November 15, 2023 • 30 mins
Picture your business caught up in the chaos of a disaster - may it be natural or manmade. Panic-stricken employees, clients bombarding you with questions, and a leadership team that is clueless about what to do next. Sounds like a situation you never want to be in, right? That's why we're talking with Jeffrey Weiss, founder of the Disaster Preparedness Network.
Jeffrey provides an overview of disaster preparedness - from setting up leadership structures to training responses to an active shooter situation. He reveals how the networks you develop can be leveraged to foster a community of preparedness and resilience.
Jeffrey also sheds light on how businesses can mitigate liability risks by investing in disaster management. In a world where disasters are no longer anomalies but rather frequent occurrences, being unprepared could lead to potential litigation and damage to reputation.
If you'd like to set up disaster processes in your firm, give Jeffrey and his team a call at (818) 624-4242 or email him directly at jeff@PreparednessTV.info.
BONUS: For Center Stage subscribers, Jeffrey is offering a free active shooter training course, which you can access by visiting https://training.preparednesstv.info/as-appointment. Even more, Jeffrey is offering his book, 60 Ways to Reward your teams, and your partner for being of value, for free by clicking here: https://tpn.mastermind.com/opt_in/2262
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
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Speaker 2 (00:53):
This is Center Stage putting your firm in the
spotlight by highlightingbusiness owners and other
industry experts to help takeyour firm to the next level.
Hey everyone, and welcome toCenter Stage.
I'm your host, John Henson, andtoday we're talking about
something that may not besomething that you're actively
considering when you're runningyour law firm, and that's
(01:15):
disaster prep.
Whether it's a natural disasteror maybe something else, it
really is something that youshould have a plan in place for
how your firm will continue tooperate in the event of some
sort of tragedy or disastertaking place.
And so, to help us with that, Iam joined by the founder of the
Disaster Preparedness Network,Jeffrey Weiss.
(01:35):
Thanks for joining us.
Speaker 3 (01:37):
Thank you, I appreciate it so much.
I'm so happy to be here.
I was looking at a lot of yourshows and really really good
work.
Speaker 2 (01:44):
Awesome, I appreciate that, and so, before we jump in
, tell us a little bit aboutyourself.
How'd you get involved in thisarea of work?
Speaker 3 (01:51):
Well, most of my life I've been a broadcast engineer
and I've been developingbroadcasting systems.
I've built over 250 TV stationswith one of my companies,
advantage Video Systems, and weprovide post facilities.
But also, besides being anengineer, I've been a force for
good in helping to volunteer.
(02:12):
When I was 10 years old, I hadthis dear friend that I had
known all my life and he wastragically killed by a drunk
driver.
And at 10 years old I wasdevastated.
I loved him.
And one thing I went toBaltimore to be with my
grandmother and we took a tripto Washington.
(02:32):
And on the trip to Washingtonwe went to the National Portrait
Gallery and there was anexhibit honoring the Roosevelt's
and I stood before this giantstatue of Eleanor Roosevelt and,
looking up her confidence, mygrandmother whispered her words
to me when you cease to make acontribution, you begin to die.
When you cease to make acontribution, you begin to die.
(02:54):
Those words echoed for me andsince then I have made my
passion to always do everythingto make a contribution.
I was working at anothercompany at 9-11 happened and I
had been volunteering givingblood for the Red Cross and I
told my boss I got to go helpout.
I got to go to New York andhelp out and he said no and I
(03:16):
said yes and I said no and hesaid yes and he said no and I
said I quit and I quit my job,went to New York, helped out
with the Red Cross in variousaspects and I really felt a
passion for giving back.
And ever since then I've beendisaster managers, shelter
supervisor, director oflogistics, director of public
relations officer, governmentrelations officer, feeding
(03:38):
manager, so on and so forth withthe Red Cross.
Plus, I've worked with CERT,the Community Emergence Response
Team developed by the firedepartment, and it's a community
member, people in the communitycoming together to help
community members and to dodisaster assessment and to help
out at different things.
We go on wildfires, we go outand do what's called water
(03:59):
stations where we give waterheight, we hydrate, we hydrate
the firefighters and stuff likethat.
So we really go out and engagewith the community and I've
developed connections with thefire department and done
training with them.
So I've done a lot of work indisaster, preparing for
disasters and I was talking withsome of my people and I was
(04:20):
like I put some YouTube videosout on disaster preparedness for
homes and I says well, why notbusinesses?
There's a big lack.
There's not that manybusinesses who are really
understanding how to preventdisasters and how to deal with
them.
And there's two aspects foryour listeners.
That is, first of all, how doesyour law firm or your company
(04:41):
prepare for disasters?
Second thing is how does yourclients prepare for disasters?
And so these law firms haveclients and there's a liability
rate.
There's a liability risk fordisasters If you are a company
and you don't prepare fordisasters, whether it's a
manmade disaster like activeshooters or riots or something
(05:02):
like that and insurrections,whatever we have, I don't know.
And then, or it's nature madehurricanes, fires, floods,
tornadoes, and they're giving memore and more prevalence.
We've had more and more firesevery year, more and more
hurricanes every year, and thesehurricanes are getting much
more fierce.
Tornadoes are up 60% over yearand flooding is a drastic thing.
(05:30):
We have levees.
I mean as much as Biden and theDemocrats are building, helping
to build infrastructure withgoing even into Republican
states and repairing dams.
There's still a massive amountsof these things that are over
the age and levees can break andthings can happen.
(05:51):
Rainstorms can cause massflooding because we're
overpopulating this.
We're going into more and moreareas and putting homes in these
things, and then floods comeand they do that.
So disaster preparation issomething that I take very
personally and I want to help alot of people.
So I said I'm going to turnthis into a business opportunity
because and it's a reallyincredible, powerful thing and
(06:16):
so we do a couple of differentthings.
We do disaster preparationshuge companies about how to
prepare for disasters, and notonly just how to prepare for
disasters, but most companieswho do oh I'm a pair of
disasters, I'll get some drygoods, I'll get some this and
that, but that's only part of it.
You have to build a leadershipstructure to lead your teams in
(06:40):
how to prepare for disasters,and if you don't get prepared,
it's amazing.
There was an incident in Texaslast year in the winter storm
and this huge storm came out.
It was like a vastly powerfulstorm and parents couldn't
communicate with their kidsbecause the company didn't have
cell phones went out, cell phonetowers went out and their
landlines went out, so they hadno way of communicating.
(07:02):
So what do doble parents do?
They got in their car and theydrove to get their kids right.
That's probably what most of youwould do, right?
So the problem is that thestorm got so severe and the only
way the parents were crossingthis bridge and they got frozen
on the bridge and four peoplefroze to death from that company
.
