Trial Lawyer View Podcast
Austin Kurtz & Brian Riley

Austin Kurtz00:00:00

Largest places and largest fees that you can, and all of them would probably be less than 3% of the firm's total revenue. And that's just because I think our systems, especially on the smaller than midsize cases, are so refined and so tight that every single day when we check the mail, it's a lot of policy limit settlements coming in every single day. And that's really what keeps the firm alive, but also allows us to be profitable.

Brian Riley00:00:25

I would send Brian cases. I feel like I know there's some case for me. Brian's like, what do you mean this isn't a case for you? I'll make money on this all day. And I was like, I don't know how he's making money on those cases. And now we're together. Brian, he's taught me how to make money on those cases. And I've met a lot of success on smaller cases that I'd traditionally not take.

Jason Lazarus00:00:41

That's Brian Riley and Austin Kurts, founders and co-owners of KRG injury Lawyers. Four months after launching their firm, they generated $300,000 in fees. Their secret wasn't chasing blockbuster verdicts. It was building systems so refined a policy limit. Settlements started arriving every single day.

Brian Riley00:01:01

I put my 25 paralegals in Columbia against any of my Arizona paralegals. They're amazing. They are so good at what they do. And so they're that good. I think utilizing nearshore hiring has allowed us to scale while people are jumping straight to AI.

Jason Lazarus00:01:15

In this episode, you'll learn why holding out for big cases leaves boutique firms cash poor, how waiting on large cases drains firms resources fast, and how hyper refined systems process small and mid-sized cases at scale. I'm Jason Lazarus and this is trial review. So you guys launched Curtis Bradley Law Group in early 2020. For both of you. It spent years inside bigger pie firms and big law. What did each of you see from the inside that convinced you the boutique trial ready model was the right bet for your future.

Austin Kurtz00:01:55

And that it's funny because it's a good question, because actually, Austin and I, I think our backgrounds are pretty different. In terms of kind of how we were molded to become the attorneys that we are today. I think, you know, my background was a little bit more in the, you know, just like your kind of, red car, blue car accident cases, you know, premises liability cases where maybe not the sexiest, sexiest of liability or the sexiest of damages, but you find a way to get into the, into the, details and get a great result for the client. And it was kind of done for my entire career at a very fast pace. I've been fireman, I think. I mean, I, I can speak for himself, but, like, you know, he was probably in a position where he had a little bit more, ability to, like, be a little more selective on the cases that he was going to handle and probably a smaller case load. But I think, you know, in doing what I did over my ten year career before starting Curtis Riley and probably also at Austin, there we both had, opportunities to go to trial and realized that you know, even the people who have most trials don't meet their bell aren't necessarily as polished as you would imagine. You know, they're great. It's kind of one of those things where when you get into it, you kind of realize everyone's just trying to figure that shit out. And it's like every single case, no matter who you're with, it's like, oh, wait. Like, I don't know that. You don't know that. We really don't know this. We need to go figure this out. And, that kind of gives you a lot of confidence. When you get a few trials under your belt and you start learning, you know, what you actually do, and, and that was sort of, kind of part of the way that we ended up getting together in the first place.

Brian Riley00:03:43

100%. Brian's right. Like, put it simply, I think we all saw gaps in like a lack of technology. Being used, at least from my side. Lack of tech aggressively, lack of speed and lack of fun. It just wasn't fun. You know, one of our mentors is Bob Simon. Bob's, like, been awesome for us and helped us grow a lot. But Bob kind of was a first lawyer in the space. So I was like, why can't you practice on a t shirt after dark? Why can't you have fun doing it? Why can't you enjoy what you're doing? Why can't you ask that question? Why can't you do that and start making us see it differently? And before and then during and kind of helped us build accordingly. And so I think we saw a gap in the market where we're like, look, if we can do this, utilize technology, we both are workhorses. Brian, probably the only person I've ever met that can work more than me. I like I pride myself on being a workhorse. And, Brian is just right there with me. We're always going. And so we're both already working that hard. Like, why not do it for ourselves? We have fun doing it. I mean, we really do have fun with everything we do, the branding and the practicing. It's all just it's a good time. Like we don't take ourselves too seriously. The work serious, but like the practice itself. Like you don't have to take yourselves too seriously to to be successful.

Jason Lazarus00:05:03

We notice how most conversations about law firm growth stop at intake, marketing and trial results, but rarely addresses what happens after resolution. That's the gap Synergy focuses on. We partner with personal injury law firms to manage the operational side of health care, lien resolution and compliance, brain structure and clarity to one of the most overlooked but costly parts of what your team does day in and day out. If you're thinking more seriously about operations beyond the courtroom, you can explore Synergy services. Be the link in the show notes or by scanning the QR code on the screen. Now back to today's conversation. This idea of being able to have fun, not being as serious in terms of just your, not not that's like a trial because obviously that serious being a lawyer, I understand, you know, that that is serious. And being someone who's been through a personal injury myself, I've been through the entirety of of that kind of a case. It is very personal, very serious. But this idea of bringing some fun to the work, you know, how do you guys make that a thing with balancing the seriousness of what you're dealing with?

