The Real Story Of The Lawman: How Bill Umansky Built A 40+ Person Firm Without Losing Himself

Welcome to episode 55 of The Earley Show podcast, hosted by personal injury attorney Christopher Earley! For this conversation, Chris is joined by Bill Umansky, Owner of The Umansky Law Firm.

Check out the episode below. You can also enjoy it on YouTube, Spotify, Apple Podcasts and Amazon Music.

Bill Umansky — known as "The Lawman" — is the founder of Umansky Law Firm, one of Central Florida's premier criminal defense and personal injury firms. He's also the host of Lawman's Lounge, a podcast featuring laid-back, unfiltered conversation with some of the biggest names in plaintiff law and legal marketing.

In this episode, Chris sits down with Bill for a wide-ranging riff on growing up tough in Rosedale, Queens, how he built a 40+ person firm without losing himself, why he's actively capping growth at 50 people, and what it means to lead with authenticity. They get into daily health habits, the real cost of scaling, why vulnerability beats bragging on social media, and how podcasting has quietly become one of the most powerful networking tools in the legal industry.

This one moves fast. Don't miss it.

Guest Info:

Bill Umansky — Founder, Umansky Law Firm

Website: thelawman.net

Instagram: @billisthelawman

Cell: 407-399-7999

Podcast: The Lawman’s Lounge

Topics Covered:

-University of South Florida, working for Dewey Valentine, and the University of Florida law school path

-100+ jury trials in 2.5 years as a prosecutor and what that taught him

-Motivation at 59: from ego-driven wins to legacy and team building

-Why he's capping his firm at 50 people and the EOS conversation that changed his thinking

-The concept of "signal" — how much of your bandwidth is truly devoted to your business

-The firm's 80/20 criminal-to-PI split — and the "Rear End Guys" rebrand

-The Lawman's Lounge: six years, no sponsors, and lessons from Jason Hennessey on asking better questions

-The Atlanta mastermind speech: stop performing "I'm fine" and talk about your real struggles

-How "The Lawman" was born from a hatred of the name Umansky -Strategic networking: double-booking with intention, the 42-minute dinner, and why poker is a business development tool

-The mastermind with John Fischer, Seth Price, and Craig Goldenfarb

-Tiger Tactics, Second Chances, and plans for an AI-assisted memoir

-How podcasting connected Billy, Steve Eichenblatt, Tom Tona, and Neil Goldstein

People & Resources Mentioned:

Jason Hennessey — Hennessey Digital

Seth Price — BluShark Digital / Price Benowitz

John Fischer — mastermind host and trial attorney

Craig Goldenfarb — trial attorney

Tyson Mutrux — Law Man's Lounge guest

Steve Eichenblatt — Florida trial attorney, author

Thomas Tona — mutual friend, trial attorney

Neil Goldstein — trial attorney, author (spelling unconfirmed — please verify)

Market by Market — Billy's former in-house SEO team PIMCON — legal marketing conference

Filevine — legal practice management software

EOS — Entrepreneurial Operating System

Lawman's Lounge — Billy's podcast

Tiger Tactics — legal book/symposium Billy contributed to thelawman.net — Billy's firm website

practicetipoftheweek.com — Chris Earley's free attorney email list

About The Earley Show:

For nearly 20 years, Christopher Earley has successfully led a personal injury law firm in Boston. On the Earley Show, a new podcast launched in the summer of 2023, Christopher and other standout attorneys will be sharing their secrets to success, and discussing the law office management habits that have allowed their practice to thrive. If you’re looking to make better use of your time, increase daily productivity or even just spend less time answering emails, you’ll definitely want to tune in to The Earley Show.

Learn more about the Earley Law Group here!

Check out the previous episode of The Earley Show here!

The Earley Show is a part of The Answering Legal Podcast Network.

Interested in learning more about Answering Legal? Click here to learn more about 400 minute free trial!

This podcast is produced and edited by Joe Galotti. You can reach Joe via email at [email protected].

Episode Transcript:

Christopher Earley (Host): Hello and welcome to another episode of the Earley Show. It's sponsored by our friends over at Answering Legal. I'm your host Chris Earley and as you know on the Earley Show each and every week we bring you the best and brightest from the legal industry. Today is no exception. We have the law man. The law man himself, Billy Umansky, out of Orlando. He scanned up a big criminal practice, a big PI practice. He's quite a character. He'll never be accused of being a boring man. I can promise you that. He's a humble guy, but also very arrogant, which I love. He's got a good mix of both. So, we're gonna get into some good stuff today.

Bill Umansky (Guest): I love when arrogant people call me arrogant. You're — you're what I call...

Chris: Oh man, this gonna be fun. I can tell.

Bill: Hey, never insult your podcast host, but you're what I call humble arrogant. That's the worst kind. Right. He's arrogant, but he's humble about it.

Chris: Yeah. Yeah. Well, at least I'm — I'm — I'm centrist there, I guess, right? But — but so we've gotten to know each other on the conference trail. You've been, uh, you facilitate masterminds I've been involved in. I just want to kind of hear if you don't mind taking us back. I always like to hear about the start, you know, growing up — where did you grow up, influences, mom and dad, just kind of how you came up because a lot of times that influences the person we are today. So just tell us kind of briefly about coming up and growing up.

