Legally On The Move: Strategy, Scaling, Sunshine and Success from Ibiza – Nadine Stanton – E6

You can hear Rob and Nadine discussing:

Connect with Nadine here:

https://uk.linkedin.com/in/professional-training

Transcript

00:00

What happens when you gather the UK’s boldest legal minds on a sun-drenched retreat in Ibiza and press record?

00:07

Welcome to the Lawyers Retreat mini-series, a special edition of the Legally Speaking podcast sponsored by Clio.

00:13

We’ve partnered with the visionaries behind the Lawyers Retreat, the wonderful Kate Burr and Kirsty Papin to bring you real, unfiltered conversations from Carla Carbo, where strategy, succession and scaling and sunshine meet.

00:28

This isn’t your average CPD,It’s leadership with a view, innovation with a cocktail, and well-being with purpose.

00:35

You’ll hear from trailblazers rethinking the legal playbook with the episodes recorded poolside, mic hike, and even post-yoga.

00:44

2025 is our year of 10Xing the show.

00:47

This mini-series is just the beginning.

00:49

So let’s get into it.

00:54

Welcome to the Legally Speaking podcast filmed live here in Ibiza.

00:59

Name, title and organisation.

01:01

Thanks so much for having me.

01:02

So my name is Nadine Stanton.

01:04

I’m the Chief Exec of a company called Professional Training.

01:08

professional training, train only law firms all over the world on what we call essential skills.

01:14

So not soft skills, essential skills.

01:17

So basically everything but the law.

01:19

So what have a difficult conversation, leadership, negotiation, all the stuff around being a lawyer rather than the job, the section 1, 2, 3, subsection 4, 5, 6.

01:31

So that’s what we do.

01:32

There we go.

01:33

Lovely, concise and to the point.

01:35

Love it.

01:36

What have you most enjoyed about the Lawyers Retreat thus far?

01:39

I think what I’ve enjoyed is that button interrupts, that ability to be away from the desk and the normal day-to-day, interacting with other business owners and starting to think around strategy.

01:50

Although I’d come here initially to network with other law firms, how much I’ve taken away myself has been incredible, and there’s been some incredible speakers, so just enjoyed the whole stepping away, I think, stepping off the platform, if you like.

02:02

Yeah, I sort of like unplugged for today to plug in for tomorrow.

02:05

It’s an initiative we talk about, particularly on the GBLO as well, which Leagues Bean Podcast does with high risk.

02:12

Okay, so let’s use a practical example for some of our listeners and viewers to take away.

02:16

There’s a client, you need to have a very difficult conversation,about collection of fees.

02:23

They’re perhaps late paying an invoice or for whatever reason, you don’t know, but you need to have a difficult conversation.

02:30

How should you as a law firm approach that potentially difficult conversation?

02:34

Break it down for us.

02:36

Yeah, I think in terms of when they’re late paying for fees, there’s all sorts of different tactics to use, but a really nice tactic is to say,actually, I don’t really want to be having this conversation with you, but if you put yourself in my shoes, obviously, we are a business.

02:53

It has come to this.

02:55

We’ve asked you three times for payment on this.

02:58

It’s really important because I know, obviously, there are things going on, but it would be really helpful, and that’s why we’re having this conversation.

03:07

And also saying things like, I know you’ll appreciate you being honest with me, I think can make a really big difference.

03:14

But I think paring that back, it isn’t necessarily getting to a point in a law firm where you’ve got to have that conversation where they’ve not paid you.

03:21

It’s the managing the expectations and managing that journey so it doesn’t get to that point.

03:28

And that’s some of the courses that we put people on are to actually make sure that it doesn’t get to that point where you’re several weeks in, a client’s not paid you, et cetera.

03:37

So I think there’s all sorts of different ways to do it, but I think it’s about the frame and the lens of which you put that conversation.

03:44

in, but also sometimes rather than going to a client and saying you haven’t paid, they’re less defensive when you say do you want to talk to me about what’s going on and perhaps why we haven’t received payment.

03:57

So again, different clients, different situations, so it’s about building a toolkit actually, a psychological toolkit of how you would approach that client.

04:05

So without knowing the scenarios, without knowing the client and without knowing the situation, those are just a few things to think about.

