Dr. Jeremy Weisz: 16:49
I mean, Mike, you refer out at least I was reading maybe hundreds of cases per week potentially.
Mike Morse: 16:58
Yep.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz: 16:59
Talk about the mentality of not keeping it in house and referring out.
Mike Morse: 17:04
Well, you know.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz: 17:06
Some people with the maybe not an abundance mindset, like we want to keep this, keep this business right. It’s a bit counterintuitive at first.
Mike Morse: 17:14
You know, my ex-wife has a saying that I refer to all the time that, you know, there’s enough, she says enough love to go around. And I take it that there’s enough cases to go around. There’s enough business to go around. There’s enough money to go around. I am not greedy. I don’t like to hoard things. But first of all. I don’t handle all types of cases, so I don’t handle divorce or bankruptcy or criminal or even medical malpractice cases. And so in those cases come in. Those are easy referrals out, right? Because I don’t specialize in them.
The second thing that we refer out are auto cases where another firm may be more skilled at handling. And there are some. And so and you know, when we started handling cases, we would handle small to big. Now we still handle some small cases, but the really small cases, we like to support other law firms. Younger lawyers, lawyers who are like me 30 years ago, I’d like to support them and get them some of those cases. And so my lawyers can work on the bigger cases, the meatier cases, the harder cases. And we’re referring out 2 to 300 cases a week. And it’s good for our clients. We get referral fees. At the end of the day, it’s a win-win.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz: 18:36
And you talk about in the book, it’s beneficial just also from the staff perspective to just be in their zone of genius, not be overworked. And also, you know, really just focus, right? And it actually helps the team too, right?
Mike Morse: 18:55
100% right.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz: 18:57
Specialization, you know, because some people could argue, like, I’m curious of why you’ve been so diligent on focus and specialization because like, hey, we’re getting whatever 50 clients a week for divorce. Maybe we should start a divorce division or something. What keeps you focused?
Mike Morse: 19:16
That’s a really good question. Because you, because you have those conversations. So I meet with my team weekly. We have bigger meetings, quarterly, right? Planning sessions and we talk about it. Should we diversify? Right. And there’s a lot of lawyers that take everything. Jack of all trades. Yeah. Could we bring in millions of dollars a year on divorce? Yeah. The last thing I want to do is divorce work. I want to focus on big injury cases where I can make a big difference in people’s lives. There’s divorce lawyers out there. They’re good. Let them deal with that headache. I don’t want to deal with that headache.
And again, I’m not greedy. I don’t need every dollar. There’s enough to go around. Let the people who specialize in these things handle it. Doesn’t mean I may not add in a practice area once in a while. Right. We’re doing explosion cases and construction accident cases. And, you know, bigger dog bite cases. You know, we do those things. But the smaller cases where other smaller firms can handle, I’m happy to bring them in and let them handle some of those.
So it’s a business decision a lot of the time, right. Do you want to do Social Security disability work? Right. We do some disability, some Social Security disability. But we don’t want to do a ton of it. So we refer out some of it. It’s a business decision. Every business has to make the decision. Do we want to do everything or do we want to specialize? So we specialize in big injury cases. And it has worked out for my firm.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz: 20:52
I want to talk about negotiation for a second. If you look at and this has been the you know, the case early and early on in your career, like, oh, this is expected to get $3,000, you get $25,000. And I’m looking on your website, if you’re watching, listening to the audio, we are on Mike’s website here 855 mike.com. And you could see what’s interesting about that. You don’t just have we got $2.8 million or we got 635,000, but you have the insurance offered 250,000 and we got 2.8.
Talk about some of the things that you and the team. And I know you have a lot of processes that are baked into actually negotiating or however you describe it to get your clients better settlements.
Mike Morse: 21:42
So we take negotiating very seriously. It’s an art form. We bring in experts. I had a friend out of New York who’s a great negotiator named Andrew Finkelstein, came and talked to my people last March, and he is a master at negotiating. And he taught my firm a ton of things. I think he helped me bring in an extra 30 or $40 million last year for my clients just on one talk to my lawyers. So there are a million different things that he taught us and that we now have incorporated.
