Leadership In Law Podcast

06 Finding Joy and Fulfillment in Law with Shawn Masterson

• Marilyn Jenkins • Season 1 • Episode 6

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Unlock the secrets to successful divorce mediation and law firm leadership with Shawn Masterson, senior attorney at Cohn Dussi, LLC and founding partner of Shapiro Dorry Masterson LLC. Shawn shares his fascinating career transition from focusing on creditors' rights and residential mortgage defaults to mastering the intricacies of divorce mediation. Learn how relationships with real estate agents and mortgage brokers can significantly impact the outcome of divorce proceedings and the importance of handling real estate conveyances correctly to avoid title defects.

Discover the power of mediation in resolving family law disputes and the art of asking the right questions to reach equitable settlements. With Shawn's background in economics, we explore the application of supply and demand principles in conflict resolution. Dive into marketing challenges in a mediation practice and the potential of social media platforms to build a personal brand. We'll also compare LinkedIn's effectiveness for business-to-business interactions versus consumer-focused family law mediation, offering unique insights into digital marketing strategies.

Shawn’s commitment to supporting survivors of domestic violence through local pro-bono cases adds a profound layer to his professional journey. Hear about the emotional and professional rewards of handling pro bono cases, and the vital role of mentorship in the legal profession. Shawn also shares practical tips on managing stress and the importance of continuous learning through books and podcasts. Join us for an episode packed with actionable insights and inspiration for law firm owners aiming to lead with vision and grow their practices.

Connect with Shawn:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/shawn-m-masterson-bb56289
https://cohnanddussi.com/attorney/shawn-m-masterson/
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC55-TN73-4cQV14o1NynXKg
Stay in touch for his upcoming Podcast!


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https://lawmarketingzone.com/ultimate-checklist

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Marilyn Jenkins:

Welcome to the Leadership in Law podcast with host Marilyn Jenkins. Cut through the noise, get actionable insights and inspiring stories delivered straight to your ears your ultimate podcast for navigating the ever-changing world of law firm ownership. In each episode, we dive deep into the critical topics that matter most to you, from unlocking explosive growth to building a thriving team. We connect you with successful firm leaders and industry experts who share their proven strategies and hard-won wisdom. So, whether you're a seasoned leader or just starting your journey as a law firm owner, the Leadership in Law podcast is here to equip you with the knowledge and tools you need to build a successful and fulfilling legal practice.

Marilyn Jenkins:

Welcome to another episode of the Leadership in Law podcast. I'm your host, Marilyn Jenkins. Please join me in welcoming Shawn Masterson. He's the senior attorney with Cohn Dussi LLC and head of the Providence office. He's a founding partner of Shapiro Dorry Masterson LLC. For the past 20 years, Shawn practice has concentrated on creditors' rights, with a focus on residential mortgage defaults. Shawn has also established a vibrant divorce and divorce mediation practice. As a certified mediator, he has successfully resolved thousands of matters through alternative dispute resolution. Shawn has successfully represented clients in the appellate courts throughout New England, including the First Circuit Court of Appeals and the Bankruptcy Appealant Panel. Believing that each attorney has a responsibility to make a positive contribution to his community, Shawn provides pro bono legal services to domestic violence victims in Rhode Island and Massachusetts. I'm super excited to have you here, Shawn, welcome.

Marilyn Jenkins:

Oh, thanks for having me. Thanks, absolutely.

Marilyn Jenkins:

I'm excited about the different things that you're doing and I was just wondering can you tell us how you got started?

Shawn Masterson:

Yeah, so it really is a divergence going from when I started my practice as a creditor's rights attorney to going into. You know, I still do some of that work but in really forging a practice area in divorce and divorce mediation, because normally those two worlds don't mix All right. Usually you'll see attorneys that have different personalities tend to migrate to certain types of law. But interesting, I spent my first 10 years with a firm that did solely creditors rights throughout New England. So I was licensed in four states five states now and I did countless because we were doing bankruptcy and foreclosure work. I did countless mediations in a foreclosure context. Every single case was a matter of we weren't necessarily litigating the cases. Our focus was trying to get to a point where the borrower, the debtor, could either make the loan performing or we could work a deal so we could take back the property and my client could move on.

Shawn Masterson:

And then in 2013, myself and two of the attorneys at Sheckman Halpern Savage, where I started, decided to go off on our own because it was just a matter of freedom, of running your own practice, the ability to secure your financial future.

Shawn Masterson:

And when we started that, what we realized is that to do the same type of work that we were doing this creditors' rights field and to get clients that were institutional clients, we had to be a bigger firm, so we had to find niches in there to do it. And our practice, when you're dealing with creditors' rights particularly in the context of residential mortgages, residential foreclosures, residential bankruptcy you do a lot with real estate. So every day there was always we were very familiar with title work. We were very familiar with transaction work, because we would foreclose on our property and then it'd have to sell to a potential third buyer, a third-party buyer, and so we decided that part of our new practice would be pursuing residential real estate transactional work and that basically, for those who are aware, you're working with mortgage companies, real estate agents, to close mortgage loans on people who buy houses or people refinancing the mortgage on their houses.