Bill: So I grew up in Rosedale, Queens. It was, uh, you know, interesting background. My dad was, uh, always working, was an entrepreneur. Uh, my mom, uh, was taking care of — she was a homemaker. Uh, when my father left when I was 13, my mom had three jobs at one point in time. She used to be a teacher before she got married. And it was a — a tough grind growing up. Uh, I don't really — it's funny. I think I used to talk about it, uh, a lot when I was younger. Uh, like you wrote your book, but as you get older, uh, you're 59. I don't even like look back and — and want to dwell on it. Uh, because I don't even look back and think to myself, yeah, that was just, you know, you become gritty and develop resilience because of your past. I think I like moved on now. Like it's not even — it's not avoiding it or not dealing with it. I had therapy, life coaches, a bunch of crap, and I'm absolutely probably crazy now anyway. But in the end of the day, like that stuff doesn't matter to me anymore. But yeah, I went to school in a tough neighborhood. Got into my share of fights. Uh, nose was broken. I lost all my fights typically. And I don't want to get too graphic, but there's other ways to handle it when you when you're not really physically possessed to fight. Well, I just didn't. So, uh, I had to learn skills in order to gain respect. I used humor. I also used some other attributes that I don't want to get into, but I found a way to make sure that people who mess with me, uh, wouldn't mess with me again. So, I think that growing up in that kind of neighborhood really helped me. Um, I was bullied, but I also bullied others. You always hear stories about people that were bullied, but they never — I kind of was both. And, uh, still have a lot of pain associated with the bullying part where I was bullying others. So, grew up in that kind of environment. Then, uh, you know, we moved out of our neighborhood and my parents divorced into actually a wealthier neighborhood. You know, can't get into details here because every time I do, if my mom watches this podcast, the private person, she gets all pissed off. Right, mom? So, uh, but we moved into a nicer neighborhood and I — I always felt like I was an outsider in that neighborhood. I still, uh, made some friends there that I'm friends with today, but just never felt — I — I got to say, I never really felt like I belonged anywhere. Have friends, but never felt like I belonged to the schools I was in. So, my uncle was a guidance counselor. He's like, "Man, we need to get Bill out of New York." I got accepted into a bunch of schools, ended up in a school in Tampa, uh, undergrad, University of South Florida. I got into University of Florida, but I — and Miami, but Tampa was like a city to me. It was a small, manageable city, and that's probably the best thing that ever happened to me. I was a club promoter, bartender. Um, I actually cooked in an Italian restaurant. I managed an Italian restaurant. Um, I had all kinds of jobs. Could never really hold them, uh, long because of my own problems with authority. So, uh, you know, was in student government at that time, uh, dating a bunch of, uh, people — be clear, women — but, uh, dating a bunch of people and working full-time going to school. Uh, took a year and a half off to go to Manhattan where, uh, worked for a fancy big law firm called Dewey Valentine. Now we could change — Dewey & LeBoeuf — and now they're out of business. Lots of stories about that. But I — I can tell you — uh, all I'll tell you cryptically is by my end of my time there, for some reason, I had access to all their, uh, their black cars, their town cars, their mini limos, and, uh, can't tell the story here, but it was, um, a lot of fun. I learned about the underbelly of law firms, how they get business, how even the people that, you know, look like FBI directors, uh, that's what this firm looked like, all like this straight out of Ivy League, straight out of Central Casting, but how they kept business and maintained business. Honestly, it taught me a lot. You know, there's a lot more that runs these firms on the outside and that really opened my eyes. Uh, went down to the University of Florida for law school. Uh, became a prosecutor. Uh, loved it. I had over 100 jury trials in about two and a half years. Uh, love trying cases during that time. You asked about my influence. Uh, because just get out of the way so we can riff. Uh, I don't know if I had any influences. Uh, I would say that my mother was a strong influence in me — that she just was a great mom and she taught me how to work hard. And my dad was kind of absent for a long time, but when I did get involved with him — not absent, like he was worried about his business. He was all about his business. So, uh, he always says this now, like he taught me what not to do, but I would say he was an influence because I — I — I tried so hard not to be like him in many ways, but I also had his entrepreneurial spirit. He was able to take risks and everything. I didn't know any lawyers growing up. Didn't have any background growing up. All I knew — I wanted to be a lawyer since first grade. There was LA Law and some other shows that were on back then. And I — I — I think I just wanted to help people get a second chance. And, uh, I liked arguing. I liked, you know, I just loved that whole thing. So, not really sure I had any real real influences. Uh, there's an influence I did have that I won't talk about, but he rose from power, was a despicable human being, but I read a lot about him because I was in a period of time in my early years of watching, um — didn't like myself. So I would look at people that rose to power. Almost anyone you could think of. I would read their autobiographies, their biographies, and try to figure out like — how the hell did they become chiefs of states, heads of armies, create massive world change. You know, people nowadays like — I — I read Grant Cardone, Tony Robbins and stuff, but back then it was really about leaders that were nothing and how they made something of themselves. And a lot of that was self-projection probably. So, I — I honestly don't know what kind of influence — I kind of just created from reading. There's not one person or one thing until my start, my career at the state attorney's office that had a major impact in my life that way.

Chris: All right, I'm gonna — we said we're going to riff. I'm going to jump around a little bit because I'm — I'm listening to you. What motivates you today? You've seen a lot of success. What motivates you now?

Bill: Yeah. You know, that transitioned — uh, used to be myself. Uh, used to use the word manipulation versus motivation. Change from manipulation to motivation. It used to be all about me — me winning cases, uh, earning money. Now it's about helping others, helping my team, always clients were always first. But my motivation at 59 is now about legacy to the people that I teach here. So, for example, I'm going up to DC to see Price and we have a paralegal that just, uh, started at George Washington and she was working here and I'm going to go up and see her in an effort — last night to see the next employee. So, I think my motivation now is the people I work with. And now, frankly, uh, I will be sitting down and creating another five-year plan for myself because I need to figure out what that next step's going to be. What is it going to look like if I want to sell the practice and where do I want to be financially in the next five years, uh, because I'm recognizing like — not really slowing down but my body is slowing down so, you know, getting out hustling is, you know, I love it still but, you know, I — I can see where that end is going to probably come at some point where I'm not going to want to view that. So that's where I'm at right now — so helping my team, to summarize, helping my team because I love it and building a legacy with them and then figuring out the next step for myself. What motivates me is what is that next project going to look like? And also I'm looking at passive income stuff. So what motivates me now is looking for — like this week I looked at three real estate deals. I looked at another deal opening up a chiropractic office, which obviously as a non-lawyer, non-doctor, I have to do it under a holding company, but I'm looking into those kind of things. Uh, some passive income stuff. That's what's motivating me now.

