“Special Friends,” Rapping for Clients & The “Human Premium” in an AI World

Jared Correia (00:00):
Hello everybody. We’ve got a show that promises to be at least mildly interesting for your listening and watching enjoyment. I’m your host, Jared Correia. I’m the CEO of Red Cave Law Firm Consulting. For the monologue. I’m discussing email management. In the interview, we’ve got An Ruda, Barco Pavia, LLP, and manages her law firm like no one else you’ve ever seen. Find out how and why. On the counter program, we’ve got a new segment called JD or og. Now let’s talk about your overflowing inbox, attorney’s, traffic, and documents and emails. Mostly lawyers spend a lot of time working on solutions for building documents. However, they’re mostly drowning in emails. It’s pretty easy to give up to watching is something like a passive observer. As your inbox count threads up into the four figures, inbox zero has been a fever dream. Traditionally, attorneys who have been more aggressive about managing their inboxes have done things like created subfolders for each matter and or for certain substantive or administrative categories.

(01:18):
Some law firms even utilize law practice management softwares as organizational tools where they can save or archive email messages to those relational databases in order to keep their messages organized under clients and matters. Oftentimes, the creation of subfolders is simply what law firms do when they haven’t uncovered the use of relational databases or they don’t want to pay for one. Ideally, you should have an organized inbox that also connects to a relational database and potentially other softwares through integrations including potentially customer relationship management or CRM tools. Lawyers who want to take email management to the next level should also consider additional products in the productivity suite. For example, one way to get emails out of the inbox is to turn them into tasks to act on. That involves the calendar tool. Another way to reduce the number of emails you have in year inbox is to turn them into projects that invokes notetaking or project management software like OneNote in Microsoft or Keep and Google.

(02:20):
You can also utilize the built-in organizational tools that providers now insert into their products. Gmail, for example, automatically organizes your inbox into four categories, primary promotions, social, and updates with a good deal of accuracy. The idea being that they’re taking the load off your email management by categorizing certain messages on your behalf. Of course, many products now feature AI tools at certain subscription levels and email and adjacent features, which can help you to move through email processing more quickly by getting summaries and organizational suggestions. Beyond that, attorneys who are successful at managing their inboxes may utilize a system once such system is a version of David Allen’s Getting Things Done. You may have heard that referred to as GTD. The idea is to reduce the mental bandwidth required for email responses. So if you can respond in two minutes or less, do so immediately, and if not, delete the message if it’s unimportant or convert it to a task to perform later on.

(03:25):
Third party AI based email management tools also exist like fixer or superhuman, both of which purport to organize and maintain your inbox quickly and efficiently and on a regular basis. These vendors promise a higher level of organizational features than built-in programs. Of course, if you require more than just the management of your own inbox, there are also more focused products for that. Too many lawyers who want to help managing client requests will allow their staff to log into their inbox, which while convenient is a security nightmare. Don’t do it. It’s better to use products like Zendesk or Front to be able to manage tickets effectively across various inboxes. You may only be scraping the surface of viable email management techniques for your law firm. Up next, we’ve got An Ruda from Barco Pavia, LLP. We’re moving from organization to complete the total chaos. Come on back. Well, I’ve effectively run out of things to say, which is awkward because this is a podcast, so I will simply drink from this graphic mug, which says kind of a big deal for the next several seconds. This is really great, but I think we should interview our guests who may be even more graphic than this mug I’m holding. Our guest today is An Ruda, who’s the CEO and co-managing partner of Barco Pavia, LLP, and welcome to the show. It’s a pleasure to have you.

An Ruda (05:06):
Thank you for inviting me. I am looking forward to letting people hear our private conversations. As you know, I was told I could be myself.

Jared Correia (05:20):
You could definitely be yourself. I don’t know how anyone in the firm will feel about that, but you can be yourself with me. As you know, I’m a little bit of a graphic mug aficionado, so I thought I’d bring out a good one for you today.

An Ruda (05:33):
You sent me a couple of mugs, if you’ll recall, but you didn’t include your name.

Jared Correia (05:42):
Correct.

An Ruda (05:43):
So we one came

Jared Correia (05:45):
Up, I didn’t want HR Max HR tracking it back to me.

An Ruda (05:48):
One came after the next. The first one was I think organic white male tears.

Jared Correia (05:53):
Yes, correct.

An Ruda (05:54):
And the second one was something else. Something else, until I figured out it was you.

Jared Correia (06:00):
I was trying to figure out white male tears mugs. I wanted to find the best ones, but I couldn’t decide between the top two. And then this is probably why I asked my wife to help me send anything I left on my name kind of embarrassing. Super. Thanks for coming on the show. I want to start here. I’ve never actually asked you this, and I’m interested in origin stories when people come on the podcast. Why did you decide to become a lawyer other than the fame and glory?

An Ruda (06:37):
Oh, okay. So I graduated from uc, Berkeley, with a degree in English literature. So this story is totally

Jared Correia (06:50):
Useful degree,

An Ruda (06:52):
Boring story, and my emphasis was African Post-Colonial studies. Okay.

Jared Correia (06:57):
Oh wow. Wow.

An Ruda (06:58):
So I was so employable. Alright,

Jared Correia (07:03):
You went all in on being non employable. Well played.

