April 2010

Did you know that the most trusted profession is nursing? No surprises there. Nurses are the patients’ advocates. Patients know who’s watching their backs. Watching out for the patient, standing up for the patient, protecting the patient – this is our primary role. And that requires integrity above all else. You have the strength of integrity.

The whole world trusts nurses. But the question is, “Do you trust yourself to succeed beyond where you are today?” Do you have the integrity to act on what you really want to do with your nursing career? When I decided to start my legal nurse consulting business in 1982, nurses did not own businesses. I had to have the integrity to trust myself and that yes, I could succeed as a legal nurse consultant.

And, do you trust the people who you spend your life and time with? If you want to become a legal nurse consultant or grow your CLNC^® business, surround yourself with family, friends and attorney-clients whom you trust and who treat you with integrity. When you do, you will easily achieve your CLNC^® dreams and desires. I had to ignore the naysayers. Their fears did not have to become my fears.

Nurses at our CLNC^® Certification Seminars always comment on what a great staff I have at Vickie Milazzo Institute. They say, “I’ve never seen a company that has so many positive people.” When I left hospital nursing, I intentionally set out to create a culture that did not include gossiping, whining and complaining. I created our mission to be about the customer. That’s the culture of integrity here at the Institute.

As you build your CLNC^® business, do so with intention and create a culture that supports your highest integrity by choosing to surround yourself with people who share and support your vision.

Never tolerate people or groups who are intentionally gossipy, mean or hurtful to you or anyone else. If you find yourself in an environment that’s putting you down, don’t put up with it. Don’t let rotten apples sour your fire and vision.

Likewise, it’s important to know that if you participate in gossiping, whining or complaining, it kills not only your fire, but also your opportunities for career advancement and growing your legal nurse consulting business. I promise you, the people who matter do notice unprofessional behavior.

The more successful we are in our careers, the more we participate in life, the more we face decisions that challenge our integrity. That’s why I love the Buddhist proverb that says, “Even the smallest act should not be underestimated, for even tiny flakes of snow falling one atop another can blanket the tallest mountain in pure whiteness.”

Success Is Inside!

I have been a nurse almost 26 years, with 24 of those years working in critical care. For most of that time I loved what I did. However, the last six years have been fraught with increasing dissatisfaction with the nursing profession. I grew (in my old age!) intolerant of the toxic, disrespectful atmosphere of hospital nursing. I had increasingly grown tired of physicians, nursing administrators and hospital administrators minimizing my knowledge, experience and contributions. What else was there to do? This was it, right? But, Vickie’s ads for the Institute’s CLNC^® Certification Program caught my attention every month FOR YEARS. I thought, “That must be nice!”

In October 2007, I decided I had to make a move. I hated my job. However, due to circumstances resulting from my husband suffering a work accident, I was financially responsible for my family. I enrolled in Vickie Milazzo Institute’s 40-hour CLNC^® Certification Home-Study Program. My goal was to complete the program, and sit for my CLNC^® Certification Exam by December 2007. Viewing the DVDs, and following along with the textbook was like sitting in the auditorium of a live conference. While I didn’t achieve my goal of CLNC^® Certification in December, I did pass the CLNC^® Certification Exam on March 4, 2008. And two weeks later, I attended my first annual National Alliance of Certified Legal Nurse Consultants Conference.

I returned home from the conference energized and motivated and ready to build my CLNC^® business. But was I really? It was so comfortable to go back to what I knew – going nowhere in hospital nursing. Sure, I developed and mailed marketing folders, but contrary to what Vickie taught, I did not follow-up. In December 2008, I finally placed a follow-up call to an attorney to whom I had sent one of my marketing folders. We met for lunch the next week, and I left with a case. The attorney was a plaintiff attorney from an aggressive, successful firm. His specialty is construction accidents and products liability. I was a wreck. What the heck did I just agree to do? That same afternoon, I emailed questions to the Institute’s CLNC^® Mentors, re-read sections of my Core Curriculum for Legal Nurse Consulting^® textbook, and referred to the many real case reports included with the VIP CLNC^® Business System.