Chris: That's awesome. Um, you've grown your firm. What's the size of your firm today?

Bill: Um, I think we're like 40, 42, 43 now. Um, I think 12, 13 lawyers. Um, good mix of virtual assistants. About 22ish. Yeah, that's about it. About 40, 40. I don't want to get any more than 50. Um, I had — my last EOS meeting — you know, it's funny for those of you out there that are building your practices. You know, we keep talking about scale, scale, scale. Um, you know, I went to my last EOS meeting and my CFO was like had these numbers on the board and they didn't resonate with me. Quite frankly, they were too much because I knew that was related to — that number was the more people, more overhead, more risk. And, uh, my leadership team looked at me and — they're like — we had to like stop and I had to really get real with myself and my CFO. You think, well, why didn't I think about that before going in? But sometimes it germinates at one of these EOS meetings with our coach. I said, dude, like that's not me. And we, we scale back the numbers because I think I'm at a stage where I'm like I get to a 30% profit margin. Um, I'm okay. And I don't want the headache that comes along with it. When people say you grow or you die, there's many different ways to grow. You can grow in efficiencies, certainly can grow in income. Um, but necessarily growing in personnel, I — you know, I don't know — because that's still the bane of the existence of everything. We get along. You have C-level employees like, you know, Chris CFO and your CEO and the CMO and all of that — director sales, director marketing — well, that's a CMO — um, and we have all these things but like at some point like, you know, it's just too much. So keeping it a tighter circle, um, you know, keeping it tight yet still being financially successful — I think that's kind of where I'm — I'm headed. And also really, uh, I — I think the piece that's missing for us and what's motivating me is we've got to get our — our KMS down, our knowledge management system down. We have all these processes. They're not contained anywhere. We always start and then stop. We always pick a software, train this year, last year, another one. So we're making a big emphasis this year on creating a KMS. KMS's are important, right? So that I can pass it on or sell it to someone else or — or have even someone within take over the practice. But, you know, those are systems that are important so people come in turnkey and just do it.

Chris: I like the self-awareness. You're not just growing for the sake of growing. You know where you want to get to and then you're going to always be optimizing. You're not just, you know, recklessly growing and just growing for the sake of it. So, I like that. Now, let a guest in say, "Well, this is this kind of where I want to go and I'm gonna be good there." Right? Because grow, you know, I — I think we have lots of friends in common. I'm not saying you even, but because you're — you're, uh, you're arrogant, but just kidding.

Bill: But, uh, you know, we got — this is me giving you s***. It's me giving you s*** back. But — but, you know, I think — I think we hear all the time about people that are like — like I'm old so I hear — I've been on this circuit now for 20 years and I hear like I want to do X and one out of 10 of those people will 10X. Right. Right. Right. Right. And the other nine don't do it for a variety of reasons. One — they're not really willing to put in the signal to do it. You know, we do know someone in the SEO digital field that's 100% signal. Actually, Seth Price is probably 80, 90% signal. I mean, that means he gets up and goes to bed thinking about business. So, but it, you know, to do that, you got to pay the price for that. My signal has been diverted. And then, you know, I work out and I listen to all these videos about like you got to push, you got to push, you got to push. You do got to push, but you may choose to spend your signal on other things. So, and I don't mean about family work-life balance. That's not what I mean. You should — you could have 100% signal on your business and still be a family person, but you're not turning it off or you're not turning that signal into other passions. And I — I just don't want to deal with it. And I've seen other people decide like there is a price to pay when you scale. And it — it — it no matter what, you're paying some type of price. Whether it's your health, there's very few people that can scale and maintain great health. I — I just don't see it. Like it's very very few people. And you hear about the guy that's a successful CEO, looks good, six-pack, he's 48 years old, drops dead, you know, like it just is a lot. I mean, you got to be a sociopath otherwise. But if you're a caring human being, it's really really hard putting the weights on your shoulder of all these different things. It is really really difficult to do that and I do know maybe some but like I said it's one out of 10 that are able to do it and do it successfully. So at the end of the day like that scaling is — is a little scary — like I can grow and grow successfully. You need to grow to be healthy but like I don't need to have a tremendous amount of cases and I think I've looked back and watched other lawyers come to that same conclusion. Some — some just haven't made it because they weren't willing to put in the discipline and make excuses. But there's others that have totally changed their thinking about it. They're like, I'm happy. I'm — I'm good where I'm at. And you know, that's important. I think coaching, Chris — you know, you mentor a lot of people. I think it's okay to coach people to be okay. Uh, it's okay if you want to be a trial lawyer at a higher level or to delegate, but you still like the work. I don't understand in our circuit where it's always like you gotta be — you got to do this — and some people make the mistake of getting out of it and then realize — shit — like I like doing the work. I just needed to be more efficient or less stressed out doing the work or having the right systems around me. But I'm a lawyer's lawyer, right? Like that's what I want to do. Not me, but I've seen that happen. I don't know what you've experienced.

Chris: No, I — I love that. I was going to ask you this. I kind of want to go back to health and self-care, right? You're — you're 59, but you're — you're — you're — I'm looking at you — you're fit, you're energetic, you know, you've got a lot of energy. Can you just walk us through your daily habits, working out, you know, do you meditate, you know, do you — what do you do for your brain and your body to to maintain health?

