143 - Pricing effort, not outcomes, in an AI world

My guest today is the renowned David Burns, an equity partner at Ronald Fletcher Baker LLP, listed as a ‘leading Partner’ in the Legal 500 for corporate occupiers, and recommended for property litigation and commercial litigation.

The firm was founded in 1948 and now has around 140 employees, walk-in offices in Baker Street, Old Street, Exeter and Manchester, and some new offices opening soon.

On today’s episode, what we’re covering are the secrets to client trust and building a thriving culture

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https://rfblegal.co.uk/people/david-burns/

About Myerson Connections:
Myerson Solicitors is a 100% employee-owned independent law firm based in Altrincham, Greater Manchester.

Myerson supports many other law firms throughout the country on a daily basis through its referral network – Myerson Connections.

Not only does Myerson help other law firms with referrals, but also provides free peer-to-peer education, knowledge sharing and practice management support.

Discover more at myerson.co.uk/connections.

About Dan:
Currently, Dan is seeking a London Law Firm turning over £1.5M to £6M to invest in, so if you are interested in receiving investment to grow or sell your law firm or know someone who might be, please contact Dan on: dan@danwarburton.com

Dan also provides law firm owners with skills that increase their profitability while reducing their workload. He can show you strategies that have grown his clients' revenues from 15% to over 300% while more than halving their workload in less than a year.

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Transcript

My next guest is David's Birds, an equity partner, Ronald Fletcher Baker LP, listed as leading partner in the Legal 500 and corporate occupiers. Yeah, it sounds good. Recommended for property litigation and commercial litigation.

The firm was founded in 1948 and now has around 140 employees, walking offices in Baker Street, Old Street, Extra, Manchester, and some new offices. The new offices are opening soon. The biggest thing for me, I've seen Steve Bartlett say this the other day, having the conditions to persist, are you actually enjoying what you do, creating an environment where clients trust and enjoy and work with you, and where employees enjoy that? Go off your own stuff, Tom, by the way. 

It sounds crap, so do whatever you want to say. Yeah, and at the same time, you picked this out because it resonated with you, right? In some way. Yeah.

That having the conditions to persist, creating an environment where clients trust and enjoy working with you. Okay, so let's put here, what we're covering today are the secrets to client trust, to enjoy working with you. Okay, on today's episode, put that there.

On today's episode, what we're covering are the secrets to client trust, and enjoying working with you. The secrets to client trust and enjoying working with you. I hope we say that even better.

Yeah, and what was the next forms? There was something you said here, and where employees enjoy the atmosphere, client trust, and building a thriving culture. Yeah, yeah. There we go. 

And building a thriving culture. Put here, thriving culture. Nice. 

On today's episode, what we're covering are the secrets to client trust and building a thriving culture. Yeah, brilliant. There we go. 

Nice. And then that's your name and your position there. Okay, brilliant. 

My guest today is, the firm was, on today's episode. Yeah, brilliant. Right, we're there.

Yeah. Really good. All right, brilliant. 

Well, I forgot to press pause anyway, so we've been recording the whole time, but obviously I'll edit all this out. Yeah, I don't mind without. All right, brilliant. 

I'm sure this is going to be a great conversation given your accomplishments. So yeah, let's go for it. Three, two, one. 

Welcome to the Law Firm Owners Podcast. I'm delighted to have here my guest, who is the renowned David Burns, an equity partner at Ronald Fletcher Baker LLP, listed as a leading partner in the legal 500 for corporate occupiers, and recommended for property litigation and commercial litigation. The firm was founded in 1948 and now has around 140 employees, walking offices in Baker Street, Old Street, Exeter, and Manchester, and some new offices opening soon. 

On today's episode, what we're covering are the secrets to client trust and building a thriving culture. David, it's brilliant to have you here. Thank you very much for the invite. 

It's a pleasure to be with you, Doc. So yeah, I mean, how long have you been at this firm for now? John, so I've been at the firm since 2010. I come from Northern Ireland, as you may have picked up from my accent. 

I don't know how much of what I say you'll be able to understand, but hopefully if you can understand 80% of what I say, that's probably good. But yeah, I came over to London in about 2006, started working in criminal law. And then in 2010, joined Ronald Fletcher Baker, who I joined as a solicitor in their criminal law department. 

So I scanned several years, acted on behalf of some notorious criminals in London. And after the legal aid cuts in that industry were quite severe. And so I think it was in around 2013 or 14, I jumped ship from criminal law into civil litigation, property disputes, commercial litigation. 

So jumped into that side of things there. Okay, great. Yeah. 