An Ruda (07:06):
I went all in. I was going to be an English professor, and then I realized that I was not that interested in an eternal vow of poverty. So that got mixed, and then I was like, let me work for a couple of years and see what I want to do. So then I went, so this is a callous, I went to interview at a radio station to be a receptionist, and this is in, oh man, like 1996. Okay.

Jared Correia (07:39):
Oh man,

An Ruda (07:40):
What

Jared Correia (07:40):
A great year. Anyway, go

An Ruda (07:42):
On. Yeah. And the dude says to me, Hey, do you know how to use Microsoft products? And I was like, oh, sure, of course I do. He’s like, we have a little test for you. And I was like, oh

Jared Correia (07:56):
Shit. I don’t actually know what Microsoft is.

An Ruda (08:03):
I was like, I kid, but I kind of lied, so I’m assuming this interview is over. And he’s like, yeah, the interview is over.

Jared Correia (08:17):
Oh, you didn’t even take the test. You just admitted you got me. No, what was going to do? I didn’t know

An Ruda (08:21):
How to do shit. What was I going to do?

Jared Correia (08:25):
I fucked up my bad.

An Ruda (08:27):
I was going to, I don’t know. I was going to sit there for an hour and pretend no, that felt torturous and there’s no way I was going to get the job. So I just figured I confessed that in there. So anyway, so there ended my career in radio before

Jared Correia (08:44):
It even started,

An Ruda (08:44):
Before it even started. And then I was like, shit, what am I going to do with my life, man? I don’t know. I don’t have good ways to make money. So I applied to law school. I applied to one law school.

Jared Correia (08:59):
Really? Out

An Ruda (08:59):
Of Lark? Yeah. That’s crazy. Oh, Lark.

Jared Correia (09:04):
And then you did the LSAT stuff and all that?

An Ruda (09:08):
Yeah, I did all of that. I didn’t study.

Jared Correia (09:09):
Study. You did well enough, obviously to get into law school.

An Ruda (09:13):
I mean, I only applied to one law school. So yeah, I got in sitting

Jared Correia (09:17):
There sweating it out like, man, I hope there’s no Microsoft questions on the lsat.

An Ruda (09:20):
I know. Fuck no, I got accepted. They gave me a scholarship. I was like, all right, I’ll do it. I grew up in a very conservative Vietnamese Catholic home where I was not allowed to go out by myself after dark.

Jared Correia (09:39):
Oh, wow.

An Ruda (09:40):
So in the summers I could stay out longer in the winter, I was like, all right, it’s five o’clock. Got to go home. It’s dark. Not allowed to stay out.

Jared Correia (09:50):
I bet your parents were like, oh, doctor or a lawyer. Right. That’s cool. That sounds like a great thing to do.

An Ruda (09:55):
No, dude. My mom was more, this is what my mom said. At one point, I got my law degree, and my sister is actually a Fulbright scholar. She has a PhD in sociology. This is what my mom says. She’s like, you girls have too much education for girls.

Jared Correia (10:14):
Oh, wow,

An Ruda (10:15):
Okay. You should have stopped your bachelor’s degree because who’s going to want to marry you? That was kind of her thesis to all this education that was happening around here.

Jared Correia (10:26):
She’s like, once you lost out of the job at the radio station, it’s all over. So you did the law school thing, you came out and

An Ruda (10:35):
I did.

Jared Correia (10:35):
You’ve been successful. And one of the things we talk about is you really have focused on mentorship in your practice. You’ve had good mentors, you have a really interesting theory about mentors, which you could share with us if you wish. But this is also time, if you want to shout out some of the people that worked with you and kind of helped you on the way up.

An Ruda (11:01):
I got really lucky. I was a first generation law student. I didn’t even know that the law school you went to was important to getting a job. I just thought I would just apply. And then I happened to take tests very well, so I got good grades. I was pretty high in my class. So somehow I hit all the right deadlines and I got into big law, big law ish. I started a firm called Crosby, he Firo May, which then got gobbled up by Reed Smith, had not really signed up to be lawyer, 1,100 something. So left with the partner that I worked with and went to boutique. He was my first mentor. His name was Clyde Hutchinson. Old guy.

Jared Correia (11:54):
Yeah.

An Ruda (11:55):
He was one of those guys that was old when he was young.

Jared Correia (11:59):
Yeah. Clyde Hutchinson is such an old guy name. He’s like Benjamin Button.

An Ruda (12:03):
He was old when he was young, and he was one of those guys that smoked outside voice sounded like gravel. And he would, before he went home, he’d call his wife and say, fire up the cocktails Joan. And then he’d go home, have a drinky poo. How dare. But

Jared Correia (12:25):
I thought you said you were law firms in the nineties, not the seventies.

An Ruda (12:29):
It was the same difference. It was old school. And you know what? He was my first good mentor, this old white guy who was, I think about it now, he was in his fifties, but he felt like he was in his seventies. And I started out working for the railroads, and those guys were great. I mean, as soon as I got sworn in, he let me take a depo and he had one of his buddies in the railroad bar RAs me. So I’m like defending a depo, and this guy is all on my ass objections. Totally just rude, just combative. And I’m just like, Jesus, man. All right, whatever. And then this is the day after I sworn in. Okay.

