TRP 216: How to Recruit Rainmakers with Chuck Curtis

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You're listening to the Rainmaking Podcast. Hosted by high stakes headhunter, author, and professional speaker, Scott Love.

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You're listening to the Rainmaking Podcast, and my name is Scott Love. Thanks for joining me on the show. Our topic today is how to recruit rainmakers. And our special guest is someone that's done that pretty much his entire career. His name is Chuck Curtis.

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Chuck Curtis retired from Pillsbury, a major global law firm in 2023 as the senior firm wide director of attorney recruiting. And he spent his whole career within law firm organizations doing recruiting. Now he works as a management consultant, niched within the area of law firms, offering consulting and coaching services, helping them to develop and execute effective partner hiring strategies and initiatives, align firm leadership, and also to assess and improve partner hiring teams. Chuck and I have an insightful conversation for you. If you're in any other industry that recruits rainmakers, those who are responsible for performing the work and also getting clients, this is a show that's going to be helpful for you because the concepts that Chuck and I talk about are malleable.

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As always, this show is sponsored by Leopard Solutions legal intelligence suite of products, Firmscape and Leopard BI. Push ahead of the pack with the power of Leopard. And by the way, make sure you check out the show notes wherever you listen to this show to connect with Chuck because we put his LinkedIn information, also his company link on there, and he'll be happy to talk with you. Thanks for listening. I hope you enjoy my conversation with my friend Chuck Curtis today.

[00:01:55] - [Speaker 1]
Hey, this is Scott Love with the Rainmaking Podcast. I've got a close friend of mine and a special guest today. His name is Chuck Curtis and we are talking about how to recruit rainmakers. Chuck thanks for being on the Rainmaking Podcast.

[00:02:08] - [Speaker 2]
Hey my pleasure Scott. Appreciate the invitation.

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Absolutely right. And I know that the ideas of recruiting rainmakers that applies to law firms, recruiting firms, management consulting firms. I know that there's always in professional services, there's the allure of wanting to get that rainmaker, somebody that has that big book. So let me ask you this. What have you found to be some of the most important elements to recruiting rainmakers in your career that you've seen to be helpful?

[00:02:36] - [Speaker 2]
Sure. My experience is legal primarily, right? So most of the rainmakers I've recruited are lawyers. There's really a it's an interesting proposition, right? Because as you know from the recruiting industry, there are not tons of rainmakers out there.

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It's rainmakers tend to be anomalies at firms, and so you're kind of dealing with a different personality set when you recruit them. The ones who who are the most, you know, how do you get to be a Raymaker? Guess it's another good question, right? And I think a lot of that is kind of partners are intuitive. There's not no law firm has a how to be a Raymaker class.

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And so what I have found is that you're either so expert in your specialty or industry space that people just flock to you because you have a special talent. But I think that's the rare case. The majority of rainmakers are very smart lawyers who good at what they do, but they have learned how to be business advisors to their clients and they become a go to business advisor for the client, which spins off all kinds of things beyond their level of expertise. And they tend to be team builders because to get to these book levels, you have to have a team. You can't do it all by yourself.

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It's still an hours based business and the best ones manage to get themselves ingrained into a whole bunch of different areas and are very good and on top of their clients' needs. And they really understand their clients' business. Anyways, that's a little bit about the rainmakers themselves. And then how do you attract those folks?

[00:04:11] - [Speaker 1]
Right. Like the fact, let me interrupt you, I like the fact that we got a working definition of what is a rainmaker. And I like the way you described it because that kind of gives me a visual of who that person is with also the context and subtext of, Gee, I'd really like to be one of those people. People listening of course. And so yes, so tell us then in attracting that person, let's say that's our avatar, that's our rainmaker, that's male or female, it doesn't matter, whatever type of industry they work in, as long as it applies to your firm and obviously can be a good fungible fit.

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That's what you want. So let me start with this. Why do you think those people move, but they're so successful? Why would they go somewhere else?

[00:04:51] - [Speaker 2]
Yeah, that's a great question. And part of the reality is that a lot of them don't, right? It's hard. So it started to find rainmakers and then started to find ones that want to move. But I think that there's, it's kind of a two tiered approach.