Bill: Yeah, I — I, uh, I write in a gratitude journal. I — I — I, uh, try to stick to that. Uh, I don't do it every day. I'm — I'm not an everyday guy like — but I — I do more than not. I definitely — I work out five, six days a week. I do Pilates. I do studio cycling. I do the gym. That is my time though to listen to — I don't listen to podcasts per se, but I listen to a lot of motivational stuff, hardcore stuff. I listen to music that is, uh — takes poetry. So, for example, uh, Rudyard Kipling, Charles Bukowski — I — I use a mixture on — on, uh, on Soundcloud where I find poets that put their poetry or someone puts their poetry to either rap music. I'm music driven. So, on Sundays, I work out to a lot of faith-based music. I — if I don't go to church, I'm — I'm basically listening to music and praying and working out. I was a meditator for years. I used to do a process called transcendental meditation. I stopped — uh, it's good that you asked this question because I — I am going to — there's a guy named, um, Provenza. He's a doctor or chiropractor out in, uh, Washington — break the habits and stuff like that. He — I'm reading his book now about meditation and I think that that's something that as I get older I want to get back into. So, I'm learning his techniques and, uh, I plan to do, uh, meditations every day. It's really good to silence your mind. As far as other health habits, uh, I don't have a diet. You know, I do have high blood pressure and I have high cholesterol and this year is the year that, uh, I am making an effort to go to doctors. So, I'm doing a lot of that. But I am — I eat what I want, but I am curtailing it. I don't — last night I saw a friend of mine that used to work at our law firm. She was down here for BluShark. I went to the Ritz. I ordered a Vesper. I had two sips. You know, basically I — I — I don't drink a lot anymore. I think that, you know, I — I don't stop myself from enjoying the stuff I like doing. I — I play around with intermittent fasting sometimes. I have psoriatic arthritis, so I use — I — I take care — I get massages a lot. I get laser treatments a lot. I take care of myself as much as I can. And this year, I'm going to get to the bottom of — start peptides. I'm on testosterone, but not huge amounts. I'm not on Deca. I — I don't — I'm going to start going to rejuvenation doctors, but you know, I'm just playing around with trying to get the joints. Stem cells are what I'm researching now. So, peptides is probably the next big thing for me — just anything to continue having that energy, uh, and drive. Um, yeah, my health is important to me and, uh, I — I try to take care of it. Oh yeah, this year is my number one priority frankly.

Chris: Well, you got a big firm. Let me ask you about your firm. So you're about 42, 43 people. Are you 50-50 PI criminal? What's sort of the — the general breakdown?

Bill: Yeah, so we sign up between 100, 150 criminal cases a month and between 10 and 15 or 20 PI cases a month. So a revenue split's 80-20, really — my — I have a small pod for personal injury — got a trial — we're in there, lit — uh, lit paralegal, a case manager and then they're supported by three or four virtual assistants that do specific things — their job — uh, once in a while we'll bring in co-counsel, uh, to help — always two heads are better than one during trial — uh, but we handle the litigation internally. We be the litigation and then the other 11, 12 lawyers are all criminal and they're all trial lawyers and I mean that — they're not just people that enter pleas. So they go to trial quite often. Uh, that's the framework. The income is like I said 80-20. The signups are higher than that — like do the math, I don't know, 150 versus 20 — so you know, 130 out of 150 cases are criminal. So for a criminal-heavy dominant firm, uh, and PI is — I would call it the side piece, but it makes a good lot of money and we're investing a lot more money in it this year than we have in the past. We're rebranding part of our thing with a really cool slogan, uh, that we'll be using — called the rear end guys. So, hit from behind call the rear end guys. Yeah. So, uh, like it — we're gonna be doing some, uh — we're doing mood boarding and, uh, be putting that stuff up on billboards. But we're — we're excited. We, uh, we do that. But, yeah, I — I — I like being around followers. I always set a vision years ago. By the way, I'm going to update that vision. I — I — it is eerily crazy that what I wrote about 20 years ago came to fruition, uh, 20 years later. The income, the type of leader that I have here — always envisioned having trial lawyers that were community leaders and we have people that are president of, uh, you know, like bar associations. In fact, one guy that worked here is now going to be the — the Orange County bar president. He's no longer working with me, but we're — we're mentors. He refers me all his criminal work as he's doing PI now and like — but all the vision I set out 20 years ago has come to fruition. The power of writing stuff down — still totally is so important. And totally — and something — something I neglected, Chris, and that's why laying out the next five years. Yeah. I'm going to go back to my strategic coaching days and figure out like — I'm doing a SWOT, uh, uh — what your obstacles are, uh, what your natural talents are, what your strengths are — and I'll be writing my vision back from, uh, that to figure out these next five years. And I think it's just so important to have that. Now we do that with EOS, but I'm talking about a personal vision as well.

Chris: I love it. I love it. Let me ask you before before I forget, could you plug your podcast? I've been on that podcast — The Lawman's Lounge, right? Could you talk about that podcast and how long you've been doing it for? What's it all about and how it helps your business?