Jared Correia (13:22):
Oh my God,

An Ruda (13:22):
This was a rite of passage. It was like

Jared Correia (13:25):
You did a deposition the day you were sworn in. Oh my

An Ruda (13:29):
God. The day after. This was his tradition, and he got one of his studies to haze me. And after the depa was over, he comes over and he’s like, you did pretty good kid. Clyde told me to haze you and go hard on you, but that guy let me do everything. I mean, I really, really learned from him because he was like a free range mentor. That’s

Jared Correia (13:59):
Cool. Where

An Ruda (14:00):
He’s like, go make your own mistakes. There’s nothing you can do that’s going to be that bad. You’ll learn, not go get humiliated a couple of times and you’ll figure it out. And then I left there. And then I have actually been with my current mentor for 20 years. Louisiana Fernandez. Yeah.

Jared Correia (14:21):
Yes.

An Ruda (14:22):
I met her in 2006. And we’re going to celebrate our 20th year anniversary this year.

Jared Correia (14:32):
That’s amazing. I’ve never heard anyone quite put it that way, a mentorship. What are you guys going to do to celebrate?

An Ruda (14:40):
I don’t know. We’ll figure out something. I mean, it’s just like, and I think that’s what makes it worth it. People are so willing to jump these days to go from one thing to the next. And I had so many opportunities to leave and make more money, but I was not willing to leave the old girl. At one point, the guys at my current firm had recruited me. They recruited me for seven years before I came to Bar. Oh yeah. It was a long courtship. Yeah,

Jared Correia (15:10):
That definitely is. Geez. It’s like Bridger or some shit.

An Ruda (15:13):
It’s totally bridger. And at some point I was considering accepting and there was financial whatevers, and I was going to make more money. And then I was like, I cannot leave Louisiana. I called the managing partner up at the time. I was like, I just can’t do it. I’m so sorry. I cannot leave her. You’re going to have to wait until she retires or dies. I’ll just stay until that happens.

Jared Correia (15:43):
It’s funny. I like where you’re like, well, I graduated from law school in like 99 or whatever. And then you told me about how you basically worked in an 1870s law practice representing Cornelius Vanderbilt in the railroads.

An Ruda (15:57):
This guy’s taught me a lot though, but you’ve never met me in person, so you don’t know. I’m about four

Jared Correia (16:04):
Foot these

An Ruda (16:04):
Head days. I have a four foot 10. So when I represented the railroads, they were like, oh, you’re never really going to know what it’s like until you climb into an engine. So they had me,

Jared Correia (16:21):
Is this a Michael Dukakis in the tank moment?

An Ruda (16:24):
I was so goddamn scared. I climbed up this ladder like a little monkey. I was like this and I’m weak. So then they had a dude above me, and then they had a dude below me.

Jared Correia (16:42):
Yeah, your whole team getting you to the train

An Ruda (16:44):
Me up into the engine.

Jared Correia (16:51):
That’s really funny. But

An Ruda (16:52):
I don’t know that people get those kinds of experiences because the people not anymore. I

Jared Correia (16:58):
Don’t feel like they

An Ruda (17:00):
Want to jump for 10, 20, 30, 40 grand, and they don’t think about investing in themselves. Actually, when I left Reed Smith and I left with Clive to go to a boutique firm, I took a $40,000 pay cut.

Jared Correia (17:20):
Oh, wow. Just so you could continue to work with him

An Ruda (17:24):
So I could continue to work with him and learn to be a real lawyer. Right. I didn’t feel like at big law I was going to get to be a real lawyer.

Jared Correia (17:34):
Yeah. Yeah. Probably would’ve been true. So we talked a little bit about how you try to talk about mentorship with the attorneys you have at the firm right now.

An Ruda (17:43):
Yeah.

Jared Correia (17:44):
And you’ve got this whole theory around how your mentors are like your homies. Would you?

An Ruda (17:51):
Okay. There’s levels. Okay. Did

Jared Correia (17:54):
I fuck it up? I might’ve fucked it up too. No,

An Ruda (17:56):
No.

Jared Correia (17:56):
It’s your theory.

An Ruda (17:57):
You mostly got it. So one day I was talking to one of the younger partners at the firm

Jared Correia (18:06):
And

An Ruda (18:06):
I said, who’s your special friend?

Jared Correia (18:09):
Oh, yes. You’re like Mr. Rogers.

An Ruda (18:12):
And this guy said his special friend were these two seven year olds. And I was like, that’s not a special friend that’s a mentor. You don’t understand the differences. So I sent an email out to the fur. I think I shared it with you.

Jared Correia (18:28):
I

An Ruda (18:29):
Said in the email is for a lawyer to have happiness and longevity at a law firm or a law practice, one, you need a special friend. You don’t need more than one. If you’ve had more than one, you’re blessed. But a special friend is your ride or die. Like that person you can say anything to, you can line, you can complain, you can talk some mad shit to, and they have your full trust. Okay. That’s your special friend. Don’t give that out easily. Not everybody’s a special friend. And then you have your homies. Your homies are like everybody else that you’re friendly with. Okay. They’re like, whatever you get along with them, you can call them, you can talk to them, whatever. And then you have your mentors and your mentor is a special relationship. That is the person that’s going to help you grow and develop and look out for you. And that has to be the organic that cannot, you cannot assign a mentor. I hate it when mentors are assigned. You don’t know if

Jared Correia (19:46):
That’s a good point. Yeah.