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I kind of broke it down into the 30,000,000 to 100,000,000 in revenue candidates, which there's not a lot of, but they operate in an environment that's really extraordinary. So that's there's only a select number of firms really that can play in that space. I worked at Pillsbury, which is a fantastic firm, but it's not one that can attract probably an $80,000,000 revenue partner. Our biggest shots that I took when I was there were up to the in the 30,000,000 range. But those are the ones where you see that the partners that are moving are going to very specific other firms, probably their main competitors.

[00:05:40] - [Speaker 2]
And so your question was, why do they move? And I think that the thing that'll make a RIN maker move is if they see something that can exponentially increase their practice that they're and they're not getting the support at their firm to do that. So for example, your M and A attorney, emerging growth in your platform at your current firm is in essence you. And then you look to another firm that has all these other players that are peripheral and you can attract work in two plus two all of a sudden equals five. Right.

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And you see this chance to really grow. I think one other area that I've seen in some of the folks we've recruited is, you know, that they are being taken care of really well by their firm, but their support team is not. So that's a foot in the door for a firm to say, look, we'll take care of you, but we'll take care of your team as well. And then sometimes, you know, this is going to shock you, but there's some big egos, right? And high level attorneys that make a lot of money can get sideways if there's management changes or changes at the firm.

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They just say, you know what? I don't need this. I want to take a look, take a look around. So I think those are some of the things that put them on the market.

[00:06:55] - [Speaker 1]
This is great. Really good, good content here, Chuck. Let me ask you this. When you said this, I thought this really encapsulated it perfectly. That they see something, like in another firm, that can exponentially increase their practice.

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And that one thing, it's usually one or two things where they see something that can really move the ball significantly just by putting on a different jersey and going to a different firm. They're doing the same thing. They're doing the same work. It's just a different strategy, or they've got a different perspective or a different name or something like that. What are some examples that you've seen where somebody made a move and it did work out really well?

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What do you think they saw at first that attracted them to that opportunity?

[00:07:42] - [Speaker 2]
Yeah, I think biggest thing that I could point to would be that they saw that growth opportunity, To build something bigger than what they had or a connection that that firm could help them build something bigger than they had. Maybe there were particular clients at that firm. You know, I'm thinking of one huge transition that we were not involved in. We we but a guy made a move to a huge to another firm because they did a lot of work for one of his clients. And that firm really wanted to do more work for his clients.

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And he was able to bring his client over and then do a bunch of peripheral things that made his practice more attractive and put more money in his pocket. And I say he, but it could be a she. It's not gender specific.

[00:08:26] - [Speaker 1]
That's great. Yeah. So let me ask you this. You talked about the staff isn't getting support. Are you talking about staff like employees of the firm or are you talking about junior level attorneys?

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What does that mean exactly?

[00:08:39] - [Speaker 2]
Yeah, I mean, if you've got, let's just use round numbers, right? If you've got a $40,000,000 practice, you have to have a significant number of other partners and staffs or attorneys. So I'm talking about attorneys, not administrative staff to service that work, right? Because we still build by the hour in the industry and you're only one person. So you've got to have a lot of people to help you on that basis.

[00:09:01] - [Speaker 2]
And so those are the folks I'm talking about. And there was one particular situation just as I was kind of walking out the door at Pillsbury where we were looking at a particularly talented lawyer who was happy with his compensation. But a number of his staff were not particularly happy with their compensation. And the firm was trying to figure out a way, you know, is there a way that we can make this work across the board? And because of origination credits and billing credits and the way the way firms compensate their partners, sometimes it's hard to reward your team, right?

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Because if you're the one who primarily has the client relationship, then they want to reward you for that. But they don't necessarily want to reward everybody else who helps make it happen.

[00:09:43] - [Speaker 1]
Right, right. I like the way you said that rainmakers, they're really good at what they do. They're good team builders and they get ingrained in a lot of different areas and a lot of ways to understand their clients business. Let me go back to the team building part of that. When you've got a rainmaker, obviously, if that one person goes, you would expect a team to follow because it's an integrated group.

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They've got cohesion. They've got a track record. They can hit the deck plates running because they've got continuity and they all come over. Where do you think most firms fail in not showing that they can be good support for the rest of the team? Where do you think most of the firms make mistakes in that regard?