Bill: Yeah. So, Lawman's Lounge — you see, uh, the sign's not in the back, but, uh, we have a lot of people come in, uh, locally, have a drink. Uh, again, you know, I'm pouring tequila an ounce, but I'm — I'm just sipping it. And it — it's barely a — I throw a lot of alcohol away, but, uh, but we do a lot of — we have a lot of people, guests on just like you, you know, people like heads of tech companies, uh, biggest PI firm in the country, you know, but we — we — we have laid-back conversations. Uh, we just want to promote the people that are on here and — and I don't — I don't have any sponsors. I've been asked to sponsor. Been doing it for six years. I don't want sponsors. I just want to be able to take it as it is. I'm respectful of guests, but I try to ask the questions. You know, it's interesting. Uh, Jason Hennessey was just on and he put a LinkedIn post that was so cool and I just was like, man, brother, thank you for learning because I was like, man, I think I usually ask good questions, but he was talking about how he's been on podcasts and, you know, I don't know if you've been on yours and this the warranty for you. Yeah, ask him like ask him about the struggles, you know, not just like — and I — I think I did but, you know, like — but I didn't ask enough I think, or maybe wasn't geared to me. But you're always learning in the podcast space and what I like to do is — is get to have a real conversation so our listeners — because, you know, we — we've been on for six years, we got steady downloads and we're still growing and we — we don't do a lot of promoting. We don't promote much except the newsletter once a month. And so I like — I like getting people because there's always going to be that one thing that someone's going to listen to and go, I resonate with that. And then obviously when you do a podcast, you're entertaining. Like we just did one on in the Filevine thing. I think we are now going to do a Filevine deck — a podcast deck — and send it out to people. Um, so that we can, uh — you could do this too and you're probably more palatable than I am because you're a humble guy. We put out a podcast deck and just do the live podcast, you know, at stages and I — I did a live one with — I did a live one with the co-founder and it's completely different. I don't know if you've done a live podcast. It is completely different than this format.

Chris: Yeah, that's cool, man. Yeah. Yeah. I gotta try.

Bill: So, uh, yeah. So, thank you for asking about that. But we — I love it. You know, we can riff. We can have serious conversations. Tyson Mutrux and I went on for an hour and a half about absolutely nothing. So, I don't care. I don't have an agenda with it. And that's what I like about it.

Chris: That's the best. Just riffing, riffing. I — so, I like what you just said about Hennessey. I like Jason a lot. I have a lot of respect for him because he's very — sadly he's a student of business and he's a doer in business. That resonates. You just talked about — it's so important to talk about the struggles. I want to highlight something that I remember from from you doing at a mastermind we were in Atlanta, like three years, two or three years ago, and John Fischer — that mastermind, there's always someone who gets up at the beginning to give remarks — and you were at the Ritz Hotel I think in Atlanta and you gave your remarks and I think your — your — your core message was like, um, don't talk about how great everything is. Talk about like what you're struggling with — like it's okay to get up and say I'm having a hard time today, right? And so I love that, right. I think the best content — be it podcast, LinkedIn, uh, whatever, mastermind — is like I'm having — I'm having a hard time with this, need some help. Us lawyers don't do it enough.

Bill: Yeah, I think that was the how-you-doing thing. I think if I remember — I need to — I need to can that into a speech that you're — that, uh, and transfer to something else. But what I love about that is like I hate happy hours. It's like, "How you doing?" "I'm fine." Right? Uh, "How you doing?" "Oh, good, good, good, good." It's like, there's nothing real that comes out of that. And that was that speech I gave, I think. And by the way, he didn't give me much time to do it. So, I had to come up with that the night before, and I was like, let me think about what I hate doing. It's happy hours when I can't have a real conversation. Like, when I'm with my buddies, we talk real shit, like, you know. But when you're at these BA masterminds it's like — so the point was — the mastermind — the whole point is to be real and talk about your struggle and put down your ego, right? So I always related to — don't ask me how I'm doing because you ask me how I'm doing, this is what I'm going to answer the question — my wife thought about leaving me about three months ago, but I got that resolved. That's not true. But I'm just telling you, uh, uh, you know, we lost a key employee and then, you know, business was — how — um, you know, that's the real shift. But like, don't ask me how — so when people ask me how I'm doing now I'm like, do you really want to know? I mean, or am I just supposed to go good? And they always tell me just answer good. I'm like, yeah. See — keep it light.

Chris: Totally.

Bill:I do think though that — you when you post about a vulnerability or something like that, you got to put a solution in, something that you figured out, because I think that just open venting — which seems to happen a hot, uh, on Instagram, right? Like, oh, I — I got up four o'clock, three o'clock in the morning with our two new puppies because we have four dogs now and it was hard and I — I couldn't get up at 9:00. Like, literally, if I sit there and really tell someone that in a serious vein or like put shit up on a post, so I'd read — like you got me all excited about this question because I'm like, you sent me to read all this shit. Like, thank God you don't see it on LinkedIn because I — I don't think people are keying up on LinkedIn, but they are more real on like Instagram and TikTok and Facebook. I feel like saying like — like look at you. You got money. You're good-looking. Uh, you got everything. So, oh, you — this didn't go right to you. Like, oh, oh, poor is you. And you're trying to teach me a lesson, but really you're not. So, I always think about when I'm complaining about something, I need to bring a lesson to it and — and show humility about it because there's people that go through way worse shit than us. What's the worst case thing that happens? Uh, we lose people. We got to let people go, which is unfortunate. You have a lot of pain, the burden on your shoulders. But really, if you're surviving financially, the real issue that people really have is saving face and their ego. The ego becomes so — it's almost like that — not Scarface movie, but that devil with that trial lawyer — I forgot — it was Al Pacino, right? And they go through this whole movie, he wins every case, and at the end Al Pacino's setting him up again — Keanu Reeves — just setting them up. And it's so subtle, the ego. And that's what's driving us. Like, you know, like what's the worst thing that could happen? And by the way, I'm 60, I can still bring in 20 cases a month by myself without advertising. I make a whole lot less money, but who cares? Like, I can survive.