An Ruda (19:48):
You don’t know if there’s chemistry. There has to be chemistry. And so after I sent out that email, what I thought was funny was everybody started thinking, well, who’s my special friend? Who’s my mentor?

Jared Correia (20:05):
Typical law form stuff.

An Ruda (20:08):
And people have amazingly, I’ve had a couple of conversations then where somebody says to me, would you think this person’s worthy of being my special friend? I’m like, the fuck if I know? I can’t tell you if that person is worthy of being your special friend. You just got to feel it. You just got to feel it. It’s not like, oh, well, what will this person give me? What can I get that’s not what a special friend’s about?

Jared Correia (20:37):
This is great,

An Ruda (20:39):
But other people,

Jared Correia (20:40):
Just another Wednesday at the firm, right? Who’s my special friend and who’s my homie? How do I know?

An Ruda (20:47):
It’s kind of like you know it, if you know it, you don’t have any special friends, you better go and get you one. Okay. You better go and get you one. Or it’s a lonely practice.

Jared Correia (21:01):
All right. Let me ask you this. Obviously you got a unique culture at your firm. You’re the managing partner over there. How do you balance this type of stuff? Making sure everybody’s friendly with each other and collegial and helping each other with productivity? That’s a hard thing. Frankly,

An Ruda (21:19):
I feel like it’s a constantly shifting

Jared Correia (21:24):
Subject

An Ruda (21:25):
Because

Jared Correia (21:26):
Yes, it’s definitely moving target.

An Ruda (21:29):
I think really the way it works best is if people are on a team and there’s a common enemy.

Jared Correia (21:40):
That’s a good way to

An Ruda (21:41):
Look at it. If you think about it, when you’re playing on a sports team, they don’t have to be an enemy in a bad way, but you’ve got a foe that you’re trying to defeat, right?

Jared Correia (21:53):
Yeah. It’s a competitor for sure.

An Ruda (21:56):
This is what law practice is. Each of the cases are different games, I mean different sports games, and you have to assemble the right team, and hopefully team members work well together and encourage each other to be better.

Jared Correia (22:14):
And even an environment like that, though, you’re also encouraging productivity and you’re measuring it too, which I think is relatively unique. A lot of law firms don’t do that effectively.

An Ruda (22:23):
I measure productivity, but I’m constantly refining it too. I started out measuring productivity as a function of someone needs to make three times their needs to generate in revenue three times their base. That’s just normal consulting principles, right?

Jared Correia (22:43):
Right. Yeah.

An Ruda (22:45):
Benefits are so expensive. If you are insuring a family of four and average family of four, you as the employer are probably paying an extra three to $4,000 a month for medical insurance.

Jared Correia (23:04):
Oh, yeah, definitely.

An Ruda (23:06):
And then at our firm, we do an automatic 3% contribution to everybody’s 401k. We don’t do a match. And so once you add everything together, when you’re measuring productivity or what someone needs to be generating, it really needs to be three x their total compensation package.

Jared Correia (23:29):
And I think most people look at just the salary and not the total package. So it’s great that you do that.

An Ruda (23:35):
Yeah. What we did at the end of last year is we generated total compensation statements to everybody, and we told them, okay, here’s your base. Here’s how much you got in bonus. Here’s what your benefits cost. Just so that people have visibility and transparency to what it costs to run the fur.

Jared Correia (23:56):
That’s smart.

An Ruda (23:57):
I do not hide that from people. I tell people, this is how much it costs for me to keep the lights on every month. I think it’s too easy for people to just think of themselves as, oh, I’m just like, well, I don’t care. It’s not my problem how revenue comes in.

Jared Correia (24:17):
Oh, absolutely. Very easy to think of that if you get a salary. Exactly.

An Ruda (24:23):
Exactly. So I’m trying to create a culture where it’s everybody’s problem.

Jared Correia (24:31):
I feel like it’s hard for all the lawyers to be like, I’m going to be transparent about finances in any way. Was that a struggle for you, or are you just like, this seems to be the right thing to do, so I’m going to do it?

An Ruda (24:42):
It felt like the right thing to do, but it’s been a lot of trial and error because one thing that I’ve had to be better at educating people on is, okay, just because you’re doing more than three X doesn’t mean that I’m going to compensate you up to that because you’re also making you up for some of your homies that aren’t doing that.

Jared Correia (25:03):
That’s why we’re all homies. We’re all pulling for each other.

An Ruda (25:07):
Exactly. And so I don’t know. I’ve thought about a team dashboard as well.

Jared Correia (25:12):
Oh, that’s awesome. I love that. Yeah.

An Ruda (25:14):
So you have your individual number that you have the company number as well, so that you can kind of know, although I have to balance it. I don’t want to scare people.

Jared Correia (25:25):
It’s true.

An Ruda (25:25):
You know what I mean?

Jared Correia (25:26):
Yeah. Although the state of KPI management and law firms is like, there’s a lot of work to be done there. Somebody out there, if you’re listening, build a good KPI dashboard for law firms, and I will help you promote it.