But generally speaking, for the masses, people who have to negotiate, it’s saying no more. It’s starting very high. It’s understanding the empty chair. The empty chair negotiation tactic. You know, listening to the Chris Voss of the world like you mentioned earlier, he’s amazing. He’s got a great book about negotiating. And it’s being strict with your nose. It’s being strict with how you negotiate, and it’s getting your client on board for whatever’s going to happen.
And that’s a huge thing because if your clients don’t like you and trust you, they’re not going to go with your recommendation later on. So we try very hard at the beginning to get our clients on board. They understand that we’re going to go for top dollar. They understand that I’m going to try the case if we need to, unless the insurance companies pay us what we think it’s worth, the last thing you want is a lowball offer, because then we’re duty bound to tell our client about it. And the client’s like, you know what? That’s enough. I’m done.
That’s not the perfect client. That’s not what I want. I want clients who are willing to go the farthest mile they have to go to get the most money for their devastating injuries. And we know best, so we advise them. Hopefully they listen to us and we employ some of these techniques that I’m telling you about. There’s probably 20 more of us and we get a lot of money for our clients. We get a lot of money for our clients. And it’s, it’s super fun and it’s super fun to put these things in motion and watch them work. That’s also very fun.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz: 24:01
Like what was one thing with Andrew Finkelstein when he came to speak? What one thing that stuck out to you, or maybe that was reported by one of your staff of what was helpful for them?
Mike Morse: 24:13
Well, Andrew, one of my favorite Andrew isms is when he picked up a chair in my sitting area, and he put it up on the podium where he was standing. He said, see this empty chair? It’s the most powerful negotiation tactic you have because if you’re fighting with somebody on a negotiation and you say, I’m sorry, Mike Morse, who’s not here, told me, I can’t settle this case for less than $1 million. He’s the bad guy, right? I’m blaming Mike. What is that person going to say to you who’s trying to negotiate? There’s not much to say. There’s nowhere to go. It’s an empty chair.
So either they pay the million or we try the case and they don’t want to pay the million, and they don’t want to try the case. So what’s the lesser of the two evils, right. Do they have an upside to try the case? Can they win the case? Usually not. If we’ve done our job and worked up the case the right way, and we’ve proven all the things we need to prove. They don’t have an upside to try it. They don’t have anybody to negotiate with because I’m not in the room. My lawyer is saying, Mike says I can’t settle it for this or that, which is absolutely true. I review the files and I tell them anyway.
I like the empty chair tactic. It works for me because it’s true. And the person you’re negotiating with really doesn’t have any place to go because they can’t browbeat you. They can’t try to get you to take less because you have your marching orders.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz: 26:00
You’re busy enough. Mike. I’m curious why I even write a book? Why did you decide to write a book?
Mike Morse: 26:06
I was bored, it was 2019. My firm was humming along pretty easy. John was running it well, and my girlfriend at the time says you got so much information. That brain of yours, why don’t you put it in a book?
So John and I sat down, wrote it, and it’s sold, I mean, tens of thousands of copies. It opens up lots of fun doors. I talk on lots of stages around the country and it’s like, it’s been this whole thing on its own. And now we have a coaching company and a mastermind company and it’s super fun.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz: 26:56
Talk about the conference. I mean, you have conferences as well. You know, I know you have one. Whenever someone’s listening, there’s probably one that’s coming up. So you could check out the fireproofperformance.com/conference page. But what are some takeaways people have gotten at past conferences? What’s going on with the one coming up that people should know about?
Mike Morse: 27:15
We have one April 2026 in Austin, Texas. And it’s basically teaching law firm owners how to scale and grow and do it the right way. Do it our way, do it the Fireproof way. There’s lots of testimonials that you can watch on the website from other law firm owners just like you to learn what they’ve learned. But it’s all about leadership and holding people accountable and how to market better and how to hire better and how to fire quicker.
