Ep. 213 – From “Unsexy” Law to Life-Changing Impact with Brian Gillette

In this episode, Ben sits down with longtime friend and Social Security Disability attorney Brian Gillette—a lawyer quietly changing lives in a space most people overlook.

No big verdicts.
No headlines. 

But real impact, every single day.

Brian pulls back the curtain on what it actually looks like to run a Social Security Disability practice—from handling 300+ cases at a time to building a team that includes a retired administrative law judge.

They talk about:

•  Why Social Security Disability is one of the most misunderstood (and underserved) practice areas 
•  The emotional weight of helping clients through life-altering situations 
•  How to screen cases efficiently without burning out 
•  The reality of marketing in a referral-driven practice 
•  Letting go of control and building a team that actually supports your growth 

And maybe most importantly—

👉 Why doing meaningful work doesn’t always look flashy… but can be far more fulfilling.

This is a conversation about purpose, systems, and building a practice that works for your life—not the other way around.

🎧 Listen now on Apple Podcasts or Spotify

Ben Glass is a nationally recognized personal injury and long-term disability insurance attorney in Fairfax, VA. Since 2005, Ben Glass and Great Legal Marketing have been helping solo and small firm lawyers make more money, get more clients and still get home in time for dinner. We call this TheGLMTribe.com

What Makes The GLM Tribe Special?

In short, we are the only organization within the "business builder for lawyers" space that is led by two practicing lawyers. 

One thing we're sure you've noticed is that despite the variety of options within our space, no one else is mixing
the actual practice of law with business building in the way that we are.

There are no other organizations who understand the highs and lows of running a small law firm and are engaged in talking to real clients. That is what sets GLM apart from every other organization, and it is why we have had loyal members that have been with us for two-decades.

Transcript

Why This Work Matters

SPEAKER_00 0:00

And it struck me that this work was uh more about much more than just legal arguments. It was about helping people who were going through one of the most difficult seasons of their lives.

SPEAKER_01 0:13

Welcome to the Renegade Lawyer Podcast, the show that challenges the way lawyers and professionals think about life, business, and success. Hosted by Ben Glass, attorney, entrepreneur, coach, and father of nine, this show is about more than just practicing law. For over 40 years, Ben has built a law firm that stands for something bigger. He's helped thousands of lawyers create practices that make good money, do meaningful work, and still make it home for dinner. Each week, Ben brings you real conversations with guests who are challenging the status quo. Lawyers, doctors, entrepreneurs, thinkers, and builders. These are people creating bold careers and meaningful lives without burning out or selling out. If you're ready to stop playing small and start thinking like a renegade, you're in the right place. Let's dive in.

SPEAKER_02 1:07

Hello everyone. This is Ben Glass and welcome back to another episode of the Renegade Lawyer Podcast, where most episodes I'm interviewing somebody inside or outside of Legal who's dinging the world. And today I'm going to talk to a good long-term friend who is a member of the great legal marketing community and the great legal marketing mastermind community. He is Social Security Disability Attorney Brian Gillette. Brian practices out of an office in Williamsburg, but really covers a lot of geographic territory. We'll talk about that. Waynesburg, Virginia. It's about three hours or so south of us, more or less. I've known Brian for a long, long time. And uh he's always impressed me as a guy who really, really, really cares for his clients in what I would call kind of an unsexy space because there's no knock on the door, Brian, and a big verdict coming in. But you are changing lives. So thanks for carving out some time today. Thanks. It's my pleasure. Give us a picture, first of all, of the firm today, generally. You know, how many people under roof? Probably how many Social Security cases open do you have? Um, I think people are people who are not in this space of Social Security disability really have no idea. It's like ERISA. Like they're like, I know the guy or gal to call, but I don't know anything about it.

