In this transformative episode, Gary Mitchell, Founder of OnTrac Coach, shares how to transition from star lawyer to effective firm leader. If you struggle with control and team management, you won’t want to miss it.
You will discover:
– What delegating perfection frees for firm growth
– How to build teams around your strengths for efficiency
– Why mindset shifts enable entrepreneurial risk-taking
Episode Transcript
Scott Ritzheimer
Hello, hello and welcome. Welcome once again to the Start scale and succeed podcast. It’s the only podcast that grows with you through all seven stages of your journey as a founder, and I’m your host, Scott Ritzheimer, and I want to talk about what I call the star player paradox, which is that the better you are as a player, the harder it can become to be an effective captain. And nowhere is this more painfully obvious than with than founders in the professional services world, and in particular, as you’ll hear us discuss today, attorneys and so what happens at this stage? You’ve you’ve had success, you’ve built your practice, you’re exceptional at what you do, your talent, your intelligence, your ability to solve problems better than at least the rest of who you’re competing against. That’s how you got to this point. That’s why clients hire you, not some generic firm or other business. They hired you, but now you’ve got a team, and you’re still operating like you did as a solopreneur, and that’s not going to work any more. So today’s guest is here to help us out, here to help us figure out how to move from just being that star to really building a thriving enterprise. And he’s got some experience doing it. He’s got over two decades of experience helping service providers break through this exact trap. Gary Mitchell has spent over two decades with lawyers in particular, helping them reshape their practice into businesses that work for their lives, not against them. Drawing on three decades of experience in business strategy, communications and leadership, he supports lawyers building efficient teams, modernizing operations, excuse me, and mastering skills. Law school never taught them. As founder of the on track coach and creator of the law firm accelerator program, Gary helps managing partners and law firm owners to accelerate their firm’s profitability. Oh, Gary, welcome to the show. Glad to have you here.
Gary Mitchell
Nice to be here, Scott. I’m excited to speak on this subject for sure.
Scott Ritzheimer
Fantastic, fantastic. Well, Gary, you kind of opened with this at the start of the show, but it’s safe to say the attorneys, attorneys, especially the successful ones, are pretty sharp. These are highly intelligent, highly skilled individuals, highly successful in building their practices, many of them from the ground up, but for some reason, they hit a wall and they hit it hard. What happens, maybe even psychologically, when these star players, if you will, find themselves having to step into this Captain role and lead a team? Why do so many smart founders often become poor managers?
Gary Mitchell
Well, you know, I’ll put it in the words of one of my more senior clients along the way, like I now only work with, I’ve niched and niched further to work with law firm owners. But a couple years back, I was working with a senior partner with an international firm, and he says to me on a call coaching call, one day, he goes, Why is it that the best lawyers usually make the worst business people. We both had to chuckle with that, and I said it really comes down to this, that the skills that make for a great lawyer, the analytical, skeptical, all those you know, fine fine tuned skills that that’s the reason why we hire lawyers go against everything that’s entrepreneurial, right? Being entrepreneurial is about taking risk. It’s about trying things right? It’s more of an art than a science, where you know perfection is the name of the game with with the law, right? The letter of the law, that’s that expression, the letter of the law. Although there is no such thing as perfection, they’re constantly lawyers are constantly striving for it, whereas entrepreneurs, we know right innately, that the biggest successes come from our mistakes and learning and trying things and it’s really hard. I often say to them, you know, you’ve got two hats to wear. You’ve got the lawyer hat. And you know, I’m not here to change that or assist with that, maybe client service, but not being a lawyer, the actual art of practicing law and being a lawyer, I’m I’d have nothing to do with that. I’m here to help you with your owner, your entrepreneurial hand, and helping you create that mindset, one of the largest challenges for for lawyers. And I said, as we were like warming up to the call, to the recording, I said, there’s no difference between lawyers and and your your average entrepreneur, but it’s like 10 to 100 times magnified. All the fears, the apprehensions, letting go of control is the biggest challenge