Maximum Lawyer

Tyson Mutrux 00:00:02 This is maximum lawyer with your host, Tyson Matrix.

Alexis Austin 00:00:11 Alexis, I'm pretty sure this is the first time you've been on since being married. So it's been a while, and I want to know, how is running a law firm different now that you're married?

Alexis Austin 00:00:24 I don't know if it has to do with being married or just how we've done it. How it's different is I really don't run a law firm anymore because essentially what we did is Jimmy, my husband and I, we separated out our silos and he is the he calls himself the Coloma, the chief operating legal officer, managing attorney. So it's Coloma. So Coloma runs everything from the firm side of things, and I just run the financials and the marketing. So I do all the high level work. But the only time I really see anybody in the firm is my C-suite team, which is my husband and our chief technical officer. I haven't seen anyone in my firm, and probably 7 or 8 months. I'll pop in now and then and, like, congratulate them on something.

Alexis Austin 00:01:13 But that's how it works. And it took years for us to get there, because Jimmy and I had a lot of tension at the beginning, stepping on each other's toes and having to figure out who's responsible for what. And I think once we figured it out and then redid it and then redid it again and got very clear on what roles we were each responsible for, it's really it's really good. And ironically, it's made us better family members too, because we can say, well, that's in your bucket, you're handling that, or this child thing is your thing, you're handling that.

Alexis Austin 00:01:43 So that seems like it's such an odd it's got to be such an odd feeling. I wonder what it feels like now that you're not you're not in the day to day as much.

Alexis Austin 00:01:52 It's interesting because I feel like I'm still in it because I live with my husband and I'm always hearing about how the firm is doing. I always know what's going on because he's always telling me. But I think what's interesting is my firm doesn't see me as much.

Alexis Austin 00:02:06 And so it's it's more impacting the relationships with the employees in the firm rather than because I feel still very deeply connected. And I've got a couple other businesses that I'm running, and I somehow let myself get talked into being the president of our local bar association. So I'm definitely busy all the time. I just with having a pulse on the firm. It may sound weird, but it's finally what I always wanted because I like the business side of things. I like running the business, I like doing high level business work, and I really don't care about the war stories of, well, this D.A. did this and this thing happened in this case. I'll talk with them if I see them, but I like being pulled out. But I do think it's interesting from the perspective of the employees. It's made them feel, from what I can tell and what I gather from talking to my C-suite team, it's made them feel much more of a team and a unit. And it essentially the company is its own thing now.

Alexis Austin 00:03:03 It operates completely outside of me, and I think that's made possible because it's a brand name, you know. Right. Law Group has nothing to do with my name, but they've become their own organization, which is really cool to see. And they have their own SOPs, they have their own systems for things. And some of it I don't even know, but I think it brought them closer. It definitely removed me, which is an interesting feeling.

Alexis Austin 00:03:25 So that firm was like your baby. And I gotta imagine there's times where you disagree with things, how things are being done. And so how do you prevent? Because I just think that's just a natural thing, right? So how do you prevent yourself from stepping in to guide them in a different direction?

Alexis Austin 00:03:42 It has become easier. I think the issue that I had to come to terms with was I realized pretty early on in my firm, and I think we talked about this on a prior podcast that I don't love being a lawyer. That's not what I'm here to do.

Alexis Austin 00:03:57 I have a law degree, but the law degree is more just the stepping stone that I got to bring me to where I am. And so when I decided to pull back, I had to recognize that the way that I operate and the way that I ran my baby for so long was just like, pedal to the metal, let's go hard all the way. Let's grow by ten times every year. And we grew very quickly. I mean, you saw it. It was go, go, go all the time. And that works really well in the startup phase. But to have the stability that the firm needed to have, the level of assurance that the team needed, I think it needed that stabilizing force that Jimmy brought to the team, and it just became something where I realized that my goals were bigger than just the firm. And so I have to recognize where the firm fits into all of my goals. And part of what I want for the firm, the the people who put their trust in me, is to make them feel comfortable, to make them feel safe, to make sure that they are well taken care of.

Alexis Austin 00:04:53 And that means not always doing things the way I want to do, which is let's blow the whole thing up and redo it in a week. I like to operate that way, but most normal humans do not like that, so it's more looking at what's best for the firm, what's best for the clients, what's best for the employees versus what I want.

Alexis Austin 00:05:11 It's a perfect segue because it I wonder the vision that you originally had for the firm you said you had these goals for the firm. Is the firm being guided by your vision? Is it being guided by Jimmy's vision? Is it what vision is it being guided by? And how do you make sure that that vision is being followed?

Alexis Austin 00:05:33 A couple of years ago, we sat down and we did the the Gino Wickman Traction book. We went through and built out our Vision Traction organizer. And at that time I want to say that was it was before Covid. So the vision then was we called it Colorado Domination. That was the vision for the firm is we want to be the best, biggest, most well respected, best service, criminal defense only firm in Colorado.

Alexis Austin 00:05:56 And that's the vision we laid out. That's the one that we said, this is what we're going to build our goal off of. And it's interesting because I was just looking at this the other day, the financial marks that we set, the in Colorado, we have the front range of the mountains. And so our first goal was to go up the front range with our offices and then expand west. And then if we want to go over east to where Kansas is, we can. But no one really cares about the east side because it's basically Kansas. But looking at it, that was our goal. And what I realized is for me personally as an entrepreneur, it wasn't a big enough goal. One state wasn't enough for me, one company wasn't enough for me, and I kept pushing for the firm. It was a fantastic goal. So what we've had to do is my husband and I have had to balance personal goals with firm goals and separate them out. The firm is actually still well on its way to Colorado domination trajectory.

Alexis Austin 00:06:48 We're from what we can tell, we're the largest, fastest growing criminal defense only firm in Colorado. We have four offices. It's a perfect line right along the Front Range. It's going really well, but it's I think it's not growing as fast as my original goal had been, because I recognized that the firm that the people in the firm needed it to be was different than what I wanted, not even what I wanted. It's interesting, I think, looking back, because I've looked back at my written vision that I've done a couple of times and the feeling that I had for the firm. Like when I say the feeling, I mean what the employees feel. I had written down. I think it was 2019. I'd written down that we had 2 to 3 offices in 2025, and attorneys were always asking if we had openings because it was known to be such a great place to work, and that is true. People are always asking if we have openings, and we're very selective in the attorneys we bring on, but that feeling that I wanted didn't match the aggressive revenue goals that I'd set.

Alexis Austin 00:07:52 And so I had to look at it and decide what was more important, the feeling of the firm, the cohesiveness of the group, or just cranking out gross revenue goals to crank them out. And what I found is that once you cross that seven figure threshold, it's just a number. It doesn't mean anything. What matters is profitability, stability, a solid trajectory forward. So it's yes, the goals are still there, but my goals personally have expanded and grown and become much bigger. And I think that that pushes the firm to do well in its goals, but also have its own goals separate from me.