SPEAKER_00 2:24

Right. Yeah, I like to say the alphabet soup of disability law. All the abbreviations that there are. Well, I'm the only attorney currently. I did have an associate for a little while, but he moved on. I've got a full-time intake specialist, I've got a full-time case manager, I've got a full-time Jack of All Trades employee who's uh really smart and is helping us to build out a lot of uh tools like Filevine and Lead Docket. I've got uh a virtual assistant in the Philippines who helps with medical records requests. I've got my wife who's a nurse who for years was requesting medical records, reviewing them, creating summaries. But we're trying to phase her out into a new stage of life. And then just recently, last um couple of months, I've hired a retired administrative law judge to work with me to review medical records and to prepare pre-hearing memorandum and on-the-record requests, and that's working out really great. I have a uh virtual bookkeeper and I have a virtual marketing assistant who works about 10 hours a month for me.

Where Hearings Happen And Why

SPEAKER_02 3:36

That's a lot of people. I remember when I started Ben Glass Law 30 years ago, how hard it was just when you're the when you're the only lawyer and you're making all of the decisions from client strategy to website strategy to color of the paint job in the conference room. Like it's really, I think it's really, really challenging. So good for you. And for for those who don't know Social Security disability, talk to us a little bit about sort of geography and venue, because as I understand, it's a nationalized practice. So really you could do, you could represent people from all over. Uh, I don't think that you do, but you can correct me if I'm wrong. But what determines, Brian, whether if a hearing is going to be held, it's in West Virginia or Maryland or any place else?

SPEAKER_00 4:27

All right. Yeah, so with Social Security disability, you don't actually even have to be an attorney to represent someone. I think they designed that so that family members could sometimes represent someone. But also there are non-attorney representatives. There's requirements. If you are not an attorney, you have to either have a bachelor's degree or I think it's three years of relevant experience working in the Social Security disability field, and you have to take an exam that they give once a year and carry malpractice coverage. As far as where the hearings go, so there's an initial application, you typically file that online or with your local Social Security office, you get turned down, you appeal, you get turned down again most likely, and then you request a hearing with a judge. That's a federal administrative law judge. And the location of the hearing is based upon where you live. So, for example, here in Williamsburg, people go to Norfolk. If you're one county to the west of me, you go to Richmond. And so that's how they uh typically distribute the cases. During the pandemic, they stopped um doing in-person hearings. Um, fairly quickly, they started doing hearings by telephone, and then after a little while started using Microsoft Teams for hearings. And it wasn't until I believe it was about March of 22 where they resumed the in-person hearings. So that's really changed a lot since I started. It used to be I'd show up at the hearing office and there'd be four or five attorneys standing around and we'd talk with each other about what was going on and in particular quirks of the judges or interesting cases we had. And now, like the last two days, I have had hearings and I show up and I'm the only attorney there. The judges really like the virtual hearings because they can work from home and do the hearings remotely. The attorneys like it because you can sit at your desk and work until you know five minutes before the hearing's supposed to start and then click on to Microsoft Teams, and then when the hearing's over, you click off and maybe you give the client a call and tell them how it went, but then you're back at your desk ready to work again. So that has changed a lot. I have tended to default to go in person since they resumed the in-person hearings, and I I'm struggling with that one because it's really demanding. In the last quarter of last year, I was everywhere from Newborn, North Carolina to Hagerstown, Maryland, to Norfolk to Richmond, to Charlottesville, to Danville, to Lynchburg. I was all up and down between I think I even went to Charlotte once. So I up and down between North Carolina and uh Maryland, and it's um it's a lot. Particularly, I mean, I I like Zig Ziglar used to talk about um Automobile University. You know, I listened to a lot of um audiobooks i in the car, and I that's something I did miss during the pandemic is I wasn't in my car listening to audiobooks as much. But there are firms, there are national firms that handle cases all over the country. And, you know, I've thought about that, but I don't really think I want to build something that big.