Austin Kurtz00:06:19

We have a team approach, for sure, and I think between Austin and myself and especially with the attorneys, we do a really good job of celebrating our wins. So many times people in our office are going above and beyond for clients, and many clients realize what's going on, and many clients are obviously super, super grateful, for the results that we're able to get them. But occasionally, you know, I just don't see it that way. So it's important for us to, you know, celebrate an attorney in our office or even each other when we get a great result for a client. We know it's a hard case. We know there's there's ization, liability damages. But have you and you still find a way to get a result for a client that you can be proud of? And, maybe it's not going to go on the Instagram. Maybe we're not going to put it on the LinkedIn. But if we can sort of celebrate each other and congratulate each other, for doing a good job, I think that's a big deal. One of the cool things that we have in our office, what's that thing called a best of board? Austin. It's right outside my office. And essentially we it's this cool, like, display it. It kind of rattles and gets letters and different things. So when someone visits our office, like Jason, when you visit our office or is that welcome, Jason Lazarus. And, you know, the whole office will know who's there, who's visiting. But every single time, you know, someone in our in our system, you know, inputs the settlement and moves the case to, you know, settled. All of a sudden that board starts rattling and it's like the whole office blocks and says, okay, he's out the case. And how much was it for? And of course, you know, it's it's awesome when you see a huge number up there. And maybe it's one of our newer attorneys who has a six figure settlement, like, we could do a really good job of making sure to highlight that. And even when it's one of our more senior attorneys to resolve the case for, let's just say, I don't know, $5,000, like we get a little raise out of him or her just by kind of joking, like, hey, is that really worth putting it on the board? Five in all in all, like every settlement, every result counts for clients. Every circumstance is different. And, you know, we don't really not discriminate. And we're grateful to have the cases. But I think that's just one of the ways where we do a good job of really highlighting what's going on in the office all around, even if we're just locked into our offices the entire day. People know what's going on. Just by having really, really high communication.

Brian Riley00:08:46

I think we're generally just pull office. I think that where we're young. Right. Brian and I are ten years and a little bit more than ten years engaged. And so with that, we've attracted other young talent. And the maturation of the firm most recently has been hiring on some more senior attorneys may be added, to about a lawyers to kind of help mentor, the younger lawyers. Within the last three months, we've added those. And, I think that we involve the team staff all the way up for attorneys and the marketing efforts and the wins and everything. I mean, they're all on the Instagram. They all buy to go make a circuit video. I think it's so fun. And that's a lot of our branding is just like all dance and social and fun and, high energy results.

Jason Lazarus00:09:33

I love that culture around winning. And and we do that internally. Every time there's a waiver or, you know, a great result, it teams lights up. And yeah, everybody on our team is celebrating that. Hey, we've helped someone who was injured get more money in their pocket by either getting a claim waived or greatly reduced. And those kind of things are part of what contributes to that atmosphere. One purpose, but also to celebratory taking it seriously, but also taking time to acknowledge, celebrate and have some fun around what you're doing every day.

Austin Kurtz00:10:14

Yeah, definitely. I mean, I think if you don't, if you don't have that type of feedback being reinforced constantly in your office, it's is really easy to see, you know, people start to, I know, get, checked out. We definitely want to create an atmosphere of like positivity. And what we're doing matters because it does get a little monotonous sometimes. I mean, I have been joking for a long time. I think I've settled enough $25,000 for some of my cases in my career. I think I can move on to something else, but, you know, I'll probably settle another one out to this call. It's like whatever. It's like, I'm never going to get sick of it. But like, at the same time, you know, maybe I can find a way to, push those cases down the line. It's hard, though, and and maybe this really connects to your world. You know, Arizona's a non-disclosure state. That's where we practice mainly. So, you know, when we're typically getting a lot of our referrals from other law firms that are stuck on cases or need help. We understand what the lens might be, but we don't really know what the policy limits are on the other side. And sometimes the biggest cases have only really no insurance or pursue. And maybe there's just 25,000. Other times you've got maybe a smaller taste, but you know, you, you end up getting into litigation or something like that. There's a $1.5 million policy on the other side and you're like, well, I could take these facts. And this client in this case and move it over here to this policy. Things would be a lot easier and a lot better for everyone involved. And then, you know, swap it for the smaller one. But it doesn't work that way.

Jason Lazarus00:11:44

Yeah. Unfortunately, that's not the reality of the statute because, I mean, all too often, you see, just I got hit. The guy who hit me had like a ten K policy. Thank God I had a lot of, stocked. And, that was what compensated me for the significant injuries that this guy caused. Because there's so many people trauma, I mean, small policies. And that's the unfortunate reality. And we see that all the time with the work that we do see the unfortunate reality. Brian, I wanted to ask you, because you spent close to a decade at some well-known firms, one that's, right here in my hometown, one of the largest or claims to be the largest. I think they are the largest. I'm curious, though, after seeing how case management worked at a high volume shop like that, what did you specifically decide not to do when you co-founded the firm?

Austin Kurtz00:12:38

When we co-founded, when we started the firm, because really, I don't want to say too bad, but like, we took all the good in the bad. That's how you want to say it. And we analyzed it and we said, you know, what parts do we want to replicate when we start? Chris Riley, what things are they doing at our prior firms that we understand from the business side of it? But maybe we want to tweak it to become a little bit more our style. Me personally, was more about just making sure that litigation case loads in a, amount of cases and litigation or employee or per attorney, we're kind of set up in a way that was a little bit more manageable. And also taking a little bit, a more laid back approach when it comes to working with opposing counsel. And the reason why I say that is because, you know, Austin and I were in t shirts most of the time. We always have a suit ready to go if we need to throw it on for an intake, or if we get called in to a hearing. But I think we do a better job of earning the respect of defense counsel just by working with them. And I think they appreciate seeing our name on pleadings when they get assigned from the insurance company, because they know that we're going to be a firm that's going to be on time with our disclosure statements, on time, with our discovery responses. We're going to give, you know, reasonable, well thought out demands or mediation statements. We're going to get expert. We're do all the things that you typically see, but you're not going to get a lot of nasty gram emails from us. And we're also really about trying to work out the case based on the merits madness on some, you know, crazy technicality or anything like that. And to be honest with you, we get a lot of referrals from defense attorneys, right? I mean, and that's probably for myself. And Austin is one of the, you know, greatest compliments with one of defense attorneys says, hey, I have a friend who was in an accident. Can you take care of them? And I think this year I've already represented 3 or 4 defense attorneys on their separate accident cases where they got rear ended or T-boned and they needed help on their case. And it's funny. You bet your ass I talk with them once I open up their first party policy. I'm like, you guys really only have $50,000 and uninsured or underinsured. Like, what are you doing? You know, like, don't you see cases like these every single day? Like you got to protect yourself. But that's sort of, I think the attitude that us and I have taken, in terms of maybe coming from our past firms and just making sure that we can be prompt and, we're very responsive, like hyper responsive with defense counsel, which means keeping the litigation like case. So it's a little smaller. And then also just giving like the most respect, probably too much respect sometimes to our opponent because we want to be the type of firm that you know, they, they call when they need somebody or from family or friend and need somebody.