Alexis Austin 00:08:27 So I actually think it's really easy to get to seven figures. It's it's about whether or not it is really what you're talking about that that sustainable growth, getting to seven figures is actually really, really easy. But a lot of people do it in a really reckless way. And they get to that point and they either stagnate or they start to decline because it's not. It's it's not this steady growth that is sustainable.

Alexis Austin 00:08:52 You hit this point where what I call the gridlock, where you've brought all these cases, and then they're not moving because you brought on all these cases and you don't have the people. And it's it creates this really, really bad environment. So I think that that's really smart in hindsight. So you've, you know, if you think back to 2019, do you feel like your, your revenue goals were were realistic.

Alexis Austin 00:09:14 The the long term vision revenue goals.

Alexis Austin 00:09:17 Right.

Alexis Austin 00:09:17 I mean, based on what we've seen, they were realistic. We our firm experienced somewhere between 25 to 150% growth every year up until a year or two ago. But we made the conscious decision a year or two ago to slow it down and really get solid on our systems. And so I think because we did that consciously and we said we're not going to push not not that we're not wanting to grow, but we're not going to push for the sake of growth. We're going to make sure we're really solid. We've now reached this place where we can grow without adding anyone else on.

Alexis Austin 00:09:48 And so before, when we were growing, we would grow by bringing on a new attorney and opening up a new office and expanding there. And you'd have to bring on new staff. And so even though your revenue line grew, your expenses grew. So you were growing for the sake of growing, which I mean, sure, you can do that if you want a vanity number, but it doesn't actually increase profitability for us. Now, what we're doing is we're growing deep instead of wide, so we're growing deep in our processes. Deepen the team. I don't think we have a single person in our firm who's been with us less than two and a half years. At this point, everyone is deeply committed to the mission. Everything is rooted and grounded. We have really, really great systems in place, and now we're at the point where we're looking at, okay, Q4 and Q1 of 2026, what can we do to just flood our firm with cases? Because we're ready for it, and we know that we're ready for it because the systems that we've built.

Alexis Austin 00:10:39 It seems to me that criminal defense is very ego driven and not necessarily from the attorney standpoint. It can be. As you know, there's there's but it's that's with any practice area. Right. It's a lot of times it's very ego driven from the client standpoint where they want the criminal defense attorney. Right. And I'm really curious how did you crack the code. Because scaling. That's why it's been so hard for many criminal defense firms to scale because of that fact. How have you cracked that code? Like, what's the secret to it?

Alexis Austin 00:11:10 I think it starts with the owner, actually. And I've talked to a number of criminal defense attorneys on this, and I always ask them, I said, well, what is your goal? Right. Is it to be the face? Is it to be the best criminal defense attorney? Do you want your name on the wall? Because if so, yeah, you can reach seven figures, but you're never going to really get past that, because it has to be about you and you're always going to be pulled back in.

Alexis Austin 00:11:31 And it's interesting because so many law firms that I've talked with, the owner says they want freedom of flexibility. They want to just take the cases that they want to take. They want to go to court when they want to go to court, and especially for criminal defense. Then I challenge them and say, well, do you really? Because if that's what you want, your name can't be anywhere on it. It needs to be almost impossible for any client to know who you are, because otherwise, yes, they are going to reach for the top. What we've done. And we did this very early on. We decided to be a brand, and we decided to make the focus of our practice. About the team of legal support that you're hiring, not even the lawyer. We don't let any, any potential client even talk to a lawyer until they've paid us, until they've signed a retainer agreement and until they've had their first call with the firm, not with a lawyer. Because the idea is we brand ourselves as the right criminal defense team.

Alexis Austin 00:12:22 Right. Law group. So when we're talking all of our ads, our TV ads say hire the right defense, it's never the right defense lawyer. It's the right defense team. So when we come at it and we're talking to people in our sales and our intake, We never mentioned the attorneys. We mentioned the exceptional results our firm gets. We mentioned the customer service we provide, but the clients. And it's interesting because basically what you're doing is you're just coaching them on what to be thinking about, and you steer them away from thinking about the lawyer. When someone calls into our firm, we completely focus on that one client. We focus on their problems, their specific pain points, their personal concerns, and we make it all about the client so they don't even think about the lawyer. And then once we say, yes, we can solve that problem for you. We're never going to make a guarantee on how we solve it. But if the problem is I want to know what's going on in my case all the time, great.

Alexis Austin 00:13:10 That's what we're here for. So we've built these these multiple kind of like a dam structure, these multiple locks that you have to get through before you even access the attorney so that the person feels invested in the firm rather than the attorney. And from a business perspective, it also helps me a great deal, because then if an attorney ever leaves, we don't have them leaving with a huge client base because the client was never really connected to that attorney anyway. They were connected to the team and the firm. If anything, losing one of our paralegals would be more detrimental than an attorney because the paralegals are talking to them. We have a requirement that every contact, every client gets contacted every two weeks without without fail. So even if we have no update, we call them to say, hey, we have nothing for you, but we're just checking in and it's that the non attorney that's contacting them and reaching out. So they always get multiple contacts from multiple people instead of just a lawyer.

Alexis Austin 00:14:01 Do you ever get any pushback from the attorneys because they want to have that contact, more of that contact with and have more a little more control? You're laughing.

Alexis Austin 00:14:10 I don't know why you're laughing, but I wonder if you do get pushback.

Alexis Austin 00:14:13 The only pushback I get is, why do I have to talk to this person?

Alexis Austin 00:14:17 Really? Okay, interesting.

Alexis Austin 00:14:19 Yes, they would like less contact. So what I pitched to attorneys who join our firm is I say, look, you became a lawyer to do legal work. You join our firm, you never have to touch billing. You never have to touch sales. You never have to touch regular updates. All you have to do is be an exceptional attorney and our attorneys love it. The only time they ever talk to clients is to discuss a specific legal issue, to discuss a plea, or to go over. Like the we have a strategy session where they review all the evidence. But our attorneys never ask for more client contact because number one, they trust the team that we have in place to do a good job. They know that our systems tell them exactly how. But I don't know. I don't know if other attorneys are different, but we usually hire client attorneys who either leave the PD office or the DA's office, usually the DA's office, and they're not used to client contact anyway.

Alexis Austin 00:15:07 All the contact they had was with victims and it was very draining. So they prefer to have their time protected. They prefer to do exceptional work and then give updates. But I honestly, I would fall off my chair laughing if someone said, I don't have enough contact with my client because it's never come up. They love having that separation.

