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The daily water cooler chatter at LWP headquarters consists of strategizing the latest challenges attorneys face each day. The incessant struggles; lead generation, lead conversion and retention. Conversations on how to support our members in creating consistent, dependable money in the bank at the end of the week. So when it came time to start planning the lineup for the LWP 7th Annual Practice Enhancement Retreat, WHAT to talk about was not the issue. We were actually torn about which topics to cut.

Together, our CC & I team, mentor coaches and lead team all hunkered down and went way back to step one in The Client Centered Estate Planning Process, The Workshop. And like every first meeting, every workshop starts with the attorney introduction. These usually consist of stuffy biographies with lack of personality and connection, classically from the head vs. heart perspective. So when the committee met around who the keynote speaker candidates were, I immediately went to that snowy day in Denver and the impact National NLP Trainer George Ira Carroll had on me during “The Art of Storytelling” workshop back in March 2012. The event was life-altering. It hit me during that retreat planning meeting, this is exact what was missing from the attorney introductions. They weren’t coming across as real, relatable, approachable, truly caring and trusting. Are these not the very core reasons why we hire someone? For ANYTHING?

On day one of the retreat, George opened by sharing his personal purpose story. WOW. You could hear a pin drop in the room. There wasn’t one of the 150 people in the room not on the edge of their seats with an instant connected heart with direct connection and instantaneous trust. Every single person could relate to some element of George’s story. And the whole experience lasted for 8 minutes. That’s it, 8 minutes to give an intentional, purposeful, heartfelt intro. Most attorneys make their first impression from their head; in that ballroom last Wednesday, we learned to start with the heart, which is especially important in this industry.

Baby boomers, the ideal clients of estate and elder law attorneys, walk into their workshop scared, non-trusting, guarded and usually burned by some other “expert” who was going to make their 2 a.m. “wake up and worry time” go away. So imagine a workshop where you walk in and hear something different. It’s vulnerable. It’s heartfelt. It’s breaking down the barriers of a big bad intimidating attorney in the front of the room －all within the first 8 minutes. Did you ever hear the expression, “You had me at Hello?”

And the cool part of the life-altering work is that we now have 150 humans, team and attorney alike, who are connecting, relating and uniting with their communities in a more authentic manner that makes a difference for everyone involved. It makes each of us richer. In every way.

I am very much looking forward to the water cooler chatter at LWP headquarters in November and December as we approach closing the year. Something tells me the struggles are going to look a little different－like how do we keep up with all the work?

Molly L. Hall, Co-Founder, Lawyers with Purpose, LLC, and author of Don’t Be a Yes Chick: How to Stop Babysitting Your Boss, Transform Your Job and Work with a Dream Team Without Losing Your Sanity or Your Spirit in the Process.

When I was three years old, I was so shy I hid behind my father’s leg and wouldn’t speak to anyone. This seems unbelievable today, since I do so much public speaking and really enjoy being on stage. But when I was three, my mother left me to my brother and father. In the 1970s it was unusual for the father to be the custodial parent, but he had little choice － my mother committed suicide.

This trauma in my life has led to many successes and failures. As a lifetime learner, I attend quite a few conferences each year. If I get one kernel of knowledge to take back to the office with me, I am usually satisfied. This year’s Lawyers with Purpose annual retreat filled my briefcase with a lot of chewable popcorn ideas!

The one I’d like to share with you is simple － Tell your story and connect with prospective clients. Were you drawn in by my story? Did you want to know more?

Clients hire people they like. They assume you have the credentials and legal knowledge. Many times I sit down with clients who have been honest enough to say they have met with another lawyer but it just didn’t “click.” What didn’t click? Their personality. Clients are looking for someone with whom they feel comfortable. The only way to really do that is to be yourself and share yourself with them – your personal self.

In my conference room I have pictures of my three-year-old twins, who are adorable. I can almost guarantee my prospective clients will comment on the pictures. I take that moment to really share a personal aspect of my life and connect with the client. It can then lead to a conversation about their grandchildren, with whom they are naturally very fond.