Chris: Yeah. I mean, we're — we're lawyers. We're basically, you know, we're pushing paper a lot. We get to have these intellectual conversations. Like, it ain't so bad, right? And I love what you just said. It's perspective. It's your perception. How you look at stuff. I really like what you just said. That was really — I hope people are — I think we need to do it as we're posting and as we're thinking about things like, is this so bad? Like, what am I really trying to get away with?

Bill: I — I have a post now that's — are you ready? So, here's one that's been sitting in my Instagram. Like, I just bought myself an Aston Martin, Chris. But okay. Okay. I have a — I have a BMW and I have a C8 Corvette that I used to have Vipers. I have a Corvette that I wrapped and my friends who are all lawyers and business guys called the poor man's Ferrari. So, like I'm sitting there crafting a post. I'm not posting it as I'm thinking about it now where it's a picture of me in the Corvette and I'm sitting there saying, you know, sometimes we don't — you know, we're poor even though we have things because we allow ourselves to be affected by that. And there is a message to that, but it is also a bougie ass message. Get like — because I have a — because I decided not to get rid of my poor man's Ferrari. I bought the Aston and I'm keeping the Corvette. Damn it. But the point is that is like even though the message is — if you don't value what you have, you are poor no matter what you have.

Chris: Right. Right.

Bill: That's a great message. But the part of me that doesn't want to post it is like — literally there's people that it makes sense among our bougie ass crowd of lawyers and business owners, you know, not valuing things. Oh, I'm starting my practice and I give myself like every — I got — I got a C-class, I need an E-class or an S-class. No, appreciate what you have and don't worry what the next guy has. There is a message, but then I compare it to like people that don't even have a Corolla. I — I don't know. Like, it — it bothers me. So, that message is sitting there and I never post pictures of me in cars. I post pictures of me barrel-chested, which I don't have a six-pack in my hair, but I won't post pictures of materialistic things. But I'm like, but I'm like, I think about it. I'm like, I struggle. Um, I probably won't post it. You think something for more than five minutes, don't put it up. But it's like, you know, it's — that's, you know what I'm saying? Like there's so many people that are going through so much other shit. Like it makes it hard. Like if you're going to post, post something meaningful.

[AD BREAK]

Chris: How did you get the name The Lawman? And do you put that in your branding a lot? I like that name.

Bill: Yeah. So, uh, Umansky. So, it came from a self-hatred of my name. So, uh, it used to be in college — it's like you demand, you demand, you man, you the man. I was a club promoter. You demand. I was the man. You demand, man. You demand. You Umansky. You the man. And I, you know, and I was like, I hated — in fact, another mistake I made when I opened my, uh, law firm, I had to do a website. I didn't do umanskylaw.com and that was my brand because I was like, I hate Umansky. It's a weak name. Like even as I say it now, it's a strong name. But like back then I was like, it's a weak name. So this is how crazy I was 20 years ago. So I'm like, how do I hate the name? And then when people come up and go, um, Umski — I'd be like — that would make me feel even weaker. Like if you wanted to kill me, just use the word um Umski. So I hated my name. Hated it. Hated it. Hated it. Hated it. Hated it. I love my name now. That's why I don't want to change it to some generic name. Even though it's probably stupid that I don't do it. So I just played around. You man, you man, lawyer, law man. And I'm like shit, I'll just take it. And now it's funny because I don't think I can really use it as a firm name, but it is the website name. But when I'm around town locally, everyone knows who he's the law man. That's what they call me. And then now people call me the law man. I like it. But I love my name now. It's like to me, you know, like I have two boys, Zack and Jakey, and I named their names back then. Again, I hated my name. How do I make a syllable that sounds like a linebacker? Zack. Not Zachary. Zachary's weak. Jacob Umansky's weak. Jake Umansky, he's Zack. And they both end up being linebackers, by the way. It's always funny. That's crazy. Yeah, but I hated my name. So, the law man is a derivation of self-loathing and hatred for my name.

Chris: I think you got a strong name. That’s my take. I want to share before I forget. First of all, keep me on track. I want to ask you about your networking. You network a lot. You speak, you mentor, you — you coach. I want to get into that. It's like — I want to just sidetrack real quick. I was on your podcast maybe a year ago and Steve Eichenblatt — also in your area, I think — is he near you? He's near you in Florida.

Bill: Yeah. Yeah.

Chris: He heard — he heard me on your podcast and Steve has a similar story. Steve reached out to me. Now Steve and I are friends. I connected Steve to Tom Tona, right? A mutual friend of ours. Then Tom Tona had, uh, Eichenblatt on his podcast and then I introduced Eichenblatt to our mutual friends, uh, Neil Goldstein. So it's funny how like — that's why the listener — you should be podcasting because these ne — these things, you should be guesting on podcasting. You should be hosting your podcast because that action on your podcast — for I — I'd had probably five, three to five Florida lawyers reach out to me said, "Earley, I like your story." That stuck. But Eichenblatt has been the one I've gotten closest to. Now he and Tom have gotten closer. He and Neil have. And now Bill — this is really cool. I think you'll like this. Next Friday, literally a week from right now, Eichenblatt and Goldstein are coming on my podcast together because we all wrote memoirs. Isn't that so cool? Is that awesome? Like you got to make content, people. You gotta like be out there and talking and getting your voice out there.

Bill: I love that. And I — yeah. And I — I — and Steve, by the way, is a really good guy and he's awesome. He's awesome.

Chris: Yeah.

Bill: No one would have heard. But then he started coming on the podcast and —

Chris: Yes. So I just want to talk — this is a lot of lessons here. Let's layer in another lesson for the audience. Networking. You're always, you know, out, right? Let's talk about that. You know, your approach to networking. Do you have a rhythm to that? Is it random like going out to dinners? What's your approach to networking? How do you go about it?