Shawn Masterson:

So that practice, in order to build that practice, you need to develop relationships with real estate agents, mortgage brokers, mortgage originators that are going to send you business. It's a very competitive field, right? Because it's the type of law we used to joke about it, the type of law that at the end of the transaction, when everybody's sitting at the table at the closing, everybody's happy. Buyer's happy getting a new house, seller's happy they're moving on. The two real estate agents are happy.

Shawn Masterson:

They sold it, made a commission, which is very different than a litigation in a foreclosure context or, for that matter, in a divorce context. But in doing that we started to see how do we build relationships with real estate agents, mortgage brokers. We can do the networking events, we can go to the luncheons, but everything's built on reciprocity. Luncheons, but everything's built on reciprocity. So how do I, if a mortgage broker or a real estate agent sends me a closing, how do I repay that? And you can't give them money, right, that violates RESPA and so forth. But what we said? Well, what if we had a mechanism where we could refer clients to them? And we had.

Shawn Masterson:

In our first couple of years of doing the real estate stuff, we had a handful of clients that we were able to refer out friends and families that came to us and said, hey, we know you do real estate law. What do you think about this? Or do you know a good realtor? I know you're in that world and we'd refer them out this. Or do you know a good realtor? I know you're in that world and we'd refer them out. And so it just dawned on me one day because we would deal with on the title side, we would have a number of files that had defects in title, and the defects in title oftentimes were caused by a non-real estate attorney grafting a deed or a conveyance as part of a divorce proceeding, and they mess up nothing critical, nothing malpractice level, but stuff that required us to do an extra step on closing.

Shawn Masterson:

And so it just said well, wait a minute, if they're touching, if a divorce attorney is touching real estate and real estate transactional by virtue of the nature of their practice, what if we did divorce work?

Shawn Masterson:

And, of course, my two partners looked at me and said we're not cut out for that kind of work, but we think you are, so go at it. And so I kind of gravitated towards it, because 99.9% of divorce cases end in some type of settlement. Right, you don't go to a trial. You don't necessarily want a judge making a decision in a divorce context most of the time. So I'm like, well, wait a minute. I've got this experience in settling cases in media. I do it all the time in another context being real estate and foreclosure. I'm in another context being real estate and foreclosure. I can do this divorce work, and so I started doing it.

Shawn Masterson:

In the first, couple of cases came about. I think my second case was a referral from someone I knew from a past business who had a relative that was a victim of severe domestic violence and this person I mean it was a pretty bad scene, and so that was a pro bono case which led me to some resources with the Rhode Island Bar Association. They do a pro bono section for victims of domestic violence. So that's how I got involved in that. But as I went along in divorce, what I realized is that your litigation skills like if you're a litigator right now and you're like you know, I don't have enough litigation clients. Maybe I should delve into family law. Your litigation skills really help you in divorce even though you're not going to. Litigation skills really help you in divorce even though you're not going to seek to litigate the case. But knowing what the steps are, having the ability to litigate oftentimes gives you a lot of credibility and confidence to go in and settle a case for your client. And just as these things come about, I was seeing that, gee, the overwhelming majority of my cases in the divorce world ended up settling.

Shawn Masterson:

And there are certain cases, marilyn, where you have a couple that have been married for, let's say, 15 years. They both have regular jobs, meaning they're getting a paycheck from somebody else and not self-employed. They have a house, maybe they have a couple of 401ks. From a financial side, no one's hiding money because there isn't a vehicle to hide money right, their paycheck comes in, goes into the bank account, right? Yeah, maybe every week when they go to the grocery store, they're stuffing 10 bucks in the market, but that's not necessarily enough to say, well, grocery store, they're stuffing 10 bucks in the pocket, but that's not necessarily enough to say, well, gee, there's some type of fraud here and those cases for all intents and purposes, would settle in a context of a 50-50 distribution.

Shawn Masterson:

So Rhode Island and Massachusetts, for example, are an equitable distribution state, meaning that a divorce court is going to look at the assets and divide it equitably. They'll look at a number of different factors but in essence it comes down to 55th. Our job is more of making certain or trying to divide those assets equitably, meaning if somebody is going to stay in the house for whatever reason, figuring out why they want to stay in the house, and maybe we have to move other assets around. Maybe you don't get a portion of retirement but you keep the house, or vice versa. So it's more about how we distribute it versus?

Shawn Masterson:

is it going to be 50-50 or something else? So in the context of doing that in litigation, I'm like for a lot of cases on a consumer level parties don't have $20,000, $30,000 between the two of them to litigate a divorce case.

Marilyn Jenkins:

True Right.