And, you know, meeting, it’s also about the community that we’ve built. You know, we have over 100 law firms that show up to these events. The conference that we’re referencing are people who are not in Fireproof. These are people who are curious about fireproof, who want to come kick the tires, see if they like the coaches, see if they like what we have to say. And then hopefully at the end of it, they want to sign up for a mastermind or coaching or both. So it’s, you know, it’s really fun. The community is great. Just everybody just wants to help each other. And it’s a wonderful thing to be part of.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz: 28:23
You mentioned a couple things there, Mike, specifically hiring. What are some of the learnings with hiring? I don’t know if you want to talk about some of the assessments you recommend?
Mike Morse: 28:36
Yeah. So. This is a, that’s a big one for me. The before I got married, my first mentor made my ex-wife and I take some personality based testing. And I remember this, this is 35 plus years ago, maybe more maybe. Yeah. And basically I remember that the questions were innocuous. And then I read the report and I was like, how the heck do those questions totally nail my personality and my drive and the things that I’m passionate about and all the things in this ten page report, it blew me away.
And he introduced me to the guy who did the test, who worked for another company. But they were such good friends. He said, will you do Mike’s law firm if he ever wants to hire anybody? And the guy said, yes. Us. And from that day on till today, I’ve never hired a person without giving them some personality based testing, ever. Not one from the mailroom to senior leadership to everybody in between lawyers, everybody does some kind of personality based testing.
So the interviewing process is not just a personality based thing. If I like the person, I don’t like the person, which is how most interviewing is. And I don’t know about any of your listeners, but I’ve definitely been burned by it. And I don’t like to be burned and tricked into hiring somebody. And so this is just another layer of assurance or help in the interview process to make sure that the person fits your core values and would be a good culture fit.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz: 30:23
Yeah, actually, I’ll piggyback on that, Mike. I did take the Colby and my wife took the Colby. We had a hard, independent coach to go through that with us to talk about where we overlapped, where we didn’t, how to communicate better. You also employ like an interesting test of what’s most people do for the NFL in football.
Mike Morse: 30:50
The Wonderlic. Yeah.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz: 30:51
Yeah.
Mike Morse: 30:52
So I don’t know if we’re still using the Wonderlic, but we definitely used it for a while. That’s more on how smart you are. That’s like an IQ test. And yeah, I like to know how smart people are when they’re coming to work for me. And I don’t need geniuses in every position, but I just want to know what I have.
And then do you fit? Do you meet my core values? ET cetera. And it’s pretty darn cool.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz: 31:25
There are some big shifts, and I didn’t realize until I listened to the book Fireproof that it’s quite literal. What happened? Can you just talk, maybe what’s going on inside your mind when you get that call of what’s going on with your building?
Mike Morse: 31:47
Yeah. Fear and dread. And I, you know, I remember hopping in my car, going 90 miles an hour down the highway the summer night, and I pulled up to my lot and it was fire trucks and firemen and running around with hoses. And I saw my secretary there and, you know, we just kind of embraced and I was crying and she was crying. And it was just, it was a bad day, bad, bad, three, four in the morning.
And then three, four hours later, we had wires coming out of the building and we were answering calls in the middle of my parking lot, and because I had a team in place, I was out looking for space and my team was making sure the lawyers were in court and IT was making sure their stuff was done right. And we were up at like, that happened on a Friday and Monday, we were in a new space and running and not missing a beat. And it proved that we were fireproof.
It proved that throw whatever the heck you want at me, universe. I’m going to be okay. You know, fire me. Take away my business. Burn down my building. I am resilient, I am going to stand back up and I am going to persevere and win at the end of the day. And it was a powerful message that I can do this and nothing’s going to keep me down. And basically, if I can survive that and I can survive all the other things I said and my dad dying in law school and all that stuff. Like what can’t I survive?
So, you know. You know, the phrase fireproof was, is meaningful. It’s deeply meaningful. And it also means tornado proof and hurricane proof and flood proof and Covid proof and all the things because those are disasters, all of them to businesses, all of them. And so what we teach our businesses and law firm owners are that, you know, get your stuff together, have it all written down, have disaster plans, have everybody have their own laptops. You know, we knew if there was another disaster, what would happen when Covid happened. We didn’t miss a minute. Everybody had already had their laptops. Everybody already had their setups at home. It was not even a blip.