they have when they know they can do something ace, right? And have it. And that’s what you alluded at with your instruction, right? That’s why their clients keep coming back to them. They’re amazing at what they do. They build this reputation. So for them to grow, they have to leave the silo of perfection and enter enter a growth category, and that means letting go of control, and it’s. Really, really hard for them. I mean that that as a coach, that’s probably one of my, my biggest challenges is helping them over time, let go, but I’ve got, I’ve got solutions and strategies for that, right? Yeah, you know, it starts with leadership. And the biggest thing I’ve learned over the years, and it kind of goes back to, like Steve Jobs, his whole philosophy about leadership, I do a 360 or a SWOT analysis at the beginning, right? Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats. I’m old enough to know the old school of thought on this, and it was, pick up your socks with your weaknesses, you got to fix them, right? And then Steve Jobs came around. I mean, he’s my number one guru when it comes to business leadership, and he said, No, you master your strengths, whatever they are, and then you build your team around those strengths, filling in the gaps left by the weaknesses. And it’s brilliant. I’m going to give you two very specific examples, because not every client is the same. So one client loves being a lawyer. He loves fighting for his clients in the courtroom. He’s a litigator. Loves it. I mean, he’s his passion, as much as this is my passion for coaching, his passion is advocating for his clients. I’m basically running the firm for him right now. He doesn’t want to do it, but that’s fine. He knows his strength, right? So we’re building the team around that. So he’s got a different model. Now, the flip side of that, the opposite, the complete opposite, is the lawyer preneur, who really could leave the law altogether, the lost side of it, Delegate all the work, and he’s, he’s, he’s got that entrepreneur bent. It’s dying to get everybody right, and he wants to play more owner and entrepreneur role. So again, we’re going to build around his strength and his passion, and his team is going to look different. Yeah, the ideal that I follow Scott is that starting at the top and however, whichever model they’re going to use, if they’re going to be running the firm, or they’re going to be having having a management team running or partners, right? There’s no one size fits all ever. I’ve never expressed that. Solution is you get everyone starting at the top, functioning at their highest level, right? And you you bring that down throughout the entire organization, and we’ll get more into the scaling part, I guess, with some of your other questions. But like, to me, this stuff is simple. It’s, I mean, simple works as human beings, we complicate things for ourselves. And yeah, it’s like, there’s no because it’s always been done this way, right? The old, old school model of building a law firm doesn’t mean you have to continue building it that way. This is yours, and that’s the biggest thing that the mindset of an entrepreneur, like as an entrepreneur, you know, it’s yours, but as a lawyer, you’ve been conditioned your entire life to do it the same way that it’s always been done, like, I mean, it is drill into you from from law school. This is precedent, right? This is the way it’s done, and it really conditions the mind. So I a lot of the work I’m doing is on the mindset, shifting the mindset, looking at it from a different angle. And you’re right, they are very intelligent. I That’s why I love working with them, because if you give them the right direction and the right guidance, and they are open, and they’re taking that guidance. They learn very, very quickly, right? Yeah. Love seeing, yeah. Love seeing that light come on, right? Yeah. It’s a sense of relief, like, oh, I can get, I can do this. Yeah? I mean, it’s just, it’s, it’s an incredible I’m a serial entrepreneur. I love building things, so I get a chance to help build things for other people as well. So it’s not just what I’m building for myself, it’s building for everyone, everyone else. It’s, yeah, it’s a way. It’s a it’s a great way to make a living. It’s awesome.
Scott Ritzheimer
Gary, so the there’s really only one reason to build a team around you, and that’s to do more than you can do on your own, right? And, and, and so there’s lots of or have them do more, and you be able to do less, but with whatever time you want to allocate to it, you’re being able to leverage other people’s time and expertise. So one of the things, though, that that generally has to come with that, is you have to grow it beyond what you can do on your own, and that takes a different kind of intentionality. So you talked about an owner’s mindset. How does this kind of entrepreneurs mindset of not just having the people, but growing the firm? How does that come into play?