Shawn Masterson:

And so if we do spend 20, 30, $40,000 combined, or more combined on a divorce case, you're eating away at whatever equity is in the house. Or maybe there was the money that was going to go towards setting up, maybe a college fund for the kids or what have you, on a level of sort of economic expediency, that why don't more people do mediation versus litigating the divorce cases? Okay, and again, there are certain cases where you maybe have to litigate. The person doesn't want to mediate, or maybe the person's self-employed and they have five or six different sources of income and there's a concern that maybe they're hiding money.

Shawn Masterson:

So yeah, that may take place in the context of a courtroom, but the average, the average, overwhelming majority. You really shouldn't be litigating this stuff because you may be right but you want to spend your child's inheritance to be right. Or do you want to say, listen, I think he may be hiding assets, but at most maybe he's hiding $5,000. Do I way to dissolve a marriage with dignity? Right, Because you're sitting at a table or over Zoom, and you're having a conversation, you know, with the mediators, third party, you know, a non-interested third party facilitating this conversation and the parties can communicate back and forth about who wants to keep the house. Well, why do you want to keep the house?

Shawn Masterson:

What's more important to you.

Speaker 3:

Why is it that securing your retirement is important to you? Because maybe there's a reason behind it. We understand those reasons and we're able to craft a settlement that both sides agree to. We don't leave it to a judge to make a decision and at the end of the day, we're still getting again 99% of the time. We're still getting to that 50-50 split.

Speaker 3:

It's just we're cutting out all of the pardon, my French all the crap to get to 50-50. And it's a lot less money for both parties. Both parties still have an opportunity to talk, to counsel individually to make sure their rights are protected. But that's kind of what led me to mediation, because my educational background is in economics. I have a bachelor's and master's in economics and I always think in terms of sort of a supply and demand. Whenever I'm looking at a conflict, it's applying to me you want something that I have. At some point we're going to hit an equilibrium point in the middle Right.

Speaker 3:

And.

Shawn Masterson:

I think all those why questions get down to the point of it. In lots of contexts we have five levels of why to find out, really, and does it come down it's because I just don't want her to have the house, or, you know, is there another reason behind it? I think having a third party and asking those why questions are get to the point and with the all the parties involved, definitely, you know, you can find a, like you said, an equilibrium.

Speaker 3:

Right, right. So that's what led me to do a more and more mediation. And so now building, you know, when we're talking about marketing, building the real estate side. For 10 years that real estate transaction which I got out of a couple of years ago, one of my partners kind of took that over. I spent 10 years building that. But building that on relationships sort of like one-to-one relationships, because I know that a real estate agent may have 20 transactions a year that they could send to us. Or a mortgage broker may have 20, 30 transactions a year they could send to us every right. So I could spend my time building a relationship with a handful of people and knowing that there's a good chance that those handful are each going to contribute a little towards sending us referrals.

Speaker 3:

When you get to more of the consumer, like in a family law, divorce mediation context, there's really not a single feeder, right? Okay, I mean, I can't. You know there's a ton of you know, maybe there's a, you know, marriage counselor type person you could go to, but those folks are geared towards trying to maintain the marriage, not necessarily getting divorced, right, so they're maybe less inclined to refer out to divorce attorneys. So social media, I think is as I'm taking my small practice to move it to more of a online divorce mediation type practice where I can service people really throughout the country. Right, mediators, for the most part, don't need to be attorneys, right? So I don't need a law license in, let's say, california to do a mediation there. I just have to be cognizant of what the laws are in California. How do I build relationships with the general public?

Shawn Masterson:

Right and I think that's where.

Speaker 3:

That's where sort of as I'm moving into, maybe using YouTube podcasting. Social media is creating a personal brand and that brand helps build relationships with a number of people.

Shawn Masterson:

Well, it's true, Social media is a great outlet for getting your brand out there for family law B2C specifically, but family law, because there's so many aspects of family law and you know people are surfing the web, they're on Google all of these different things, Whatever's going on in their life, and they keep seeing you and you're reminding them of something they're thinking about. It's a great way of getting personal branding out there for that.

Speaker 3:

I agree, yeah, yeah, and it's like you know, the idea came to me of doing more podcasts and YouTube, and as I'm building my, my YouTube, I do a lot of a lot of running, and so I don't know, maybe a couple, three years ago, I just started going on YouTube looking for, I think, maybe something had popped up, not even looking for it, and so I follow a couple of three YouTubers that deal with running marathon running, ultra running.

Speaker 3:

Right, and they do this video on a very regular basis and after you watch it for a couple of years, it's almost as if you know them, so they'll show a video of them preparing for a race or in a race, and you find yourself like, hey, I'm rooting for this guy. I don't know him from a hole in the wall, other than what I see on YouTube, but it's if I had built a relationship with this person.

Speaker 3:

That's the no-migrant trust factor, yeah, yeah, and I think for a lot of attorneys there's not a lot of attorneys that go and use YouTube, or you know there's a lot to do podcasts but to really build a brand, particularly if you want to build it on a, if you're in a large state or you can build it regionally or nationally, I don't see it an easier vehicle than you know, like a YouTube or, you know, facebook or something like that.