What was a blip was nobody was driving. And I’m an auto accident lawyer. That was a blip, but it didn’t last that long. We still got a ton of cases during Covid, which was shocking because when I drove down the highway, there was nobody there. Somehow people are still getting in accidents and calling me. It was wild. But. Yeah. So anyway, that hopefully answers.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz: 34:46
Just to give people a sense, like when you say space, right? We’re not talking a 200 square foot office, right? You know, you had to talk about the evolution, the space that you were in and what you had to replace there because it’s not insignificant.
Mike Morse: 35:05
We were in a 6400 square foot building. We had 25, 26, 27 employees. We had hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of clients, and the entire building got flame and smoke damage. And I had to find space for all these people within a day. That Friday I found space. Monday we moved in. I had to find a place that had furniture and chairs because I didn’t have time to go buy all that stuff. But I did it. And I had a team making sure the firm was running and the phones were being answered and the computers were being done and all the other things. Right. And
And the fire taught me so much. Not just about. Yes, I had to rebuild the building and I had to deal with the insurance company and I had to do all the things. But not only did it make me, you know, feel resilient, which is a good feeling to have, it made me realize I can’t do it all by myself anymore. And that’s when I hired my Gino Wickman calls, my integrator or COO, somebody who’s going to manage my business for me. I was doing both at that time, but I couldn’t take on dealing with the fire, and I couldn’t take on dealing with the insurance, and I couldn’t take on all the things that were going to come. So within a very short time after the fire, I hired my number two, and he’s been with me for 18 years, and he helped free me up to do other things. And he ran the business side of the business, and I ran the other stuff with the lawyers and the mentoring and the cases and learned that in those years that this is more than a law firm, right?
It’s a business. It’s a real business. And that’s what when I lecture to law schools, I make sure they realize that you’re not just getting a law degree. You are now business people. And nobody says that. Nobody talks like that. No. You know, I would say that to a dentist. I would say that to a doctor. I would say that to an architect. You’re not just that, you’re also a business person. Learn a PNL, learn how to sell, learn your numbers, learn how to hire and fire properly. Learn the tenets of being a business person.
Most business people kind of suck, and they just aren’t organized and they don’t know their numbers, and they don’t set goals and they don’t do all the things that we talk about in the book. But once they do and a disaster happens, you’re better off and you’re going to be better off. Right? You’re going to be stronger. You’re going to be able to bounce back quicker as opposed to someone who has never dealt with a problem before.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz: 37:53
In the book, you talk about the jumbotron because you’re talking about numbers for a second, and you’re saying most people don’t know key metrics or numbers. What are some of those key metrics or numbers that you talk about with people in your mastermind coaching program? What are the few on the jumbotron that are important?
Mike Morse: 38:15
I mean, there’s hundreds of them. Every business is different, right? What do you care about? So you could give me any business title, and I could tell you what I would care about if I was a plumber. If I was a dentist. If I was a chiropractor. If I was a lawyer. If I’m a lawyer, right. I want to know how many people called for my services this week. How many did we want? How many of those did we get? What is the percentage of that? How many rings did it take to get that call? How many form fills were there on the website? How much should I pay for that lead? How much did I pay for that case? How much is my average fee? How long does it take to have a case from beginning to end? How long does it take a case from the end to giving the client the check? What are the dollars per day that you work on a case like this? I could keep going.
There are literally hundreds. You know, what is my profitability margin? So if I bring in $100, how much of that goes in my pocket? So I asked these questions to any business owners and most of them don’t have any clue. And so, I know that this is across the board, no matter what business you’re in. You don’t know your you know, when I asked me a question like, well, let me think you should know. I know my profitability margin. It’s 45%. It flexes to 47. Goes down to 43. But I’m right at 45. Right. The average is 20-25%. So I’m doing better than the average. And I can teach people how to do better.