Jason Lazarus00:15:26

And that's smart business philosophy. I mean, factionalism goes a long way. And civility and I know, you know, I still handle some things and in cheer in Florida through my law practice where I litigate with, Florida medicaid. And you got to approach that professionally and to respect because the scorched earth mentality, I just don't know that it gets you anywhere, you know that. And then when you need something, hearing needs to be moved around because you know, schedule change. And yeah, you don't get the pushback that you do if you're just being a total jerk to your opponent. I mean, we all have a job to do. So, Austin, you you trained under Tab Turner in products liability and built litigation experience with trial firms. In your jurisdiction, how did that combination of work in product specific and big law discipline shaped the way you have approached the case selection for your firm?

Brian Riley00:16:30

I think Brian hit on the head earlier is like I was absolutely way more selective because Ryan and I got together, I would send Brian cases. I'd be like, I know this is the case for me. Brian's like, what do you mean this isn't a case for you? I'll make money on this all day. You know, it's like, I don't know how he's making money on those cases. And now we're together, right? Like, really? I mean, props, Brian, he's taught me how to make money on those cases. And I've met a lot of quite a lot of success on, on smaller cases that I'd traditionally not take. I think that like, I would disagree with pay selection issues on there. And what I learned. But I do think that there was a lot of benefit, from working in those capacities. I've been really grateful to have, some amazing mentors. In practicing, I started at Slater Page in Denver, and worked with some great lawyers there and saw traditional, big law and, had my writing torn apart, in ways, like I try to tell our attorneys that they're so lucky that I don't do to them what I went through because it was exhausting. But at the same time, I will text those attorneys that I worked on earlier like, hey, like, I am so grateful that I went through boot camp with you guys because it made me so much better. And, fighter, I worked commercial litigation before in those capacities. And so now when I have a defense lawyer trying to do the big law shit with me, I'm like, dude, come on, like, I've done this. I know exactly what it went like, just stop. And then alternatively, like working after slay Drop, I worked with Ty Taylor at Aiken Shank and, Ty again at Gallagher and Kennedy and a bunch of great attorneys at Gallagher Kennedy. And we brought Ty over here. That's on now, Ty's training a bunch of our young attorneys over here, which is really cool. And then Tab, working with doing products I was during Covid, I was doing products with Tab all across the country. Pro hop to in like 14 states or something crazy. Because everyone was sent tabs, products, cases and he was, Turner Associates. He was Tab Turner and I was associates. Me and one other guy, and AB is just one of those brilliant kind of human beings that that knows how to do it. He taught by doing, a lot more than the top by telling, but I had the opportunity to try a case with them, which was really cool, because we would kind of debrief it every night. And then after trial, we went through all right, what do we do wrong? What did we do right? How do you prevent that at future? And Mike, those moments are are priceless. And like I mean guys advice to anyone who's our vintage or younger and Mike trying to get into it, it is like, I mean, I really do think getting the right mentors is so, important. And I mean, we like Bob and Monroe, are good friends with good mentors, too. Like when we have trial questions and work up questions like, we'll go and ask them, hey, what would you do on this? Who would you call? Why would you do it? And a lot of time we're bullshitting with each other and buddies and joking around. But like when it becomes serious, it's like, hey, I really like, how did you do this? How did you get those results? Like, they just give the feedback. That's so great. And so Brian and I both try to get that back to young attorneys in town. Whenever someone asks like, I never say no to coffee, I never say no to a LinkedIn message. Like, someone wants to go and pick my brain. I'm flattered that they think I know anything to offer, but, that was always given to me anytime I asked a question. So having the opportunity to work at those firms and get those relationships and get those opportunities and on and on training, I mean, it really did shape a lot of how I practice and do stuff you pick. Well, I like what he does. I don't I don't like this part. I like that part. And just kind of take and choose. It's like building a superhero with all their different talents. It's pretty cool.

Jason Lazarus00:20:01

You know, for most people, when they're starting a business, I now experience this myself. When I started Synergy is I underestimated kind of the runway, that I needed financially to start the company because if you've never been in charge of all the financial decisions, when it starts piling up on you, you're like, oh my God. And and looking at wall when it had a revenue start to flow. And how's everything cash flow. What did the first six months look like for you guys financially. And you know, how did you kind of get through all of that, especially not having the safety net of, you know, what you had before, which was being with established firms?

Austin Kurtz00:20:49

Austin, answer this one first, but I'm interested to see if he's going to tell a funny story or not. And then I'll follow up with the funny story if he doesn't get it.