Shawn Masterson:

Right Now are you using LinkedIn. Are you growing your LinkedIn with the videos as well, or are you staying with the more B2C platforms like YouTube?

Speaker 3:

Yes, so so LinkedIn has been more of a um business to business right. So, on the on my, when I put my other hat on and I'm doing sort of the creditors rights litigation stuff, the LinkedIn is is where it is, where it's at right. So, you know, there's relationships that we have with other attorneys or maybe there's a post on LinkedIn that indicates something going on in the commercial lending side where someone's going to see and think of us. But not necessarily for the consumer side. I just think I may be wrong.

Shawn Masterson:

No, no, we're clicking the same thing. Yeah, linkedin is not necessarily the consumer, right? Yeah?

Speaker 3:

Yeah, I mean. I can put a very different message on, you know, a Facebook or a YouTube.

Shawn Masterson:

And are you yeah, I absolutely agree, and podcasting is going to be your B2B and B2C Podcasting seems to cover the gamut of the audience. Are you working with any local, say, non-profits or something to help with the domestic violence outreach that you're doing pro bono? How often do you do that?

Speaker 3:

Yeah, so we or I. As part of that it's called Partners Against Domestic Violence. I usually take about one case a year from them and then inevitably we'll pick up another pro bono case, usually a direct referral from somebody that I know. Maybe another attorney or a friend or something like that will say hey, listen, there's someone in my office that has an issue domestic violence or whatever, because oftentimes domestic violence really there's no necessarily socioeconomic dividing line, right, but what happens is it tends to affect people who have a lower economic resources, whether that's because you know their spouse cuts them off, you know because they're manipulated and you know the spouse is the one that's out earning the income.

Shawn Masterson:

Right.

Speaker 3:

They're at home taking care of the house, taking care of the kids or whatever, and then the spouse says well, I'm cutting you off and you don't have access to money. I mean it's amazing how many of these clients will come in. And part of any divorce filing any mediation is one of the first steps is, you know, domestic violence. Are you safe? You know, get to a safe place. But as we start to get into the case, one of the first steps is okay, let's look at the finances. We're going to divide them up. How are you going to survive this? And it's amazing how many of these folks have no visibility or have very little disability or you know, they're like well, I have the last 20 years I've worked part-time and my entire job was to my husband and he controls everything. I don't, I don't know.

Shawn Masterson:

Yeah. Or they say I don't have any skills. What am I going to do? Yeah.

Speaker 3:

Or I tried to go back to work, you know, 10 years ago, and he said a husband. And most times, you know, it goes both ways, but predominantly what I've seen in my practice is the husband being the abuser. It's either both ways, but oftentimes it's the husband and that was just a matter of it's a matter of control. But they don't have access to funds. So that's why they'll, you know, come to me, We'll help them through the process and we've had a lot of success in that. And just on sort of a selfish note, when you have a practice that for 20 years I've been involved in foreclosure bankruptcy where I represent the creditor, bankruptcy where I represent the creditor and I see, you know, quote, unquote, a win for me, or my client is taking possession of the house, right, which means on the other side, unfortunately, someone is losing their home, right, Right.

Speaker 3:

So you don't feel like a superhero when you hey, I've got a win for my client. But I'm not a superhero because someone is out of a house, right, Someone is struggling to find new housing, Whereas on some of these pro bono cases that we do, I think part of me takes it selfishly. It's not an act of kindness, it's really an act of selfishness for me because I feel good about myself. After you see someone that's like, oh, now I have freedom. Oh, I didn't realize that I could have a life away from this person who has dominated and manipulated and controlled me for 10, 15, 20 years. So seeing them succeed and be happy really is something I take pride in, but it really makes me feel good.

Speaker 3:

So sometimes I take them, not because I'm generous, it is something I take pride in, but it really it makes me feel good. So sometimes I take them not because I'm generous, it's because I'm selfish and I want to feel good. But it's an incredible way, you know, for a lot of attorneys out there. There's some states I've realized that have requirements for pro bono work, work and within those states some of the big firms will have one or two people that only do pro bono work to kind of satisfy the requirement for the firm. But if you're a solo practitioner you're in a small firm and it's difficult to take a pro bono case because you you know you need to make a living right you got to make a living, but it really is rewarding to take a pro bono case.

Speaker 3:

It really, it really is You're helping someone and you're using your. You're using your resources in your gift right To be a lawyer. Right, you know you earned it, but you're gifted right. You're gifted with the intelligence to be able to go to college and go to law school. You're gifted with the ability to succeed and get through law school and pass a bar exam.

Shawn Masterson:

Right.