Alexis Austin 00:15:26 It's interesting. Okay. Because it's just I think with with pie at least we I mean, we the attorneys seem to want to have a little bit more control over the clients and they would have a little bit more. And I think that's because especially whenever it's a case like that, they bring in, they want to have a little bit more control. And we definitely want to shift it more towards like the way you do things. And that's that's why we do things the way we do is we're you know, it's a lot of it's being done by non attorneys when it when it comes to the client communication everything. So it is it is definitely interesting when it comes to attracting talent.

Alexis Austin 00:15:57 What do you think. What do you think is like the most important thing to the attorney that would make them want to join your firm? Because I mean, it could be culture, it could be money and all that. But there's there's a lot of different things that they consider. And I wonder what what you think is the key to attracting top talent.

Alexis Austin 00:16:14 So I think it differs somewhat in criminal defense because our attorneys are always in court and because we have a policy, it's not really a written policy, but we need people who already have litigation experience. We're not trying to train people how to actually review a case or learn the rules of evidence. So we're always trying to poach from government agencies where people already have trial experience. And I think what's what's been really helpful in the past is other attorneys that we're interested in. They see how our attorneys hold themselves in court. They see how they are not complete jerks like some attorneys. They like the attitudes of the attorneys. They like the the way that they seem not to be completely stressed out of their minds like some other law firms.

Alexis Austin 00:16:55 They can see it on the attorneys how the firm treats them. Then we also have a very regimented process for basically wooing an attorney in our firm. So we've set it up where if we identify, we're always looking for the next hire. We're always trying to see who's that next person that really shines, that we would like to see if they're interested. And it's kind of like dating. We then say, okay, well, this person looks cool, let's invite them out for a drink. Then we so we start with we start with lunch. We invite them out for lunch just to talk to them, see how they're doing. Then we invite them out for a drink with the firm and the other lawyers just to see how they get along. And for me personally, I really like to see because you know how lawyers are with drinking. I want to see how they handle themselves in a social setting to see if they're going to go violating client confidentiality or anything. And so we get them familiar with the team, and then we come back and we talk about what did you think of that person? What did you think of their answers.

Alexis Austin 00:17:44 And if we enjoyed hanging out with them socially, then we will actually offer them a formal interview. And then we have an interview with me and Jimmy, and then we have an interview with our C-suite team. So it's four very specific stages. The first to the attorney may or may not even know that they're being considered. And by the end, we've already decided that we like them as a personality fit. Then we see if they're going to be a good fit for our systems.

Alexis Austin 00:18:06 All right. So I have a question. I'm going to ask you a question that was asked to me a year or two ago, and you made me think of it with some of the things you said. What is more important, in your opinion, having really good people or having really good systems and processes?

Alexis Austin 00:18:21 When you say what's more important? My first question is to what?

Alexis Austin 00:18:25 To the firm, to the business.

Alexis Austin 00:18:26 I think it's more important to have.

Alexis Austin 00:18:30 It's tough, isn't it? This is very tough.

Alexis Austin 00:18:32 Yes.

Alexis Austin 00:18:33 Yeah. I was going to say the right people in the right systems. I think that if you have the right systems, you will very clearly see if you have the right person. So I think systems are more important because with the right systems, you can find that diamond in the rough even if the person. So I see this all the time when I do private coaching with clients and I see their firms and they say, well, this person is not performing correctly. And I say, well, what did you do to set them up for success? What is the system that they're following? Because from what I see. Like I'm thinking of one client in particular. There's this new person and I think that the person is doing really well taking on these new tasks, showing proactivity. But the the owner is saying, no, they're not doing a good job because they're not doing these things. And I said, well, you don't have a single system in place that says those are the things they're supposed to do.

Alexis Austin 00:19:18 So how would this person know? So I think if you have the correct systems, then the right people rise and shine to those systems. So I think systems.

Alexis Austin 00:19:25 It's a good answer because it was funny. My initial reaction was people, obviously it's your people, your people, but the bad systems can can make an a player into a sea player because they don't have the right tools. It's a that's it's one of those things where you want to initially say it's obviously the people, obviously the people, but I think it's because you have to look. And I think the way you you put it, it's great too, because you, you can help the better systems you have, the more you can help the people that you currently have. Because I think that that's I think the way you put it was really good. But then the opposite is also true though, because if you have really bad systems, you can just you can you can kill the morale of your team. You can turn a really good employee into a bad employee.

Alexis Austin 00:20:04 And so that's what makes it a really tough question to answer, because you you just initially want to say, obviously, you know, people, but so that's me.

Alexis Austin 00:20:12 But I think from a business perspective, it's easier to to have good systems because then you can manage the system instead of the person, because then there's no personality conflict. What I always tell everybody in our firm is we manage systems, not people from a management level. When someone isn't doing well, we don't say you are a bad employee or you are doing a poor job. We're saying, what about the system? Do you not understand? How does the system need to be tweaked to give you what you need? Is there something that's going wrong? And it helps kind of put that separation too, because then the employee doesn't feel attacked. They can actually give feedback on the system. And if it is the system, then we can fix it and make everyone better. If it's not the system, it becomes very obvious that that person is not working well within the system.

Alexis Austin 00:20:53 And then we can say it appears that you're not able to work within our systems. It's nothing on you personally as a human, but you just don't have the skill set necessary, which makes it much easier to separate amicably instead of causing all kinds of drama.

Alexis Austin 00:21:06 Absolutely agree. What do you do with your week and what is your job title now.

Alexis Austin 00:21:11 In the law firm? I think I'm still listed on the website as CEO, but that's really just an honorary thing. I think the better term for me would be CVO Chief Visionary Officer Jimmy, my husband. He is our CEO. He's the one managing everything we have our chief technical officer running all the tech. So in the company I'm more of the high level. I guess if we looked at it from a true business perspective, I'm CEO because I still have everyone answering to me and I still do the final approvals on major decisions. But when I look at myself personally, I see my title as entrepreneur. That's what I do because I'm building out other companies, I've been coaching other law firms, and now I'm building out a new tech platform where I'm helping law firms do everything that with sales and intake specifically because that's my favorite thing, building out the sales and intake platform to help law firms really step into that position for themselves.

Alexis Austin 00:22:01 And hopefully this doesn't come back and bite me, but eliminate the need for coaching on sales and intake and just have them start taking control of their systems themselves. So for me, I think it's my ultimate title is Just Entrepreneur. I like to always build and create and grow.

Alexis Austin 00:22:16 Let me ask you about something that I kind of struggle with, because to me, we have a very not to me like we actually we have a very specific way and strategy that we handle cases. And it may be different whenever it's, you know, the way you handle cases in your firm. But we have a very specific strategy. And to me, it's very, very important to have quite a bit of interaction with front lines, people to to make sure that the, the, that we're handling cases the right way because that leads to the best result. How were you able to do that with the way that you're currently running your firm? And maybe you don't think that it's that important to do it that way.