Now, after that, the kids weresafe, the school had a program I
(07:28):
tell you the families of thosefour people they got their own
lawyers and that company is nolonger in existence because the
liability issue, because theydidn't have a proper
communication system.
If they had had one person be aham operator or had a satellite
phone, because there's no snowin this space, and so if they
(07:52):
had set up some kind ofcommunications plan FEMA has it,
red Cross has communicationsplans these different things
have different levels ofcommunication that you could
have done and all it would havetook is a few dollars and a few
minutes, a few moments of theirtime to really lay out these
things.
But many people don't know howor don't know that there is a
need for this or that.
You know.
Speaker 2 (08:11):
Yeah, so you know, let's talk about natural
disasters Because I mean, youknow, I've been working with
lawyers for nine years now.
I've known of clients inCalifornia who've been displaced
by wildfires.
I've known of you know clientsin the Midwest who've been
displaced by flooding.
I've known clients in Floridawho've been displaced by
hurricanes Like.
I've seen so many differentexamples of this.
(08:33):
What does a preparation plan oreven a response look like for a
small firm, a small business,when it comes to some of these
natural disasters?
Speaker 3 (08:45):
So it all starts with leadership.
Everything rises and falls withleadership.
You have to have the properleaders in place to lead your
teams and you must do drills andyou must drill these things.
And you know, I say preparationstarts in the office but it
expands to the community.
So you have to have the rightleaders to take on this task.
(09:08):
Okay, so you have to findpeople who are inspired about
this and who want to help theirpeople and who want to take this
on, because you have to haveleadership on it and if anybody
leave this thing, it's nevergoing to happen.
Yeah, you're going to go to thelocal supply stop.
You're going to buy some firstaid kits.
You're going to buy this orthat.
You're going to watch somevideos.
Oh, I need to buy a little gokit, but the go kit is going to
(09:30):
expire.
The band aid is going to themedications and the things that
the first aid kits going toexpire.
No one's going to be able tofind it during a panic.
If you don't have the rightleadership, nothing else.
Everything rises and falls withleadership, and that's with any
business.
If you have a business, if youdon't have proper leaders and
you're not inspiring people tocreate new leaders, then you're
(09:52):
out of business.
You know you can start abusiness.
This you know I was looking atyour company and your marketing
and all this stuff and theincredible people.
You have to go out there and doall handle people's social
media and and take in the slackthat these people can do.
But you do that because youlead by example.
Your company leads by exampleand that's the.
That's the thing.
So it all starts withleadership, but then it starts
(10:13):
after leadership.
It starts with creating thecorrect planning and
infrastructure.
So you have to do that.
So there's there's there's fourpillars to a disaster
preparedness plan.
First of all, there's afoundation of what kind of
equipment and the tools you needand having the right tools in
place and having the rightmechanisms and softwares and and
(10:35):
so that second is having theright leadership and developing
that.
The third problem is to createpublic and private partnerships.
You know, when you are planningfor disasters, you've got to
plan where you're going to go,what resources you're going to
go, where can you go for help?
Am I going to go?
Where's a local fire department?
Where is a local place that theRed Cross is setting up
(10:56):
shelters?
I got to know where thoseplaces, those shelter locations,
are, because if I need toevacuate, I need to send my
people there.
I don't need to send my peopleto an area where no one's going
to know where we are and we getlost and forgotten.
We need to go where it is.
So creating the right publicand private partnerships are
that engaging with the community.
And then the fourth is showingappreciation.
(11:17):
When you are building a, whenyou're building a plan, when
you're building a plan to getout there and to and your whole
team is involved in doing thatyou need to show appreciation to
the people who are planningthis so that they are inspired
to keep it up.
Because if you just say, okay,I want you to be a leader and to
(11:39):
plan this thing out, and that'sfine, and that's your and
that's, I'm adding that ontoyour job, and that's it, and
then you don't show them howmuch you appreciate them.
They're going to find reasonsnot to do it.
They're going to say, oh, mykids and I can't do it this week
, they're going to find ways to.
When you show a preach, whenyou don't show appreciation,
people notice that, but when youdo show appreciation, people
(12:00):
notice that even more and theybecome more inspired to take
that on.
So those are the four pillarsof creating a disaster plan
organization, leadership,partners and rewards.
Speaker 2 (12:13):
Nice, I love it, and so I want to come back to that
for a second.
But I want to kind of ask aboutthe other kind of element of
disaster prep and theunfortunate nature especially as
you talked about naturaldisasters becoming more
prevalent also seems like a lotof these active shooter
situations are becoming moreprevalent and a lot of our
(12:35):
audience might even be sittinghere thinking like I'm a small
law firm, it could never happento me and it's like no, like
there was a situation last yearthere was a small law firm in my
hometown where a client was ina meeting.
He apparently didn't like howit went and got up and started
(12:55):
brandishing a gun.
A lawyer ended up getting shotand killed in the office, and
you know it's so.
Those sorts of things do happen.
So what are, what are some ofthe elements of an active
shooter training that firmsshould probably think about
having as part of their plans?
Speaker 3 (13:14):
Well, I'm going to.
I'm going to say a common thing.
It all rises and falls withleadership, but you know so if
you have, because if you havegood leaders, leaders are not
loners.
Most active shooter or peoplewho do things, are loners.
There's three major reasons whypeople conduct active shooter
instances.
One is lack of communication.
Every active shooter thatthey've looked at, every single
(13:38):
one, whether they looked attheir diaries because they're no
longer alive or whether they'veinterviewed them because
they're in prison, all of themhave said no one would
communicate, no one couldcommunicate with me.
So that guy in that, in that, inthat meeting with those lawyers
, didn't get the rightcommunication level.
Okay, there was not a, therewas, there was a breakdown in
(13:59):
communication.
That's what caused that problem.
You know, obviously there wassome other issues on in his, in
his way, but if the right, if hehad been communicated, if the
right communication levels weredone, you know, then that may
have mitigated that.
That's you got to learn how tocommunicate properly, learn how
to you know, and it's you know,what lawyers do.
(14:21):
Lawyers go into court, lawyersgo into meetings and they
communicate for their clients,but a lot.
And they know how tocommunicate to clients on a
legal aspect, but how do youcommunicate with people on a
different aspect, on connectingwith them.
And so that's one thing wetrain on, we trade on leadership
, we're john max will leadershipcoaches, and so part of all in
all of our training, ourfoundation is is leadership and
(14:43):
communication, and so that's themain thing is how do you?
You know?
So that's the thing.
Second thing is people.
People also commit.
Commit these acts because notonly communication, but because
of of they feel isolated, theyfeel like loners, they feel like
they're so when you promotepeople as a leader, they no
(15:04):
longer are a loner.
A loner is a leader, is not aloner by definition.
A leader.