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Yeah, that's a great question. I think that in assessing the partner that the group, And all the things that you said are right, they're an integrated team. That's why you want to get somebody like this in, because you're not just bringing one person, you're bringing in a whole team and they've already got their their thing that they're good at. But I think that that firms can get stuck a little bit in trying to squeeze them into their system. This is the way that we do it here.

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And I think there's a lot of flexibility required in these types of transitions, right? It's there's not a specific playbook that says, you know, do ABCD. You've got to be able to it's like jazz, right? You got to you got to go with the flow a little bit. And then I think it's, it's so critical because when you're recruiting somebody at this level, it's a super individual pursuit, right?

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You are recruiting, you are taking cues from them and figuring out what is it that they want? How can we make that fit? How do we make, how do we put ourselves in the best possible light? And so these these are kind of the most they're really fun to do because you're trying to think of a bunch of different factors to make it work. But I think I think that ability to flow with it and having within your firm structure, being able to differentiate yourself in a way that is impactful and also to be flexible.

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If you kind of make it a rigorous standard, it could be challenging.

[00:11:45] - [Speaker 1]
Yeah, that I understand completely. So

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what do

[00:11:49] - [Speaker 1]
you think firms need to do in terms of leadership support to attract rainmakers? Do you think if there's a significant rainmaker that a firm wants to talk with, should the chairman be on that first call? What do you think? What are some good ways that law firm leaders can get really involved in the process?

[00:12:08] - [Speaker 2]
Yeah, I think it's absolutely critical that somebody at an extraordinarily high level of the firm chair, firm advantage partner, somebody who's got a good reputation and has a lot of pull in the organization, be the one to do the initial outreach and get involved. If it's somebody who comes to a recruiter, then that person needs to really guide that effort, right? It can't just be a standard hiring partner. It can't be somebody like me who's a SAP person. You can make the introductions, but you really have to have somebody who connects with them.

[00:12:41] - [Speaker 2]
And that person really needs to forge a connection, personal, that they hit it off. You know, here's what we can do and really be a good spokesperson and salesperson for the firm. But I think that's in these types for this rear breed, it's just got to be somebody at the top of the firm.

[00:13:01] - [Speaker 1]
Right, absolutely. So Curtis, tell me a story of someone that you had presented to you at your firm. They were looking at other options and they joined your firm. What do you think it was that caused them to do that outside of compensation? What do you think your firm did really well in showing that rainmaker that attracted that rainmaker to your firm?

[00:13:23] - [Speaker 2]
Sure. You know, I think what I just talked about was that connection, right? The example that I'm thinking of both the firm chair and the firm wide managing partner established a very special connection with that person and a line of communication so they could kind of walk them through the recruiting process and they really took ownership of it. And I think that, you know, we came up with what I think was a really creative compensation package so that we paid market to them. So a big base, but also lots and lots of upside.

[00:13:55] - [Speaker 2]
So here's what you can do. If we do what we think we can do and you do what you think you can do. You know, here's the ways that you can get to these numbers that you're looking for. So I think I think those are the were the big things. And then, you know, in this particular case, there were, you know, bottles of wine exchanged and can we do this?

[00:14:14] - [Speaker 2]
Just, you know, they are our furniture and our furniture and magic partner picked up on cues and thought, hey, these would be good things that would be helpful, you know, kind of some personal ways get to this person in addition to all the standard, you know, here's the platform, here's how we can make it work. Here are the client synergies that can happen. Here's some clients that can introduce you to that are firm clients. So in addition to all that stuff, kind of that personal touch, and we really want you. And so I think those are the things that really got it across the finish line.

[00:14:45] - [Speaker 1]
Yeah, that's great. What are some of the trends that you think people in the legal industry are seeing right now as it comes to recruiting rainmakers and group leaders?

[00:14:54] - [Speaker 2]
You know, I've made a small represent earlier, but I think there's a lot at the top right there is a there are a lot of a big name folks you know in London. I've seen it in Texas. I've seen it in New York. I've seen it where where people with big names, big firms right are moving because they're offered an awful lot of money, right? They're throwing a lot of money around.

[00:15:20] - [Speaker 2]
And like I said, that's kind of in that rare air place. So I don't have much personal experience with that, but I think firms are flush. They've had some great years. The big firms have done really well and they are willing to expand on what they consider to be strategic talent. And so there's been a lot of that going around, you know.