Understand that your vulnerabilities (struggles you have had, pain you have experienced) can be an asset in developing strong relationships with your clients. I share with my clients on my website, in my workshops and during initial meetings that I moved out of my parent’s house when I was 17 years old, still in high school and without any money. After a year and a half of going nowhere, I enlisted in the Air Force. This tells them that I was not born with a silver spoon and that I am “like them.”

What is your story? How can you connect with your prospects? What vulnerabilities are you willing to share?

If you are not used to this, try something small at first. If a client travels, share where you have traveled. If a client’s spouse has a health concern, share if one of your family members had a similar health issue and how you dealt with it. Then build on that and incorporate your story into your marketing messages and conversations.

Immediately notice the connections. Immediately notice the increase in conversation rates. Immediately notice that you have helped someone else by sharing yourself.

If you are currently not a Lawyers With Purpose member and would like to learn more about what we have to offer, please spend some time with us on November 19th at 5:00 EST. We are offering a one hour live webinar where we will share:

• Why clients don’t care how much you know and what they want from you.
• There’s no such thing as crisis Medicaid planning and the preplanning you are missing out on is right in front of you.
• The key features and provisions of grantor, non-grantor, and pure grantor trusts and when to utilize each for asset protection, Medicaid and VA planning.
• The newest forms and procedures to file VA apps and appeals and receive timely decisions.
• Why annuities are often the “lazy-attorney” approach to Medicaid planning and what it fails to consider.
• How to calculate if an IRA should be liquidated and when not to use personal service contracts when Medicaid planning.

Register now by clicking here : https://www3.gotomeeting.com/register/308773030

Victoria L. Collier is a Veteran and Certified Elder Law Attorney, Fellow of the National Academy of Elder Law Attorneys, Co-Founder of Lawyers With Purpose LLC, and author of “47 Secret Veterans’ Benefits for Seniors—Benefits You Have Earned … but Don’t Know About.”

What is the greatest success you’ve had since joining LWP?

I have been able to come up to speed and confidently prepare multifaceted estate plans for clients with only rudimentary prior experience.

What is your favorite LWP tool?

The entire program is excellent but if I have to pick one thing it would be the software, it allows customization for every person who walks through my door.

How has being part of LWP impacted your team and your practice?

It is a complete system we dropped into and with very little training time we were running like old pros. We still have some tweaks to make but it has not been as painful as I expected to learn an entirely new area of law practice.

Pictured from left to right Jacqueline Amador, Michele Ungvarsky and Aurelia Maxey.

How do you know whether you are traveling down the wrong road and need to turn around, or are within inches of success and need to keep going?

The closest Krispy Kreme to my house and office is approximately 15 minutes away without traffic, and I wanted fresh, hot donuts before work. With rush-hour traffic heading into Atlanta, the travel time is no less than 30 minutes one way. I only live two miles from my office. Therefore, I was making a deliberate choice to spend at least an hour in traffic for a donut.

I knew the route, but I have no geographical sense. After I passed a Dunkin’ Donuts, which I did not want, and had not yet seen Krispy Kreme, I began to doubt myself. Had I gone too far? Did I miss it? Should I turn around? In a split second I did a very unsafe u-turn. While driving, I looked up the address of the Krispy Kreme on my iPhone and input it into my GPS, which prompted me to do another u-turn.

Upon reaching the point of my first u-turn, I could see that the Krispy Kreme was less than a block away – visible from where I actually turned around. I did not see it previously because I was so frantic about whether I had gone too far, and about “wasting” any more of my precious time. Whereas, in reality, doubting myself took me even longer to obtain my goal.

So, how do you know when to keep going or to turn around? Unless you have a crystal ball, you don’t. But, you can assess the situation to make a sound decision. Ask yourself these five questions:

1. How badly do you want to achieve the goal? How important is the goal to you?

   — If it is your life dream, you may want to keep going regardless of all factors. But if it is just another “interest,” then you may want to cut your losses and focus on more productive interests. In this case, I REALLY wanted a donut!