An Ruda (25:41):
I feel like I’ve been refining the one that I’ve been working on for three years now, and when I first rolled it out, I think people were resentful. People don’t want to know their

Jared Correia (25:56):
Number. That’s always sad. Also, everyone would like to coast if they could. Really?

An Ruda (26:03):
Yeah.

Jared Correia (26:05):
I think it’s great. Okay. Would you like to touch the third rail with me?

An Ruda (26:09):
Sure. Tell me what you want to touch. I’ll touch it. I don’t care.

Jared Correia (26:13):
Let’s talk about DEI.

An Ruda (26:15):
I’ll do this and touch the electrical rail.

Jared Correia (26:19):
Oh, you don’t have to do that.

An Ruda (26:21):
Okay. We’ll get electrocuted together. I’m good with that.

Jared Correia (26:24):
So DEI has been shifting stands for years now, 2020 pandemic. Everything was like, we’re woke. We’re doing all the shit now. Trump is back in office. Unless you’re a white rich dude, he doesn’t give a fuck about you. I feel like it’s ping pong. What is going on right now in law firms and what should be going on?

An Ruda (26:53):
Well, I mean, I have different pressures than big law, right? Yeah. But I was at big law for a hot second, and when I kind of feel like when you’re at big law, people are working their asses off. I look at the billable hours requirements. There’s a publish, and then there’s a unpublished. That’s

Jared Correia (27:17):
Fucking nuts. Yeah.

An Ruda (27:19):
So if you’re sitting there and you’re billing 23, 2400 hours on the regular just to be part of the homies at my firm, you built 1800. It’s a true 1800. I always say to people, that’s 500 hours less of your life. Think about it. Think about it. Right? And different people want different things. But when I think about what can you offer when you’re at big law to these young people who went to law school, most of whom went to do good,

Jared Correia (27:58):
Every lawyer I ever talked to was like, why’d you become a lawyer? I want to help people. Literally everyone says that.

An Ruda (28:05):
Yeah. Except me. I needed a job

Jared Correia (28:07):
Except for you. I blame the radio station. That’s why you’re here.

An Ruda (28:14):
But if you want to help people, how can they offer something to you? So there’s pro bono programs, there’s DEI initiatives and shit like that.

Jared Correia (28:25):
Yes. Right.

An Ruda (28:26):
That is performative. Okay. And I’m not mad at you. You got to put some shit on your website,

Jared Correia (28:37):
Right? We need the That’s cool.

An Ruda (28:39):
Yeah. You need the content. You got to put some brown faces on your webpage. That’s cool. But you’re not really, I mean, my concern about those programs and who they anoint to lead the programs is it’s performative. It’s like, so

Jared Correia (29:01):
You think there’s a token black lawyer or a token Vietnamese lawyer at the firm, just have one?

An Ruda (29:05):
Well, they usually don’t have a old white guy heading those DEI initiatives. Jared, why don’t you pull it up and see how many, I’ll give you a hundred dollars for every old white guy that’s the head of A DEI initiative for big law. Okay.

Jared Correia (29:19):
Yeah. I don’t think I’ll be making much money from that.

An Ruda (29:23):
Okay, why don’t you give me a thousand dollars? You can’t find any, and I’ll give you a hundred bucks for each one you can find. Alright, good deal. I’m going to go spend that money right now because I’m going to win. Okay.

Jared Correia (29:37):
Yeah, go ahead. Go

An Ruda (29:39):
Ahead. Here’s the thing. You could call it whatever you want. It doesn’t matter. I don’t have DEI on my website. It’s intentional. Okay. I don’t have that. But the number of women, the number of whatever non-dominant culture people I have working in my firm is very vast. Part of that is law of attraction, because I literally give no fucks what color someone is, what gender they are. Just call yourself whatever you want. I don’t care. My clients don’t care. Yeah. First of all, don’t use it as an excuse, like, oh, whatever, boo fucking who that was me too. Just what I tell people is, listen, they’re going to think you’re not as good. That’s just the fucking bottom line, okay? Don’t be mad about it. Whatcha going to be mad about Just be better. That’s what you have to be. So don’t be mad about it because all the time you spend being mad about how unfair life is, you’re here. Nobody promised you fairness. All you were promised is an opportunity,

Jared Correia (31:07):
Right? So you don’t have a formal program. You don’t think you need a formal program, but it sounds like in just the course of actions that you take and how you talk about the firm and promote the firm that you attract, the kind of candidates you want. And then once you get ’em in, you don’t care what background they have, what race they are, whatever.

An Ruda (31:32):
I spend more time on an individual basis telling women not to go 80%. The only people who ever come to me and ask to go 80% are the women. The men never do that.

Jared Correia (31:45):
Interesting. So I’ve never heard that before. Why do you think that is?

An Ruda (31:51):
Because they feel the pressure of the billable hour and they’re very responsible. And I’m like, don’t do it. Or if you want to do it, do it at the end of the year. I’ve

Jared Correia (32:04):
Talked

An Ruda (32:04):
Them out of it just because no dude ever rolls up to me and says, oh, I know my billing sucks ass, so can I take a 20% pay cut? Never happened.

Jared Correia (32:16):
Ever.

An Ruda (32:17):
Okay.

Jared Correia (32:18):
Yeah.