The Five-Step Disability Test

SPEAKER_02 7:33

That's that's a really interesting point because you know, a lot of sort of the the marketing around the business of law conferences and the coaching guru space is about building and scaling your law firm. And a lot of times, I think many lawyers skip over the for what, or how would that benefit my life, or why would I ever want to do that stage. And you know, the whole premise of great legal marketing has been build what you want and need for your own life and your family's life, and don't listen to anybody else. And if you know what you want to build, like we can help you craft that and build it. You know, Brian, a lot of lawyers probably think they know a little bit about a framework for what makes for a good Social Security disability case. But can you can you describe sort of what you're looking for when a prospective client calls you?

Fast Lead Screening With Scorecards

SPEAKER_00 8:31

Aaron Powell So Social Security follows a five-step evaluation process. The first step of that is are you engaged in substantial gainful activity? And each year they establish a certain amount of money that if you're making that amount of money gross, you're presumed to be engaging in substantial gainful activity. There are some exceptions to that. For example, if you have disabilities and you have work-related medical expenses, those might be able to be subtracted from the earnings. But in general, if you're making over that certain amount, you're not eligible. That's the end of it. There's no partial disability. You either qualify or you don't. But most people call in are out of work, or they wouldn't be calling a Social Security disability attorney. The next step is do you have a severe medically determinable impairment? That's do you have a physical or a mental condition backed up by a valid medical diagnosis of a condition that has lasted or is expected to last 12 consecutive months or result in death and is causing some symptoms that impact on your ability to engage in work activities. Things like sitting, standing, walking, lifting, caring, paying attention, concentrating, following instructions, staying on tasks. Most people calling up do have a severe medically determinable impairment. Next, Social Security looks at what they call the listings. The listings are very specific, very tough requirements. Most people do not meet a listing because they're so strict. The idea of the listings is when you have these findings, it's pretty bad. It's pretty clear that you can't work eight hours a day, five days a week consistently. But most people don't meet a listing. You can win a case at that stage, but you don't lose it if you don't meet the listing. Next they come up with an opinion or an idea of what it is they think you can do despite your limitations. You know, how long can you sit? How long can you stand? How much can you lift and carry? Can you do simple work or you can do detailed and complex work? And then they look at the work you've done in the past. That's called your past relevant work. In the past, they used to look back 15 years, but about two years ago, they shortened that time period to five years. So they look at any job that you've done over the last five years long enough to have learned how to do the job. Every job has what's called an SVP, specific SPV. SVP? Specific vocational preparation, I think is what it stands for. See, it's one of those alphabet soup abbreviations. That determines how long it takes to learn the job. So some jobs can be learned in 30 days or less, others you have to do for four years or more. If you've done a job long enough to learn how to do it at substantial gainful activity levels, then that job and within the last five years now, that's considered past relevant work. If they look at your limitations they think you have, and they think you can do your past relevant work, then you lose. At step five, if you can't do your past relevant work, then they look at are there any other jobs that you can do despite your limitations? And for somebody under 50, that's a pretty tough case because you have to prove not only can't they do the kind of work they did in the past, but they can't do anything. So typically it comes down to what would keep you from working eight hours a day, five days a week consistently? What would cause you to miss two or more days a month from work? What would cause you to get into a position where you couldn't work, like laying down or sitting in a recliner with your feet elevated? What would cause you to have to take a nap? Would pain, fatigue, side effects of medication interfere with your ability to pay attention and concentrate? So typically, you know, employers hire people because they work they need to get done and they need that work done on their schedule. So what is it that would keep you from being a reliable employee? Once you turn 50, the rules start changing in your favor. At age 50, if you can't do the kind of work you've done in the past and you're limited to most doing a sit-down or sedentary job, then you should be approved unless you could do your past relevant work or you have some transferable skills that you could use in a sit-down job. At age 55, that moves to light. Difference between sedentary and light work, typically sedentary work doesn't require uh standing and walking more than two hours in an eight-hour day or lifting more than 10 pounds. Light work generally involves more standing and walking four to six hours and lifting up to 20 pounds. So that's sort of the framework Social Security looks at. And so that's what I'm looking for. If you're working full time, well, you're not ready for us yet. If you decide you have to stop work, maybe you've got some accommodations that are allowing you to continue to work, but now you've got a new supervisor that comes in and they're not happy with the accommodations you have and you're worried you're gonna get fired or something, and you do get fired, then you know that might be a time to give me a call. We get sometimes referrals from employment attorneys because, you know, when you've worked, when you have a disability and you've worked hard and you've tried to do the best you could, and then suddenly somebody comes along and says, you know, this isn't cutting it for us, you've got to go, people get upset. And so they oftentimes reach out to an employment lawyer because they they you know they're mad about that, but they also want to apply for disability. And so usually I say, I think you need to decide which direction you're going. My philosophy is if you try to go in both directions at one time, you're probably not gonna get very far in either direction. Personal injury attorneys sometimes reach out to me because they have clients who are in serious accidents and um aren't able to get back to work. Sometimes I have divorce attorneys call me because uh one spouse isn't working and the other spouse is, you know, not wanting to pay support and they're worried about, you know, does this person really qualify for disability or not? So, you know, if somebody's been out of work and it doesn't look like they're gonna get back to work, and um, I would say if they're out of work for six months and you don't have a clear return to work, then they should probably should be talking to a disability attorney.