Speaker 3:

Good way to you know good way to give back, right. So you know I see it. You know my wife's a physician, so you know every day she's doing, you know, these acts of kindness just in her general practice as a physician, as all physicians do. As lawyers we don't necessarily get to do that all the time. Sometimes doing that pro bono is a nice little. Hey, I feel good about myself, I did something good. So all those memes on Facebook about the lawyers, the big bad lawyers and the lawyer jokes, right, it kind of counterbalances that a little bit.

Shawn Masterson:

Well, it's good to be able to help people like that. I mean, you're making a living, you're giving back and you're helping people on both sides of the table. And then it all kind of circles back around to the real estate stuff that you were doing. If someone's in the middle of a divorce and neither want the house or, however, or even one keeps the house, someone else needs a place to live. So you know you can help with your network of putting the whole world together in two different worlds together, and you can just yeah, I mean, that's like what the old saying not every superhero wears a cape. You know you get to go at the end of the day realizing how much you've done.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, I don't want to be on record as saying lawyers are superheroes, but let's feel many times to you know, to help someone, right. So it's not like, okay, I had a client, I won, you know I won and we got a settlement. It's you, you're helping someone, they're walking away happy, right. And you know divorce is, divorce work is is difficult, right. And you know divorce work is difficult, right, because you're dealing with difficult situation. And I tell people all the time like what is it about your clients? Like how would a client describe the process? And inevitably clients will come to me in the early stages, right? They just maybe their spouse filed first and they're coming to me or they're about to file. And, marilyn, you can see on their face, in their body language, the frustration, the stress, the anxiety, and see it. And it impacts their physical health, it impacts their psychological health, it impacts their earning ability, particularly if they're someone that's self-employed.

Speaker 3:

They're in sale they're self-employed, if they don't wake up feeling good and positive, it's very difficult to go out there and sell or to run your own shop when you're just, you know, not up to it psychologically. So I see clients and then, through the process, they get better. They get better right, because everyone comes well, not everyone, but most people come into it Like I don't know what's going to happen, I don't know the process, I don't know how long it takes, how am I going to survive? Or my spouse is threatening to take the kids full custody and I have to counsel these folks. I'm like that's not going to happen. It's very rare that that happens. But you see, as we go through the process, as you start to break it down, and here's the strategy, here's how long it's going to take, here's what we're looking at from a reality standpoint. Here's a way, through mediation, we can resolve this without it costing you $30,000, right. And you see the people each step they look better, yeah.

Speaker 3:

They start to carry themselves a little better, the people. Each step they look better, yeah, they start to carry themselves a little better. They get a little bit of confidence and I have clients that will come back. You know, maybe it's like in Rhode Island, for example. We have a.

Speaker 3:

You know, whether it's mediation or litigation, you have to have a hearing and it takes 90 days after that hearing for it to be filed. So oftentimes I'll have a client that will come back at that 90 day mark to get a copy of. You know, I can mail it to them, but they'll come in and get a copy of the final judgment. Or maybe they need to sign off on the deed, right, we try to sign off on it. And you see them 90 days after. You can tell it's like, oh my God, like you're a different person than you were, you know, nine months ago or a year ago when you came into my office, and they'll say, yeah, I never thought that I could be free or I never thought I could get a fresh start, right, I didn't realize how unhappy I was until I started being happy now that I'm in this new life, right.

Shawn Masterson:

Yeah, you don't realize how unhappy you are because it's a gradual thing, and then all of a sudden it's 90 days. It's like, oh my God, it's a new lease on life. Yeah.

Speaker 3:

Yeah so it is rewarding.

Speaker 3:

I know there's a lot of it. Like I said at the beginning, my partners are like, yeah, we're not doing that, we don't have the personality to do family law work. So guess it is for particularly attorneys. You're starting to go off on your own and trying to build that practice in different practice areas. Family law it really is a rewarding area of the law. It can be frustrating. You have to be able to take phone calls on the weekends, phone calls after hours, right, Because again, it's a consumer-based. Well, are these people working nine to five? So when they need to reach you after five o'clock it's after six o'clock, so you've got to be willing to do that. But I think on balance, on balance, it's a very positive area of law to practice.

Shawn Masterson:

Okay. Well, that's very good to know, because people come in and I've talked to attorneys that that niche dried out of law school and we're super happy about it, and then attorneys that you know worked in a generalist firm and then later in life niche down and then so you know it's, it's seeing that, that journey, what's that journey for you? And and finding something that you really enjoy, that you know that lights you up. Obviously you like being able to help people and seeing the outcome and and the mediation instead of the litigation work for you. So that that's very good to to to tell people. You know we love to hear stories of what other people are doing. How do you keep yourself in in those times where maybe motivation might be an issue and you're kind of bogged down and you have to come back fresh in the next mediation session? How do you keep yourself excited and inspired and motivated?

Speaker 3:

Yeah, I don't know.

Shawn Masterson:

That where running comes in. Is that something that keeps it clear to your mind? I mean, that kind of helps me.