You know, if you're a leaderand you're going up a hill,
there's no one behind you.
You're a hiker, not a lead nota, not a leader, you know.
And so that's what you need todo.
You need to inspire people tobecome leaders, and and when
people are leaders, they are notloners and they become powerful
(15:26):
people in it.
So that's, that's the secondthing.
The third thing is you got todo, when you know reason these
actions is because people don'tknow the rights, how to see the
signs.
There are signs to you know.
No one wakes up one morning andbecomes an active shooter.
People have signs.
There are things that people do.
You know.
The people are coming in andthey're late to work all the
(15:46):
time.
Something is causing them tocome to late to work.
Maybe they're having maritalproblems.
Maybe they're there, they'rethey're.
Maybe they had somebody passedaway in their life and they're
having that stress.
Maybe they're going bankrupt,something like this, something
is stressed in their life.
Maybe they're just not, they'rejust not managing time
correctly.
So, and also people who argue alot at work.
(16:08):
If you have people, if you havea client that comes in and he's
always argued menative, I meanwe all, we are adversely, you
know, but lawyers have deal withpeople who are adversarial in
its nature, but if you, there'sa level of different being
adversary and beingargumentative.
If you have people who arealways starting or being
involved in arguments, those arepeople who are at risk, you
(16:31):
know.
If you have people who aredepressed all the time these are
some then there's a number ofdifferent signs that we can that
we demonstrate on our classesthat teach people about what to
look for and what the sciencedoing, how to mitigate those
things.
One of the things that we say isthe absolute best way to turn
people from these kind of thingsto not is volunteerism.
(16:54):
You know, when you're abusiness, the three most
important things in any businessis retaining your best
employees, attracting your bestemployees and building your
company brand so that people,your clients and your investors
and the community sees you in apositive outlight.
Now, nothing does that cheaperand more powerfully than
(17:17):
volunteering as a community, asa business.
So if you volunteer as abusiness, then you go out there,
your employees gain a sense ofworth and accomplishment, which
makes them better employees,less likely to do harmful things
at work, less likely to steal,less likely to say bad words or
do big instances like aftershooters.
Your client, your new employee,the new lawyers you want to
(17:38):
come work for you are going tolook for you and say, well,
great, I make great margins, butI also help them marginalized,
and so they're more apt to cometo want to work for your firm
instead of that guy down thestreet.
And then, third of all, thecommunity sees that you're
giving back and helping people.
And, like I said before, whenyou're not visible, these things
, when people don't see yougiving back, when they don't see
(17:59):
you doing things in thecommunity, then they see that.
But when you do, people seethat even more.
When you're at the local foodbank handing out food, when
you're at the local churchhelping people, when you're at
the local, you know, when you'reat the local Red Cross helping
people to do that, people noticethat and you get.
And that's and it's more thanjust a smart business
(18:22):
opportunity.
It's a great opportunity forbuilding your business and it
reduces the act of our tutors.
Speaker 2 (18:27):
Yeah, no, and I love that.
And you know just some of thethings that I've heard so far in
terms of you know howbusinesses can help themselves.
It's it sounds obviously itstarts with the leadership but
it's developing that culture ofyou know the volunteering and
just you know having that, youknow giving that, having that
giving mindset and stuff likethat.
(18:48):
You know one of the otherquestions that I wanted to ask
you you know, growing up inschool we would always do like
fire drills or tornado drills orstuff like that.
Is there an element of thatthat you encourage businesses to
have where, even if it's likeonce a year, to just kind of
review the disaster prep andresponse policies, doing any
(19:10):
sort of like mock scenarios,anything like that?
Like what do you suggest in anongoing?
Speaker 3 (19:14):
Absolutely.
Part of our program is buildingdrills for you.
When we do those things, webuild a set of drill exercises
that we drill and you don't wantto do them once a year.
You don't want them doing twicea year.
You want to do them as often asyou can.
You know I have people who dothem every month.
You know they get they do themevery.
I have people you know who dothem every month, but they also
(19:35):
send out reminders all the timeon different things that people
know, because you, at least atminimal, need to do it every
quarter at minimal.
Because you know people have athing called muscle memory and
when a disaster happens,everything you know goes out the
window.
When people panic, when there'san active shooter, when there's
(19:56):
a flooding, when there's a fire, when these things happen, our
minds go blank.
That's what happens Now.
If you drill this in and createa muscle memory, then it
becomes second nature and it'snot something you have to
remember, it's something thatyou know.
You know to go to this location, you know where the kits are,
(20:18):
you know that they haven'texpired because you have a date
on your kits, on your go-bags,that tell you this has not
expired, and I researched this.
I know what's in the kit, youknow.
I know what's in the kitbecause I looked at it a month
ago, you know.
And so these are things that wedo.
So we have a set of drills andpeople drill this over and over
and over again and you know, Ihad this one incident with this
(20:40):
company and we were doing thesedrills and they were doing
damage assessment and the jobwas for this team to go and,
from body to body, see what waswrong with these people and move
on to the next body.
And these people would come.
And they went to this guy andit was at mannequin and it said
lost leg bleeding, you know.
(21:02):
So the guy stopped the bleedingokay, which is good when it
stopped the bleeding from theperson's leg and then you need
to move on.
But he didn't want to move onbecause he said oh, this is my
friend, I can't move on becausehe was so invested in this thing
and he couldn't get out of it.
He couldn't get that mindset togo, move to the next thing.
But if he doesn't move on andassess all these other people,
(21:24):
yeah, he may save that oneperson, but seven other people
are going to die.
So you've got to drill in thesepeople so these people
understand and they cancomprehend how to do this.
And so, yeah, we drill all thetime, just like your school did.
Speaker 2 (21:38):
Yeah, no, and that's really really good stuff and so
share with us.
You know how can people get intouch with you to learn more
about just setting up any kindof preparation, training or
system or anything like thatthat you can help them out with.
Speaker 3 (21:56):
Thank, you Certainly so.
We have a couple of differentprograms that we do, but you can
.
You can reach us on our website, which is PreparednessTVinfo.
You go to preparednessTVinfoand at preparednessTVinfo like
right there you can you you cansign up and for an appointment
and talk with us.
We have disaster preparednessprograms that treats you about
(22:17):
fires, floods, earthquakes,tornadoes, all these things.
We have active shooter trainingwe do, where we train people
and it's a whole thing and it'susually an online course.
We train people about activeshooters and we go through the
whole program and it's not onlyjust you know how to do.
We have a three phase activeshooter program.
One is what happens before anincident happens.
(22:38):
How can you mitigate it?
How can you stop the?
Because the best active shooterincident is the one that never
happens, yeah, so how can youmitigate it and what programs
can you?
You instigate that to mitigatethat thing, and how can you?
In the second part we do is thecommon run hide fight program
that everyone knows.