An Ruda (32:19):
I don’t know. You tell me why that’s the case. I don’t know. That’s just my

Jared Correia (32:22):
Observation. I feel like every mediocre white dude is like, I’m taking all my shit right now, getting everything I can, I think. But that’s kind always been the way it is, honestly,

An Ruda (32:33):
Because they have a sense of confidence. And I want give the young women and the men of color the same confidence, the same swagger, and to be able to say, no, I’m just going to perform. I worked when I had a baby. It just sucks. You just change your schedule around so it’s like you can do it. So they’re the only ones who’ve ever asked me to do that. And I’m very intentional where I’ll say, well, you wrote the motion. You should argue it.

Jared Correia (33:16):
Yeah.

An Ruda (33:17):
Why are you signing my name? I didn’t write this thing. You sign it.

Jared Correia (33:22):
So you’re kind of preaching like take ownership, have some swag, and just do your thing.

An Ruda (33:29):
Yeah.

Jared Correia (33:30):
Because

An Ruda (33:31):
In most law firms, it’s like the partner signs the plea. No, you wrote it, you sign it,

Jared Correia (33:38):
You

An Ruda (33:38):
Wrote it, you argue it, or you co argue it.

Jared Correia (33:42):
And you feel like because you’re at a mid-size firm, you have more wherewithal to be able to do something like that. I think you would probably do the same thing at a big law firm, but I’m just saying you may feel like you have more flexibility.

An Ruda (33:56):
I think I feel like I have more flexibility because we’re about 70 lawyers. I have more of an opportunity to really get to know people, and I encourage them to come talk to me. And so I don’t know how you would do it in big law. I guess you could do it by departments or practice groups. But the whole point is if you want to do some performative shit for your website, that’s fine, but you still have to invest in the people. And part of investing in the people is giving them the opportunity to fail and being okay with it. Maybe the first time the young lady argues the motion that she wrote, she won’t be great. Okay. She’ll be better the next time. So I’ll give you an example. I had a summer law clerk do a binding arbitration, labor arbitration for one of my clients, which was a nonprofit

Jared Correia (35:04):
Huge deal though, for a summer law clerk, right?

An Ruda (35:06):
A summer law clerk, a second year

Jared Correia (35:08):
Summer

An Ruda (35:09):
Law clerk. It was a one day arbitration. And I talked to the client in advance and I said, Hey, we’re going to supervise him. We’re going to make sure he’s trained. We’ll be in the background, but are you okay with this? And then I said, you know what? I’m not going to charge you for his time. So free is always better.

Jared Correia (35:33):
It’s free is always better. I want to dump one more topic in here before we finish up this segment. Artificial intelligence. I can’t go through a podcast now without talking about ai. You’re a very people focused, culture focused manager. What do you think about throwing AI into the mix?

An Ruda (35:56):
I love ai. I want as much AI as possible. Here’s what I tell the employees when they’re concerned,

Jared Correia (36:10):
Right? Because when you say that, I think people are probably thinking a little bit like, okay, what about my job?

An Ruda (36:17):
Here’s the thing, human beings are the premium product. I think I was talking to one of my friends who’s a CEO, and we were joking that having a human being EA is a new flex because people have calendar three or whatever. But actually having a human being ea

Jared Correia (36:39):
Reflect, you’re like, I don’t have an automatic scheduling tool. I have a human.

An Ruda (36:44):
I have a human

Jared Correia (36:44):
Who’s going to help you schedule. And

An Ruda (36:46):
Having an onshore human being,

Jared Correia (36:49):
Oh, that’s even very, flex

An Ruda (36:51):
Is the mega flex, okay. Because it’s like AI assistant, offshore assistant, human being assistant that sits outside your door. That’s the ultimate flex right now, tell you

Jared Correia (37:04):
That’s funny.

An Ruda (37:07):
And so what I say is human beings are the premium product, right?

Jared Correia (37:10):
Yeah.

An Ruda (37:11):
So what can you do as a human being that AI cannot do? Okay. And I listen on my doom scrolling to when Jensen Wang talks about this, or Jamie Diamond talks about it or whatever.

Jared Correia (37:25):
And

An Ruda (37:26):
One thing that

Jared Correia (37:27):
You do, lot of doom scrolling on ai.

An Ruda (37:28):
Yeah. And one thing that Jensen Wang said that I thought was very interesting is the nature of what it means to be smart has changed pure academic intelligence, pure analytical ability, computational ability is a commodity. So what is not a commodity? I’m going to steal this from him because I really liked it.

Jared Correia (37:52):
Well, you attributed this, so you’re

An Ruda (37:53):
Good. And I believe the same thing. It’s a premium product. It’s the human being’s ability to form connections with other human beings to see around corners, to use judgment and to provide a concierge experience. So if you’re a human being, your ass better be the Ritz Carlton. Okay? Because if your Motel six, it’s going to be a robot checking you it. Okay,

Jared Correia (38:27):
That’s great.

An Ruda (38:28):
People will pay for the human premium.

Jared Correia (38:31):
Yes. I see. I think that’s a great point. Okay, last question for you is when you are thinking about how to introduce AI into your firm, what does that look like? Where does that start? Is that in association with individuals? Are you looking to have AI run certain tasks? What are you thinking about right now? I know it’s a work in progress.