But you should know how many calls came in. For whatever business you are a week and how many you signed and how much money is in the bank and all those things. But you should know because you’re reviewing your books every week. If you don’t review your books, you won’t know those things. And if you are low. So it’s. Imagine being in a. Imagine being in a mastermind and there’s 15, ten other law firms there. And you’re like, my profitability margin is 15%, which is common 20%. But there’s a lot of people in the room, 30, 40%. Don’t I want to learn from them? What am I wasting my money on? What am I not? Why am I, why don’t I have better margins? Teach me.
And I’ve sat in those rooms and it’s like, well, how much is your rent? Well, my rent is $1 million a year. Well, mine’s 200,000 a year. Where’s your, what building? Oh, I need a big building with a big sign and a big load. Do you really? That’s one tiny example. But, you know, you might have too many staff. You might have, you know, wasting money over here, over there, or you fancy cars or whatever. A lot of ego, a lot of ego, and a lot of businesses that waste money. I have a friend right now that I said, you’re spending $1 million a year on rent. You’re crazy. I spent 300,000. Who cares? It’s a nice enough building. That extra 700,000 goes directly into my pocket.
So. But if you have a big ego and you need your face or a big sign or buy a building or whatever, that’s okay. If it’s going to serve a business purpose, then do it. But I look at everything and I’m proud that my other column, when you’re looking at the four categories of, you know, compensation and case acquisition and fees and other right, which is rent and things, mine’s less than 5%. I’m proud of that.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz: 41:57
Characteristic. Thanks for sharing that, Mike. I think, you know, like you said, it’s applicable to any business really characteristics of a key I see piece of the journey was hiring the integrator. What were some of the characteristics you were looking for at that time in an integrator?
Mike Morse: 42:23
Let me first say I thought we were going was when should you hire an integrator? And I just want to answer that even though you didn’t ask it. So number one, for law firm owners, it’s between 20 and 30 employees. And I don’t know if that correlates to any other business, but that’s what we have found true. And you know, you mentioned earlier the list in Rocket Fuel that I gave to Gino many, many years ago when I was interviewing John, I had a list of things that I didn’t want to do anymore, things that I should have delegated long ago because I didn’t love to do them. And I wasn’t great at them. Right. That’s you delegate everything but those things. If you love to do something and you’re great at it, you keep it in your bucket. Everything else you delegate.
So I had a list of like 87 things, and these were not small things that I couldn’t get to, didn’t want to get to, wasn’t going to get to. And when John interviewed, I handed him that list and I said, can you do the things on this list? And he took a couple of minutes and he went through it, and he looked at me and says, yeah. I said, okay, you’re hired. Do those things. And then he got through them and I gave him another list and another list. And now there’s no more lists. But he does what I need him to do.
And that’s what a good integrator does. Right? It’s number one, taking your vision and implementing it. That’s the key to what an integrator does. Right. Here’s my business. Here’s how I want it run. Make it happen. Manage everybody and get it done. And you know, it’s also all the other things that you don’t want to do. He’s got to either do it himself or find somebody to do it for you. So those are the two key things. And it’s super important for any business. It’s you know, we do not think that any one person can be both a visionary and the integrator and be successful. People try.
I’ll get on a phone with a business owner who, you know, thinking about coaching. And I’ll say, well, tell me about your business. And they’re clearly the visionary and they’re clearly sitting in the marketing role and they’re clearly sitting in the integrator role, and they’re clearly running the books. And they also have a caseload. Like, what do you you can’t do all this. You. That’s impossible. You’re never going to get to where you want to go. If you’re trying to wear five hats. And a lot of business owners try to wear all the hats because either they don’t know better, they’re cheap. Nobody has shown them the way, all those things.
So, you know, it’s fun giving people those aha moments. And I think, you know, since our book came out, people are hiring integrators, they’re hiring CMOs, they’re hiring HR directors. And I don’t think a lot of that was happening before our book.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz: 45:02
I’m curious, Mike, what was something on that list that you were thinking? I do not want to do this. I hate doing this. And the other person’s not going to want to do this either, but they do because that’s just what they like to do. What surprised you on maybe what that other, you know, they are like, I love doing this and you hated doing this?