You got to run away first.
If you can't run away, you hide.
(22:59):
If you can't hide and you can'trun away, then you fight, and
the fighting is not tactical,military fighting.
You know.
No one needs to fight a.
You know all this thing andpeople say, oh, every, we should
arm everybody because then theneverybody can stop the active
shooter.
Well, the problem is thatshooting someone is not an easy
thing to do.
Believe me, I know, you know, Iwas in the military it is not
(23:20):
an easy thing to do, to pull atrigger and kill somebody.
The police don't just pick up agun one day and say I'm going
to go and do this thing.
They train every single day Todo that.
You know so.
Giving everybody guns justmakes more guns and more
problems.
So you, we teach people not tolearn how to fight, but learn
how to defend themselves so theycan run away.
(23:43):
You know so.
It's not.
It's not run hide, fight, fight, kill them.
Yeah, you should fight andsubdue them, but if you, but you
need to subdue them to, or stopthem to a point where you can
get away Because the police arecoming.
Active shooter instances areusually on on, or usually over
within 15 minutes when theystart, so it's not like it's a
(24:05):
lot of time.
So we teach you that.
And then the third part is whathappens after an incident,
because that could be the mostimportant thing, how you know.
You know, basically, mostcompanies throw up their arms
and say, hey, I'm going to letthe officials to feel it.
You know, handle thing.
Problem is officials do nothave your best interest at heart
.
What they have is they'regetting elected and they're
(24:25):
political donors.
You know who.
Whatever you know, and and andtheir political ideology, that's
what they have at heart.
Your business and your brand isway down the line.
Yeah, and the media alsodoesn't have your best interest
in art.
What they care about is their,their, their, their media's
agenda, whether it's right wingor left wing, and Getting the
(24:47):
clicks.
So if they can trash yourbusiness and trash your people
and get more clicks, they'regonna do that.
Yeah, you know, I don't.
You know you, we see it all thetime and the and the and the.
You know.
So we teach you how to createpublic relations officers, to
talk with those people mediarelations officers and then
Disaster mental health people,because you need to take care of
(25:09):
your people.
You know to get them back towork, because the best cure is
to get back to work.
You know, and you need to beinvolved in every aspect, and we
go through a whole trainingprocess on this.
So we do that and and so we do.
You know natural disasters,active shooters.
And then we have a anothercourse that is really popular.
That's our corporate culturalservice, where we teach people
(25:29):
how to create a whole volunteerstructure, like I talked about.
You know how to get, how togive back, how to create the
organization, the leaders, thepartner, partners and giving,
and how to how to be a b-corpcertification, how to align
yourself with the 17 goals, theun, how to get public and
private Great, how to get grantsand loans and let to pay for
the thing.
You know all these things weteach on this whole program and
(25:50):
you can find that on our on ourpage as well, and I'll put the.
I'll give you the links to putnotes down in the field so you
can put notes on this edit, onthis video, so that people can
find all these differentprograms that we offer.
And For a limited time, we havea really cool offer that we're
offering your listeners, whichis for a limited time.
We have a free active shootertraining program.
(26:10):
It includes a pre-assessmentmeeting, valued at $500.
It includes a two hour or twoand a half hour active shooter
training program, valued at $500per person and up to 25 people
in that class, and it involvesan after-class assessment
meeting with your, with yourleaders, to figure out what your
(26:31):
next steps are.
And so we offer all this forfree.
It's a 14 up to $14,000, and foryour listeners and people who
subscribe, you have to besubscribed, you have to
subscribe this channel, you haveto like this video and, and, if
you like, and and, subscribe tothis channel, and then we will
give you a free active shooterprogram that will enable you to
To to protect your people, andit really covers the entire
(26:54):
thing.
It's it, we cover the wholepull back, and so we offer that
so that you can reach us.
Like I said, my email is jeffat preparedness tvinfo, jeff at
preparedness tvinfo.
My phone number is 818-624-4242, that's 818-624-4242, and of
course, we'll put all the linksand stuff like that in the in
the fields here, so you can, youcan contact with us, but that's
(27:16):
how to get in contact with them.
We have a lot of trainingprogram, a lot of leadership
programs, all that.
Speaker 2 (27:21):
Yeah, awesome.
Yeah, and I mean you know, Iknow, I know what we Don't have
here and I would be willing tobet that a lot of our audience
this is just something that theyhave just never really actively
thought about as being just areally important aspect of how
they run their firms.
And so I really appreciate youcoming on, really appreciate you
(27:42):
sharing all of this insight,and I really do encourage people
to go Uh and check outeverything that you have and
take advantage of this offer.
And so, before we wrap up, Ihave one final question for you,
and that is, if you had onefinal piece of advice for our
listeners, what would it be?
Speaker 3 (27:59):
I would say, to really inspire your people to
become leaders and to open linesof communication.
I can't stress that enough.
I would say that it really yourbusiness does it.
People think about these thingsand they think about oh, this
is extra stuff, it's notsomething that adds to the
bottom line, but it's the samething about what your services
(28:22):
are, what your firm does and theway it does is.
It's not just SEO, you're notjust an SEO and marketing
company.
You really take it to the nextlevel and do the things that and
people think, oh, these extrathings, they don't add to my
bottom line, but they do.
My training and your servicesadd to the bottom line of these
companies.
So really invest in thesethings.
(28:43):
Right now, in the state ofCalifornia, active shooter
trainings are mandated by thestate of California and in many
states it's mandated.
So if you don't have theseprograms in state, another law
firm is going to sue you,because I don't know whether
your people know this, butlawyers are litigious.
Yeah, a little bit, and if youdon't properly protect yourself
(29:05):
and your employees, law firmswill sue you, your employees
will sue you and the communitywill.
But I would say one additionalthing it's important that when
disasters happen, your companyresponds to the community.
That's one thing I didn't sayhere, because that would really
help build your company's brandout there.
You can put all the billboardson them and say if you're in an
accident, call me, but reallywhat does that is when you're
(29:30):
out there in the communities instress and your company is out.
Your law firm is out thereresponding and helping people
working in disasters, givingfree legal advice at a disaster
site.
So people don't just think I'mtalking to a, I'm talking to a
service, offer free legal adviceand do these things and get out
there and engage with thecommunity when these disasters
happen, and that will help buildyour company too.
Speaker 2 (29:54):
Yeah, absolutely.
This has been really great.
I know I've learned a lot.
I didn't realize, honestly, howdeep this really went, and so
there are some ideas that I'mgoing to even take to our
leadership team to potentiallystart doing some of this
implementation as well.
So I know some of my favoriteepisodes are the ones that I
walk away with some ideas andlearning a lot of stuff too.
(30:14):
So I really appreciate youcoming on and thank you all out
there for continuing to listen.