Alexis Austin 00:22:50 So I do you think it's important that's important. And then if so, how do you how do you make sure that you maintain those channels with the frontline people?

Alexis Austin 00:22:59 When you say, do you think that's important? Can you be a little bit more specific?

Alexis Austin 00:23:02 Yeah. So having having that contact with the frontline people to, to understand, to to make sure that they are implementing the right strategies when it comes to working through their cases.

Alexis Austin 00:23:13 Front line people being intake and salespeople or and attorneys.

Alexis Austin 00:23:17 I'm talking to anyone that's got that. It's actually putting hands on the case.

Alexis Austin 00:23:21 Okay, maybe I'm being thick. I'm not sure I understand the question. How do I make sure that the firm and the team members in the firm are actually serving clients in the way that we want them served?

Alexis Austin 00:23:31 No no no no. So so I'll give you sort of an example. Like when we the way we negotiate a case is we have a very specific way we negotiate a case. We have a and I'm not going to talk about it here because I don't want everyone to know what it is.

Alexis Austin 00:23:44 But we have a very specific way that we do it right. And we want to make sure that that is always followed because it's it's gotten very good results for us. That's one example. Right. But how do you make sure and and I don't know, maybe you don't have like a specific strategy as to how you will handle cases. But I'm sure you have a, some sort of general framework for a case goes here and then it goes here, and then it goes here and goes there. So how do you make sure that all of that is being followed and that you that you are employing best strategies all the time because things will change like that. That's why I think it's so important to have make sure that we, I am tied in so, so heavily into the front lines because strategies will have the change. Case law changes like the statutes change. So we have to have to, you know, different strategies on the other side because we had, you know, reptile was really big.

Alexis Austin 00:24:35 And so the defense came up with with strategies to counter reptile. And so we had to we had to really understand how those work because that affects all the systems and processes. So I how are how are you able to stay tapped into that to make sure that you are evolving the right way?

Alexis Austin 00:24:49 I see, I see well, for from the attorney legal product perspective, I hire people who are smarter than me. I hire attorneys for more tapped in. When I look at it, I'm looking for attorneys who are either have more experience or have more relevant experience, or close in time experience. Like I haven't stepped foot in a courtroom in three years, so I don't know. I don't know what's going on.

Alexis Austin 00:25:12 Congratulations.

Alexis Austin 00:25:13 Well, thank you, thank you. But I want to know what's going on in the courtroom all the time now. For my specific setup, it's not my job to know what's going on legally. It's Jimmy's job because he's the head of legal. The way that he manages this is he has.

Alexis Austin 00:25:28 First of all, we build systems so that no one can deviate. There's no opportunity to deviate from the right law way of doing things. And then in order to change those systems, we're doing continual feedback loops. So every single week Jimmy is meeting with our case managers individually, talking with them, seeing how the systems are going, see what the clients are going through. He has those high level meetings every single week. We're having meetings with our attorneys. It's a one staffing meeting that we have where it's about an hour and a half. We work through all of the cases. We talk about the case law we're building up. And in each of these meetings, our chief technical officer, Brandon, also sits in so that if he hears anything that comes up, even though he may not understand the legal ramifications. He can tweak the system to adjust to what we need. And then Jimmy meets with that legal assistance every week. So we have compartmentalized meetings each week, and they're not meant to be pro forma meetings where it's just sitting there checking off a list.

Alexis Austin 00:26:20 We're going over specific case issues, so it's really more case staffing. And that's how our our C-suite team stays involved in the cases themselves and make sure that we understand what's going on. And then we have, you know, we operate on slack. So if there's ever any emergency kind of issue come up or if there's something that the Da start doing that's just crazy sauce, we can put it in a, in a, in a fire channel and say, hey, this is something we need to address. And then we all just hop on and brainstorm together. Does that answer your question?

Alexis Austin 00:26:48 Yeah. No, absolutely it does. Yeah. I think that's the reason I want to ask you is because, you know, every firm is different and there's there's different viewpoints on that specific thing. And so that's why that's why I want to ask you about it. Because you are you are in a pretty unique position where I think Brett Tremblay calls it the owner's box, right where you're sort of like in the owner's box.

Alexis Austin 00:27:09 And Jim and I, we've talked about this quite a bit about the owner's box and how we don't think it's truly possible to just be in the owner's box. And because and I actually I don't think you're truly in the owner's box either. I think because you do, you are tapped in. I think if you were truly in the owner's box, you'd have zero contact with anybody in the firm and you'd just be sitting there collecting profits. That's why we think that the the whole idea of it is a little bit it's not possible for the most part, when it comes to running a law firm.

Tyson Mutrux 00:27:35 I think it's possible.

Alexis Austin 00:27:36 If you don't care to be involved, but then you don't have as much control over what's going on, and I don't. I guess for me, I don't need control. I just want to make sure that we are presenting ourselves in the correct way to our community. We're serving our clients in the best way. So I come at it more from a just doing a little check.

Alexis Austin 00:27:53 But I think it also goes back to that people conversation of hiring the best people. Because when you have a good team, you can trust that 95% of the time they're going to be able to run it for you. But I also I think you're right. I think if I didn't, if I wasn't married to the person running the firm, it would be a very different feeling and I would feel much more disconnected. But that just means you got to marry. Well.

Alexis Austin 00:28:15 That's that's so true. Very true. That's a really good point, though, because you I can't imagine I my, my guess is that is that you if you were not married to the person that's running the firm, basically that you wouldn't do it. You would, you would not. You would still be more tap dead, as my guess, probably.

Alexis Austin 00:28:33 Probably. It's interesting because there are some weeks that we don't discuss much of the firm except for it. Well, we've also done a good job because when we first started, you know how it goes.

Alexis Austin 00:28:45 You've got everything going on in the firm, and then you bring it all home and then you're never getting away from it. You never have time to just be married. And it's exhausting. So we've also had it kind of separated out where the firm actually hired my law firm, consulting company as a consultant. So we have specific meetings where that's where our time is spent. Where I'm talking with Jimmy and Brandon about what's going on in the firm, and we try to keep it boxed in there and treat it. I mean, it helps for tax purposes, too. So we have a clean delineation, but we try to keep it pretty compartmentalized so that we're not blurring those lines. But I do think I do think the being married and tapped into the person running it is essential for what I'm doing.

Alexis Austin 00:29:25 How do you make sure that you set a time, set aside time for the marriage?

Alexis Austin 00:29:28 So that's an interesting question, because right now we've got our little guy. He's turning 11 months today. So that's been it's been a challenge.