[00:15:41] - [Speaker 2]
And so, you know, for the rest of us, for the rest of us who are recruiting at a slightly different level, you know, there's probably less opportunities. You don't have that option to just say, hey, look, we'll pay you whatever you need. But I think that's the trending I've seen is that firms are willing to spend for talent, willing to spend a lot for talent. And even some of the firms that you would think would not be susceptible to having people go or watching people walk out the door.

[00:16:07] - [Speaker 1]
Yeah, right. Right. So let me ask you this. What advice would you give to a law firm leader where the partners just aren't pitching in? They're not contributing to the interview process.

[00:16:18] - [Speaker 1]
They're not responding. They're not responding to staff. And that's slowing things down. It's just not showing well to those respective laterals. What advice would you give to that law firm leader in terms of facilitating change?

[00:16:31] - [Speaker 2]
Yeah. Wow. That's a great question. I say, first of all, don't start by trying to recruit a rainmaker if that's what your process is. But I think that that firms really need to get smart.

[00:16:43] - [Speaker 2]
It's if you want to effectively recruit partners and if you want to be a firm that creates success and fire hiring, you really need to be strategic. That means that your your managing partner, your firm chair needs to be involved. Your hiring process needs to be good. You need to be aligned. It needs to be everybody's role lowers at the same time, because if not, you're at a competitive disadvantage and other firms will just leave you in the dust.

[00:17:11] - [Speaker 2]
So you really need to look at what you're doing, make sure that you are thinking that it's correct. Know, hire somebody like me if you're not sure about it, you know, hire somebody from the outside. Of course, it doesn't need to be me. There's a lot of people who can come in, take a look and say, and say, look, here's here's where you can improve. Here's some some challenging spots that I see.

[00:17:31] - [Speaker 2]
You you don't go in there with the idea of just tearing things down, but to give advice in terms of, you know, maybe this is a disconnect. Maybe, you know, you're saying one thing, but then when people interview candidates, people are saying different things. And that is, you know, people pick up on that. So you really need to be aligned and you need to be strategic. You need to know what you want.

[00:17:53] - [Speaker 2]
And you'll relate to this guy. You also need to know who you are in the industry so that what you're selling rings true. You know, you have to be authentic and candidates can see through that. If you're trying to represent yourself as something you're not, they will figure that out in a heartbeat.

[00:18:08] - [Speaker 1]
Absolutely right. I've seen that up close and personal where a law firm chairman overestimates his firm's brand equity. They think they're a bigger deal than they really are. And that's really hard because nobody else sees them that way. And I think you're right.

[00:18:21] - [Speaker 1]
I think we need to have a realistic sense of where are you situated in the caste system of law firms and know exactly who you are, what separates you from everybody else. And I also like what you said that in terms of people rowing oars together, and thank you for that visual. That's great. Rowing oars together. I've seen that the lateral recruiting process is an easy way for a firm to develop a bad reputation because they don't execute quickly.

[00:18:49] - [Speaker 1]
You have people with egos that expect to be courted that aren't, and they really should be. And I think even the LPQ, which stands for long painful questionnaire, when there are errors on it, which I've seen, when there are formatting issues, a simple document that just doesn't work, or the same question is asked three times but in different ways on that document. I've seen partners kind of scratch their heads and saying, don't know if I want to go here again. So I think, and I want to talk more about your consulting services here in a second. I want to find out more about that.

[00:19:22] - [Speaker 1]
But let's say we're summarizing this into three action steps a leader of an organization can take to really improve their firm's odds of attracting sophisticated and successful rainmakers? If we could distill the downchuck into three action steps, what would those action steps be?

[00:19:39] - [Speaker 2]
Yeah, I think I think to keep it to the rainmakers, And some of these will apply in different ways. But I think for rainmakers in particular, it's, you know, if you have the ability to track somebody, be flexible in trying to make a deal and be willing to bring their whole team and treat the team with respect, not just the managing partner because you're bringing the whole group. So you want them all to come over happy. I think number two would be get your chair or for my magic partner, somebody who is very influential at the firm and has credibility to be the one who's leading that effort. And then the third thing is to get back to what you just talked about is to mind your P's and Q's.