Please rate and review the showand so that new episodes get
downloaded automatically, andthat's going to do it for us
this week.
Jeff, thanks so much forjoining us.
Speaker 3 (30:27):
All right, Thank you.
Everybody Subscribe and likeand comment.
Thanks for listening.
Speaker 2 (30:34):
To learn more, go to spotlightbrandingcom.
Slash center stage.
This podcast is brought to you by Spotlight
Branding.
Whether your firm only gets afew referrals or it's 100% of
your business, you have theopportunity to double your
referrals through educational,informative content.
The pros at Spotlight Brandingcan help you create that content
through blogging videos, emailnewsletters and more All
(00:22):
designed to help you increaseyour referrals and attract the
kinds of clients you want towork with.
Visit spotlightbrandingcomslash pod to learn more.
That's spotlightbrandingcomslash pod.
Speaker 2 (00:53):
This is Center Stage putting your firm in the
spotlight by highlightingbusiness owners and other
industry experts to help takeyour firm to the next level.
Hey everyone, and welcome toCenter Stage.
I'm your host, John Henson, andtoday we're talking about
something that may not besomething that you're actively
considering when you're runningyour law firm, and that's
(01:15):
disaster prep.
Whether it's a natural disasteror maybe something else, it
really is something that youshould have a plan in place for
how your firm will continue tooperate in the event of some
sort of tragedy or disastertaking place.
And so, to help us with that, Iam joined by the founder of the
Disaster Preparedness Network,Jeffrey Weiss.
(01:35):
Thanks for joining us.
Speaker 3 (01:37):
Thank you, I appreciate it so much.
I'm so happy to be here.
I was looking at a lot of yourshows and really really good
work.
Speaker 2 (01:44):
Awesome, I appreciate that, and so, before we jump in
, tell us a little bit aboutyourself.
How'd you get involved in thisarea of work?
Speaker 3 (01:51):
Well, most of my life I've been a broadcast engineer
and I've been developingbroadcasting systems.
I've built over 250 TV stationswith one of my companies,
advantage Video Systems, and weprovide post facilities.
But also, besides being anengineer, I've been a force for
good in helping to volunteer.
(02:12):
When I was 10 years old, I hadthis dear friend that I had
known all my life and he wastragically killed by a drunk
driver.
And at 10 years old I wasdevastated.
I loved him.
And one thing I went toBaltimore to be with my
grandmother and we took a tripto Washington.
(02:32):
And on the trip to Washingtonwe went to the National Portrait
Gallery and there was anexhibit honoring the Roosevelt's
and I stood before this giantstatue of Eleanor Roosevelt and,
looking up her confidence, mygrandmother whispered her words
to me when you cease to make acontribution, you begin to die.
When you cease to make acontribution, you begin to die.
(02:54):
Those words echoed for me andsince then I have made my
passion to always do everythingto make a contribution.
I was working at anothercompany at 9-11 happened and I
had been volunteering givingblood for the Red Cross and I
told my boss I got to go helpout.
I got to go to New York andhelp out and he said no and I
(03:16):
said yes and I said no and hesaid yes and he said no and I
said I quit and I quit my job,went to New York, helped out
with the Red Cross in variousaspects and I really felt a
passion for giving back.
And ever since then I've beendisaster managers, shelter
supervisor, director oflogistics, director of public
relations officer, governmentrelations officer, feeding
(03:38):
manager, so on and so forth withthe Red Cross.
Plus, I've worked with CERT,the Community Emergence Response
Team developed by the firedepartment, and it's a community
member, people in the communitycoming together to help
community members and to dodisaster assessment and to help
out at different things.
We go on wildfires, we go outand do what's called water
(03:59):
stations where we give waterheight, we hydrate, we hydrate
the firefighters and stuff likethat.
So we really go out and engagewith the community and I've
developed connections with thefire department and done
training with them.
So I've done a lot of work indisaster, preparing for
disasters and I was talking withsome of my people and I was
(04:20):
like I put some YouTube videosout on disaster preparedness for
homes and I says well, why notbusinesses?
There's a big lack.
There's not that manybusinesses who are really
understanding how to preventdisasters and how to deal with
them.
And there's two aspects foryour listeners.
That is, first of all, how doesyour law firm or your company
(04:41):
prepare for disasters?
Second thing is how does yourclients prepare for disasters?
And so these law firms haveclients and there's a liability
rate.
There's a liability risk fordisasters If you are a company
and you don't prepare fordisasters, whether it's a
manmade disaster like activeshooters or riots or something
(05:02):
like that and insurrections,whatever we have, I don't know.
And then, or it's nature madehurricanes, fires, floods,
tornadoes, and they're giving memore and more prevalence.
We've had more and more firesevery year, more and more
hurricanes every year, and thesehurricanes are getting much
more fierce.
Tornadoes are up 60% over yearand flooding is a drastic thing.
(05:30):
We have levees.
I mean as much as Biden and theDemocrats are building, helping
to build infrastructure withgoing even into Republican
states and repairing dams.
There's still a massive amountsof these things that are over
the age and levees can break andthings can happen.
(05:51):
Rainstorms can cause massflooding because we're
overpopulating this.
We're going into more and moreareas and putting homes in these
things, and then floods comeand they do that.
So disaster preparation issomething that I take very
personally and I want to help alot of people.
So I said I'm going to turnthis into a business opportunity
because and it's a reallyincredible, powerful thing and
(06:16):
so we do a couple of differentthings.
We do disaster preparationshuge companies about how to
prepare for disasters, and notonly just how to prepare for
disasters, but most companieswho do oh I'm a pair of
disasters, I'll get some drygoods, I'll get some this and
that, but that's only part of it.
You have to build a leadershipstructure to lead your teams in
(06:40):
how to prepare for disasters,and if you don't get prepared,
it's amazing.
There was an incident in Texaslast year in the winter storm
and this huge storm came out.
It was like a vastly powerfulstorm and parents couldn't
communicate with their kidsbecause the company didn't have
cell phones went out, cell phonetowers went out and their
landlines went out, so they hadno way of communicating.
(07:02):
So what do doble parents do?
They got in their car and theydrove to get their kids right.
That's probably what most of youwould do, right?
So the problem is that thestorm got so severe and the only
way the parents were crossingthis bridge and they got frozen
on the bridge and four peoplefroze to death from that company
.
Now, after that, the kids weresafe, the school had a program I
(07:28):
tell you the families of thosefour people they got their own
lawyers and that company is nolonger in existence because the
liability issue, because theydidn't have a proper
communication system.
If they had had one person be aham operator or had a satellite
phone, because there's no snowin this space, and so if they
(07:52):
had set up some kind ofcommunications plan FEMA has it,
red Cross has communicationsplans these different things
have different levels ofcommunication that you could
have done and all it would havetook is a few dollars and a few
minutes, a few moments of theirtime to really lay out these
things.