Alexis Austin 00:29:37 It's been a challenge. We try to schedule at least one date night a month with our little guy. It's been it's been a little different. It sounds very unromantic, but it's been incredibly helpful for us. We actually schedule out our week on Sundays and we schedule because we both we work from home as much as we can. I only work from home, but we don't have our kiddo in daycare. We both watch him. We want him to grow up with family around him. So we go and we look at our schedule and we look at all of our calendars and we say, well, this is when you've got little Guy and this is when you've got him. And so then we schedule him, hey, this is date night when he goes to bed. This is when we're having a date night. So it's it's it sounds unromantic, but it's scheduling. It's using the calendar because you schedule what matters, right? So if it matters to you, you make sure it's on the calendar.

Alexis Austin 00:30:17 Yeah. That's why we have date night on the calendar every single week. It's on the. The kids know about it. Everybody knows about it. I mean, our parents know about date night. It's just one of those things, like, it's just. That's date night. So there's nothing gets scheduled on a date night. It's just how. It's how it works. I am super curious, based on what you said. Are you all going to homeschool? And if so, how are the hell are you going to do that with running a law firm?

Alexis Austin 00:30:37 I think my husband wants to know the answer to that question, too. Do you know that I was homeschooled?

Alexis Austin 00:30:42 No, I'm, you know, okay. So please, I'm going to get hate mail for this. I'm shocked by that. I because you interact so well, I think homeschooling the idea is such a great thing I do, I do, I do, I do. So please don't get sent me any hate mail.

Alexis Austin 00:30:58 But I'm not a weirdo, right?

Alexis Austin 00:30:59 You're the most normal homeschool person I've ever met that I know was homeschooled. So that I'm. I'm very, very surprised by that fact.

Alexis Austin 00:31:09 So the way I was homeschooled, I was homeschooled from second to eighth grade, and maybe I was at a slight disadvantage because my mom was actually a college professor. She wasn't at the time, but she is now. But I think I think it's the way in which it's done. So I credit a lot of my ability to run a law firm to the fact that I was homeschooled, because my mother just set out a curriculum for me and said, study this, do this. And I was just I've always been a driven person. So my goal was to get done with all of my schooling by noon so I could go do whatever I wanted, and I would grade my own test, and I wouldn't cheat because I really wanted to know how good I was. And that's the type. If I was to homeschool my son, that's the type of environment I'd want him to be in, where it's all about being driven to be the best version that you can be.

Alexis Austin 00:31:50 And I personally, having been through this entrepreneur journey a little bit here and I'm looking at what's going on in the world. I think the greatest skill that you can teach a child is how to think. And so if I'm able to teach my son how to think outside of the traditional school system, great. If there's a school system that is focused on teaching someone how to think. I heard about a school in Boston where they teach children how to fail, which is fantastic. They're working with them. Yeah, on robotics and different things, where the whole goal is to fail as much as possible so that you're learning and improving. So it may not have to be homeschooling, but that is my goal for him. Little guys only, you know, less than a year old. So we got some time. But the goal is to teach him how to fail and how to think so that he can be the best version of a human in the world, whether that's homeschooling or not, I don't know.

Alexis Austin 00:32:36 And if it if it is homeschooling, I won't be doing it. I outsource everything, that's what we do. I'll get my mom to teach him or I'll hire a private tutor. We'll go Vanderbilt style. We'll see.

Alexis Austin 00:32:45 There. I mean, the reason why I asked about it is because I'm one. I'm curious about it ourselves because we've talked about it when it comes to me and Amy with our kids And because there's massive benefits, the test scores, I mean, it's just they're off the charts. Way better than than people that are going to public schools and private schools. So there's that. There's also you have I mean, you have that connection with your kids. They do learn that more independent learning. They learn the time management part of it because they realize, oh, I can do I can spend three hours a day and I could I mean, you could probably actually get graduate early doing three hours a day, or you could do six hours a day and graduate really early. You can you get to control your you're learning a lot of different things.

Alexis Austin 00:33:28 And nowadays I've, I've noticed like our Jiu-Jitsu. So I go to jiu jitsu and they've got a homeschool classes so kids can come into during certain hours for homeschool kids. Taekwondo has it. There are soccer teams. Like there's all these different resources nowadays that probably weren't didn't exist back whenever you were homeschooled. Maybe they did exist, but.

Alexis Austin 00:33:49 Oh no, I was homeschooled, I did taekwondo. We did soccer. I did softball because the key is if you're going to homeschool. And this is just my opinion, but if you're going to homeschool, you have to embed social activities. And I think having more social activities is helpful because you want to have that group collective that you have them a part of. So we would do all kinds of different camps and things, but I also think it's helpful to follow adults around. So when I was homeschooled, we would have a week each semester where I would follow an adult around to learn what they did and basically like they get a free little intern for a while, like I would do it where I'd follow.

Alexis Austin 00:34:28 When I was younger, it was my grandparents and I would learn how to cook and clean and stuff for my grandmothers. But later on I would follow my my grandmother around her job. She worked at a furniture store, so I learned how to set things up and you have to get permission from the companies. But it was really helpful because I would get embedded in these adult environments, and I grew up being able to talk to people of any age because I wasn't, you know, surrounded only by my peers. It was a wide range of people. We also were really active in theater, so we had a really active theater life and did a lot of musical theater as homeschoolers. So and we had the time to and we were really good because we could practice. So I think if you do it, you have to do it in a way that the schooling is just a tiny portion of your day. The purpose, in my opinion, for homeschooling, is to give your child much more experiential learning than a normal kid.

Alexis Austin 00:35:17 Kids can't wait to find out what you all are going to do whenever you make the decision, so stay tuned for that. Let's transition about the coaching. And is the coaching different from consulting? Because what's interesting about this is I think that the way you learned as a kid probably helps you with the way you probably coach. And so can you talk a little bit about the coaching and is the its consulting the same or is that something different?

Alexis Austin 00:35:41 So I have branded myself as a consultant, not a coach, I think. I think coaches Is just a very blanket statement for me. Coaching seems to be this here's my system of doing things. Go watch these courses. Do these things and you'll be successful. When I work privately with the law firm, I consult. So what we're doing is I'm sitting in and I'm basically acting either as a CEO with them or a CEO or whatever they need. And we're building out together what they need in their firm. So I'm a lot more hands on. I'm a lot more in the firm.

Alexis Austin 00:36:14 Their team knows me. I communicate with the firm. I'm a consultant. When I'm doing sales coaching, that is coaching more, it's I teach. So I've actually like I was telling you earlier, I'm rolling out, I call it my chief virtual sales officer program, where I teach the law firms intake and sales teams how to appropriately qualify leads, how to actually sell from the perspective of customer service selling. Not my lawyers the best because they know all this stuff. Egotistical sailing I keep saying sailing my Southern's coming in, but for that perspective. It's coaching because it's here are the general ways that you need to understand sales from the psychological perspective. Here's what you need to be looking for in sales calls. And then we do a lot more hands on. I call them hot seats where we get them up, we pull sales calls and we dig into them and say, this is where you did this. This is what the client is feeling here. And we do it over and over, and we do it with lots of different sales calls.