Speaker 3:

No, that's a good question. You know, because I do run. You know, just about every day, knock on wood, yeah it, I don't know. It's almost like you have to have a separation. Yeah, each case is different and sometimes you have to take a deep breath when you walk out. But you know, since, you know, let's say, 2000 or 19,. I don't want to say the year because people don't realize how old I am, but 1994, right, when I started graduate school, because I had my graduate degree, I worked full time and went to graduate school. So I always had to have that shift between okay, here's my work mode, now I've got to shift. Now I've got to go sit in the classroom, now I've got to go study, right.

Speaker 3:

So I think, early on I, in my professional career I learned how to do that shift Right, Sort of that mindset shift.

Shawn Masterson:

Yeah, I call it compartmentalizing, but yeah, same thing. Yeah.

Speaker 3:

And that carry over as I you know, because I was running hotels when I was going to grad school law school so I'd have a, you know, a busy day, and when I'm sitting in a classroom, I'm doing something totally different than what I'm doing today.

Shawn Masterson:

And you have to focus. Yeah, so you have to put it, you have to do that separation.

Speaker 3:

So I think I just I just sort of developed that mindset or the ability to compartmentalize what I was doing and just the realization that it's not fear to your client If you have a bad client experience. Let's say, in the morning you're in one court and it's just a bad outcome, bad experience, whatever. High stress and that's going to get anybody stressed and down. But then you have to jump to another hearing or mediation or something, client meeting. It really does a disservice to the other client if you continue to you know kind of kind of dwell on it. So it really is just being aware of you know what's going on. But I think overall, at the end of the week you're going to have, you're going to have some type of outlet that you know, whether it's outside or whether it's being with the family, whether it's, you know, sitting alone watching television for a couple hours just to veg out, and you know, totally separate from the world.

Speaker 3:

There's got to be something, because it is relatively, you know, high stress.

Shawn Masterson:

Yeah, well, I know that you say that you run every day and that's obviously very therapeutic. What are other helpful resources that's helped you along the way to get to where you are? And you know in life as well you are, and, and you know in life as well, you know your mental life as well as in helping your client, because, obviously, economics being having your degree, you you've got the numbers as as part of what you are. You know, I'm just I'm seeing the big picture here, but if someone else were to say, okay, how could I do something like that? What kind of resources helped you that maybe can help someone else?

Speaker 3:

Yeah, I think you're talking about how I went off on my own, my own practice.

Shawn Masterson:

Well, I'm thinking about. As you've grown and you know you took your your. The positives of of the working with the debt and the mortgages and that sort of thing and the mediation took, all of those Are there. Is there a specific book that you've read that makes you, you know, just as there's something that we can say, okay, if you want to go off on, do this, you know your mindset needs to be set like this and you know think about how you can help outside sources, you know, with your cases. So everything kind of revolves in together and everybody wins. That probably didn't make sense of the question.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, no, I think I get you know. I think I read a lot.

Shawn Masterson:

Okay.

Speaker 3:

And I've you know, is there one book? You know I think there's a book. I'm forgetting the author right now, but two professors at Harvard wrote a book about mediation and negotiation titled Getting to yes. That was from a mediation standpoint. That was probably one of the best books, and I think I was just listening to a podcast the other day. It was talking about negotiation. They brought up that book right, so I think that's a fundamental I've heard it read from you.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, if you're a lawyer, if you're doing any type of negotiation, whether it's in sale. Yeah, if you're a lawyer, if you're doing any type of negotiation, whether it's in sale. Read that book, and I think I remember it was from a book I'm reading now by Charles Duhigg. Called it's about communication, super communicators or communication. It's his newest book and he brings that up, he brings that book up.

Speaker 3:

But what I found is that in law school. But what I found is that in law school undergraduate, graduate school, law school at least where I my schooling you didn't have a lot of classes in education on the how-tos.

Shawn Masterson:

Mm-hmm.

Speaker 3:

Right that the how-tos come from experience. They come from outside reading. So I've gotten it. I mean the podcast. I wish podcasts existed, you know, 30 years ago. Yeah, exactly Because I think I'd be much better off. And I think you know young folks that are coming out just starting out now with all the resources, with podcasts, youtube. There's more and more books that are written in all aspects of whether it be psychology, communication, negotiation. You know, marketing across the board is much more than it was back. You know, when I was, when I was coming up.

Shawn Masterson:

Right.

Speaker 3:

I mean there's.

Shawn Masterson:

That's right, and we can hear so many stories and so much advice and learn from so many different people, thanks to podcasts and YouTube.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, and I think I think it's just been a combination of, you know, just listening to, you know, audio books. You know I was on my in my old practice because we had a regional practice. I was on the road, a lot going towards, and then I forget what it was, what year it was, but Audible started to come out. Right, we had books on tape. Before that you'd have to buy a cassette or a CD. You put it in the car thing.

Shawn Masterson:

Those were all- or you rent them from the local video store, right? That's what I did when I was traveling.