So you've had quite a journey already. So when we look at the secrets to client trust, one of the things I've learned, especially from Bob Berg's book, Endless Referrals, is that especially in services-based businesses, people only buy from us when they know, like, and trust us. So first they need to know of us, then there needs to be some kind of rapport, likeability, and then trust. 

And without the trust, none of it happens. Clients aren't created, business doesn't happen. Over the years, what have you found is key to creating that trust that onboards new clients? Yeah, it's not something that I deliberately set out to achieve initially. 

But I think over the years, I've realised that open communication with clients right off the start, usually either in person, face-to-face, which is ideal, or if that's not possible, over a Teams call or by phone, at least not just by email, where people can get an idea of what that person's like, and communicating, for example, my approach to whatever their problem is, and to try to be as honest with them at the start about what their position looks like, the sort of relative strengths or weaknesses of the position they're in, what sort of fees they could be in for if this goes all wrong. And I think that honestly right at the start of saying, look, especially in cases, for example, where I feel it's not worth it. So if there's a dispute worth, I don't know, 50 grand, and the legal fees are going to be 50 grand, then I'll say that straight away to clients.

And often I find having those conversations where on the face of it, I've forced myself to apply it because I've told them not to use me. Yeah. That often creates a cascade of other clients who will come to me because they can trust that I'm going to give them honest advice and not, you know, blade them for legal fees on a key that isn't worth it. 

Yeah. Yeah. Brilliant. 

I mean, you know, this is one of the foundations in skilled leadership. You know, it's not manipulation. It's just saying it as it is. 

And what I'm also hearing is you're really listening to the client. You're really getting in their world and hearing what they're really dealing with. Yeah, because I find that if I'm a keyboard warrior and I don't pick up the phone or speak to the clients before I start work or start a witness statement, for example, often you miss all of this crucial information. 

Number one, in respect of the actual nitty gritty of the case. But number two, in respect of what does the client actually want to achieve? Is there alternative ways of getting in there which may not involve a fully contested trial? And, you know, for example, can I pick the phone up to my opponent and cut through some of the issues in dispute? I find the clients always appreciate taking an approach which, you know, puts their goals at the forefront and they can hopefully see that me and my colleagues want to try and work towards fulfilling them in an efficient way. Yeah. 

Yeah. And as you as you tell me all this, you know, what becomes apparent to me is the secret to success isn't to think about the money and how you're going to get the money and, you know, just getting that client over the line just so that you can, you know, build loads. It's actually secondary to just genuinely caring for the client and being in their world. 

And if you do that effectively, then the finances just work themselves out. Exactly. And because on the opposite side of that scale, I find that if you go down that first route, you were saying of just trying to get the money, you know, sort of almost at the expense of what the client's best interests are, then immediately they will tell that to whoever the friends are that you've dealt with. 

And so you end up, your reputation can be undermined so quickly. And it's something I'm so careful to try and protect. So when I'm dealing with anybody, I want to make sure that at the end of the case they're blocked away with a good experience so that they'll tell their friends or colleagues, you know, when they have an issue that they'll feel like, yes, David's going to take care of these people or, you know, otherwise, what's the point? Yeah. 

Yeah. Yeah. I love everything you're saying. 

It makes complete sense. I know that a lot of law firm owners, you know, they avoid anything to do with sales. You know, they try calling it business development and they still don't even like that. 

What advice would you give to law firm owners and partners who want to, you know, win more work, but are worried about coming across like a classic salesman? Yeah, there is, obviously, I know there's a line and there's a balance there to be had. My view on it is that getting out there and doing things, taking action is a good first step. So better off spending lots of time trying to work out the exact, precise, scientific best way to, you know, target and convert clients. 

For example, I will do quite a few different networking events, often in areas where I'm interested in. So for example, auction property sales, I'm part of an auction buyer's club, the Ealing property meet where there's a lot of property investors there, Brendan Quinn's event, we'll go and speak on panels, you know, the National Development Summit. So I'll generally attend events where I'm just interested in speaking to the people anyway. 

So I just like engaging with those clients. I mean, often when you're interested in the people and the topics and the talkers, then it doesn't feel like work as much. And so it's easier to keep going and stay consistent. 

And so getting yourself out there physically is always important. And then also I'd say social media, you're obviously a proponent of LinkedIn. So my, you know, I use a lot of the social media networks if I can, you know, YouTube, doing podcasts, you know, being a bit, putting yourself into slightly uncomfortable positions.

I think it's worth it. Yeah. And also when you go out networking, don't make it the objective to generate business, just make it the objective to be interested in people. 

That's it. You know? Yeah. Yeah. 