Alexis Austin 00:37:06 So that's more coaching. The private work I do is more consulting because it's more deeply embedded in their individual firms. And, you know, every single law firm owner has a slightly different version on what they want in their firm. I do tend to work only with flat fee firms on the consulting side, just because that's what I know. But the goal I have for people is to build what they want. Not to say do it my way. Who cares if if my way work for me, it may not work for you. My goal is to figure out what that person wants and help them build what they want. And then spoiler alert in sales, that's exactly what you do with clients too. You figure out what they want and you sell them what they want ethically and within reason.

Alexis Austin 00:37:42 I'm going to ask you a question that may seem weird to you, but I'm asking it for a reason. Why do you use the word sales.

Alexis Austin 00:37:50 As opposed to consults?

Alexis Austin 00:37:52 So, Yeah. Yeah. Well, all of the different terminology that are used by a bunch of other people in legal space, I think sales is the right way of putting it, but they call it, you know, into int they call it conversion.

Alexis Austin 00:38:06 There's, there's all these different terms that they use and it's freaking sales as what it is. So it is does it does it frustrate you that we use that in the legal industry, that sales is like a dirty word. And then all these other words are used in place of sales.

Alexis Austin 00:38:21 So you hit the nail on the head. The reason that people don't use sales is because it has a negative connotation. It's because people think that sales is something that you do to someone. But selling is something you do for someone. When you're selling someone, you're trying to help them get what they want. You're trying to help them achieve what they want. Even car salesman, which have a terrible reputation generally. Car salesmen are trying to get you into a vehicle that makes you happy. Now, whether you have buyer's remorse after it is based on how they actually conduct a sale. I don't get upset with it. What I try to do is reclaim the truth. The reason I call it sales is because that's what it is.

Alexis Austin 00:38:56 And honestly, if you look at any kind of human interaction, every human interaction is a form of sell. One person in the conversation is selling the other person. Generally, it's the person speaking less who's selling, because the person speaking less is the one that has more control. Just like in this conversation, you have more control of the conversation by speaking less and by asking questions. So I think personally, I think almost every human interaction is a sale in some form or another. One person is trying to get something and one person is trying to give it, or both are trying to get and both are trying to give. But I think calling it sales is helpful for two reasons. Number one, it's calling truth. Truth. That's what it is. That's what we do. And two, by calling it sales, what I found is it helps law firm owners get out of this notion that lawyers have to do the initial client contact. If you're calling it a consultation, that has more of a legal connotation.

Alexis Austin 00:39:47 And so then you bring in all these ideas that you need to be providing some kind of legal advice. I personally think that providing legal advice on an initial call with the client is unethical. I think it's dangerous, and I think it risks your license because if you're providing legal advice, you're not, unless you're actually doing a paid consultation where you gather information up front. So if you're actually going through like for Pi, if you actually had medical records and had police reports, then you could do it. If you're in estate planning and you actually had their documents and you did some kind of strategy session, or if you're in criminal and you actually pulled their records, sure, you could do a legal consultation, but short of that, you're talking in generalities. And I think that talking in generalities, one is a huge disservice to the client because you're just telling them, well, this is what I generally do, and I'm going to fit you into this bucket. It's the exact same idea with consulting.

Alexis Austin 00:40:36 No one wants to feel like just a number. No one wants to feel like. Well, I'm gonna do for you. I'm gonna get a DUI plea because I always get DUI. Please. They want to know that you're going to put time and attention into their case and actually be their attorney and actually be their law firm. And so if you speak in generalities, you water down your expertise because it makes you sound like you just do this every single day. It's just something that you do. And then they start price shopping as opposed to actually purchasing the result that you can get them. But I also think from an ethical perspective, if you're going to comment on what you can get for them and make promises to them, or even something that could be misconstrued as a promise on the call, you're risking your license because you haven't looked at anything, you've just looked at their case type. And even that may be incorrect because our clients don't know they're normal human. So I call sales sales because it is and should be a sale.

Alexis Austin 00:41:25 And if it's not a sale, I think you're risking a lot by not doing it as a sale.

Alexis Austin 00:41:29 We tell clients that if we if we were to give them that, that sort of guidance, we'd be lying to them because we would be lying to them. Be because I don't know. I, I still I listen. I, I'm believing what you're telling me, right. But I've had several clients that they've, you know, fudged the truth a little bit. And then whenever I get the actual evidence, it's not the same. And so the, the any advice I would be giving you right now would not be the truth. So they usually they tend to to latch on that it's also a nice sales technique because then if they go to someone that's that gave them some advice, they're like, no, they're a liar because they are. Let's just call them what they are like. If because we see this a lot in the P.I. space where, you know, they're giving, well, your case is worth $50,000.

Alexis Austin 00:42:12 How did the frick do you know that? You know what I mean? Like, you don't know that. You don't know what the policy limits are. You don't know what the all the injuries are. You don't know anything other than they were in a crash. So it drives me freaking crazy, as you might tell. But. So there's. We had Theo van McKinsey in the Guild the other day doing a sales training, and he talked about from a sales technique alone, you set aside everything else you said just from a sales technique alone. Don't ever give it, he said. Don't ever give advice. And I even said, well, are you even? Are you talking about information or advice or both? And he said both. So. Like for example, like what's the statute of limitations on a personal injury case in Missouri? You don't. Well, why is that important to you? So you turn around and you ask questions about it. You know, why is that important to you? And you you don't answer those questions in there.

Alexis Austin 00:42:59 You because you want to. The reason why is you want to get to the get more information basically is what you want to do. And then you answer those during the actual intake and all that. But that's you know, we don't get all that. So but I think that just from a sales standpoint, I think that's smart. But also everything else you said is is right too. I mean, you're setting yourself up for failure by giving giving them that guidance. I do wonder why consulting. My guess is that when you were a little kid, you weren't like, I can't wait to be a consultant, you know? So I do wonder why consulting.

Alexis Austin 00:43:30 For me personally or why anybody would.

Alexis Austin 00:43:32 Why you want. No no no. Why you personally.

Alexis Austin 00:43:34 So for me personally, it's a stepping stone. I will not always be a consultant. The reason I got into it is because I want to help other law firm owners and other business owners achieve success, and I want to be of service to them to help them reach that goal.

