to learn how to run a business, but I just think I'm automatically going to be a leader without investing some time and resources into that. And so they often blame their employees. Well, my employee's not doing this or they're not listening to me or they're not whatever. And then you start digging into it and say, well, like what instruction did you give? Did you set clear expectations? Did you provide a routine reporting? Did you inspire them to follow you on this mission? What are your core values?

9:17I mean, there's a lot to that, but really investing in sort of understanding what leadership skills you need and what management skills you need to run your business. So those are some key tips that I think I would tell people right off. Just having done this, I've done this for 12 years. So I've had conversations with hundreds of women law firm owners and men as well. And it's just, it's the same over and over again, that stumbling block of hiring other lawyers and then managing them. Yeah. Tell me about how you work together. Do you work with clients and individually? I do. I do private coaching.

9:57I have a group coaching program and I have a private coaching program. And so my group, and then I have my podcast. So there's something for at every sort of budget level, right? And every level in your business, my group coaching program is really kind of an incubator. It's for those women solos who are climbing that six-figure ladder. They're just learning the basic principles of growing their law firm. They're setting up their marketing systems and all the other seven essential systems. They're starting to hire staff. They're thinking about hiring lawyers and they're kind of working their way up to half a million in revenue.

10:33And then my private coaching, I'm working with clients who are already at that half million in revenue, maybe 600 ,000, 700 ,000. And they keep sitting there at that place year after year, and they're never able to get over that million dollar mark. And so we really dig in together and find out what it is that's holding them back from getting into that seven figure, multiple seven figure range in their business. Yeah. So your website, I want to share, there's wealthywomanlawyer.com. And from there, you can access the podcast or in your podcast app, because our friend is actually listening to a podcast right now.

11:12If you just simply search for wealthy woman lawyer, you are on most we're on many of the podcast apps, because we distribute through transistor FM. So we're on a lot of different podcast apps. Apple is the number one, you know, that most people listen to us, like something like 92 % of people listen to podcasts on their Apple, but we're definitely there. I will tell me what what you talk about on your podcast. So I have a couple of different probably three different ways that I interview and share content on my podcast. One is that I like to interview women law firm owners, because my audience of women law firm owners loves to hear stories of other women law firm owners who are growing their businesses and they get inspired by that.

12:05So that is a huge audience for me. I mean, interview method for me. And then the other thing is I interview experts who can contribute. I'm kind of selective about this. I'm really looking for people that might be able to, you know, help them with their marketing or help them, you know, with systems, things like that, that they have tools that can help these women law firm owners. And those are more peer to peer conversations where we're discussing, um, methodologies and, and their expertise and that kind of thing. Um, and then the other thing is I create content and my content is kind of like little laser coaching content.

12:46I, I teach some to my audience and I also just present some ideas to them and a point of view to them to get them thinking about what it is that they really want and whether or not they're getting in and how they may be able to get it. Your website, Wealthy Woman Lawyer, someone's like, oh boy, I need help. And there are a lot of great attorneys doing so much great work out there. You know, and a lot, I mean, I think what we're talking about too is then we get frustrated, that if let's say that our client load has gone down a little bit and we start thinking, is it me? Am I doing something wrong?

13:30Am I not good at my job? No, you're probably excellent at your job. It's just there's all of these other things that, hey, if you're going solo, you got a whole bunch of new tasks that, guess what? They didn't teach you that in law school. Right, exactly. What they teach you in law school is how to think like a lawyer, very specifically. They teach you how to think like a lawyer. And what that means for people who aren't lawyers is they teach you how to analyze issues and spot issues in legal cases and apply the law to that and then make a good argument for whatever side you want to make an argument for, right?

14:07And so that's what we learn in law school. But they don't teach you how to own and operate a business. Yet, probably the majority, I mean, for big law, big law is looking for the top 1 % of the top 1 % of law schools to hire. So that's going to leave a whole lot of people out there who aren't going to be getting a job at big law. They're getting a job at smaller law firms, or they're going to work for themselves. That's a trend that I think we're going to see more and more of is people starting their own law firm businesses because they don't fit into big law firm businesses because the culture doesn't embrace them.

14:50So I think that is what we're going to be seeing more of is people starting their own law firms. And they're going to need to learn how to think like a CEO if they start their own law firm. You can't, it's not good enough to say, well, I'm a really great lawyer. And so therefore people will come and hire me. You really need business strategy and you need to know what, what you don't know. Right. And so that's really what we're helping people learn. Okay. So Davina, if someone goes to your website, what should they click on? What, what should they do if they, if they ready to kind of, no, no, no, no, no.

15:27I need to talk with Davina. Yeah. Okay. If they're ready to talk to me, there's a button right at the very top. This is book a call. So you can book a call and you can talk with me. I have a practice growth assessment that you can complete and then book an appointment with me. I also have a training on there, though, that is right there at the top that you can check out that training. It's a little over 30 minutes, so it's not very long. And it gives you a good sense of what I'm teaching in the training. And then also I share information about my group coaching program for people at that level who are saying, you know, I've been solo for a couple of years.

16:09I, you know, still here and I'd like to grow. And where do I go from here? So that's a great training for that. Lots of tools on my website. And I, and again, it's one of those things that there's, if you don't know me and you want to get to know me, the podcast is right there on the website. And that's a great way to get to know me and know my audience and know the kind of people that I'm working with. Davina Frederick, law firm business coach, Wealthy Woman Lawyer dot com, the podcast Wealthy Woman Lawyer. Davina, thank you so much for the conversation. Thanks, Josh. I appreciate you having me here.

16:52Thanks for listening to The Thoughtful Entrepreneur Show. If you are a thoughtful business owner or professional who would like to be on this daily program, please visit upmyinfluence.com and click on podcast. We believe that every person has a message that can positively impact the world. We love our community who listens and shares our program every day. Together, we are empowering one another as thoughtful leaders. And as I mentioned at the beginning of this program, if you're looking for introductions to partners, investors, influencers, and clients, I have had private conversations with over 2 ,000 leaders asking them where their best business comes from.

17:34I've got a free video that you can watch right now with no opt-in or email required where I'm going to share the exact steps necessary to be 100 % inbound in your industry over the next six to eight months with no spam, no ads, and no sales. What I teach has worked for me for more than 15 years and has helped me create eight figures in revenue for my own companies. Just head to upmyinfluence.com and watch my free class on how to create endless high-ticket sales appointments. Make sure to hit subscribe so that tomorrow morning, that's right, seven days a week, you are going to be inspired and motivated to succeed.

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