Hasan: I joined an estate planning firm after law school and quickly took a liking to helping clients plan for their futures. Not long after I started, one of my clients had a parent with cognitive decline and no estate planning documents. I asked my mentor for guidance in assisting my client with obtaining guardianship for her parents. That case began the trajectory of my probate litigation career as I was then sought after for more guardianship and conservatorship proceedings, including by wealthy clients whose family members did not establish an estate plan. Because I didn’t shy away from being in a courtroom, I was also asked to represent people in contested trust and estate matters. Gradually, more challenging cases started to come my way. My experience in court also led to my partners approaching me for noncontested work, where I had to go to court to file a petition to modify a trust or approve a settlement agreement. Given my expertise with the Estates and Protected Individuals Code (EPIC) and the court rules, my partners found my handling of such matters to be highly efficient and a value-add to our existing clients requiring this service.
In contrast to much of my estate planning work, in my probate/postmortem administration and fiduciary practice, I am able to help clients deal with a very difficult period in their lives, either helping them realize their loved one is in substantial cognitive decline, holding their hand through the wealth transfer process after their loved one passes away, or advocating for them through a contested process against family members.
Hasan: In law school, I didn’t have a complete understanding of developing “a book of business” per se, but I understood that I needed to develop a practice. I also understood that I needed to be unique, particularly in an area where the market is supersaturated with attorneys. I was always interested in both litigation and tax. My concentration was litigation, but my interest was in tax. I took several wills, trusts, gifts, and income tax classes, and I knew that was the area of law where I wanted to develop a practice. I eventually went on to earn an LLM in tax.
Hasan: Definitely. With my niche practices, I can help other probate attorneys with matters involving court intervention when those attorneys do not wish to go to court without onboarding an entirely new ongoing/indefinite client relationship. For example, some of my estate planning and trust administration colleagues will run into a situation where the trust needs to be modified, and such modification can only be done by going to court. I am hired for the purpose of drafting the petition, attending the hearing, and obtaining the order to modify the trust. The client remains my colleague’s client.
Another thing that is unique about part of my practice is that not many attorneys want to do this kind of work. The contested fiduciary and probate litigation work is often hard and grueling, and sometimes thankless. Therefore, if you know this going in, are willing to do the work few people want to do, and do it well, the work will come.
Hasan: As my experience in estate planning and litigation developed, that work found its way to me through word of mouth by my clients and my colleagues within and outside of the firm. I’m fortunate and grateful that continues to this day.
I still spend a lot of time networking with accountants, financial advisors, bankers, and other attorneys who do not practice in this area or who want nothing to do with any matter that could remotely land them in court. I have also been active in estate planning and probate bar groups. All these activities have been very effective. I also attend many women’s networking events. For example, I received new clients through a professional women’s organization that met monthly on Zoom and gave each member an opportunity to present.
My favorite marketing activity is when I don’t have to market. It’s when my client refers a family member or best friend to me. That’s the highest form of compliment. I think staying in front of existing clients and checking in with them every two to three years helps. It’s especially easy to do this with my clients who are on a gifting schedule.
Hasan: Know your skill set and where you can add value, especially in the context of cross-serving/selling across your firm.
Be confident about your knowledge. If people sense you are not confident, the referrals will not make their way to you. Find a support system that will encourage you. It is helpful to have people around you who give you positive feedback and who believe in you. We can be our own worst critic, so we can’t count on just ourselves to find the confidence within us.
Talk to people about your practice. Never stop discussing what you do for a living, but don’t be boring! Make it fun to talk about.
Hasan: Everyone says networking is about building relationships, and relationships are how you build a book of business. This is true.
For example, my first client at Dykema was a client of mine at PNC, where I had been a fiduciary officer. At PNC, the financial team was recommending that he see a new attorney for his estate plan update. When I informed him shortly thereafter that I had taken a position at Dykema and would be going back into private practice, he was so relieved and said, “Perfect, I can just go with you.” It was built on an existing relationship, just in a different capacity. I have other clients from my PNC years who are still my clients at Dykema to this day.
You never know where work will come from, or when, or what it will turn out to be. I’ve had many referrals from my partners over the years. One unexpected client was a referral when one of my partners, who does a lot of work for a large manufacturer, had someone from the company’s legal office reach out to him, asking him if he knew someone who could help her cousin and uncle. They thought it was just to prepare an elderly parent’s powers of attorney documents, only to find out that the elderly parent had an estate of several million dollars with assets held in several business entities, which required substantial planning. In addition, the client’s brother had suffered a stroke, requiring guardianship and conservatorship proceedings. His estate was also several million dollars.
I’ve practiced law for more than 15 years, and I love helping my clients with their lives. Thank you for this opportunity to share some of my experiences. I hope there is learning here for other lawyers that helps them develop their practice in niches they enjoy!