Alexis Austin 00:43:49 So right now, for me, consulting helps people actually achieve their goals faster. It's the same idea of, you know, coaching with a basketball player. Why does Michael Jordan have a coach? Because he needs someone to help him. Well he did obviously he's retired now, but he needed someone to continually make him better and to reach that next level. I like helping lawyers, I love lawyers, the clients that we have. It's I'm I'm okay helping clients, but I love helping lawyers. I love the way lawyers think, I love the way they interact. And so what I can do to be of service of lawyers right now is consult and help them build and grow. The next phase is helping them get more money in their firm through the sales techniques. And I love what Theophanes said. That he's completely correct, because the whole issue for everything, for consulting, for sales, it all boils down to what is the person across from me actually want? What are they actually looking for? That's the hardest, biggest question you can ask anybody what do you want? And if you can get them to really tap into that.

Alexis Austin 00:44:46 If it's a client hiring a firm, or if it's someone that I'm working with consulting, if they can really be honest with themselves about what they want, getting that clear picture of it means it's already attainable. What I think I see the most happen with law firms is they have something that they think that they want. They say, I want to have a seven figure firm or I don't want to go to court, but that's that's just a surface level idea. It has nothing to do with what they actually want. What most people actually want is deep human connection, meaning in their life. And what that looks like is different for every person. So for me, consulting with law firm owners right now is just a way to exercise, helping people truly get what they want and allowing themselves to actually admit what they want and making themselves much more happy in the long term. It's sometimes a little like pulling teeth to ask someone what they really want, because it's it's tough for people to allow themselves to want what they want, because sometimes it doesn't seem big enough, or it doesn't seem cool enough or flashy enough, but giving people that space to actually experience, hey, this is what I want.

Alexis Austin 00:45:54 This is what I want to go for. This is who I want to be, and then helping them achieve that. It's so incredibly rewarding. I absolutely love it.

Alexis Austin 00:46:01 Yeah, that is something I've found too, because it's influenced by so many external things where they're thinking like, well, such and such said this and such and such said that. And I heard this on the podcast, I saw this in a video and it very much is guided by that. And I think that that's that's really wise of you to try to try to try to look past that. I do wonder what is the most frustrating thing law firm owners do when you're consulting them, because I can ask you like the best things. Yeah. Yeah. What's your favorite part? I don't know. People don't care about that. I am very curious about, like, what is it that they do that. So you're you're working with them, you're consulting with them, and then they do X and it just frustrates the hell out of you.

Alexis Austin 00:46:38 They do what I used to do when I see them making the same mistakes I made. It drives me crazy because I'm like, you're. I'm here to not let you do that. I'm here to try to prevent you from making the mistakes I made. And the number one thing is creating chaos. I created so much chaos in my firm, in my mind, in my life. I think that people so shiny objects and domino is a huge thing that law firm owners and any business owner suffers from. But with the rise of AI and the amount, the sheer amount of information you can access now, I think the single most important thing you can do is get very clear on what you're working on and just drill into that one thing. If you want to change and you want to switch over, make a conscious decision to change and switch over. But what I see them doing is they let themselves be pulled in all these different directions, and they won't allow themselves to focus on what's most important to them.

Alexis Austin 00:47:29 They they do things where they will. And again, it's what I did. That's why I can recognize it. They will build things for other people, not for themselves, because I think people worry about being selfish or worrying about coming off as an egotistical jerk, when in truth, if you actually built from what you truly want, then everything would flow much more smoothly because you can get people on board with your vision. But I think creating unnecessary chaos is the biggest pet peeve of mine, because we think that overcoming something difficult makes us more valuable. So if it's not difficult enough, we make it more difficult so that we feel more value in ourselves by overcoming it. When really the simplest, elegant solution is usually the best and the cleanest way to go. But people say, well, that's too easy. Yeah, of course, that's why I just going forward and having success would be much easier if you just let it be easy.

Alexis Austin 00:48:21 How do you reel them in? Because I think that can be really difficult, especially whenever sometimes it's like their entire world is chaos, right? It's there.

Alexis Austin 00:48:29 It's not just the firm. Like in their personal life, it's chaos. And so that's that's kind of rolling into the firm. So how are you able to to help guide them to a point where the seas are a little bit more steady. And I'm using it. Since you said sails and sailing, I want to make sure you make a Jim Aspel reference, because he would love the fact that we're talking about sailing. But how do you how do you make sure that how do you help the seas become calm in a, in a when when you're dealing with some someone that has a pretty chaotic life?

Alexis Austin 00:48:56 I mean, the truth is Tyson, I don't. No one no coach can do that. No coach can calm anything down for any person. The question is, does the person you're working with actually want that solution? And my job is to get them to really take personal responsibility of what's going on, which, again, personal responsibility isn't a favorite topic that people have, but it gives you so much control and power in your life if you actually take personal responsibility of what's going on.

Alexis Austin 00:49:21 Because once you say yes, I pause this. Then you have the ability to say, well, do I actually want to continue doing this? So I don't help them get control. I shine a light on what they're doing and ask, do you want to continue in this path? And that's up to you. Like I tell all my clients, you can choose to listen to me or not. I don't have a personal preference. Like I'm going to be here and be happy no matter what, but I'll shine this light on what you're doing. And then if you tell me you want to fix it, I ask them what you are going to do. I ask every client, what is your number one sabotage pattern? What do you do when you start tearing yourself down? How do you deviate from what you say you're going to do? And then I ask them for permission to remind them of their habit. I'm not calling them out on it. They've identified it themselves. I'm just here to serve as that mirror and reflection.

Alexis Austin 00:50:04 Say, hey, remember how you told me that you'll go off and do something else when you're worried about your ability to do this thing? I see you doing that. Can we please come back to what you said you want or have you changed your mind? So it's really being able to get them to identify it, which that can take a couple of sessions just to get someone to identify their habits. But once we identifying it, getting their permission to call them out on it. Because the thing is, humans are humans. If they're not open to hearing it, they're never going to hear you anyway. So you can't fix anything unless someone wants to fix it themselves. And if someone wants to fix it themselves, I'm all for it. We're going to get them moving much faster.

Alexis Austin 00:50:40 I'm. I'm so glad you said what you just said because I wanted to ask you about this James Joyce quote. mistakes are the portals of discovery, and it's so it's so perfect for what you just said, you know, because and you mentioned accountability.

Alexis Austin 00:50:55 I love whenever there's a dog barking. What kind of what kind of dogs you got?

Alexis Austin 00:50:58 Guard dogs. Can you tell?

Alexis Austin 00:51:01 I love it yeah. So but I did want to get your thoughts also on that quote. So mistakes are the portals of discovery.

Alexis Austin 00:51:07 I mean that's just another way of saying mistakes are opportunities in disguise. And I think that's exactly right. I don't think there are mistakes. I think that making a mistake. Quote unquote, is just you learning something that didn't work because then you now know how to make it work. That's all a mistake is, is an opportunity to see what isn't working and change it. And I always challenge people when you call something mistake, if you reframe it and say, this is an opportunity, it's incredible because instead of saying, oh, look at this mistake we made with intake, what opportunity is there here? And if you just did that simple reframe, what's the benefit? What's the good thing about this? You open yourself up to exponential improvement instead of beating yourself up about it.