Gary Mitchell
Okay, so the formula I use, and again, I keep, I try to keep it simple. You get the right people in the right roles, and you build systems. That’s how you scale. Okay, simply put, I call it the plug and play. You plug the right people into the right systems and press play. So as one, as one of my clients, you know, on an early call, I brought up McDonald’s, and he. Laughed, and he said he worked in at McDonald’s in high school, and then as he became an owner, he’s been an owner for over 20 years now. He goes, I want to build the McDonald’s of law firms. I said, we’re going to get along great. That’s exactly what I’m talking about. I said, I’m sorry. I’m comparing a hamburger to to law he goes, No, no, I get it. I get it. It’s like they perfected how to build, how to replicate the speed and quality of this, of this product, again and again and again, no matter who was making it, no matter who it was, where it was in the world, right? That’s the secret. We get, the systems, we get the right people. That’s critical, right? And then we we plug them in. Now another ingredient when, let’s break that right people down, to be more specific, because I have always believed attitude equals or is responsible for 99% of it when you have the right attitude, when you’re nimble, when you thrive in a changing environment and are not afraid of it. Because the thing is, Scott, as you grow, as you know, right? This is what you specialize in, your podcast. The life cycle of a business. Any business goes through many different changes. You need people that can move with you, ideally, right? Otherwise, you’re, you’re, you’ve got the employee roundtable or the revolving door, right? If you’ve got people that have to have things the same, can’t change, don’t want to be a part of change. That’s going to be that’s going to put up several barriers along the way. So getting the right people, people who thrive on creating innovation, thrive and change. They’re nimble, and they strive for excellence at every team.
Scott Ritzheimer
That right people thing is so important, because I’ve found that really the defining question of this stage for most folks is actually what’s wrong with these people? Because you start hiring folks, and it’s usually mostly our fault, like we hire by pulse and proximity, you know, if there’s someone who meets the minimum criteria and is willing to work for us, it’s a yes. But there’s how do we kind of distinguish between what’s wrong with these people and what’s wrong with how we’re managing these people?
Gary Mitchell
Okay, well, first of all, that’s actually, that’s two, I hear two questions, because that’s, that’s another magic pill. If you get the right people, you don’t necessarily have to manage them. They have they have the self, self discipline. They have the work ethic they’re going to manage themselves. I mean, sure you have, like, actually, when you get the right people, there’s more leadership than management involved management, management is required when you need to pull people or push people right. If you get the right people and the right systems, there’s a lot less of that, and sometimes not even any required. They’re going to do the best job they can, because that’s their nature. That’s the way that they approach everything. So when you get the right people, it also makes leading or managing much easier, right? You’re not babysitting, you’re not trying to convince or persuade people to do things right? And the bare minimum, you just, you just described my latest client, my biggest client I’ve ever had in 20 years, to a T like he, it’s almost like he’s, he’s a Make Work Project, and he’s taking on these it’s been, it’s been a year, let me just say, and he’s finally come to on Tuesday morning, our call. He’s finally come to the conclusion I made. I just said to his, I won’t mention the names, but I just said, Okay, this is the core of who you have now. This is the minimum bar moving forward, right? Like, I’m not overseeing H HR, but I am influencing it to a great degree, because you, you nailed it. It’s like, Do you have a pulse? Are you close? Can you make it into the office, you know? And it’s like, that’s not the standard you set for yourself. No, like it. Ha, where it starts at this at the top, we have to replicate that throughout. That’s, that’s how you create culture, right? That’s how you create a winning culture. I know these people are out there. Because, you know, the other thing I know is that there’s a lot of terrible cultures. There’s a lot of unhappy lawyers and paralegals out there with with it, with the environment they’re in, and by creating a more magnetic culture, a culture that is about innovation, that is about excellence, that is about teamwork. It’s no accident. I’m wearing my Toronto Blue Jays Jersey today, because it’s, it’s I’m just the last two weeks, professional and personal has crossed. I’m watching one of the best sports teams I’ve ever seen in my life, not not by the way, they’re, I mean, yes, they’re playing work very well, but I mean, as a team like they’re standalone leaders, and yet they’re coming together as a team like I’ve never seen, and I’m seeing that now with some of my new clients, like, yeah, the team, their management team, is really coming together. It’s like ego at the door. What’s the goal? What’s our focus? The clients, right? That’s the end game. We I don’t have to be right. You don’t have to be right, but let’s get it right together. It right? Yeah, and yeah, it really is just so much. It really is about mindset. It really, I keep coming back to that. And, you know, I read something, some self professed business guru said, he says it’s not about mindset, it’s about tools and systems. I’m like, You’re wrong. You’re wrong because you don’t get the right tools or systems unless you have the right mindset, yeah, you don’t understand people unless you get the right mindset,
Scott Ritzheimer
yeah, and you don’t use either of them the right way, unless you have the right mindset. Yeah, 100%
Gary Mitchell
You’re not open to changing as the circumstances change. And what’s one thing that we know is a constant in this world today change absolutely by the second now with AI, yeah, right, yeah. Literally, for sure that we’re talking AI has already improved tenfold, right?