Speaker 3:

But then, you know, audible came out and I had a car that I don't know what year it was, but it was like the first time I had Bluetooth in the car and so I could go from, get on my phone, played on the Bluetooth in the car and I could listen to. You know, I'd have a two hour trip to you know, from Providence to you know, hartford, connecticut.

Speaker 3:

Oh, I could listen to a book on tape you know, and so I'd focus on, you know, business oriented, right. Because I was like, hey, it's a work day, I'm in my car, right, it's all work. Let me focus on a work thing instead of listen to sports radio, right, right, particularly as I'm driving.

Shawn Masterson:

I didn't even know what's happening, yeah, instead of listening to sports radio right, right, particularly as I'm driving, depending on what's happening at the time yeah, I mean it really.

Speaker 3:

You know, when I was driving in towards Connecticut and I started to get to New York stations, I didn't want to hear about the Yankees or the Giants, so I would turn sports radio off right, and I could, you know, listen to these business books.

Speaker 3:

It just made sense, you know, so it would work day, so it would work, Okay. And then podcasts came out. It was sort of the same thing as you could say wow, hey, I read this book by X author. Well, now it's interesting to see what they have to talk about, what guests that they have, what books that they recommend, Because I think I want to say in the last I don't know, maybe 10 years, I think that I've read, you know, business oriented book.

Marilyn Jenkins:

I've gotten the inspiration, if you will, to read that book from a podcast, you know you listen to.

Speaker 3:

You know Joe wrote experience and he has on X author and they're talking about their book and like, oh, that sounds interesting, I should get that book or listen to it on tape. And then there's a couple of books we'll listen to on tape. I'm like that's a lot of detail, I better get the book. I've got probably a bunch of those where I had to go out and buy the book after the podcast. So the resources that I use those resources. I've never really had a mentor in the legal business. The way my first firm was set up there was no mentor system which, looking back now, I wish that I had that. The first firm that I worked with was more of an assembly line factory firm. You're doing stuff that wasn't overly complicated. The concern at that firm wasn't developing your abilities as an attorney. The concern at that firm was making sure that you got to court on time and signed the documents right, because it wasn't overly complicated and you were doing basically the same general thing each file. So after a while it's really easy to pick up.

Speaker 3:

But I would say if you're a young attorney I would seek out a mentor because there's a lot of attorneys even if you're solo or you're a small practice, and you got a partnership where in my last firm that we started, one of my partners was doing all of the transactional work, so I was going out marketing for it. He would actually do the physical work. He was learning. We didn't have a mentor. We end up talking to an attorney that refers us to another attorney who's like oh yeah, you should call Dave, because Dave's very good at this area of these closings. It had to be a Connecticut issue and then through that particularly, my partner developed a good relationship and he was the same age but he had been doing that type of work for a little bit longer and sort of acts as a mentor, right, someone that you can call and say I've got this issue, I don't know what to do.

Speaker 3:

Having a mentor is going to help you. Yeah, I mean it's shared experiences, absolutely. Yeah, and sometimes those mentors too. Those mentors I didn't mean to cut you off there, marilyn, but I think the mentors too. As a lawyer, you know obviously other lawyers, but oftentimes there's other people, particularly if you're running a practice.

Speaker 3:

Right, you're running it off. If you're running a practice, other professionals can act as mentors in the sense of maybe it's just from a marketing standpoint. What lawyers tend not to realize is that they're safe If you run your own practice. Welcome to the jungle. You're here, exactly. You're a salesman practice where we went off on our own our landlord where we rented. We then bought the building from him. Our landlord was a was a oral surgeon. He had his practice down the street from where our building was. He owned that building. He owned our building. Nicest guy in the world, you know. He'd stop by and we'd just talk for 10 minutes about business.

Speaker 3:

I mean, obviously, being a dentist and doing the medical stuff is very different from a lawyer. But running the office a lot of similar issues Dealing with what, dealing with referrals, dealing with employee stuff. So sometimes it's hey, I don't really have a lawyer. I kind of know the area of law that I'm in. I've done it for five, six, seven years at this firm. I'm comfortable with how to do it. How do I run the practice? Yeah, and sometimes it's difficult If you're working, if you're a young attorney, you're working with somebody and then you say, oh okay, well, you've trained me for the last five or six years. I'm now going to go start a firm across the street doing the same thing.

Shawn Masterson:

Will you be my mentor? It's a difficult decision.

Speaker 3:

I would say, like if that former boss is a good person with vision, he will be your mentor, right, because the pie is not limited. So I think resources, your books, your podcast, every attorney who's running their own firm should be in some type of networking group, whether it's a B&I type, business networking, and in those networking groups there's all kinds of professionals, right, some that are going to send you business, some that won't, but there's going to be people who have insight in how to do, and I thought I always found the Chamber of Commerce the same thing.