Alexis Austin 00:51:49 Love it. I want to ask you about something else. So it's the quote is from Robin Sharma. Leadership is not about a title or a designation. It's about impact, influence and inspiration. So when it comes to the firm, who would you say provides that impact, influence and inspiration? Is that you? Is that Jimmy? Is it somebody else?

Alexis Austin 00:52:13 Number one, I think that that's an ideal for inspiration. I think some people actually embody that leadership. I think some people think leadership is dictatorship. And I think that a lot of law firms fall into that second category without meaning to for for us, I think true leadership is developing other people into leaders. So for me, my goal with the firm has been to teach those around me how to become their own leaders and to step into it, because I, I pulled out after having already had people in there. I was fortunate to have some of our attorneys who've been with us a long time. They are stepping up as leaders and they're leading.

Alexis Austin 00:52:51 So it's not just Jimmy. Jimmy does a fantastic job of leading everyone in the right direction, but he empowers them to be leaders as well. Because if you're truly building a culture and a movement that you want to have happen with your company, it's not just one leader. It's developing everyone else into leaders. So helping them say, well, this is what I see. This is the issue that I'm seeing, the opportunity that I see. How do I fix it? They're taking that leadership role. I'll step in and say a few things here and there. But what I tried to do was I tried to build a culture of leadership through the group before I left. And now it's a continuation. It's it's the brand. It's who we are. Everyone does things the right way, the right group way, because that's who we are. I don't know, I don't know if that answers your question, but the goal is to instill leadership in others, not to have a leader.

Alexis Austin 00:53:40 Listen, it's your view on the quote.

Alexis Austin 00:53:41 So it's it's it's whatever. It's whatever you think I there is no right or wrong answer. I do think you're right about other law firm owners do sometimes they do view it as a dictatorship. Sometimes they're too lax. It's somewhere in between because you got to have some sort of like, you know, this is the way you have someone that's kind of that's still leading because the, the element that a lot of owners, they don't they, they neglect is the leadership part of it. And leading people. You still have to lead. It's not. There are many studies on this and this whole idea where you flatten the leadership. It doesn't work. It's not a successful way of doing things. You still have to have someone that's at the top. That's why you have a lot of a lot of companies in general. They've got one leader, the most successful have one leader. Yeah, you have a committee, you have a board, whatever you want to call it, your leadership team, but you still have the one leader that ultimately is guiding the way.

Alexis Austin 00:54:33 So I think that that that part's really, really important.

Alexis Austin 00:54:35 Well, I think too, as a leader, my goal as an actual leader and everything I do is to be the dumbest person in the room, because you can lead and create direction, but it doesn't mean you have to be the smart one. So for me, I think leadership is more like the rudder on a ship. If we're going back to Captain Jim Bell's analogies. The leader is the rudder. They're not the the main thing. They're supposed to be the one that guides the ship the way it needs to go. But every other expertise is needed. So I think wanting to be the smartest person is the fatal flaw that a lot of law firm owners have. It's not about how smart you are, how good you are. It's what are you doing to move things forward. And to do that, you don't need to be the smartest because then you're going to tap out. You're never going to be greater than you are.

Alexis Austin 00:55:20 Totally agree it.

Alexis Austin 00:55:21 I don't know that I don't remember the story about Henry Ford, but there's that whole story about Henry Ford, about someone, you know, saying that they're that he's a just an idiot or whatever. But and he talks about all the smart people he has around him. I don't I don't know the full story, but it's a, it's a, it always that makes me think of that. I think that you're right. So here I have a I have a fun little question and then we'll start to wrap things up. But so you're, you're at a dinner party. You and I meet for the first time. Okay. And I say, you know, hey, Alexis, my name is Tyson. I, you know, I run a personal injury firm. How do you how do you introduce yourself? Because you've got the firm, you've got the consulting. What do you what do you say.

Alexis Austin 00:55:55 I ask you about you?

Alexis Austin 00:55:56 Well, no, I asked you, I here's the I listen, I know this game and I would play this game with you and you I would get an answer from you because I know this game.

Alexis Austin 00:56:05 I know how you I know when people try to turn it around because I'm doing the same shit right back to you. So it's exactly what I do. I try to, I try to make it about them because, okay, so I know is it because whenever you're asking them questions and they're talking the most, how the person feels, it makes them feel special, is that is that why you do it? Yep. That's it's. But you're also being you're genuinely curious.

Multiple Speakers 00:56:29 I love learning.

Alexis Austin 00:56:30 That. Yeah, but I'm genuinely curious. What? Like what? What do you say in that situation? How do you introduce yourself?

Alexis Austin 00:56:35 My mission in life is to teach people how to utilize faith to live the best life possible. And what I do is I teach people faith in business. I teach people faith in their personal lives. And I don't mean it from an Uber Christian religious perspective. I mean exercising faith. That's what I do, and it shows up in lots of different ways. But that's who I am and what I do.

Alexis Austin 00:56:55 You know, I did notice that you started like a Facebook group or something like that, right? So tell me about that.

Alexis Austin 00:57:00 So my whole thing, what I've learned is I think that entrepreneurship and business ownership is the most gigantic leap of faith a person can take. And I think that if you truly embrace it, and I don't care if you come from a religious background or more of a metaphysical background, the exercise of faith is, you know, the Hebrews quote in the Bible is the evidence of things not seen. You have faith that this thing exists, and faith is an action towards an expectation. It's a confident expectation that something's going to occur. So when you're looking at utilizing faith in a business, you have to come from the approach of having a confident expectation that your goal is actually happening. Not that it will happen, not that it's going to happen at some future point. It's actually happening, and a confident expectation is continually taking action in that forward progression. So what I teach people to do in anything that I'm doing is how do you recognize, number one, what that that outcome is that you're wanting? And then how do you operate from the perspective of continually taking action towards that? Because as you take action, it shows up.

Alexis Austin 00:58:04 Now, if you think, oh, it's coming in the future, it'll always be in the future and you'll never realize it. But if you take that consistent action towards your goal, your goal shows up a lot sooner than you think. It's crazy how quickly things come in. If you actually exercise faith, which is an action, it's a verb, not an idea.

Alexis Austin 00:58:21 I like it. Let me end with this. So when you look back years from now, so near the end of your career, what do you hope will be the lasting legacy of your work?

Alexis Austin 00:58:33 Looking back, I want to be able to say that I made the world a better place for the people that were in it by helping them improve their lives, improve the lives of their family, and get more connected to their purpose in life.

Alexis Austin 00:58:46 Alexis. Awesome. Thank you.

Multiple Speakers 00:58:47 Yes, sir. Thank you very much.