SPEAKER_02 14:12

So me listening to that recitation, it would sound like a lot of time and energy goes into that initial conversation and the screening of the potential client. So and and you're the guy, like you're one of the guys in Virginia whose name would show up on a listserv as someone says, hey, who's the Social Security disability expert? So how have you managed, Brian, to efficiently screen the leads that come to you? And and as you answer that question, I know some lawyers will help at the initial application, others are saying, no, my space really is after you've been denied. So you could you could start there. But how in the world do you efficiently screen without getting all the medical records, I presume, at the beginning and all of the documentation about past work, because you're gonna get a lot of calls.

SPEAKER_00 15:13

We've developed what we call the referral scorecard. It's kind of like a Chinese menu with column A and column B, and uh we hand them out to referral sources. And if somebody has something in column A and they don't have anything in column B, then we say, hey, this is somebody that um should talk with us. And I've trained my staff on that as well. They know what's because we used to use it before we handed it out to referral sources to educate them. We used to train our employees on it and they had it by their desks, you know, how to work, not making more than a certain amount, has a doctor is getting treatment, that sort of thing. So I've trained my intake staff very well and I've delegated to them the authority that if somebody has something in column A and they don't have something in column B, then you can tell them we can help and get to work for them. In the past, I was more concerned with my staff saying no to somebody than saying yes to somebody. Because unfortunately, most people don't reach out to a Social Security disability attorney if they can really work. I mean, nobody wants to say, hey, I'm gonna stop work and maybe in three years I'll get fifteen hundred dollars a month. Nobody wants to take that gamble. They're not calling us, you know, unless there's really something seriously going on in most cases. So I give folks the benefit of doubt and delegate to my staff the authority to accept cases and decline cases. Now, what I have found is that sometimes leads to me talking more to clients or potential clients whose cases we aren't going to take. You know, one of my goals has always been that if somebody has the courage to pick up the phone and reach out to us for help, I want to leave them in a better situation they were than they were when before they picked up the phone to give us a call. So I always try to explain to people, hey, this is this is something that if it changes might result in us saying we would take on your case. This is the sort of thing that you need to be on the lookout for. This is what you might do to put yourself in a better position to be successful. Or sometimes, you know, I refer them to we have the Department of Aging and Rehabilitative Services who offers vocational counseling, and I suggest, hey, hey, why don't you work with a vocational counselor and see if you can get a job that you can do? And, you know, that that goes both ways. If they can, great, they're working, super. If they're not, now there's some documentation of the problems they were having when they tried working. And they didn't just try to wander out on their own and try to find some job that everybody agrees they can't do. They work with a professional who works with folks with disabilities to help them find jobs that maybe they can do. But what I have found, what I have found sometimes, we've got a few one-star reviews, not many, but the unf the unfavorable reviews are typically from people whose cases we haven't taken. And so sometimes I wonder am I spending too much time trying to be helpful to folks who, when I pick up the phone, I know I'm not going to take their case.