Mike Morse: 45:27
Everything on the list.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz: 45:28
Well, like what was one thing?
Mike Morse: 45:29
But the point. But I’ll tell you, I’ll think of one and I’ll mind you, that was 18 years ago I wrote that list and I haven’t looked at it since. But, the key about the list is this: Visionaries, right. Chapter one of my book, Know Thyself. Are you a visionary or an integrator? They’re completely separate. They’re completely separate skill sets. So he doesn’t want to be a visionary. And I don’t want to be an integrator. I don’t want to manage people like he does. I don’t want to look at the data every day. I don’t want to read long contracts and long emails and go call insurance brokers and price out insurance and do and do all the processes around the business. But he loves those things. He’s great at those things.
That’s his, that’s what he loves to do. So we have totally separate personalities. We are opposites. And so that’s it’s not it’s not one thing on the list that he didn’t want to do. He looked at that list and said, this is all what I do. And I’m like, great, because I don’t do that stuff. But he doesn’t want to come be the visionary. He doesn’t want to go shoot commercials. He doesn’t want to be on all the stages. He doesn’t want to do all the things that I do every day. And so that’s why we’re a perfect match.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz: 46:48
I asked that because I think some people think just because I don’t want to, if I don’t want to do it, then someone else isn’t going to want to do it either, you know? But that’s not the case because people just are, you know, wired differently.
Mike Morse: 47:03
I learned a long time ago that there are certain people who want to do everything. And so at the beginning, you know, when I first started hiring people and learning how to delegate. I was on the phone with every client every day, hundreds of clients while doing everything else. And my father in law looked at me and said, you know, Michael, there are people who love to be on the phone and may even be better than you and maybe even have a little bit more patience in you.
And I said, well, let’s go find that person. And we did. And she’s still with me today, 20 some odd years later. And that’s the truth. They have patience and love and respect and just sit there on the phone all day and they’re happy as clams. I would, I would hurt myself if that had to be me. So there’s, there’s a, there’s if there’s, if you have a task, there’s somebody out there who would love to do that task.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz: 47:55
Mike I’ve one last question before I ask it. I do want to point people to check out FireproofPerformance.com. You can go to the conference page, check out their upcoming conference whenever that is also the book as well. And of course, you know. 855MikeWins.com.
You know what I do see, Mike, is you’ve used your success to give back a lot. And so I do want to talk about some of the things that you do. And they’re important to you in the community. Right. And so I’m pulling up the https://www.855mikewins.com/scholarships/. Can you talk a little bit about some of these pieces here?
Mike Morse: 48:44
You know, I just have so much gratefulness in my heart and love in my heart for my community, for trusting me and my firm to handle their family’s cases in the most difficult times that I wake up every morning thinking, how can I help my community? And so we do dozens and dozens of things a year. But some of the big ones are, we make sure that every kid who needs a backpack full of supplies gets one. We make sure that Michigan Humane, which is the largest, largest adoption agency and discount veterinary care agency, has the funds it needs to do their good work. And there’s dozens of other organizations that we help out every year.
And it’s just my way of giving back and saying thanks. And the community knows it. And they thank me all the time, and they ask me about it, and they support us and we support them. And it’s a beautiful thing. So I get on stages all the time and I teach my Fireproof clients to figure out meaningful ways to give back to your community and your community will love you back for it. While you’re loving your community and it’s just a massive win-win.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz: 50:05
Yeah. If you check this out, you’ve as of, you know, probably given out over 300,000 backpacks with supplies to Michigan students. I think one year I read like you donated over 20,000 backpacks. It’s incredible.
Mike Morse: 50:21
Yeah. Thank you. It’s meaningful. And the kids appreciate it and the teachers appreciate it and the principals appreciate it. And it’s just a massive win-win.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz: 50:33
Mike, I want to be the first one to thank you. Everyone check it out. Get the book. If you have the opportunity to attend a conference or mastermind or coaching. Mike knows his stuff. He’s learned from some of the best and he brings in the best. So Mike, thank you so much.
Mike Morse: 50:48
It’s my pleasure. Thank you for having me.