An Ruda (38:56):
Well, we’re implementing two, right? One is, and I’m not plugging this, but Nancy Hubert give me a discount, is billables ai.

Jared Correia (39:06):
She was one of our recent guests, so plug away.

An Ruda (39:10):
We rolled that out. And honestly, I wanted to roll it out house wide, I believe, to get good data collection.

Jared Correia (39:18):
Which you did, right? You just put it out there. Yeah,

An Ruda (39:23):
I did, but I had to hold it back a little bit because there’s some privacy issues. So we rolled that out. I’m going to check in to see how that’s doing. And the other AI tool we’re going to roll out is a tool called Connect ai, which will be our HR assistant. We still have a human being assistant. We still the human being HR person, and we have a human being senior HR consultant. But for the mundane questions, this AI agent will be able to answer the employee’s day or night.

Jared Correia (40:00):
Yeah, that’s a great use case. It’s awesome. And

An Ruda (40:04):
I’m, I’m looking at more.

Jared Correia (40:06):
I’m

An Ruda (40:06):
Looking at more what are the efficiency tools that I can roll out. The more the better.

Jared Correia (40:14):
Absolutely. Ana pleasure as always. Will you hang around for one more fun segment before we let you go?

An Ruda (40:21):
Of course. Me and Bob, me and Bob are here for you.

Jared Correia (40:24):
We haven’t mentioned Bob because there’s a human head behind you.

An Ruda (40:28):
Yes. Bob is my punching bag. He’s dressed. He’s in a T-shirt.

Jared Correia (40:35):
I mean, he looks pretty good for somebody who gets knocked around. So good on you, Bob. He’s

An Ruda (40:42):
Tough.

Jared Correia (40:43):
We’ll be right back. Welcome back, everybody. That’s right. It’s a counter program. It’s a podcast within a podcast. This is a conversational space where we can address usually unrelated topics that I want to explore at a greater depth with my guests. Expect no rhyme and very little reason. An, I drew up something just for you. I think you’re going to be into

An Ruda (41:08):
This. Oh, I’m excited.

Jared Correia (41:11):
I put together a little game called JD or og. It’s very simple to play. I am going to read a statement and you just have to tell me if it was uttered by a lawyer or a rapper.

An Ruda (41:26):
Okay.

Jared Correia (41:28):
I know you’re into the culture, so I believe you’ve wrapped for clients before. I just like, is that correct? I thought got a client. Yes.

An Ruda (41:37):
That’s how I got a client sent

Jared Correia (41:38):
A video. Alright, before we get into video, do you want to tell that story? I think that’s great.

An Ruda (41:42):
It was so funny. I got a referral and one of my friends says, Hey, he’s so tired of his lawyers. He needs a gangster. So I told him to go talk to you. So I put on a fur vest and I think it was, I don’t know if it was ludicrous, like, bitch, get out of the way, or something like that. And I did a whole performance and I

Jared Correia (42:11):
Can vouch for this

An Ruda (42:11):
To him. I texted it to him. You saw it? I texted to, I’ve seen the video. It’s real. I texted to him and he’s like, no questions asked. You’re hired.

Jared Correia (42:23):
That’s amazing. Alright, if you’re ready, I’ll start. I’m going to start out slow. This will be easy. First couple will be easy, I think. Okay. If it doesn’t fit, you must quit. Rapper or a lawyer.

An Ruda (42:37):
That’s easy. I know that was a lawyer.

Jared Correia (42:41):
I think that might be the most famous statement ever uttered by an attorney.

An Ruda (42:46):
Yeah, but he’s kind of a gangster though.

Jared Correia (42:48):
Johnny Cochran. Yeah, definitely.

An Ruda (42:50):
Yeah. I don’t know. He’s like part lawyer, part gangster.

Jared Correia (42:54):
Yeah, absolutely. Alright, next. I’ve got this one. My glove compartment is locked. So is the trunk in the back and I know my rights. So you’re going to need a warrant for that rapper lawyer

An Ruda (43:10):
Going to,

Jared Correia (43:11):
I know I didn’t do it justice, but

An Ruda (43:12):
That’s a rapper.

Jared Correia (43:16):
I got 99 problems. Great. Great song. All. You’re two for two. Can I just tell you, I know you’re an attorney and you’re competitive. I don’t think I’ve ever had anyone get a hundred percent right on our little segment at the end of

An Ruda (43:32):
The show. Oh shit. Now I

Jared Correia (43:33):
Try hard. No pressure. No pressure.

An Ruda (43:35):
Oh man. Like you tell me that

Jared Correia (43:37):
Just to fuck with. You messed

An Ruda (43:38):
Up.

Jared Correia (43:39):
Okay. Messed

An Ruda (43:39):
Up. My brain’s competitive. I would run a foot Reese that. I can’t run that. I can’t win for a dollar.

Jared Correia (43:52):
That’s great. All right. Here’s another one for you. I’d rather have a mind open to buy Wonder than one closed by belief. I’d rather have a mind open to by wonder than one closed by belief. Is that a lawyer or a rapper?

An Ruda (44:12):
That is so lame. That’s a lawyer. Am I wrong?

Jared Correia (44:19):
No, you’re right. You’re right. Jerry Spence, famous trial lawyer. I think Jerry Spence just died recently. It was a hundred years old.