Finding Purpose Beyond Personal Injury

SPEAKER_02 18:12

But I know that you have this real deep caring for the client. So talk to us a little bit about, because you started in the world, in the legal world, as I think a personal injury attorney, but then found what you call your true calling in this space, the Social Security Disability Space. So talk to us a little bit about that, because I know a lot of lawyers, maybe in a practice area and they're not sure they really like it a lot. They hear about things that, you know, on one level can be less stressful because you're not in depositions, you're not cross-examining people in trial and stuff. On the other hand, like you have demonstrated, you're you're putting lots and lots of miles on the car to give your clients their very best shot with live hearing. So we don't want to discount that as being not stressful. It certainly is stressful just to keep up with your calendar. But tell us a little bit about your journey from personal injury attorney to, hey, I really like this space and I want to build it.

SPEAKER_00 19:16

Well, like you said, early in my career, I was uh doing personal injury litigation, which is a great practice area, and truthfully, I probably would have made more money over the course of my career if I had stayed in personal injury. But I happened to handle a few Social Security disability cases along the way, and there was really something different about those cases. When we were on a disability case, the reaction from clients was unlike anything else I'd ever experienced in the law. Sometimes clients would come in person to the office to thank me personally and to give me a hug. They would tell me about how getting approved had allowed them to keep their home and finally get the medical care that they need or bring some stability back into their lives. And it struck me that this work was uh more about much more than just legal arguments. It was about helping people who were going through one of the most difficult seasons of their lives. In 2007, when I found myself starting my own practice, it was a very difficult time for me, both personally and professionally. It forced me um to think about what type of practice I wanted to build. But fortunately, you know, I'd always had in the back of my mind, if I wasn't doing this, what would I do? If I wasn't doing this, what would I do? And so I did have a a bit of a an idea that if I were to go on my own, that social security disability is an area that I might want to consider. And uh fortunately, I did have a mentor who had been an associate with me at a prior firm who had started social security practice at the firm we worked at who could guide me. So I went to the office depot and I got uh business planning software, and and in the box was this book um by Guy Kawasaki called The Art of the Start. And one of the main points of that book was to think about what's the meaning you want to make in the world? You know, what's the impact you want to have, what's the value you want to bring to the world. And that really stuck with me. And um I realized that what I wanted to do was to help people who were going through that kind of uncertainty and difficulty that I'd experienced myself. People who were sick or injured, who are worried about their future, who need somebody to guide them through a complicated system. You know, I uh later on I learned, you know, from a former uh GLM member, Charlie Hoffheimer, he used to say, you know, if you're going to go through a minefield, do you want to wander off on your own and hope for the best, or do you want to follow somebody who's been it been through it before? And so, you know, walking through a mine uh walking through the disability process can be like walking through a minefield. And our clients hear no multiple times, and many of them lose hope along the way. And a lot of what we do sometimes is just keep people from giving up because they get frustrated when they hear no so many times.

unknown 21:59

And so

SPEAKER_00 22:00

So I really get a lot of personal satisfaction about walking along alongside people and guiding them through the process. You know, every once in a while you get a moment that reminds you of why you chose this type of work. For example, yesterday I was in a hearing with um with a judge where the judge uh un uncharacteristically uh announced a favorable decision at the hearing. Usually at the hearings the judges just say, Well, that's the end of the hearing and you'll get our decision in the mail. But in this one, he told the client who happened to be a veteran that he was going to issue a fully favorable decision. And the client um who was a veteran broke down in tears. And the hearing reporter also started crying. And so after the client left the room, I told the judge, uh, days like this are why I do what I do. Because at the end of the day, helping somebody regain stability and hope is about as meaningful as it gets.