But many people don't know howor don't know that there is a
need for this or that.
You know.
Speaker 2 (08:11):
Yeah, so you know, let's talk about natural
disasters Because I mean, youknow, I've been working with
lawyers for nine years now.
I've known of clients inCalifornia who've been displaced
by wildfires.
I've known of you know clientsin the Midwest who've been
displaced by flooding.
I've known clients in Floridawho've been displaced by
hurricanes Like.
I've seen so many differentexamples of this.
(08:33):
What does a preparation plan oreven a response look like for a
small firm, a small business,when it comes to some of these
natural disasters?
Speaker 3 (08:45):
So it all starts with leadership.
Everything rises and falls withleadership.
You have to have the properleaders in place to lead your
teams and you must do drills andyou must drill these things.
And you know, I say preparationstarts in the office but it
expands to the community.
So you have to have the rightleaders to take on this task.
(09:08):
Okay, so you have to findpeople who are inspired about
this and who want to help theirpeople and who want to take this
on, because you have to haveleadership on it and if anybody
leave this thing, it's nevergoing to happen.
Yeah, you're going to go to thelocal supply stop.
You're going to buy some firstaid kits.
You're going to buy this orthat.
You're going to watch somevideos.
Oh, I need to buy a little gokit, but the go kit is going to
(09:30):
expire.
The band aid is going to themedications and the things that
the first aid kits going toexpire.
No one's going to be able tofind it during a panic.
If you don't have the rightleadership, nothing else.
Everything rises and falls withleadership, and that's with any
business.
If you have a business, if youdon't have proper leaders and
you're not inspiring people tocreate new leaders, then you're
(09:52):
out of business.
You know you can start abusiness.
This you know I was looking atyour company and your marketing
and all this stuff and theincredible people.
You have to go out there and doall handle people's social
media and and take in the slackthat these people can do.
But you do that because youlead by example.
Your company leads by exampleand that's the.
That's the thing.
So it all starts withleadership, but then it starts
(10:13):
after leadership.
It starts with creating thecorrect planning and
infrastructure.
So you have to do that.
So there's there's there's fourpillars to a disaster
preparedness plan.
First of all, there's afoundation of what kind of
equipment and the tools you needand having the right tools in
place and having the rightmechanisms and softwares and and
(10:35):
so that second is having theright leadership and developing
that.
The third problem is to createpublic and private partnerships.
You know, when you are planningfor disasters, you've got to
plan where you're going to go,what resources you're going to
go, where can you go for help?
Am I going to go?
Where's a local fire department?
Where is a local place that theRed Cross is setting up
(10:56):
shelters?
I got to know where thoseplaces, those shelter locations,
are, because if I need toevacuate, I need to send my
people there.
I don't need to send my peopleto an area where no one's going
to know where we are and we getlost and forgotten.
We need to go where it is.
So creating the right publicand private partnerships are
that engaging with the community.
And then the fourth is showingappreciation.
(11:17):
When you are building a, whenyou're building a plan, when
you're building a plan to getout there and to and your whole
team is involved in doing thatyou need to show appreciation to
the people who are planningthis so that they are inspired
to keep it up.
Because if you just say, okay,I want you to be a leader and to
(11:39):
plan this thing out, and that'sfine, and that's your and
that's, I'm adding that ontoyour job, and that's it, and
then you don't show them howmuch you appreciate them.
They're going to find reasonsnot to do it.
They're going to say, oh, mykids and I can't do it this week
, they're going to find ways to.
When you show a preach, whenyou don't show appreciation,
people notice that, but when youdo show appreciation, people
(12:00):
notice that even more and theybecome more inspired to take
that on.
So those are the four pillarsof creating a disaster plan
organization, leadership,partners and rewards.
Speaker 2 (12:13):
Nice, I love it, and so I want to come back to that
for a second.
But I want to kind of ask aboutthe other kind of element of
disaster prep and theunfortunate nature especially as
you talked about naturaldisasters becoming more
prevalent also seems like a lotof these active shooter
situations are becoming moreprevalent and a lot of our
(12:35):
audience might even be sittinghere thinking like I'm a small
law firm, it could never happento me and it's like no, like
there was a situation last yearthere was a small law firm in my
hometown where a client was ina meeting.
He apparently didn't like howit went and got up and started
(12:55):
brandishing a gun.
A lawyer ended up getting shotand killed in the office, and
you know it's so.
Those sorts of things do happen.
So what are, what are some ofthe elements of an active
shooter training that firmsshould probably think about
having as part of their plans?
Speaker 3 (13:14):
Well, I'm going to.
I'm going to say a common thing.
It all rises and falls withleadership, but you know so if
you have, because if you havegood leaders, leaders are not
loners.
Most active shooter or peoplewho do things, are loners.
There's three major reasons whypeople conduct active shooter
instances.
One is lack of communication.
Every active shooter thatthey've looked at, every single
(13:38):
one, whether they looked attheir diaries because they're no
longer alive or whether they'veinterviewed them because
they're in prison, all of themhave said no one would
communicate, no one couldcommunicate with me.
So that guy in that, in that, inthat meeting with those lawyers
, didn't get the rightcommunication level.
Okay, there was not a, therewas, there was a breakdown in
(13:59):
communication.
That's what caused that problem.
You know, obviously there wassome other issues on in his, in
his way, but if the right, if hehad been communicated, if the
right communication levels weredone, you know, then that may
have mitigated that.
That's you got to learn how tocommunicate properly, learn how
to you know, and it's you know,what lawyers do.
(14:21):
Lawyers go into court, lawyersgo into meetings and they
communicate for their clients,but a lot.
And they know how tocommunicate to clients on a
legal aspect, but how do youcommunicate with people on a
different aspect, on connectingwith them.
And so that's one thing wetrain on, we trade on leadership
, we're john max will leadershipcoaches, and so part of all in
all of our training, ourfoundation is is leadership and
(14:43):
communication, and so that's themain thing is how do you?
You know?
So that's the thing.
Second thing is people.
People also commit.
Commit these acts because notonly communication, but because
of of they feel isolated, theyfeel like loners, they feel like
they're so when you promotepeople as a leader, they no
(15:04):
longer are a loner.
A loner is a leader, is not aloner by definition.
A leader.
You know, if you're a leaderand you're going up a hill,
there's no one behind you.
You're a hiker, not a lead nota, not a leader, you know.
And so that's what you need todo.
You need to inspire people tobecome leaders, and and when
people are leaders, they are notloners and they become powerful
(15:26):
people in it.
So that's, that's the secondthing.
The third thing is you got todo, when you know reason these
actions is because people don'tknow the rights, how to see the
signs.