An Ruda (44:29):
No offense, actually, a lawyer would talk about wonder.

Jared Correia (44:34):
That’s

An Ruda (44:34):
True. There’s no threats of violence. Nothing like that.

Jared Correia (44:39):
Speaking of threats of violence, try this one on for size. I’m a short fuse son of a bitch, and I’m going to get you. I’m a short fuse son of a bitch. I’m going to guess you lawyer rapper. What do you think?

An Ruda (44:53):
I like that. I feel like that’s a lawyer.

Jared Correia (44:56):
It is. Oh my God. That is a lawyer named Joe Jamell, who was a famous attorney. 1920 to 2000, I think he was alive. All right, you’re four for four. No pressure

An Ruda (45:11):
Man.

Jared Correia (45:11):
But the pressure bill at the same time

An Ruda (45:13):
Anymore.

Jared Correia (45:14):
No, they don’t. You could get a little sign, put that on your desk like Harry Truman had the buck stops here.

An Ruda (45:20):
I like that. That’s a good sign. It feels like a t-shirt.

Jared Correia (45:24):
Yeah. Alright, well now I’m going to have to send along some t-shirts that I don’t put my name on, so watch out for that in the mail. All right, next one. The truth is undisputed until the evidence is tampered with and the jury is polluted. The truth is undisputed until the evidence is tampered with and the jury is polluted, rapper or lawyer.

An Ruda (45:48):
See, the easy answer is lawyer, so it’s got to be rapper.

Jared Correia (45:52):
Oh, this is why I like having lawyers on this because you really think about the answer before you say it is a rapper. It’s push a t from the song, the games we play. Alright, so I will tell you, you have three left. You go three for three. You’re in the hall of fame.

An Ruda (46:10):
I’m sweating.

Jared Correia (46:10):
You’re in the hall of

An Ruda (46:11):
I’m sweating. All right. I’m

Jared Correia (46:12):
Going to mess. Just look back at Bob, get some encouragement.

An Ruda (46:15):
Okay, Bob. Bob, if I don’t get this, all right, Bob, I beat the shit out of you.

Jared Correia (46:23):
All right, here’s another one. I don’t want to know the law. I want to know the judge, lawyer, or rapper. That’s lawyers. I want to know the law. I want to know. It is.

An Ruda (46:35):
It

Jared Correia (46:35):
Is a lawyer.

An Ruda (46:36):
Lawyers are always so fucking arrogant. They always think, oh, I know the judge. He’s got to do something for me. Okay,

Jared Correia (46:44):
William Fallon, attorney known as the great mouthpiece. All right, two more. Two more. Got to keep the perfect streak going here. Here’s the next quote. Premature certainty is the enemy of truth. Premature certainty is the enemy of truth. Lawyer or rapper.

An Ruda (47:08):
I’m a go rapper. Oh,

Jared Correia (47:11):
You’re

An Ruda (47:11):
Right. Because lawyers

Jared Correia (47:17):
Are always the late hustle soul

An Ruda (47:20):
Because lawyers are always prematurely certain.

Jared Correia (47:25):
That is a good part. I was trying tricky on that one. I feel like that was a tough one.

An Ruda (47:29):
That was a hard one.

Jared Correia (47:31):
Now I’m sweating because my reputation is in serious trouble here. Because you have the chance to go 100% here. The last,

An Ruda (47:42):
Okay, Bob. Okay, Bob, help me out.

Jared Correia (47:45):
The last question. The more you say, the more vulnerable you are, control the information and you control the situation. The more you say, the more vulnerable you are. Control the information and you control the situation. Rapper or lawyer,

An Ruda (48:05):
That’s a lawyer statement.

Jared Correia (48:09):
My track record is intact. God damn it. But that was the closest anybody’s ever come. Now I was sweating. That was Mr. 50 50 cents.

An Ruda (48:25):
Oh, I love Pty too. I love Pty.

Jared Correia (48:31):
That was great. I love, do you prepare for this in advance? I’m impressed. No,

An Ruda (48:37):
No. I’d prepare for it. Well

Jared Correia (48:38):
Played Well, I’ll say that. That was fun. I would say that you were the true OG of the legal industry, so thank you for coming on. I appreciate it.

An Ruda (48:49):
Thank you.

Jared Correia (48:50):
Alright, we’ll have you back sometime. Take it easy.

An Ruda (48:54):
Okay, thanks Jared. See you soon.

Jared Correia (48:56):
Thanks to our guest, An Ruda, the CEO and co-managing partner at Bartko Pavia, LLP. To learn more about An and Bartko, visit bartko pavia.com. That’s BART like Simpson, Bart Simpson, KO like knockout. PAVI a.com. Barco pavia.com. Check ’em out now because I’ll always be a nineties kid who sadly never learned to Rollerblade, but his true passion is burning CDs for anyone who would listen. I’m now just doing the Martin version of that, which is creating Spotify playlist for every podcast episode that I record where the songs are tangentially related to an episode topic. For this week’s playlist, we’ve got rappers dropping lyrics about legal issues. It’s juris at the mic and is sponsored by Death Row records. No, it’s not, and I probably shouldn’t even say that. I mean, I don’t want Suge Knight hanging me off a building like he did with Rob Van Winkle. Join us next time when I spit even more. Fire.