[00:20:18] - [Speaker 2]
You know, there's a lot of ways that firms can slow these down and screw up. But when you're working on these things, can't afford in these high profile ones, you can't afford to not be on top of your game. And so you always have to endeavor to be faster, you know, to take away those types of things. And I think, you know, this is four instead of three. But be first.

[00:20:39] - [Speaker 2]
Be the first person to make the offer. Right? Get out ahead of the game and and make yourself the target. Make all the other firms match or beat you. But I think getting in first is a huge advantage to getting people across the finish line.

[00:20:52] - [Speaker 1]
That's great, Chuck. And you know what? I think we should have you back on the show to talk about that. The offer itself, because that's worth the whole conversation.

[00:21:01] - [Speaker 2]
Yeah, that's true.

[00:21:02] - [Speaker 1]
And so tell me then, and our listeners, what are the services that you offer? What are you doing that you think can help people? And we'll also put all of your links on the show notes.

[00:21:12] - [Speaker 2]
Sure. Well, yeah, what I've done is, you know, after being in the industry for a long time, you know, retired early last year and have have been working on building a practice. It's really been interesting. So it's another thing we can talk about offline is you can you can probably give me some good advice on building a business because I worked for a firm, right? And but it's been fascinating to try to do it in my objective has been to be very organic in it, right?

[00:21:37] - [Speaker 2]
And work with people that I know and through my own individual contacts in the industry. But what I do is, is I've had a lot of experience in partner hiring integration. You know, partner hiring is we mentioned earlier, I can I can take a look at what's going on at a firm, make recommendations in terms of alignment in the strategy? Is there's doing right? Is what you're doing wrong?

[00:21:56] - [Speaker 2]
And just part of it is just figuring out what is it that you want out of it? What are your objectives? I think a lot of firms like, oh, let's go hire partners and like it'll just happen and you have it has to be thoughtful. You have to What do we want? What type of person do we want?

[00:22:10] - [Speaker 2]
What are the industries we want? So to make it strategic, you have to go through a whole exercise. I can help firms, I think with that. And then the other thing that's kind of been a pet project for me, and it hasn't gotten traction yet, but it's going to is the concept of integration partner coaching. So when you bring that, you make this huge investment, you get somebody across the firm and they come in and every firm has integration plans.

[00:22:34] - [Speaker 2]
And that has improved greatly since 2007 when I started doing partner hiring. But there's another element to it. And that's, you know, lateral partners come in and they're outsiders. You know, it's just reality and existing partners have more information about how the firm works and what the compensation system is. And so lateral partners have to learn all that stuff as they go.

[00:22:57] - [Speaker 2]
And they don't have a resource to kind of say, hey, well, this has happened to me. What do I do? And so I think that a coach for new partners is going to be industry standard within a couple of years because it's somebody who understands the integration process and can help guide, you know, are they giving you the access to the business development? Do you get to regular contact with the practice section leaders? Is the firm leadership talking to you about what they promised when they brought you in the door?

[00:23:25] - [Speaker 2]
And all those questions that they don't want to ask internally, because it could look bad. You can ask that third party and get help in a way to get answers to some of those questions. Take some of the mystery out of it, because I think we've made this big investment. We want make a payoff, you know, spend a couple extra bucks and make sure that that partner has the resources that they need to be successful at your firm and having a coach who understands that process can really be a huge advantage to a new partner.

[00:23:51] - [Speaker 1]
That's great, Chuck. Absolutely. And I can see you as being that resource for that person and even to the firms in how they integrate and recruit people on board. So we'll put, for everybody listening, we'll put Chuck's contact information and his LinkedIn profile link on the show notes. Wherever you listen to this podcast, go to the show notes and you'll be able to connect with Chuck directly.

[00:24:12] - [Speaker 1]
But, Chuck, thanks so much for being on the show. I look forward to having you back on, and great job with sharing all this great advice today.

[00:24:18] - [Speaker 2]
My pleasure. Thank you so much.

[00:24:24] - [Speaker 0]
Thank you for listening to the Rainmaking podcast. For more information about our recruiting services for international law firms, visit our website at attorneysearchgroup.com. To inquire about having Scott speak at your next convention, conference, sales meeting, or executive retreat, visit the rainmakingpodcast.com.