04:12

Well it’s a really good question, thanks Rob.

04:14

I love the way you approach that is rather than sort of blaming, shaming, you’re saying like, let’s collaborate, empathize and come from a place of understanding to try and work with them to get to the solution.

04:25

And I think that’s a great way to also continue to keep that client relationship rather than potentially burn any bridges.

04:31

I think that’s a really good point, actually.

04:32

So it’s the commercial perspective.

04:35

So yes, okay, you could go heavy-handed about getting the money out of a client.

04:41

but it’s that wider perspective of do you want to continue to work with that client and the commercial kind of realities of it, which, you know, and preserving that relationship.

04:49

And I think most of the time, not all the time, again, it depends on the scenario, but that’s can be really important.

04:55

Yeah, no, completely agree.

04:57

What are the top three essential skills?

05:00

You kind of explained earlier the difference between sort of essential and soft and various other skills.

05:04

But like for a modern lawyer in 2025, what are the top three, would you say, essential skills that people should have in their toolbox but also be continually working on because skills need sharpening and kind of improving time by time?

05:17

Okay, so we have a mantra.

05:19

So it’s IQ, intellectual ability or quotient versus EQ.

05:25

So it’s about how to win,how to wow and how to retain clients.

05:29

So it’s the skill of how to win business, so how to effectively network and win work and bring that in is an absolutely key skill for a modern lawyer 2025, because you’ve got to eventually become the lawyer who wins the work that lands on the desk as opposed to doing the work that lands on the desk.

05:50

I think the retention piece is about the client service.

05:53

How do you might make clients feelhead for, attended, you know, important.

06:00

So that client service piece is really good.

06:02

So the wow piece of it is that how do you manage those expectations so that a client raves about you, refers you, wants to come back and you become that kind of go-to for everything legal.

06:15

And so win, wow, retain.

06:18

All of those go back to those are the key skills.

06:21

Again, to stand out and makes you a differentiator.

06:26

Intelligence isn’t the differentiator because everybody’s bright.

06:29

It’s what makes you or your firm.

06:32

the edge?

06:33

It’s the marginal gain.

06:34

What makes you the lawyer that I’ll just go back to?

06:37

So that was a really good question.

06:39

A really good answer.

06:39

Win while we’re saying.

06:41

Love it.

06:41

And that’s a great way to probably pull this to a bit of a close.

06:43

But before we close, why would you encourage people to come to initiatives such as the Lawyers Retreat?

06:50

Maybe people listening to this are busy, they don’t think they can justify the time, the energy, the effort.

06:56

What would you say to people that perhaps just not in that mindset?

06:59

These are all really good reasons why you wouldn’t go.

07:02

busy, you haven’t got the time, you’ve got so many other priorities.

07:07

But actually, to make the boat row faster, if you take two or three days away to think about the overall helicopter strategy, that will help you prioritize on the day-to-day.

07:20

So actually, overall, it’s a win in terms of your time because you’ve paused, you’ve stopped and you’re thinking about what’s working, what’s not, what you’re going to do differently.

07:29

So I think it’sIt’s easy to say no, and actually I probably was in that camp myself.

07:35

I was like, I don’t know if I can justify that amount of time.

07:38

I’m really glad I came.

07:40

Good, and it’s been an absolute pleasure having you on the Legally Speaking podcast.

07:43

If people want to know more about you or indeed your organisation, where can they go?

07:47

Feel free to share any websites, any social media handles.

07:50

We’ll also share them this episode for you too.

07:52

Brilliant.

07:52

So if you do want to visit our website, www.professional-training.co.uk, have a look at us there.

08:00

I’m on LinkedIn.

08:01

quite regularly, so do have a look at us there.

08:04

But as I said, we’ve got our team all over the world.

08:08

There we go.

08:09

Well, just leave me to say thanks so much once again for joining me live here in a yoga studio in Carla Cabo in Ibiza.

08:15

But for now, from all of us, over and out.

08:17

Thank you for listening to this week’s episode.

08:20

If you like the content here, why not check out our world-leading content and collaboration hub, the Legally Speaking Club over on Discord.

08:30

Go to our website,www.legallyspeakingpodcast.com for the link to join our community there.

08:37

Over and out!