2. How much time and effort have you already invested, and how much more are you willing to invest, even if all efforts have ended in failure?

   — Have you spent only a few months pursuing this goal, or has it been years? From the outset, how much time did you envision it would take to achieve the goal? Have you given it enough time? I knew that it would take 30-45 minutes to get to Krispy Kreme. I was willing to spend up to an hour and a half to get the donut.

3. What are the negative consequences of going forward with the current plan?

   — Will you be investing more time and money into achieving the goal? Is it affecting other people around you? Is it preventing you from reaching other goals you have? When I set off to get my donut, I knew I had no appointments that morning and could take until lunchtime. Now, obviously I did not want it to take all morning, but even if it did it would have no direct negative impact.

4. Are you making short-term decisions based on immediate pain reactions or long-term decisions based on research, data and experience?

   — Be mindful as to why and how you are making your decision to keep going or to turn around. If you are making the decision because of the immediate pain you are in and are disregarding the huge reward at the end to eliminate the current pain, you may want to step back and see if there is any other way (short of turning around) to minimize the pain (i.e. if you are short on money, how can you generate it otherwise or cut expenses). As they say, “No pain, no gain.” Remember, short-term pain is worth pushing through. Chronic pain calls for treatment (changing the plans).

5. If you turn around, will you always regret that you didn’t go forward?

   — You live with your success, your failures and your decisions. How will this decision affect you? Will it roll off your back because tomorrow is another day, another plan, another opportunity, or will it sit inside you, eating at you and tainting everything else you do? In my decision to turn around the first time, I was still in pursuit of my donut dream. I was not going to give up until I had it. I would have driven that road, making unsafe u-turn after u-turn, until I had it in my watering mouth.

However, I recently made a decision for one of my businesses where I said to myself, “I will invest a certain amount of money for the next two months. If this does not return the results I want, I will not invest any more money or time into it.” Well, those months were September and October of this year and as of October 31, I will be satisfied with my decision to walk away and follow a different road to success. (To be clear, the business is not my law firm or Lawyers With Purpose).

Where are you on your road? Are you just enjoying the scenery without knowing or caring where you end up? Do you need to turn around or keep going to achieve the success you seek?

As for me, now that I have had my donut I will be pursuing other goals.

Victoria L. Collier is a Veteran and Certified Elder Law Attorney, Fellow of the National Academy of Elder Law Attorneys, Co-Founder of Lawyers With Purpose LLC, and author of “47 Secret Veterans’ Benefits for Seniors—Benefits You Have Earned … but Don’t Know About.”

What is the greatest success you've had since joining LWP?

Our greatest success is simply the number of clients that are coming to us for assistance. These are clients I would not have been able to assist before LWP, and I certainly would not have been able to provide them assistance as effectively without the organized approach we learned from LWP.

What is your favorite LWP tool?

My favorite tool is the workshop. It took a leap of faith. My first workshop was mostly for family of my staff, and I didn't make an impressive presentation in my opinion. But I immediately saw how I could improve and it gave me confidence. We have been able to keep people coming as word spreads. In fact, my current challenge is how to most effectively focus my business development efforts. I have several insurance and financial professionals that want to be part of what we are developing. All I needed to do was implement the tools LWP provided.

How has being part of LWP impacted your team and your practice?

LWP has opened up entirely new opportunities for our practice. We are able to provide services in very specialized areas of estate planning (i.e. Medicaid planning) and do so in an organized way that allows us to think both short term and long term. This sets us apart. I am very optimistic about our future.

Join us for our weekly webinar and explore the key issues, step by step, in creating the optimal plans for your clients. Today we’ll be talking about lifetime planning (for all plans). You must know what rights and powers the grantor intends to retain during his/her lifetime, including:

1. Income
2. Principal
3. Powers of Appointment
4. Disability panel
5. Disability instructions – who will retain these powers

Registration Link to register for the entire series:

Registration Web Link: https://www3.gotomeeting.com/register/143535054