Brian Riley00:20:56

I don't know that I have a funny story. I, I know that we both had our both both our firms were were very amicable. When we were leaving, we worked out, hey, these are our cases. Fry and I were both pretty good at originating work. And so we're like, hey, this is our work. Who is where we're going to go? And they were cool with that. And that allowed us to know we had some sort of runway, cases. But, you know, if you look at Karol G now and you look at where we were, the strategy was not like, hey, how are we going to bankroll firm of 12 attorneys and a full staff? Right. The thought was, how are Brian and I going to go work a law firm out of the back of Bob Simon's office downtown in Phoenix for free and, like, just enjoy life. And how are we going to get case as well? We'll just like, go do our thing and go out and be everywhere and just go to events and suddenly case, we'll come in May. We'll like make as much as we were making before. Like that was kind of the strategy. Let's just enjoy it a little bit more. And so, we both had good savings set up and like, we'd been intentional with our savings before and we knew that we would be able to kind of get by based on the pipeline. And we kind of thought like, okay, we'll just find a way to get cases. It just took off a lot quicker than we expected.

Austin Kurtz00:22:11

Yeah. And I think obviously, you know, awesome. And I always said if you, you know, put us in the corner together, we're going to fight, fight our true away, whatever it takes. And like when you are on your own, that's exactly what you're doing. You're putting yourself in a corner, right? There's no more a you're you know, you're getting paid every two weeks on Friday, like, all that stops as soon as you go out on your own. It's scary. But, you know, for anybody who's listening and interested in starting their own firm. Yes, you know, having an amicable break with your prior law firm is a really good idea. Especially from, perspective of, you know, let's make sure that clients are taken care of in a way of, you know, is this case staying or is it coming with me? Can we work out a deal to, you know, negotiate the fee back and forth, like what's best for the client? That's number one. Number two, as I know, Austin and I both took out, he walk loan. So if you're a homeowner, you're going to walk down and, basically just got, like a line of credit, which was ready for us, kind of we needed it. And, you know, when you are officially on your own and you've only got maybe, you know, a quarter of as many cases as you've had before, you become very intentional with, in those cases, those, you know, that smaller caseload and it can be a little bit easier to, drive the cases. Oh, I'll get the policy limits opposite. And I know for a fact, Austin, I did that. And, you know, we had or I think I officially came over March of 2020 for, my prior for Morgan and Morgan, I stay and make sure the manager was set before I left and then ended up coming over officially with Austin at the beginning of March 2024. We hustled hard on the cases that we had. We got a bunch of checks in, we had the he Walk loan ready just in case, you know, our bank accounts were going low. And, sure enough, a lot of cases banked. And I think, one of the members of either one of our families got a little excited on Amazon one night, and they, ended up having to hit the walk just to make sure that the credit card can get paid. But, other than that, I'm not going to name names, but it was fun to, you know, be able to report to our wives and say, hey, you know, like, it's our fourth month in business and we've done $300,000 in fees. That's pretty good. You know, like our operating account set up, and now we can pay for, employee and we can pay for an office and all that. Super exciting to talk about with your family, but it's important to, you know, if you have a family, let them know. It's not like that's my money. It's not like, that's awesome money. That's the firm's money. And at some point in the very future, if you're the owner of the firm or partners at the firm, you're going to figure out what you're deciding to pay yourself in. You're in a distribution at the end of the year or at the quarter. Whatever you decide to set it up. And, you know, that's that's definitely kind of a funny but cautionary tale, that if you want to keep the firm growing, you got to you got to have a structure in place, to make sure that's what's going to happen. And also, and I also learned in our first year, especially when you're pulling in some big settlements, I can't reveal who said it, but they're like, can you talk to an attorney and get like a real operating agreement set up? Like our operating agreement was like a combination of ChatGPT and like the first time. But I can buy an online and like, didn't, you know, spending the five grand to get the operating room it done was big because you know Austin and I know the rules. You know, it's like neither one of us can just on a whim, say, hey, we're paying five grand for this. So I think that's what it does. And so, you know, that means no charging. We bought a sprinter van last year. Like, that was a pretty big expense. And it's not like I can't just go down and, you know, say, hey, put the sprinter on a credit card like you have to have it. The decision has to be made in a formal way in order to prevent fights from happening later on. And we've been very, good partners. I expect us to be good partners. We're heading to Cabo on two days, so, we're excited for that. And, you know, it'll be more fun and and celebration and all that kind of stuff. But good thing there's nothing in Cabo that costs more than five grand, so we won't have any of those conversations.

Jason Lazarus00:26:20

So you guys describe your firm as boutique and that that could mean a lot of different things. How do you define, operationally and how have you gone about defining it from a marketing perspective in terms of differentiating your firm from the others out there that you compete against?

Brian Riley00:26:41

Yeah, I think we're less boutique, every day, than we were when we started. I think we are boutique in the sense that, you know, like when I think like, like a lot of the times I've worked in places. But Gallagher and Kennedy did a good job of one of the things they described as like, we have skill sets, big firm capacity. But like, we treat you like a small firm, like we have confirmations that were there and you can reach an attorney and everything. I think that we're boutique in a similar nature, in the sense that people can get Ahold of us. We built out really to make this a client first firm. Every attorney at the start of a case gives a Calendly lake right to their client. Hey, you want to book a call? My calendar. Don't tell me you can't get Ahold of me. You have a lake that's evergreen. You can book whatever you want. That's, like a very unique nature. And that's hard to do. Most law firms kind of structure when you're doing a volume capacity. We'll structure it like an attorney up top and a really big team. And with that big team, it's pretty hard for the client to get to the attorney because they just get stuck on the team and we've tried to avoid that. So we really built our odds and here to, kind of attack, each client with an opportunity to like, really have a one on one experience, and be have that handheld from the start. I mean, look, going through an injury stakes, it is not something anyone wants. And there's a lot of talk of when you hear personal injury at scale and everything, that this is just like a conveyor belt. You throw them on and you go through, and it is what it is. And and it's not I mean, every injuries unique and different and every case is unique and different. And why you can systematize so much of the process. You still need a unique handholding process to reach out. And so I think that makes us boutique now sits at start to finish any type of injury case we will take. You'll get a full team. You will get an attorney assigned to you. They'll work it all the way up fast. Go to trial. We are going to work it all the way. We're not a pre-lit firm. We're not a litigation firm. We are an everything firm. We'll take it all the way. Start to finish.