There are signs to you know.
No one wakes up one morning andbecomes an active shooter.
People have signs.
There are things that people do.
You know.
The people are coming in andthey're late to work all the
(15:46):
time.
Something is causing them tocome to late to work.
Maybe they're having maritalproblems.
Maybe they're there, they'rethey're.
Maybe they had somebody passedaway in their life and they're
having that stress.
Maybe they're going bankrupt,something like this, something
is stressed in their life.
Maybe they're just not, they'rejust not managing time
correctly.
So, and also people who argue alot at work.
(16:08):
If you have people, if you havea client that comes in and he's
always argued menative, I meanwe all, we are adversely, you
know, but lawyers have deal withpeople who are adversarial in
its nature, but if you, there'sa level of different being
adversary and beingargumentative.
If you have people who arealways starting or being
involved in arguments, those arepeople who are at risk, you
(16:31):
know.
If you have people who aredepressed all the time these are
some then there's a number ofdifferent signs that we can that
we demonstrate on our classesthat teach people about what to
look for and what the sciencedoing, how to mitigate those
things.
One of the things that we say isthe absolute best way to turn
people from these kind of thingsto not is volunteerism.
(16:54):
You know, when you're abusiness, the three most
important things in any businessis retaining your best
employees, attracting your bestemployees and building your
company brand so that people,your clients and your investors
and the community sees you in apositive outlight.
Now, nothing does that cheaperand more powerfully than
(17:17):
volunteering as a community, asa business.
So if you volunteer as abusiness, then you go out there,
your employees gain a sense ofworth and accomplishment, which
makes them better employees,less likely to do harmful things
at work, less likely to steal,less likely to say bad words or
do big instances like aftershooters.
Your client, your new employee,the new lawyers you want to
(17:38):
come work for you are going tolook for you and say, well,
great, I make great margins, butI also help them marginalized,
and so they're more apt to cometo want to work for your firm
instead of that guy down thestreet.
And then, third of all, thecommunity sees that you're
giving back and helping people.
And, like I said before, whenyou're not visible, these things
, when people don't see yougiving back, when they don't see
(17:59):
you doing things in thecommunity, then they see that.
But when you do, people seethat even more.
When you're at the local foodbank handing out food, when
you're at the local churchhelping people, when you're at
the local, you know, when you'reat the local Red Cross helping
people to do that, people noticethat and you get.
And that's and it's more thanjust a smart business
(18:22):
opportunity.
It's a great opportunity forbuilding your business and it
reduces the act of our tutors.
Speaker 2 (18:27):
Yeah, no, and I love that.
And you know just some of thethings that I've heard so far in
terms of you know howbusinesses can help themselves.
It's it sounds obviously itstarts with the leadership but
it's developing that culture ofyou know the volunteering and
just you know having that, youknow giving that, having that
giving mindset and stuff likethat.
(18:48):
You know one of the otherquestions that I wanted to ask
you you know, growing up inschool we would always do like
fire drills or tornado drills orstuff like that.
Is there an element of thatthat you encourage businesses to
have where, even if it's likeonce a year, to just kind of
review the disaster prep andresponse policies, doing any
(19:10):
sort of like mock scenarios,anything like that?
Like what do you suggest in anongoing?
Speaker 3 (19:14):
Absolutely.
Part of our program is buildingdrills for you.
When we do those things, webuild a set of drill exercises
that we drill and you don't wantto do them once a year.
You don't want them doing twicea year.
You want to do them as often asyou can.
You know I have people who dothem every month.
You know they get they do themevery.
I have people you know who dothem every month, but they also
(19:35):
send out reminders all the timeon different things that people
know, because you, at least atminimal, need to do it every
quarter at minimal.
Because you know people have athing called muscle memory and
when a disaster happens,everything you know goes out the
window.
When people panic, when there'san active shooter, when there's
(19:56):
a flooding, when there's a fire, when these things happen, our
minds go blank.
That's what happens Now.
If you drill this in and createa muscle memory, then it
becomes second nature and it'snot something you have to
remember, it's something thatyou know.
You know to go to this location, you know where the kits are,
(20:18):
you know that they haven'texpired because you have a date
on your kits, on your go-bags,that tell you this has not
expired, and I researched this.
I know what's in the kit, youknow.
I know what's in the kitbecause I looked at it a month
ago, you know.
And so these are things that wedo.
So we have a set of drills andpeople drill this over and over
and over again and you know, Ihad this one incident with this
(20:40):
company and we were doing thesedrills and they were doing
damage assessment and the jobwas for this team to go and,
from body to body, see what waswrong with these people and move
on to the next body.
And these people would come.
And they went to this guy andit was at mannequin and it said
lost leg bleeding, you know.
(21:02):
So the guy stopped the bleedingokay, which is good when it
stopped the bleeding from theperson's leg and then you need
to move on.
But he didn't want to move onbecause he said oh, this is my
friend, I can't move on becausehe was so invested in this thing
and he couldn't get out of it.
He couldn't get that mindset togo, move to the next thing.
But if he doesn't move on andassess all these other people,
(21:24):
yeah, he may save that oneperson, but seven other people
are going to die.
So you've got to drill in thesepeople so these people
understand and they cancomprehend how to do this.
And so, yeah, we drill all thetime, just like your school did.
Speaker 2 (21:38):
Yeah, no, and that's really really good stuff and so
share with us.
You know how can people get intouch with you to learn more
about just setting up any kindof preparation, training or
system or anything like thatthat you can help them out with.
Speaker 3 (21:56):
Thank, you Certainly so.
We have a couple of differentprograms that we do, but you can
.
You can reach us on our website, which is PreparednessTVinfo.
You go to preparednessTVinfoand at preparednessTVinfo like
right there you can you you cansign up and for an appointment
and talk with us.
We have disaster preparednessprograms that treats you about
(22:17):
fires, floods, earthquakes,tornadoes, all these things.
We have active shooter trainingwe do, where we train people
and it's a whole thing and it'susually an online course.
We train people about activeshooters and we go through the
whole program and it's not onlyjust you know how to do.
We have a three phase activeshooter program.
One is what happens before anincident happens.
(22:38):
How can you mitigate it?
How can you stop the?
Because the best active shooterincident is the one that never
happens, yeah, so how can youmitigate it and what programs
can you?
You instigate that to mitigatethat thing, and how can you?
In the second part we do is thecommon run hide fight program
that everyone knows.
You got to run away first.
If you can't run away, you hide.
(22:59):
If you can't hide and you can'trun away, then you fight, and
the fighting is not tactical,military fighting.
You know.
No one needs to fight a.
You know all this thing andpeople say, oh, every, we should
arm everybody because then theneverybody can stop the active
shooter.
Well, the problem is thatshooting someone is not an easy
thing to do.