What Marketing Actually Works Here

SPEAKER_02 22:58

Well, you know, the other thing that I think happens, because we see it in our ERISA disability practice, is that no one else but you is putting together the client's entire story. Like probably no one in their life has put together their story of the medical, whatever the medical condition is and the hardship that it's creating, and then gone and and advocated either in a pre-hearing brief or or in a hearing for them. And there is, you know, there's real value in that too, because I know a lot of times your clients then have to wait. They don't get the decision right at the hearing. They have to wait for that. But there's real value in having somebody else stand up for you for the client and tell an accurate, compelling story. Talk to us a little bit about marketing. You mentioned cheat sheets really for referral sources. So I'm curious both how you care and feed referral sources, how you stay in front of them, but also how do you go out and get the next uh client who's looking for a self-security disability attorney? What's what has worked for you and maybe some things that haven't worked?

SPEAKER_00 24:12

So I've done done quite a few things over the year, years. When I first started off, and it was just me, I had um ads in uh the local newspapers. Remember newspapers? They used to come in on the driveway and your fingers got dirty. Yeah. I did newspapers.

SPEAKER_02 24:31

Actually, the other day in my office about newsprint. Yes.

SPEAKER_00 24:35

Yeah, so I I I did newspaper advertising. I was in the yellow pages. Um a year or two into my practice, started I shot some television ads and I ran television ads. I think it was from about it's either 2008 or 2009 through about uh 2016.

SPEAKER_02 24:54

I didn't know that, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 24:55

Yeah, and that worked. That worked um until it didn't work so well. Um there came a time where many people would call up and they had not applied, and maybe if they applied and followed your advice, they would get approved, but they never applied, and then you spent time following up with them and in the end closed it out and wished they hadn't called you. So I stopped on television. You know, I think we have you know, there's the fracturing of the TV audience. You know, there used to be three networks, and now there's hundreds and DVRs where people can skip past um ads. So I moved beyond that. I have sent out a mailed monthly newsletter to every current and past client and referral sources, um, and eventually that list got into the thousands. And I stepped away from that. I'm thinking now about I think I need to re-engage more with my current and past clients. One of the things newsletters work really great when you're gonna have um repeat customers, but most of my clients are not repeat customers. Unfortunately, many people who get approved for Social Security disability are gonna uh pass away within five years of when they get approved. But I do get referrals from clients and I do want to stay top of mind with them. I send out a calendar magnet every year, but I shifted the mailed monthly newsletter to primarily referral sources. Other attorneys, other professionals who are who are the grizzly bears in the salmon stream of my prospects, you know, who come into contact with folks maybe before they were thinking about reaching out to a disability attorney. So I've done that, I've done um gifts to uh referral sources. I do feel like I'm not optimizing my marketing. I probably could be a little bit more organized and thoughtful and consistent in what I'm doing. The most consistent thing I've been doing over the last several years is uh the newsletter and sending out the referral scorecard, and I offer to do lunch and learns. So if you have a firm where you come into contact with folks who might need help, but you don't know about Social Security, I'll bring in lunch and talk with you about Social Security. I'll hand out my referral scorecards and go over that. So I've done that for several uh estate planning firms who do special needs trusts, come into contact with families with folks with disabilities. You know, Social Security has its ups and downs uh with the swings in the economy, but I I think you initially asked me how many cases. We've got about 300 cases that we're handling right now. You know, I think we're about as busy as we can get without adding more members to the team.