Jason Lazarus00:28:53

That Calendly link is such a great idea because, you know, one of the biggest complaints is communication. And giving the client the power to schedule, not seemingly not abuse it. But your point, I mean, I, you know, that was kind of what I was getting, earlier when I was talking about my experience, you know, having a friend represent me because being a lawyer, I mean, you know, in this jurisdiction for 30 years, I knew a lot of trial lawyers, but it's different when you have a friend representing you. But I think if you can give people that steel because of how important it is, because of how shitty everything you're going through, having that not ability to really connect with who's representing you is really important.

Austin Kurtz00:29:42

I would agree with that too. And thinking about like maybe where we started, as a firm and where we're at now, we've certainly realized, you know, but so when we started, this is another funny story, I think, on our business cards and our email, we had, like all of our contact information for the firm. And then we had our cell phones and, that's changed, right? Like, so do I consider as a boutique firm for sure. But are we going to allow many or all of our clients to have our cell phones, like we've made a decision not to do that anymore? You know, after receiving brand text messages by phone calls up 1 a.m. on a Thursday night, I think that that's not something that we're really wants for ourselves or our attorneys. But you do make sure to give all of our clients ample opportunity and ability to contact us. I know when you know, client signs on with our firm, obviously an attorney assigned right away, you have a legal and a legal assistance those three people are in contact with in the client, with the client within 24 to 48 hours of time that they sign up. So that's like your first point of contact is you've got a team of three people. And if you're the client, it's really a team of four people because the client's a huge piece of them. And as your case moves along, once it resolves, it actually goes to another department that specializes and finalizing filings, you know, which is, you know, kind of connecting with you guys, right? Where all of a sudden we're trying to find a way to resolve on a resolution, and it has to we have to get that a resolving down. And for one reason or another, we can't figure it out. Well, that's when we call Synergy, because those are the ones that you guys have. You know, the secret sauce. I don't know what it is. I kind of figure it out. But you guys got the secret sauce to help those clients actually get paid what they deserved. And that's sort of our process. So you know, and I think, you know, when you talk about boutique as well, if for some reason a client needs their case to go to litigation that goes to a litigation lawyer and the litigation lawyer and their team handles the litigation case, some of us handle private and litigation. But I think, you know, my preference is that litigation lawyers only doing litigation work, billable hours on the pre-market work. And of course, the trial lawyers should only do the trial work because that's how you get the best of the best in the passing interest section or department of the case. And it's helpful giving the feedback downstream and upstream as the cases are going on. So that's sort of my that's sort of my, take on, you know, what we're trying to create here. I think a lot of that still in process, probably two years in. But we did this again in the year or two. You know, we could probably see hopefully more attorneys, more senior attorneys, more people with trial experience, part of the team, you know, sort of building our building, our core group into, the type of attorneys we want them to.

Jason Lazarus00:32:41

Be and doing prep for this episode and kind of given where things are at right now, I came across, podcast, episode called Speed Tackle. Kurtz really built an explosive pie firm and when you talk about speed and tech, what does that actually look like in your workflow today? And where are you spending money on technology, and where are you choosing to not spend it and stay away from.

Brian Riley00:33:10

One of the things we utilized, extensively, we still utilize. It's our file line. I've been pretty loud. Look, I think file buying is an amazing product. I think it gets better if you know how to edit it and clean it. I think our file buying is as good of a file line as there is out there. And I'll say it out loud. As for file lines customer service, don't get me started. But like, you know, that's a different topic. And they know how I feel about that as well. But the that was one of the things that made us quick initially is like our file buying stack was really good and we still to this day we'll go back and edit file buying maybe once a month. It used to be every day we'd go back, hey, this will be better. And Brian and I win the combo on Thursday or 60 plus people. I guarantee there will be an edit made to file by from Thursday to Sunday that I personally do because we see something we take. So we go, hey, this just needs to be this and we do it ourselves. That is a tech approach that an older law firm has never done. Won't to. It would never have one of the owners going on the back end of fixing it. But we know, hey, if we do this, our reports will run this way and we'll be able to generate this dashboard from that. We'll be able to get 1% better by doing this. That was a start. There's this whole AI push right now, obviously. And the invoke answer is to say like, oh, I just have I do everything. But I think that the reality is like, AI is getting there and it's more there today than it was there yesterday. And it will be there more there tomorrow than it was two days ago, but it's still not there. One of the ways we've combated that is, well, everyone is going heavy. AI we're building it, we're doing it, we're doing it. Certain facets. We also rely heavily on, sailboat, which is a nearshore hiring company we utilize. And so we have 25 plus paralegals in Columbia country that are fully bilingual. And I will say loudly on stages, like we did our big charity event raiser in February. And I was up there on the mike and I was like, I put my 25 paralegals in Columbia against any of my Arizona paralegals like these. They're amazing. They are so good at what they do. And so they're that good. And I think utilizing nearshore hiring has allowed us to scale, while people are jumping straight to AI. This is kind of that middle up. Like, I will get there. It'll I've watched it do some amazing things. We're big, court visors on bench, which we think is like a great company. And we've watched Finch grow. I know garage has been on the pod like big six and of Finch, I think it's going to do amazing things. But I think as it goes. So that allows us to keep up in a way that we're tech forward, but we're not going to take our lie and say, oh yeah, I writes all our demand letters from scratch. Like, you know, I know some company say that and they just don't. And so like we have templates that it's a good file line templates that does demand letter. And then it's good nearshore hiring that cleans it. And that's a speed and a tech push that allows the templates allow the tech push. But utilizing nearshore is kind of the gap though.