Shawn Masterson:

In the Chamber of Commerce you've got businesses of all sizes, all types and you know you can not only have I met some of my best friends in life for my, my chambers and BNI type networking events, but you learn so much more because they've been in other experiences that may or may not touch you at some point but could always be learning. I guess is is the thing Always be looking for something new to learn, and I love that. You're feeding your mind as you're. You know, doing your podcast. I mean doing your running or or doing your trips. You know I do the same thing. It's like a lot of the times it's not a toss up to listen to music or a podcast. There's so many interesting things out there to listen to so I mean this is this has been great. I loved hearing your journey and gosh, thank you so much for your time. Where can our listeners connect with you and reach out to you if they have any questions?

Speaker 3:

Yeah, so Cone.

Shawn Masterson:

Oh, with your YouTube, yeah.

Speaker 3:

Yeah Well, YouTube is going to launch in about a month and the podcast is going to launch in about a month called Divorced in Reality.

Shawn Masterson:

Okay so for those who aren't listening to it right now. This means you're going to be launching in early September 2024?

Speaker 3:

Yep, okay perfect, divorced in reality, but they have reached me. You know my email, smasterson. At cohenandducicom C-O-H-N and A-N-D, d-u-c-i-n-d-u-s-s-icom, you know. Shoot me an email, always willing to help. Insight. I mean even and I will say this too about resources, mentors, my competitors have been some of my better referral sources, really my better referral sources, just because they end up having conflicts, they get conflicted out of something. I've got a quick story.

Speaker 3:

When I was practicing in my old firm, did a lot of bankruptcy work in Vermont Vermont has not a very big bankruptcy bar. When I started, one of the sort of leaders, if you will, of the debtors and I'm a creditor of the debtors bar, you know welcomed me in and she said yeah, it's like, you know, welcome. You know there's now 14 members in the bankruptcy bar in Vermont, right. And I thought what's 14? Like, usually, you know there's 1,400 in Massachusetts, right, yeah, yeah, and literally there was 14, right. But I can remember, because they all knew that I traveled up from Providence to go to Vermont and it's, you know, four hour drive at times and I would have them all the time they would say hey, listen, if you're coming in, you got an early morning here, why don't you just come up. We got an extra bedroom. You can stay at our place or.

Speaker 3:

I was up there once it was snowing and I had to get back. But I had a couple of people I'm going to say don't drive in the snow, stay at my house, right? I mean there was very. When we're in the courtroom we're. There's no reason why you have to be adversarial outside of that. You know I've referred stuff to them, they've referred stuff to me and you think that they're the enemy, but you know they can be some of your best referral sources.

Shawn Masterson:

Yeah, yeah. Well, I'm excited about sharing your YouTube channel and your upcoming podcast, divorced from Reality. Is that what you said? Divorced in Reality, divorced from Reality?

Speaker 3:

Is that what you said? Divorced in Reality.

Shawn Masterson:

Divorced in Reality. We're going to make sure that that's in the show notes as well as your YouTube channel. We'll get all that updated, so no matter when you're listening to this podcast, those two things are going to be launching in early September 2024. Make sure you look for Shawn there. And any last comments. I've thoroughly enjoyed our conversation today and what you shared.

Speaker 3:

No, I did too. I mean, it's always interesting to. I look forward to listening to more of your podcasts and see what other folks are doing.

Shawn Masterson:

Absolutely.

Speaker 3:

But yeah, I just say, being a lawyer is highly stressful. It can be rewarding in other ways other than money, but when you want to be a leader in the law, you just, you just got to be out there. You know, just be out there always, always trying to either learn something new, talk to people I don't, you know, don't be shy about getting to court. Get off this If you can elect to go to court, versus zoom here and go to court. Yeah Right, you got to learn more. You're going to meet more people. You need to be better off for it.

Shawn Masterson:

Fantastic. Thank you so much, Shawn this is great, I appreciated your time and again, thank you so much for joining us today.

Speaker 3:

Thanks, Marilyn.

Shawn Masterson:

Thanks for joining me today for this episode. As we wrap up, I'd love for you to do two things. First, subscribe to this podcast so you don't miss an episode, and if you find value here, I'd love it if you would rate it and review it. That really does make a difference in helping other people to discover this podcast. Second, you can connect with me on LinkedIn to keep up with what I'm currently learning and thinking about, and if you're ready to take the next step with a digital strategist to help you grow your law firm, I'd be honored to help you. Just go to lawmarketingzonecom to book a call with me. Stay tuned for our next episode next week. Until then, as always, thanks for listening to Leadership in Law podcast and be sure to subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts so you don't miss the next episode.

Marilyn Jenkins:

Thanks for joining us on another episode of the Leadership in Law podcast. Remember you're not alone on this journey. There's a whole community of law firm owners out there facing similar challenges and striving for the same success. Head over to our website at lawmarketingzonecom. From there, connect with other listeners, access valuable resources and stay up to date on the latest episodes. Don't forget to subscribe and leave us a review on your favorite podcast platform. Until next time, keep leading with vision and keep growing your firm.