SPEAKER_02 27:41

Yeah, so let's um let's talk about that for our sort of our last subject. So a big topic that comes up in the great legal marketing world is, you know, outsourcing or well, first of all, let me say, everybody feels inadequate with marketing. Like everybody knows there's one more thing they could have done. But what we're always working on is what's the best use of my next hour and my next dollar. And you've done a great job of it. And I know because we get your your monthly newsletter for your referral sources, so you're always you're always in front of us, and everybody kind of feels like shit. There's there's more stuff I could have done. But let's just talk about in your case, you mentioned you have brought on a created a relationship with a, I think you said a retired administrative law judge. This is someone who sat and listened or heard uh Social Security disability hearings, right?

SPEAKER_00 28:32

Right. They were actually a um a representative for a number of years before becoming a judge, and then they were a judge for uh more than a decade and recently retired. Um I saw on the uh email discussion list that they were interested in doing this sort of thing, and so we started talking before the holidays, and you know, at the beginning of the year we worked out uh an agreement, and I've been really pleased with how it's been going so far.

SPEAKER_02 29:00

Well, talk to us about two things. So you don't have to mention specific numbers unless you want to, but basically what's the framework of payment? Is it per case, whatever? And then um, and then how are you actually working together? Like what what's the either the software or the the rhythm of referrals to of cases to this administrative law judge? People are always curious, like, all right, if I'm gonna do this, I know I'm not the first one to do it. So as Charlie Hoffheimer, our friend, said, you know, you want to follow somebody into the minefield, right? So what is what is what do those two things look like for you? Like the framework for how the financial deal is, but then also how are you actually working together?

SPEAKER_00 29:47

So they proposed working 20 hours a month for me for a certain amount of money. In the first month, we had a meeting where we went over the cases that had hearings scheduled in the month and identified which ones I wanted them to work on. In the social security world, there's something called Chronicle, which allows access to the Social Security claim files. And so we created a user for them where they can access the claim file. I use Thompson Readers Co-Council as an AI tool for reviewing cases, and they have access to that as well. We use um we set them up with an email address and Microsoft Teams account. And so we have a chat with what we call the hearing preparation team, which is me and oh, I forgot one employee. I've got uh another employee who works 30 hours a week remotely, primarily talking to clients and request uh identify where we need to get the medical records. And um she also works on we handle Virginia retirement system disability claims for state and municipal workers. She handles those claims. But she leads up the team, manages the virtual assistant as we're trying to phase my wife out of handling cases. So we have a chat, we identify the cases, we have a list in there, she'll prepare a draft of the memo. If she has questions along the way, she'll put them in there, we'll respond. Um she sends me the draft, I finalize it, I upload it, and um after the first month, I said, let's increase it to 30 hours from 20 hours. So um I've been really pleased with it. I've had some I've received some decisions where we didn't have to go forward with the hearing because the judge was convinced. I've had three or four hearings where the hearings have been very brief because the judge was 90% of the way and just had a few questions that they needed clarified. And so it's been working out great.

SPEAKER_02 31:41

It may work out to be one of those things you wish you'd just earlier.

SPEAKER_00 31:46

You know, so the challenge, you like you said, I care so much, right? Yeah. Yeah, yeah. And the problem with caring so much, you know, it's the old entrepreneur's curse that nobody can do it as good as I can do it. Right? And you know, there's only so many hours in the day and only so many days in the week that you can work or that you want to work. And at some point you have to, you know, give up a little bit of control and trust that others can do things. Now, maybe they're not gonna do it exactly the way you do it or quite as well as you would do it. But you know, if you want to help even more people, then you gotta surround yourself with people who can help you get the job done.

SPEAKER_02 32:28

And how has uh this uh new person been how do you introduce uh the administrative law judge to the client? Like what's that conversation like?

SPEAKER_00 32:36

She doesn't interact with the clients, she just reviews the medical records. If she has a question, she'll reach out to us and we'll talk with the client.

SPEAKER_02 32:45

Well, cool.

SPEAKER_00 32:45

Um and you you do uh Virginia retirement system disability, which is another whole Yeah, that's state and municipal workers who belong to a retirement plan that's being phased out now, but it's mostly school teachers, firefighters, police officers, correctional officers, beat out workers, folks like that.