Jason Lazarus00:36:17

Yeah. That's such a great blueprint you just gave because that we we actually have a team in Colombia as well. And utilizing the right tech stack overlay with AI and some of these near shoring, type solutions. You build all that together and you could get to a very efficient and profitable operation. Whereas as you said, just just relying on one solution isn't going to get you there these days anyway. And particularly AI is I mean, AI is a beautiful thing. It's incredibly helpful. But as you said, it's even I've got it trained on my writing and I've done a ton of thought leadership writing, but it's still at do what I do. I, I see that, I see what it puts out there. Just like any of these solutions are not going to be out of the box, able to replicate anything that you or I can pull out of our brain today. Maybe, maybe another year or two that'll change. I don't know. But, you know, short term.

Austin Kurtz00:37:24

Yeah. I mean, I think some of the most impressive parts of the AI that I've seen, and there's there there is a lot of very impressive companies ventures out there, of course, that do some cool stuff. And I think utilizing the AI for attorneys is essential because all of this is coming super fast. So it's like you need to get on the train in some facet. I don't I don't think it really matters if you're on the you know, the first aboard of the last aboard, like get on the train as soon as you possibly can start implementing and using this stuff. Obviously negotiating with defense attorneys, right. Like finding ways to summarize the records, pointing to the records showing the records doing it and, and a presentable way that can be convincing and persuasive for them to bring it to their insurance adjuster and say, look, the old tricks ain't working. Where we're saying, hey, this is, you know, no causation or whatever. Like Brian's showed me six different ways and the records where, you know, he's finding objective evidence, like, we're not going to be able to pull this one off. We need to put our value on the case. That's one of the ways that I use AI. We have some AI, like, medical stuff built into our file behind. We also use CPO. I've been really impressed with them, and I've gotten a lot of value on using the AI tools to, you know, get the insurance companies and the adjusters to are the defense attorneys to you know, put more money on the table for our clients. So I really like that stuff. And then also, you know, this is one of the things that I have not utilized enough with Finch is, I mean, how cool is it to have an AI receptionist, you know, call and open a claim and order the police report or basically open two claims or to the police report and contact the health insurance and contact, you know, six different providers all at the same exact time in an instant, using a, you know, a virtual AI assistant where you couldn't you know, potentially have even one Arizona paralegal make seven phone calls in one day. They can do it all at the same time within five minutes. So that's really cool. And I think that is what I'm super interested in, like seeing the value because that's I mean, talk about efficiency. That's that's massive. And like, I really think and truly believe that when someone's hurt in an accident today and if their case is worth $100,000 because of how bad that accident was today, it's our job as the attorney. If they hire us to get them that money as quickly as possible, because as soon as that accident happens, that's when, in my opinion, they deserve that money. So, you know, the insurance companies game is to push that as long as you possibly can. And you know, why can't we get, you know, if the accident's been going on for three months, then why didn't we get our client paid earlier? And that's kind of an aggressive and intense approach. But that's the type of approach that the opposing side needs to feel, because these people are going through significant pain and probably have their life fully turned upside down. And the $100,000 calls, one that's offered that comes in today, is going to be worth a lot more to them than in a year from now, because this is when they really need it. So I think we kind of have that attitude in the firm, let's do everything we can to be as efficient as possible. And if that means using AI or, you know, nearshore hiring or a combination of all of it, whatever it takes, let's do it. And, we're really excited to see where I goes, but we're also very I think we're smart enough to realize, you know, two things. Whatever I product we're analyzing, does it fit within our tech stack? Does it fit within our standard operating procedures? Right. That it doesn't fit either? We need to change our standard operating procedures to make it fit, or maybe it's just not the product for us. And then the second thing is the price and the cost. And how is it being billed to the client? You know, there's a lot of great AI tools that are being offered to us personal injury firms, but I don't need a medical records review on a case that's worth 25 grand that they're going to pay me 25 grand on, you know? So like, I shouldn't have to be billed for that particular case. I kind of like the olive cart model a little bit more where when I need something, like when I eat a medical records review, I want to be able to click a button and I can go get that done. Versus being billed for every single case. We sign up every single month and not using it on, you know, 90% of the cases.

Jason Lazarus00:41:58

E-meter are really great for you. And I think it's worth repeating, which is, you know, anything that a law firm does that is repetitive, administrative in nature that could be done by technology that would be faster, that reduces time on desk. That's an area to me that, you know, is where law firms should be looking at deploying any type of technology that can free up staff time to move cases more rapidly through the firm. It's, we just brought a, solution to market that does the identification and verification means through a combination of AI and a human in the loop, because, you know, law firms spend all this time and money with their staff performing a function that can actually delay disbursement. If it's not kept up with and done timely, why not let technology do those sorts of things? And there's a myriad of other things, right? Things that you guys have explored CBO with all their solutions and, you know, things that are being built into the case management software systems, which are all very positive things that ultimately I think are going to help you guys deliver that result even more quickly. For people that, like said, really need that money now, not, you know, a year and a half from now. You know, I'm curious with with you guys being co-founders, that kind of a structure to people can break a lot of business relationships and and law firms. I'm curious, how did you guys go about dividing up the responsibility between the two of you, and are there any decisions you guys initially made together that you've now said, hey, you made that decision? I made this decision.