Believe me, I know, you know, Iwas in the military it is not
(23:20):
an easy thing to do, to pull atrigger and kill somebody.
The police don't just pick up agun one day and say I'm going
to go and do this thing.
They train every single day Todo that.
You know so.
Giving everybody guns justmakes more guns and more
problems.
So you, we teach people not tolearn how to fight, but learn
how to defend themselves so theycan run away.
(23:43):
You know so.
It's not.
It's not run hide, fight, fight, kill them.
Yeah, you should fight andsubdue them, but if you, but you
need to subdue them to, or stopthem to a point where you can
get away Because the police arecoming.
Active shooter instances areusually on on, or usually over
within 15 minutes when theystart, so it's not like it's a
(24:05):
lot of time.
So we teach you that.
And then the third part is whathappens after an incident,
because that could be the mostimportant thing, how you know.
You know, basically, mostcompanies throw up their arms
and say, hey, I'm going to letthe officials to feel it.
You know, handle thing.
Problem is officials do nothave your best interest at heart
.
What they have is they'regetting elected and they're
(24:25):
political donors.
You know who.
Whatever you know, and and andtheir political ideology, that's
what they have at heart.
Your business and your brand isway down the line.
Yeah, and the media alsodoesn't have your best interest
in art.
What they care about is their,their, their, their media's
agenda, whether it's right wingor left wing, and Getting the
(24:47):
clicks.
So if they can trash yourbusiness and trash your people
and get more clicks, they'regonna do that.
Yeah, you know, I don't.
You know you, we see it all thetime and the and the and the.
You know.
So we teach you how to createpublic relations officers, to
talk with those people mediarelations officers and then
Disaster mental health people,because you need to take care of
(25:09):
your people.
You know to get them back towork, because the best cure is
to get back to work.
You know, and you need to beinvolved in every aspect, and we
go through a whole trainingprocess on this.
So we do that and and so we do.
You know natural disasters,active shooters.
And then we have a anothercourse that is really popular.
That's our corporate culturalservice, where we teach people
(25:29):
how to create a whole volunteerstructure, like I talked about.
You know how to get, how togive back, how to create the
organization, the leaders, thepartner, partners and giving,
and how to how to be a b-corpcertification, how to align
yourself with the 17 goals, theun, how to get public and
private Great, how to get grantsand loans and let to pay for
the thing.
You know all these things weteach on this whole program and
(25:50):
you can find that on our on ourpage as well, and I'll put the.
I'll give you the links to putnotes down in the field so you
can put notes on this edit, onthis video, so that people can
find all these differentprograms that we offer.
And For a limited time, we havea really cool offer that we're
offering your listeners, whichis for a limited time.
We have a free active shootertraining program.
(26:10):
It includes a pre-assessmentmeeting, valued at $500.
It includes a two hour or twoand a half hour active shooter
training program, valued at $500per person and up to 25 people
in that class, and it involvesan after-class assessment
meeting with your, with yourleaders, to figure out what your
(26:31):
next steps are.
And so we offer all this forfree.
It's a 14 up to $14,000, and foryour listeners and people who
subscribe, you have to besubscribed, you have to
subscribe this channel, you haveto like this video and, and, if
you like, and and, subscribe tothis channel, and then we will
give you a free active shooterprogram that will enable you to
To to protect your people, andit really covers the entire
(26:54):
thing.
It's it, we cover the wholepull back, and so we offer that
so that you can reach us.
Like I said, my email is jeffat preparedness tvinfo, jeff at
preparedness tvinfo.
My phone number is 818-624-4242, that's 818-624-4242, and of
course, we'll put all the linksand stuff like that in the in
the fields here, so you can, youcan contact with us, but that's
(27:16):
how to get in contact with them.
We have a lot of trainingprogram, a lot of leadership
programs, all that.
Speaker 2 (27:21):
Yeah, awesome.
Yeah, and I mean you know, Iknow, I know what we Don't have
here and I would be willing tobet that a lot of our audience
this is just something that theyhave just never really actively
thought about as being just areally important aspect of how
they run their firms.
And so I really appreciate youcoming on, really appreciate you
(27:42):
sharing all of this insight,and I really do encourage people
to go Uh and check outeverything that you have and
take advantage of this offer.
And so, before we wrap up, Ihave one final question for you,
and that is, if you had onefinal piece of advice for our
listeners, what would it be?
Speaker 3 (27:59):
I would say, to really inspire your people to
become leaders and to open linesof communication.
I can't stress that enough.
I would say that it really yourbusiness does it.
People think about these thingsand they think about oh, this
is extra stuff, it's notsomething that adds to the
bottom line, but it's the samething about what your services
(28:22):
are, what your firm does and theway it does is.
It's not just SEO, you're notjust an SEO and marketing
company.
You really take it to the nextlevel and do the things that and
people think, oh, these extrathings, they don't add to my
bottom line, but they do.
My training and your servicesadd to the bottom line of these
companies.
So really invest in thesethings.
(28:43):
Right now, in the state ofCalifornia, active shooter
trainings are mandated by thestate of California and in many
states it's mandated.
So if you don't have theseprograms in state, another law
firm is going to sue you,because I don't know whether
your people know this, butlawyers are litigious.
Yeah, a little bit, and if youdon't properly protect yourself
(29:05):
and your employees, law firmswill sue you, your employees
will sue you and the communitywill.
But I would say one additionalthing it's important that when
disasters happen, your companyresponds to the community.
That's one thing I didn't sayhere, because that would really
help build your company's brandout there.
You can put all the billboardson them and say if you're in an
accident, call me, but reallywhat does that is when you're
(29:30):
out there in the communities instress and your company is out.
Your law firm is out thereresponding and helping people
working in disasters, givingfree legal advice at a disaster
site.
So people don't just think I'mtalking to a, I'm talking to a
service, offer free legal adviceand do these things and get out
there and engage with thecommunity when these disasters
happen, and that will help buildyour company too.
Speaker 2 (29:54):
Yeah, absolutely.
This has been really great.
I know I've learned a lot.
I didn't realize, honestly, howdeep this really went, and so
there are some ideas that I'mgoing to even take to our
leadership team to potentiallystart doing some of this
implementation as well.
So I know some of my favoriteepisodes are the ones that I
walk away with some ideas andlearning a lot of stuff too.
(30:14):
So I really appreciate youcoming on and thank you all out
there for continuing to listen.
Please rate and review the showand so that new episodes get
downloaded automatically, andthat's going to do it for us
this week.
Jeff, thanks so much forjoining us.
Speaker 3 (30:27):
All right, Thank you.
Everybody Subscribe and likeand comment.
Thanks for listening.
Speaker 2 (30:34):
To learn more, go to spotlightbrandingcom.
Slash center stage.
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