“What is the “Average of Five Rule? Coined by motivational speaker Jim Rohn, the Average of Five Rule says that you are the average of the five people you hang out with most. What does this have to do with starting and building a law practice? Everything.
Make a list of the five people you spend the most time with. Are they optimistic or pessimistic? Are they pushing you to build a better law practice or wondering why you haven’t sent out more resumes for firm jobs? Are they telling you that you need to put an ad in the yellow pages or asking you what kind of “outside the box” legal marketing you are engaging in? Are they telling you that you need to work 60-80 hours a week in order to be successful as a lawyer?
Believe it or not, these five people are going to make or break your law practice, and perhaps your career as a lawyer. If you want to build a law practice that serves you, that makes your life better, that increases your wealth, then you may need to re-evaluate your friends.
I don’t mean to be harsh here. I’m not telling you to divorce your spouse if they are not 100% on board with your decision to start a law firm. But when it comes to your business dealings, if you are currently in an office share with an attorney that believes that you need to work 80 hours a week to be successful, or that you need to keep your fees down so that you “can help more people”, then you may want to start looking for a new office.
You need to start surrounding yourself with other lawyers and business people that have an entrepreneurial mindset. They believe that it is more important to work “on” your business than “in” your business. They believe in spending more time on practice building and marketing than doing legal work which they could hire someone to do. They read books by other successful marketers and business owners, rather than the practice management books from the ABA.
Some people aren’t going to like this post. That’s ok. A lot of attorneys may not like my style of marketing. That’s ok too. The readers of this blog will relate to the material I put out and will take action to put it to use in their daily lives.
So here is a quick action step – look around at who you are hanging out with. See if you need to make a change.
Agree? Disagree? I want to hear from you. Feel free to post your comments below.
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