Brian Riley00:43:54

I think we've gone through like 100 different iterations of that, honestly. You know, here's the thing is, like when we started a law firm, a lot of people were like, oh, you two, are you good luck or that's not going to work or yeah, my partner never worked like I've heard all that, but their partner wasn't Brian Riley. Like, I don't know what to tell you. I'm sorry I didn't work for everyone else. It works really well for us. Brian and I are just like we were friends going into the firm, and we've just become like brothers doing it together. I don't know. It's just. It works really well at times. Like, are we both like, well, I disagree or whatever. Yeah, but like, we know that we're both trying to get the best for the firm. And so we're always dedicated to like, how do we get there? I just think that, like, I think it's something about, like, good luck, but, like, I just know that, like, we always say, hey, Chicago so bad, and if everything goes bad, where do we go back to? Back to us fighting our way out of a corner like that's where we're meant to be. And so we just kind of have a way of like, I'm protective of Brian. Brian's protective of mean. I see stuff coming up, Brian, and I'm like, hey, we need to do this back to you. He does the same for me, and we just constantly kind of figure out where the pressure points are, and the other one fills a void. And I don't know, it's never really been like, like we broke in and been like, you do let I do pre-lit or whatever. Inverse. And and we've done a bunch of different iterations and it always comes back to us about just doing it together. And there's certain things that like we just know kind of who to take what, but we just feel like.

Austin Kurtz00:45:28

I'd say it's pretty natural, like we get copied on a lot of emails for business decisions and things like that. And depending on the subject matter, we kind of will differ a little bit to each other. And if it's not, you know, being decided, we'll figure it out together. But like, you know, Austin's got an incredible marketing brain. And, you know, the best thing that Austin can do is keep that thing kind of going. You know, when it gets a little bit too sucked and having too many cases and too many things on his mind, like, that's not that's really not a great thing for the firm because he needs to be able to obviously kick ass on his caseload, which are beyond us. Our higher value cases, and also have that creatives, going in the background at all times to that's super crucial for the firm. And then for me, like I've got a pretty large capacity when it comes to work and, you know, maybe kind of can be the bad guy in the office occasionally when it comes to having to make tough decisions. But I just kind of own that role. And, and, you know, I think, you know, the other thing that's really important to me and Austin's work very competitive with each other and also the entire office I come from a football and a sports background. So being on a football team, that doesn't mean that you play every single play and you play every single down and you're not, you know, starting on offense and defense and special teams like you have a role within the team. And you know, when I was the starting tight end for most of my career, there was always a second string type, and the second string tight end, when he was on the field with me, those were his his, you know, responsibility in that play was just as important as my responsibility in that play. Because even if one of us screwed up, that's going to screw up the play in the backfield most likely. So I think we kind of take that same approach where, you know, there's no real like first string or second string. It's just a matter of all being in this together, all trying to find a resolution for a client that makes sense. And, you know, kind of, you know, every single day just fighting through it and, you know, not being afraid to ask questions and make decisions and work together.

Jason Lazarus00:47:41

Yeah. If you're going to make partnership work, that's the way you know, it's gonna work. I'm curious, is there one piece of conventional wisdom about running a pie firm that you guys have actively rejected? CLG and what convinced you it was wrong?

Austin Kurtz00:47:59

I got a crazy take on that. So the question was, is there one piece of conventional wisdom that you've been, you know, given before you started Karol G, that you've, you know, decided it is probably not correct? So this is kind of an interesting one that I realized a while ago. And I kind of knew it for our firm. But I didn't have the data to really support it. And I think part of the reason I'm going to get to what it is in a second, but I think part of the reason why we're at where we're at right now is because our, our firms kind of still in the baby toddler stages where only, you know, just over two years old. A lot of personal injury firms and lawyers will tell you that the firm makes 80% of their money on 20% of the cases. I think that's called like, it's that's called like the carrot zero treatment principle. The principle. So the firm makes 80% of their money on 20% of their cases. And I think that will become true for us at some point in the future. I think, you know, as our larger cases continue to mature, I may get further in litigation. Maybe that becomes true. But for all the results that our firm has had, in the last two years, I'm not going to tell you the exact number, but it's been a lot. I mean, largest basis and largest fees is probably less that you combined. All of them would probably be less than 3% of the firm's total revenue. And that's just because I think our systems, especially on the smaller than mid-sized cases, are so refined and so tight that every single day when we check the mail, it's a lot of policy limit settlements coming in every single day. And that's really what keeps the firm alive, but also allows us to be profitable. So I'm very excited for the perito. It's called the burrito curve is what it's called.

Jason Lazarus00:49:59

Principal, I believe.

Austin Kurtz00:50:00

I'm really excited someday to come where, you know, 80% of the revenue is built on 20% of the cases, because that means that we're doing really great all the way around. But I just think that we're still kind of coming around that corner. And I think the point that I'm trying to say is, if you are looking to start your own firm, it's not necessary for you to have a lot of cases or only have a few big cases. You can do it in different ways and you can be successful in different ways. It's about kind of figuring out how to manage your operation in a way that allows you to, you know, do well for yourself. And so your for I'm curious.

Jason Lazarus00:50:40

What is the next thing that you guys feel like you have to get right? Karol G for the firm to keep growing without breaking the model that has worked thus far.

Brian Riley00:50:51

I think you got to scale. Brian and I, we're doing it. But it's really hard to do. I think that, like, we have started the process by bringing in talented senior lawyers to start scaling us, helping mentor our younger lawyers. That's like one part of it. We started to spend differently in marketing to start scaling a little bit of that. We've tried to build out operationally, managers in different sections to start scaling a bit of that. I think that's the biggest hurdle any, law firm goes from. But, I mean, for us right now, we are at a point that, like, what we're doing is working, really well. And the firm is being very successful. But if we want to reach levels about this, it's continuing to scale. And I know that's such a simple answer. Hey, how do you get bigger o scale, like that? That really is, like, in its simplest terms, scaling us is, the most.