We actually do it on that topic. One of the, I recently arranged, I think it might've been the first ever Brazilian Jiu Jitsu slash property networking event in the UK. And so I didn't know how it would go or how many people might get injured out of it. 

I do a lot of Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, I've done for many years, as I thought, and I don't really, I don't really drink. So I'd be out of those events and you may be out of the very odd classes, you know, or something, but I generally avoid drinking. So I thought, let me see how many people I can get from the property world to do Brazilian Jiu Jitsu.

And it was packed. I had all sorts of people, young, old, big, small. I knew from probably, I had one guy, Des Taylor, and his son, who's 14 years old, you know, they were there.

I had all sorts of property investors. I had Lady Charlie Parks, who onboard me, he fell viciously several times. So, and, you know, did I specifically get a case out of, you know, doing that Jiu Jitsu property networking thing? Actually, I did get one, but that wasn't the, the idea was just about fun with lots of people that you know, and do something, you know, interesting. 

Brilliant. So that's the kind of example. Yeah, brilliant. 

I mean, I don't know how we've gone from how to create client trust to Jiu Jitsu property network mink, but hey, the wonders of being a podcast host. So, so coming back to it, you know, the other part of this was building thriving teams. And it makes sense that if you lead with an intention of not trying to sell, cajole, manipulate, but just listen, serve, and be clear with clients, that that's obviously the same way that you look at leading and managing others, right? And that will be the foundation of creating that thriving environment. 

Absolutely. And I think the way I sort of approach it with my team as well is to provide as many opportunities for all of them to excel and to develop what our specialisms they're interested in, to market in the way that they want to market, to build their own client base, their own brands within the team and to go out and sort of express who they are as a solicitor and who they are as a person. Because I feel like, you know, them being able to connect with their clients and build that trust only benefits the, you know, the unit as a whole.

And so in terms of the atmosphere we've got, I love the atmosphere. I get a lot of stick in the team, but I think that's a good sign in a way, isn't it? When they feel when everyone feels comfortable enough to give me a lot of stick on a daily basis. I mean, there's something comforting in that in an odd way. 

But surely, you know, I'm in the mind of the listener, the law firm owner listening to this thinking, well, if you go and build teams of people that then go and create their own client bases and their own relationships, isn't there then a worry that they are just going to be able to leave, join another firm and take all their clients with them? Yeah, they could do. And I think that's been probably the traditional approach that usually it will be partners that sort of maintain a lot of the relationships with the big clients. And then, you know, the juniors do more of the sort of work in the background and the donkey work.

But in my view, I just think there's enough clients to go around. There's enough work to go around. And if the solicitors and even the paralegals, trainees in the team are able to build and develop relationships with clients, then if that client follows them afterwards, because they've had a really good service, then we need to find other clients. 

There's enough work, I think, for most people. So I don't want to restrict solicitors from having that experience and building that network, because ultimately, it's a benefit to the firm. And I'm happy to take the risk that some clients might leave. 

It's sort of a probably a bit of a compliment that we've done well, that they've placed their trust in those trainees. I recently hired a paralegal. We weren't really even looking for, to be honest. 

I'd just hired three. I'd hired a partner, a managing associate, and a newly qualified. And then just a few months before, I've hired a new paralegal.

But I met, it's a random story, actually, about a year ago, or slightly longer. I was admitted into A&E with some sort of throat issue, like a Quincy. So I was the, whatever it was, surgeon. 

I stuck some needle in the back of my throat and then sent me into some room. And there was a lady next to me. I was trying to do some work. 

And my phone's battery, she heard charger. And then said, oh, by the way, I'm doing a dissertation on law. We got to speaking. 

And then I said, we can come in and do a week's work experience. And so she did that. And then just recently said, oh, any chance of a job? Because there was some issues with her BPC course. 

So I said, yeah, okay, come here. And now her father and some of her father's friends are now instructing the firm. So it's good for us. 

We've got some really good cases. I've got an excellent trainee who really impressed in the time she was on her work experience. But yeah, I think that's the sort of atmosphere I think there is in the team where, when I had asked the other team members about Katie as the name of the party legal, I said, oh, Katie's just asked me for a job out of nowhere. 

And they were all like, oh, she's really good. Bring her in. So then we brought her in. 

And she brought in her own client. So why would I try and stop something like that? I really want to encourage her to do that more. Yeah, yeah. 

I'm seeing that the secret here to building a thriving firm is to really support people, the team members, to challenge themselves, to go out there, to build these relationships. And as you say, build their own selves as a brand in themselves. And I think that's really empowering and nurturing of people. 