Bill: Yeah, it used to be random. I hired a business developer. I think we're a little more strategic now about doing that. Uh, because I think I'm older, so the energy level isn't that great. But like I, you know, networking is like — so I'll give you an example. Last night, um, Dan Define, who's a great guy, uh, is at Pimcon. You know, I — I — I — I did the opening at Pimcon this year. I know you did. So, you know, Dan was there and there was another lady, uh, wonderful lady who's throwing the event. She's no longer working with them, but Dan and I always hit it off. We kind of — I don't want to get into politics — but we kind of are similarly aligned and he's a cool guy. And, um, you know, he's here in Orlando for artificial intelligence conference. So, you know, I put it on the books as a whole that he's coming down. I only showed up to the conference to see him for seven to 10 minutes and at the same time I also made plans with — I knew that, um, Seth Price's — Price Benowitz — director of marketing used to work for me. That's — I introduced her to Seth. She now is his head of marketing there. She was down so I wanted to make sure I had a dinner with her. And then I had poker after that, which was just as important to me because there's eight guys I play poker with and I lose a lot of money each week, but there are guys that report me cases. And so, you know, so how was that planned? You know, beforehand it would be random. Um, now a calendar is kept for me. I — I'm — I'm a — I don't like calendars and I don't like that shit. So, I don't look at my calendar, but I have an executive assistant who stays on me. And we went from a remote executive assistant to an actual executive assistant here, which is obviously more expensive because she's got her own network. And — and she could relate to people in a way because she could see them, she could talk to them. She's actually in business development in a sense. I have a business developer, but my executive assistant's also doing that. So, look at my calendar, figure it out, and I'm like, the poker's non-negotiable, but I still want to see these two people. How do we work it out where I can do it? And that's what I do. And I went and said hello to him. It was really meaningful to him because I told him it took me 30, 40 minutes to get there. I reminded him I took him 30, 40 minutes to get there. And then, um, at dinner — but like I had dinner with, uh, my former employee who now works with Seth. It was — they — she — you know, my executive assistant, her friends because she referred her — that's talking about your podcast and the connections. But I didn't stay there. I ordered an appetizer, hung out with them for 42 minutes. I always said I got 42 minutes. 42 minutes — I left and got to the poker game and played four or five hours. So, yeah, my networking is a cadence in the sense of — I will double book but I'll make sure that I have a meaningful conversation and then I'll move on to the other things. But I also as I get older don't want to stress too much about like doing that.

Chris: Yeah. No, I love that it's intentional because that 30 minutes, whatever, could have been three hours. So that's getting a lot out of your — that's milking your day. That's squeezing your day.

Bill: Yeah. But I'm learning too and I have a — a bad habit. I would say to trial lawyers out there, any listening to your show, a lot of them, you know, the easy thing, the nasty thing to say is, well, all they do is they talk about themselves. Well, you know what's funny? Sometimes they talk about themselves because they're funny and they're interesting. And quite frankly maybe even more interesting than the other person. However, you got to stop and you got to like listen and ask questions and — and then engage. And if you get that involved in a story that you're making them laugh, because that's the thing — it's fun making people laugh. You got to remember to pull back and like honestly I can't keep going. I got to stop and ask about him or her.

Chris: Yeah.

Bill: Because at some point they look at you as a theatrical person and don't. So that's the — the networking has kind of changed for me. I like to listen more. Uh, learn more, but I like to entertain too though, dude. So, like I get out of that.

Chris: Of course, you have it both ways.

Bill: You know what you're doing. Wait, wait, wait. I caught you. This is called the humble arrogant. Of course. Of course.

Chris: Oh, man. We're — we're — we're vibing, man. We're on the same wavelength. That's how we get along. It's a dance. Let me ask you this. I'm curious. How did you and John Fischer, Seth Price, and occasionally, um, Craig Goldenfarb, right? He — go — how did that mastermind — how did you get involved in that room? How did that come about?

Bill: I saw John, which is funny because, uh, Seth — you're probably not listening to this, but I'm going to send you a copy of this. Seth just started my business developer, how I'm competing with John Fischer, my mastermind. I'm like, no, I'm not. I'm like, can I do a mastermind, please? You know, like honestly. But so I'm not gonna have to call John and go, okay I'm gonna do my mastermind, but I'm not gonna do that because I'm like we all have masterminds. But Seth, you hate me for doing this but dude, I — I know you got my best interest in mind. So, how I met them? I, you know, I love Craig, but Craig — when I say I love Craig, I like Craig. I'm closer to John and Seth. And I met them first through stuff. And like John basically tells this story all the time — when he ran his first mastermind, he's a trial lawyer. And again, because I don't have a filter, I saw him being like really like stressed out. I came over to him, put my hand on his shoulder. I didn't know him. Been, you know, like, you know, I just — I said, "Dude, everything's going to be fine. Like, you're here. Just go through it. It's like a trial. You — you already been — you planned everything. Now, just enjoy it. Like, it's going to be okay." And so, we became close after that. And then, uh, Seth — you know, uh, Seth — the interesting thing about Seth — I don't know if you know this, Chris — but I — I had my own in-house SEO company. They became Market by Market now and they have a lot of lawyer clients out there. They don't go to the conferences as much because they get word of mouth clients. Market by Market, great guys, Ryan Klein, uh, Paul Warren, uh, down in, uh, Fort Lauderdale, but they were my guys. We did in-house SEO. And then they kept hiring new guys. They would leave. They were like, "I'm leaving. We'll hire you the next guy and the next guy." And all those next guys ended up working with them. So, but my thing with Seth was what my issue was. Uh, so when we're on the table, Seth was in the room, I looked at everyone, I go, you know, my issue is — is whether I hire the guys that used to work for me or hire this new company called BluShark. And Seth's in the room and like I'm pushing it like — because I don't know what to do. My heart's like with the old guys and then there's this guy promising me X, Y and Z. And so that was my issue. And so Seth and I have become close. Uh, Seth's a brilliant man and John is, uh, a principled man. And so we travel together and we enjoy each other and, uh, I just love them both very much. And you know, like honestly, that's it. Goldenfarb is such a great business guy that has a lot of wisdom and a lot of technique. I'm not as close to him. Uh, but I respect him and respect his work. I mean, he's just unbelievable, phenomenal business guy. So, that's my relationship — really was those two and we just kept it going and I like facilitating up there. Sometimes I feel like maybe you could facilitate better or Tom could facilitate better. So, sometimes I'm glad when I don't go because someone else can get a shot at facilitating. Uh, my groups tend to be emotional, so you know. So, I get a lot of the newer players. I think sometimes I know where I am and what I'm good at, what I'm not good at. But I enjoy helping them, but now I'm competing, I suppose. So, who knows?