Austin Kurtz00:51:53

Yeah. And I think also like for Austin and I and this is going to be the hardest, probably the hardest thing for us to do make a decision on is like I was saying earlier, like the lawyers get really bad. I agree with the litigators get really get we get to litigation. The trial lawyers get really get to trial. And like right now Austin and I are in my opinion and the data will, you know, support it. But we are definitely really good at working cases. And, you know, being in rainmakers. But in between that we're also trying to be marketers and we're trying to be business people, and we're trying to become better trial lawyers. And I think at some point in the future, you know, basically letting the reins go on one of those areas is going to be helpful for us to continue to grow the firm, too. So, for instance, if it's me, you know, basically if it's Austin doing folding marketing and me doing fully networking and business development, do I think what is ever going to happen? Probably not with me, honest. I just think we're too into multiple cases and and all that kind of stuff going on for being able to maybe spill out of some of the cases and give a little bit more trust to our team to handle some of the cases and situations would be helpful for the firm to have, two people at the top that are, you know, actually trying to push the business and not, hey, let's get more cases the way versus let's just keep our results going out, which isn't a bad thing. I mean, I'm not I mean, I love getting big results. It's just it's a different way of scaling.

Jason Lazarus00:53:25

Well, scaling any business is a challenge having, you know, started Synergy and hope a lot of time. God tells me with five people now, over 100 people, I mean, the changes in iterations over time are just, you know, massive. And you realize at some point it outgrows you as someone who started it, served as, you know, CEO and you know, so I mean, there's there's seasons. But the challenge always is getting that scaling right and being a good steward of the direction of the company. For all the people that are depending on you to lead it in the right direction, right. Because, you know, it's not just you guys anymore. Now you got a whole bunch of people that are depending on you, for their livelihoods as well. So it becomes very important, you make those decisions and ultimately then deliver your services. Important stuff. You guys have been really generous with your time. Don't want to take up, really much more, but I want to ask you both a question that I always asked. And the podcast, it's very open ended, so you can answer it however you guys want to us and I'll, I'll ask you first. I know that you from doing some research or your dad was a lawyer. And so you come from that background. You you've got this interest in tech. And I'm just curious, what is your view, where you sit today as a trial lawyer.

Brian Riley00:54:52

So I think that, like, one of the topics that is, so hot right now is that, like, the common law firm is ending. I think that that's like this, this point that everyone's making is like, we're just it's just going to go away. And I just disagree vehemently. I think that tech is making lawyers better. And I think, it's allowing, greater access to justice. And I don't think it's the beginning of the end. I think it's, a new opportunity for this to get even better. And one of the things we've seen in our business over the last several years is big ships take a long time to turn, right. We always say that like a we're not a mega yacht. It doesn't take us a lifetime to turn the boat around. We're a speedboat. We just. Hey, you know, we don't want to do that. We rip it the other way and go. And I think you're going to have a lot more speedboats out there. And this access to justice is going to increase. And, you know, I don't think it's the beginning of the end. So the end is not near. And everyone who wants to keep saying it needs to chill out.

Jason Lazarus00:55:51

Brian. Same question. I'm curious because you're you're very different background, but, you know, you guys have built this firm together and I'm curious, you know, about your view as where you sit today.

Austin Kurtz00:56:04

I mean, kind of going back to what Austin said earlier, right? Like, I think we're both men of cycle needs and means, and we, we, we have a passion for, helping injured people and helping out on the cases. And if for some reason there was a great consolidation and all of a sudden there's only four law firms in the United States, do I see myself in Austin actually working for those law firms? Probably not, to be honest. Like, I think we'll probably spill off and do our own thing and, you know, try to get in the courtroom and, you know, make some noise, that way. And, and probably pull away from, you know, the traditional norms of just kind of falling in line with everybody else. And that's what I think. You know, honestly, if that ends up happening, then I'm excited for it because I think we will find a way to market ourselves differently, and we'll continue to grow our skill set in a way where we'll it'll be undeniable how much, you know, people and other firms will need us to represent them in cases. Thankfully for myself and Austin, hands on our side, you know, we're in our mid 30s and, there's a lot of big law firm owners out there that don't necessarily have time on their side as much as BDO, and maybe they're the ones who are speaking loudly about the great consolidation. And, you know, everyone, everything kind of imploding and changing. And I just don't really see it that way because for me it's all about being, flexible. And you know, realizing that if, let's say there is no more car accidents in five years or ten years because there's automated vehicles or great on the next products. Liability attorney, that best price liability attorney in Arizona next to Austin. Number two. But like that's not happening right now. So until that happens I don't have to be flexible for it. I think just continue to increase my skill set. Learn, work with Austin, become a better attorney, and hopefully just help people in the process.

Jason Lazarus00:58:04

Well, thanks to both of you for your time. Can you guys briefly just give an overview of the firm where you have your practice areas and if somebody's got a case, they want to refer to you guys in your jurisdiction. What's the best way to get in touch with you?

Brian Riley00:58:20

Yeah, we are, as simple as it goes. Chris Aecom, you can find us. We'll do any sort of, injury case, in Arizona. We, love referral work. We're passionate about it. You can find us on Instagram and Karol G as well.

Jason Lazarus00:58:35

Well, thanks again, Austin Brian, for joining me today on trial, all of you. We'll see everybody on the next episode. Thank you.

Brian Riley00:58:42

Thank you.

Jason Lazarus00:58:43

If today's episode gave you a new perspective on how your firm operates or sparked a useful idea, consider sharing it with a colleague and be sure to follow the show so you don't miss future conversations with leaders across the personal injury space trial law Review is brought to you by Synergy, a strategic operations partner helping personal injury law firms resolve health care lines more efficiently. If you're looking to accelerate case flow and allow your team to focus on high level legal work that moves cases faster, consider partnering with Synergy. I'm Jason Lazarus and I'll see you in the next episode.