And I think that that will probably make them want to stick around for longer, knowing that they're always being given that encouragement and training, right? Yeah, I think so. I think people have, myself included, have the autonomy to sort of feel like they can do things in the way they want to do them. Obviously, we'll supervise the work and all the rest of it. 

But having autonomy to go out, win clients, build relationships, run cases, I think it leaves a good feeling. And you can see development of solicitors in the team as a result, which is brilliant to see. And then would you say that with this way of leading and managing them, they naturally start to create relationships with clients that trust them? Absolutely. 

I've got it. I know it's a slightly extreme example, but I will have it with, obviously, the Barley girl who I'm working with. She's quite a personable person. 

And so she is on rattle together with me. We're working together on some of them, but developing a relationship with some of her connections. And the same with newly qualified solicitors who are developing relationships where they'll pick up the phone regularly to clients, keep them updated proactively, even if there's not necessarily anything that's happened on the case to say, well, we're chasing, we'll let you know when we've got an update, but we're still, we're on it. 

We're dealing with it. Clients always appreciate it. And as a result of it, they say, oh, actually, my friend has got this thing. 

Can you help them out with it as well? And it makes my life easier because if it's me winning, trying to get all the work in, it can be a tough slog. It's better having lots of people adding into the mix. Yeah, brilliant. 

I mean, this is an insightful conversation and it's certainly an angle I've not heard from many other law firm owners or partners, you know, implementing a lot of the time with the, you know, law firm owners such that I get to speak to or who approached me, are just exhausted and burned out from trying to do billable work themselves and just don't have time to support, nurture, you know, the associates. How much billable work are you doing versus management and supporting of others? Yeah, it's definitely more towards, it's on an increasing trend, less and less billable work, more supervisory work and management and doing these kinds of things. So even, for example, today, I had a call before this with a lady about speaking at an event and I'm doing some stuff then. 

I'm speaking with you now. At one o'clock, I go out for a lunch with Forrester's. At three or four, I'm going to meet an ex-colleague, just have a chat with her. 

She's in town. And so I just don't have that much time to do the actual casework in a day like this. It was similar yesterday. 

I was out and about a lot. So I don't know what the proportions of the split are, but quite a bit of my time is now devoted to BD, management, sales. In reality, that's probably the realistic term for some of it.

And then probably the rest is more supervision of the team. The thing is, because I've just hired some excellent people, I've got another partner, another equity partner in my team. I've just hired, actually, an equity partner and another salary partner and a managing associate.

So there's quite a bit of supervisory help now, which is a godsend for me. Yeah. I relate to what you're saying. 

One of my clients has just flown to CleoCon to pick up an award for Best New Law Firm 2025. And he crafted out these questions and the kind of answers he might give. And one of the questions was, how have you managed to grow so quickly and what's your secret? And he said, first and foremost, the owners must remove themselves from the billable work so they can focus on supporting the rest of the team and investing in themselves to improve their communication, management, and leadership skills. 

So it was really hit home. It was like, yes, it's working. The work that we've been doing together.

I think for a lot of solicitors who spend their entire life judging their performance by way of billable hours. Or their value to the firm. Exactly. 

So it's a really difficult thing, even for me. It's a difficult thing to take yourself away from. But ultimately, I think in the long term, it's a better strategy. 

Yeah. Yeah. Because when we look at the simple maths of it, if a law firm partner charges £500 an hour, at the end of that one hour, they can bill for £500. 

But they've not been available for any business development, any management. They haven't been available to handle anything else. But if you have a team of charging half that, £250 an hour, at the end of that, there's £2,500 being billed.

Even after their wages, that's around £2,000 coming into the business. So what would you prefer? Bill £500, limit of £500, or bring in £2,000 and be free for management, leadership, business development, and everything else, right? Yeah. And also, you're not at the point where you're going to burn out and have a heart attack. 

Yeah. And we're 50 years old. But what I'll try and do as well is most days, I'll be with two litigation teams in the firm. 

And there's a guy from the other team. We'll go to the Jane Mavery lunchtime. Actually, there's three of us now. 

Because I think it's important to try and have boundaries around the amount of time. If you're just stuck at your desk doing chargeable work day in, day out, then you're just going to end up absolutely shattered quickly. And so, yeah, I wouldn't agree more. 

It's funny. I was just speaking to the management partner yesterday about this very topic and saying that how important it is for the partners of the teams to focus on business development, management, growth, and things that aren't just straight fee earning. Yeah. 

Yeah. Well, for any of your team members that are partners or owners who are struggling, tell them to buy this book here. Delegate Now to Supercharge Your Profits.