Chris: One last question. Have you written a book? And if not, have you considered writing a book?

Bill: Yeah, I wrote books. Uh, I — I — I, you know, the Tiger Tactics symposium was one. Of course. Yep. I had a — a — a book, uh, called Second Chances that I wrote before, but I never really, uh — I didn't like it, so I didn't really publicize it. I did another book before with a third party author. I had a book idea, I can't remember the title, which was going to be, you know, from rags to riches — how, uh — I forgot the title, it was catchy — but basically it was going to start with me telling, uh, me getting fired from this famous personal injury lawyer's office, you know, and then she tried getting me a job with someone else because she was cool. And she doesn't say fired, she says letting go. But, uh, she then started talking about her employee. I'd only been with her for a year and a half and for a year and some other people were there longer and it's a long story. But anyway, I — I chose at that point to open my own firm. Uh, and I kind of burned the bridge with her. Um, but, uh, it was going to start off like being fired, you know, and then — and then making money. But I since lost that idea and then now that AI is back, I may do it again. Uh, just have AI help. But, um, I did talk — it's funny that you mentioned that because I talked to a publisher who published my first book and I may decide to do it again. I don't know. I know you wrote a book. Um, I don't know. You know, part of my story was like already put out in Tiger Tactics. Um, but it'll be fun to write another one. I — I don't know what to write on. I like it though. I mean, your book is great.

Chris: Yeah. So, I really got a lot out of your book and Steve's book and actually Goldstein's book. All three of you. The only one that hasn't written a book out of the people you mentioned was Tom Tona.

Bill: Yeah. Tom should write a book on jiu-jitsu.

Chris: Yeah. Yeah.

Bill: And — and not drinking, jiu-jitsu. And, uh, what's the third thing? He's pretty disciplined guy.

Chris: No, he is. He's — he's a good person. He said it. He's a good — they're all great.

Bill: That's — these podcasts are great, too, like you said, because it's up to you to make the relationship. You know, you went out of your way to foster a relationship with Steve and that's why you're referring him cases and not me. But that all happened because — yeah. I'm trying to buy Steve and you're getting in the way of that.

Chris: Bill, you're — you're — you're an entertaining guy. You're a big success and you're an inspiration. How can people get in touch with you if they got a case they'd like to refer to you or just to, you know, connect with you? How can they reach you?

Bill: Yeah, I love Instagram. My favorite medium. So, it's Bill is the law man. Bill is the law man. And my cell is 407-399-7999 — like anyone could get that number. So, my website — though I know no one's going to go there but you can — the lawman.net. I'm on TikTok but I don't really like TikTok so I'm not good at it. So I'd say Instagram but if you're like some people don't like using Instagram so my best way is 407-399-7999. I suspect that Chris's, uh, intakes, outtakes, whatever you call them, will have my cell phone number prominently written through the whole time as a scroll.

Chris: Of course. Yes.

Bill: And if you want to come on as a guest on my podcast, feel more than welcome to reach out to me. We love irreverent humor. Um, like to have some guests on that are humble and arrogant like Chris.

Chris: Love it. Well, congratulations on being a refreshing uh different dude in this profession that can be very boring. You're obviously you got a good brand. You're you're different and different is good. I encourage listener be different. Be a renegade. It's okay. You have that right. It's okay. We give you permission, right, Bill?

Bill: Yeah. Life's short, dude. Like at at the end of the day, if you're if you're have the yoke of a business on your shoulders and you can't even be yourself, like that's another yoke. Like how many yolks do you want to put on yourself? You like enslave yourself here? Like the whole purpose of running your own business is so that you could be your authentic self. Like and then the next evolution too is making sure the people in your practice are their authentic selves. And also never forgetting that you may have leverage over them. So be careful how you talk to them and and encourage them to be open and honest with you. But also understand you need other people in your lives that are not connected to you. Because here's a sad fact. If you are making payroll, even if you encourage honesty and transparency in your office, um some people are just not going to give you that 100% authenticity or what you need to hear. So things like masterminds, things like having mentors like Chris Earley, reading LinkedIn posts. I actually read your LinkedIn posts. Uh and you motivate Hey, you motivated me to post more um and to do more. Yeah. And I don't like looking at your s*** because then it's like it's 120 likes and I got like 16 likes and I'm like I'm not as good as Chris and I don't get it. I'm just much more handsome, entertaining.

Chris: I appreciate you. Well, Bill, thank you so much, brother. Appreciate you so much.

Bill: Uh, we should go to all the seminars and go, "Listen, get Chris and I to do dual hosting podcasts together. You be like the straight guy. I be like the goofy guy.

Chris: We could kill it. There's potential there. We got to tap into that." That's it for this episode of the Earley Show. Be sure to check out more episodes of our show on Spotify, Apple Podcast, The Answering Legal YouTube channel.