Scott Ritzheimer
Yeah. So Gary, there’s, yeah, go ahead. Sorry, yeah. So there’s this question. I want to make sure we have time for it, because I’m very interested to see what you have to say here. And the question is this, what is the biggest secret that you wish? Wasn’t a secret at all. What’s that one thing you wish everybody watching or listening today knew?
Gary Mitchell
Okay, that’s really, actually, that’s very easy. Scott, anything’s possible. Anything’s possible. The greatest achievements of mankind, people kind, have been achieved by thinking big, thinking out of the box, thinking differently, thinking thinking, thinking anything is possible. Like you come to us, you come to a problem. If you’re focused on the problem, you’re going to stay in the problem, right? If you come to the problem that with the mindset, there is a solution here. I don’t know what it is right now, but there is a solution here. And then you build a team, and you focus on the solution, you will come to it. You will find it. I can’t I’m no I’m no mind reader or a future provider, like I can’t see the future, but I’ve seen this in action every single time in my own life and career, and those are my clients. So that’s the one thing. Believe in yourself. You know what you need to do? Like, you know if there’s things to improve or delegate, right? Some things we do need to improve we can’t delegate, okay? But knowing the difference, because you start out, if you start out with anything is possible. What do I want to create? What is the life? What does it look like? What’s my why? What gets me out of bed in the morning and don’t let go just because it’s always been done this way? Right? I mean, think nothing would have ever changed or been been created. No inventions would have been made if people always just kept doing the way things the way they were done, right? Yeah, you know, it goes back to ice from from harvesting ice in the north to refrigerators, right? And all the steps in between, and none of the people involved in each iteration went on to the next. It was somebody new, trying something a different way.
Scott Ritzheimer
Yeah, fantastic, fantastic. I love that don’t focus on the problem, focus on the solution with the belief that anything is possible is so good. Gary, there are some very successful attorneys and law firm owners that are listening to this, and they’ve been looking for someone who really understands their industry and how to move forward, where can they find more out about you and the work that you do?
Gary Mitchell
Ontracoach no K, double C, ontraccoach.com and there’s no there’s no pressure, like I love to talk to lawyers and attorneys about their challenges. They’re very similar at this stage, not much surprises me, because there’s a pattern, right? And I mean, how many times am I saying to my clients, you’re not alone. This is there. This is a very common challenge, and I’ve seen this before. So don’t feel bad about yourself. Don’t get down on yourself. You’re not alone. It’s low pressure. I do a 30 minute consultation to dive in, find out where they’re stuck. If there’s a fit, do they like my style, and are they open and willing to take the advice? So that’s, you know, it’s a very soft, down to earth approach.
Scott Ritzheimer
Excellent, excellent. Well, thank you, Gary, just a privilege and honor. Having you here today. Really appreciate your time, and for those of you watching and listening, you know your time and attention mean the world to us as well, I hope you got as much out of this conversation as I know I did, and I cannot wait to see you next time. Take care.
Contact Gary Mitchell
Gary Mitchell has spent over two decades helping lawyers reshape their practices into businesses that work for their lives, not against them. Drawing on three decades of experience in business strategy, communications, and leadership, he supports lawyers in building efficient teams, modernizing operations, and mastering skills law school never taught. As founder of OnTrac® Coach and creator of the Law Firm Xelerator™ Program, Gary helps managing partners and law firm owners accelerate their firms’ profitability.
Want to learn more about Gary Mitchell’s work at OnTrac Coach? Check out his website at https://ontraccoach.com/