028: Crushing the 175-Day Challenge with Josh Dorcey
How would your life change if you could take three months of the year off? Where would you go? Who would you spend time with?
The secret to taking significant time off every year is the team you hire to support you. With the right team in place, what sounds impossible to pull off becomes entirely possible. But the catch is that you have to trust them and give them the freedom to run the business well while you take an extended break to recharge.
In this episode of Great Practice, Great Life®, founder and managing partner Josh Dorcey of Dorcey Law Firm in Florida is Steve’s guest. Josh started his practice during the recession of 2007 and has grown it from a solo practice to one with 12 attorneys and 42 staff members. Josh embraces taking time off and entrusting his team to nurture his business while he does it.
Josh’s firm doesn’t suffer while he’s gone. Instead, they give him the space he needs to spend time with his family and rest. In turn, he offers his team the same courtesy. He believes it’s all about trust and positive constraints.
In this episode, you will hear:
- The origin story of Josh’s practice and why he built his practice around his life
- His strategy for taking time off, why his week isn’t the classic workweek, and the importance of calendars for his family
- How Josh supercharges his vacation time to make the most of time off
- What he does to prepare his team when he takes time off, and why it’s a team effort
- The advice a former veterinarian gave Josh in law school and how it affected how he runs his business today
- The trust and confidence he’s built in his team to take extended periods off and what he does to address any problems that occur during his time off
- How he stays in contact with his team while he’s away, the boundaries Josh set around that with them, and the importance of giving team members the same protection of their time
- Some practical steps for disconnecting from work during your time off and setting positive constraints
- The importance of dissecting what worked, what didn’t, and what could be done to improve the process when Josh or a member of his team was away
- What he would tell his younger self about starting a law firm and the things he wishes he’d known to do when he first started
- The one thing that caused Josh to manage his team differently
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Supporting Resources:
Referenced Links:
Josh Dorcey: Adjunct Practice Advisor and Attorney
Steve Riley
Certified Practice Advisor & Attorney
Steve Riley has coached attorneys for more than 20 years. His one-on-one coaching focuses on a limited number of top producing attorneys committed to taking their practices to new levels of excellence, profit, and personal success. He also presents at group coaching workshops around the country for individual law firms, state bar associations, and other legal organizations.