Buying Tires vs. Legal Services

Are you ever in the market to buy tires? Sure, all of us are at one point or another. How do we buy tires? We wait until we need them and then we start shopping for them. We don’t see any tire ads until the time we decide we need them and then that’s all we see are tire ads. You just don’t think about tires until something happens when you need a new one or set of them.

Is this any different than how you use an attorney? I don’t think so, at least for the majority of people. When something happens, then you do a mad search for an attorney and hope you find one that is ethical, honest, can be trusted and is someone you want to deal with about some of your most critical issues. Tough way to shop for something that could help you change your life one way or the other.

The big question for attorney’s is, “how do you build a relationship along the way with people so that when the time comes they need an attorney, this isn’t a “knee-jerk” reaction and you just pick the one that happens to come along. This is one of the key reasons I am doing a blog. To help let you and your friends get to know me before you need me. Then you can make an “educated decision” on whether or not you want to work with me or not.

Now isn’t that a much better way to shop for something as critical as legal advice instead of running all over town “kicking tires” of different attorney’s and hope you found the one that best fits your needs and personality? We think so.

Special Forces or the whole Army?

I had the rare privilege of spending a few years in the U.S. Army Infantry, and I was lucky enough to be Ranger and Airborne qualified.  I worked with great soldiers, officer and enlisted, in our Army and those of other countries.  I worked with quite a few Special Forces units, especially other Rangers and Commandos (mostly British SAS and French Army.)  What a life experience that was. I can look back on that time and realize that this training and these experiences truly shaped who I am today. So what does this have to do with Law and attorney’s you might ask?  Plenty.

People ask us all the time what is the difference between those of us who work in smaller, very focused law firms vs. the very large ones. Great question and one that needs an answer. But rather than just give you some generic “sales pitch” about us, I thought I could better illustrate it through an example.

“Special Forces” soldiers, whether RANGERS (like me) or SEALS or GREEN BERETS are expected to be agile, problem-solving, solution-oriented and above all, focused on action and results.  Rangers don’t have time to try and be “politically correct” in everything they do – the focus is on action (speed and energy) in order to accomplish the mission as expediently and efficiently as possible with the lowest possible cost to the troops. The “whole Army” is focused on a larger scale involvement, with a lot more moving parts and a decidedly more ponderous approach to making the enemy see the light...

It is no different in law. Most of us in the Wealth Planning area are boutique firms that work just like the Rangers. We specialize on just diving in and getting the best and most expedient result for our client – whether that is a normal individual or someone of very high wealth. We don’t worry about pleasing anyone other than our clients – getting it done. This is probably the biggest difference I feel we have in our smaller, more specialized and focused practice. We are the Special Forces of planners - we just solve the problem as expediently and efficiently as possible. Something to consider when choosing the type of lawyer or type of legal issue you might have.