How law firm owners can massively increase their profits while reducing their workload. So, I'll read that. I'll order it and read it. 

Yeah. It's got 20 years of experience that I've had through all the leadership management programmes I've done. And in the last nine years, working with law firm owners and partners to implement it and the results it's gained for them. 

So, yeah. Also, I'm pushing out an open door then on this about not just burying your head in billable time. Yeah. 

Yeah. Doing so very much makes a law firm owner the bottleneck of their own success and of everybody else. The topic we've chosen today is the secrets to building client trust and a thriving culture. 

Neither of that happens if you're not available to be able to build those trustful relationships with possible clients or to support your team to thrive, right? None of it happens. It's interesting. Actually, right before I came on this podcast, I had an email from a longstanding good client of mine. 

And he's got some issues. He did a hearing coming up in November and he just emailed saying, I've got this hearing, David, can you help? I'm in my head and immediately I thought, I've got a new partner, Billy, who's, he comes all the way in from Blackburn, so we're based in London, but Billy's out in East. And I said, Bill, could you look after this client? He's a really good client and a good connection. 

And Billy was happy to do so and then realised the area where the clients live is very close to where Billy lives and their businesses that they're dealing with, Billy's been to on several occasions. So I'm like, I'm not worried. Billy's part of the firm and why would I hand over that client to Billy so he can build that relationship? And then I can sit here on a podcast with you as a result. 

Yeah, yeah, yeah. To you who's living it and walking it, it's obvious, but to someone who's spent years becoming qualified to practise law and then has become the go-to expert and then has always identified themselves and the value they bring by the hours that they bill, it's very difficult to let go of it until they can really see the value that they can bring rather by managing others and leading others than doing the billable work, right? Billy, I suppose as well, maybe there's a certain thing with, you know, a certain personality type as well, that is the side of the work I really enjoy is the client interaction. I knew I was that far. 

There's just the interaction with other people. And so, like, for example, today, meeting with you, who I've never met with, or meeting with the foresters or the ex-colleague, I enjoy that side of it anyway. I enjoy the technical side and assistant supervising, but dealing with people is what I really enjoy. 

And, you know, so I think it lends itself to certain personalities, probably more so if you've got an introverted personality type that prefers to do the work, it might be more of a stretch to them, bring yourself out of just the technical work, you know, keep putting yourself out in front of new people. Yeah. And of course, the thing to get is it's not for everybody. 

Not everybody should be delegating their work away. But, you know, if you're in a firm and all the partners are just focused on billing, that's just not going to work. You're all just going to remain where you are all burnt out and exhausted. 

And you need to team up together and think, right, who's going to move into managing partner and give up the billable work so they can really support and nurture everybody else in the team. Somebody must be doing that role. Otherwise, the firm doesn't grow anywhere near as fast as it could, right? Completely agree. 

Yeah. Couldn't agree more strongly with all of that. Yeah.

We've got a new management partner in and that is the focus. You definitely need one who's a management partner who's setting the tone, steering the ship and continuing to grow. And we've actually, one of the things we're doing as a firm as well, we currently are in two locations in London, Old Street and Baker Street. 

And we've recently bought a three-year property in Holborn, which is sort of in the middle of both. And so we're going to have everybody under one roof, but a large office space. And so we're, that's going to be removing there in January of next year. 

And we think that will really sort of supercharge the culture, the amount of cross-referrals, the interaction between different teams, because we'll probably have, you know, 65 or 70 on one floor and then another, I don't know, 40 or so on another floor. All, all together. And I think that I will really have, I think the culture of the firm and it will allow us to do a lot of networking events from the, you know, the ground floor where we've got open spaces to do that. 

So I'm itching to go. I've already got lots of people lined up to come in and start, you know, using the space. Brilliant. 

Brilliant. Well, I really enjoy speaking to you and I know we could just keep going on forever. Absolutely brilliant. 

Brilliant conversation. I will put links to your website in the note descriptions so that anybody that's heard this can click on those, find out more about you and what you offer. And yeah, let's, let's hopefully meet in person sometime. 

Definitely. I can invite you to one of the opening of the new office if you want to come along. Where are you being done? I'm in the South of Spain a lot of the time. 

Oh gosh. Nice. But I also, but I also have a home near Haywards Heath in Sussex, so I can easily, is, is where are the new offices being opened? In Holborn. 

Holborn. Oh yeah. Great. 

Okay. Fantastic. Well yeah. 

Keep me posted. Yeah. Brilliant. 

All right. Pretty much for the invite and for bringing me on. I've really enjoyed it. 

Yeah. Brilliant. Me too. 

Speak soon. Cheers. Thanks.