SPEAKER_02 33:07

Well, very good. What is the uh what does the tech stack look like? You mentioned the Social Security sort of proprietary database. I think you mentioned Filevine and Consumer Reuters, Co-Council AI. So just in terms of AI, are you using Filevine's AI or so?

SPEAKER_00 33:26

Tomorrow I've got a demo set up for the MedCron tool. I think they're giving us brief free um use of it. But we're in the early stages of implementing Filevine, and truthfully, I haven't spent 10 minutes doing any training on Filevine yet. But the main AI tool that I use for putting in client information is Thompson Reuters Co-Council. But I've used ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Notebook LM, Perplexity. Um I'm digging into that.

Out-Of-State Clients And How To Reach Brian

SPEAKER_02 33:58

Well I think you will find, or at least I have found, of course, Favon's AI, like you've heard me say, I love it. And it's really help helping me and my work, which is mainly doing what we call pre-like pre-claim consults with doctors and other high-wage earners, like figuring out their different policies and stuff. And it's great on that. But where where it really will accelerate you is in client communications, because it can go just look in the file and it can draft the most amazingly detailed like emails that are accurate because it's only training on itself, um, uh, for you or your team to edit. And so, you know, it just from a client perspective, like the stuff they're getting from us now when they have a a question about strategy or something in their case, it's actually a very detailed email that in the past I never would have written because it was too long and too many typos to do it. Uh, and of course you read everything before you send it. But I think you'll be really amazed when you do get a chance to dig into it. It's a great, I think it's a great product. Well, all right, sir. If now, what happens when someone calls you from out of state, like too far away? Do you refer them out or how are you doing with those calls?

SPEAKER_00 35:14

So we do get some calls from out of state.

SPEAKER_02 35:17

You may get more after the podcast is published.

SPEAKER_00 35:21

Well, you know, we'll talk with people in, you know, if you're in Idaho or something, I'm not gonna fly to Idaho to do your hearing. But if you want us to represent you and you're okay with us doing your hearing using Microsoft Teams, then we can take on your case. We can help you. If I know somebody in your area that does Social Security, you know, I can give you their name. But I'm a member of the National Organization of Social Security Claimants Representatives, NOSCRA. They have a loyal referral service, and we give folks the NOSCAR lawyer referral service number. But we're we're happy to help people anywhere, but if you're I would say if you're beyond North Carolina or Maryland, we're probably gonna tell you we're not gonna drive that far to do an in-person hearing. But if you're okay with a Microsoft Teams hearing, we can help.

SPEAKER_02 36:09

Well, it sounds like with with 300 cases in the portfolio today, you're you're a busy guy and your team is busy, and here you are trying to retire Jennifer and figure out what three people are gonna replace the work that she was doing for you. All right, man. Well, look, if someone wants to uh reach out to you, look at website, uh maybe a lawyer who wants to get on your um uh newsletter list, be a referral source.

SPEAKER_00 36:33

Where should they go look, Brian? They can go to GilletteLawgroup.com. Also, the law firm has a Facebook page. I'm on LinkedIn as well. I'm always happy to talk with folks. And just yesterday I had coffee with a local attorney who wanted to pick my brain about my newsletter and how I get it done. Always happy to make connections.

SPEAKER_02 36:53

Yeah, very good. All right, sir. Thanks for spending some time with us today. Sure. My pleasure. All right, we'll talk soon.

SPEAKER_00 37:00

Alrighty, be well.

SPEAKER_01 37:03

That's it for today's episode of the Renegade Lawyer Podcast, where we're rewriting the rules of what it means to build a great law practice and a great life. If something sparked a new idea or gave you clarity, pass it on. Subscribe, leave a review, and share this with someone who's ready to think bigger. Want more tools, strategies, and stories from the trenches? Visit GreatLegalMarketing.com or connect with Ben Glass and the team on LinkedIn. Keep building boldly. We'll see you next time.