After emailing the attorney my completed report, he responded, “This is way more than I expected. We need to talk.” Again we met for lunch. He asked if I would “take control” of working to create a visual to use in court as demonstrative evidence of the client’s damages. “Absolutely!” I responded. On my ride home, my thoughts were, “Where do I start?” Then I remembered I had a business card from a medical illustrator vendor that exhibited at the NACLNC^® Conference. With a budget of essentially nothing, and a timeframe of just two weeks, I worked with a phenomenal team in Florida to create a 2D presentation of our client’s injuries. The presentation was used during the expert testimony portion early in the trial. On the evening of the fourth day, the defense offered a settlement of $4.5 million.

For the next four months, I continued to work for this attorney. His paralegal would email me that there was a case that needed to be picked up. I would develop the case, and, with great anticipation and excitement, wait for the next email. All the while, I was spending most of my time in a hospital position which exhausted me, both physically and mentally.

Vickie’s words resonated in my head: “Go all in.” Summer was approaching, and it was as good a time as any. I emailed my attorney-client, expressing my desire to consult on more medical-legal cases. He responded by asking me to come down for a meeting as he had “an idea that will work for both of us.” I met with the attorney-client, his paralegal and his secretary. He asked me to be his medical-legal coordinator. “Did you just make up this job title?” I asked. “Yep,” he chuckled.

I maintain a consultant status, but completely manage the medical issues of all the attorney’s cases. My most common CLNC^® services include reviewing medical records and developing chronologies, researching and defining alleged injuries, researching past medical history, calculating pain medication requirements post-injury, working with medical illustrators to create demonstrative evidence, writing comprehensive reports and assisting with discovery. I present possible defenses, and suggest the best expert witnesses. I speak with my attorney-clients at least monthly to just “check-in.” My attorney-clients love this! I also attend trials and depositions.

I took a leave of absence from my job at the hospital for the summer and have not gone back! I worked from the beach all summer! My time was totally my own – I could work at the crack of dawn or after midnight. My goal, by the end of 2009, was to bill $8,000.00 for one month. For December 2009, I billed for $10,000.00! And this was just part time!

I love what I do. I feel appreciated and part of a team again. My nursing knowledge is valued. Thank you, Vickie, for giving me the tools, support and encouragement to be a successful Certified Legal Nurse Consultant. As Vickie says, “We are nurses, and we can do anything!^®”

Guest Blogger Profile

Annmarie Johnson, RN, ASN, CLNC owns and operates Bucks Medical-Legal Consulting. She has been a nurse for 26 years, 24 specializing in critical care. Annmarie’s CLNC^® business specializes in construction accidents and products liability.

On your legal nurse consulting desk or credenza is a powerful and effective marketing tool that you’re already paying for but probably using a lot less and a lot less effectively than you could be. The tool is… the telephone.

Telemarketing is an area of tremendous interest to a new Certified Legal Nurse Consultant as the cost of other methods of prospecting and qualifying attorney-clients, and marketing, continue to increase dramatically. For the small business owner and consultants, telemarketing has many advantages.

Among them, the fact that you literally pay as you go. In direct mail, for reasonable economics, you may have to print thousands or even tens of thousands of CLNC^® consulting brochures and materials all at one time. In media advertising, you have to pay for circulation of thousands, tens of thousands or even hundreds of thousands of people all at one time, but with the telephone you can reach out and contact as few or as many attorney-prospects as you wish at one time.

You literally have no marketing costs other than time. For example, a Certified Legal Nurse Consultant, who disciplined herself to call just three prospective attorney-clients a day could promote to almost a thousand new attorney-prospects a year in less than a half hour a day at virtually no cost. This is one type of telemarketing that works great for Certified Legal Nurse Consultants just starting their practice.

Telephone prospecting, this method can be used to qualify good prospective attorney-clients to mail materials to.

Like direct mail, this method of marketing does require the selection or compilation of a prospect list. Then you’ll find it best to write a legal nurse consulting script to use and refer to when making calls. You can refine the script through practice.

Another application of telemarketing for most legal nurse consulting businesses is as a way of communicating with past and existing customers. Omaha Steaks, for example, calls their customers from time-to-time with special offers. A legal nurse consultant should do the same thing.

Now, I would like to give you some basic guidelines and tips you’ll want to keep in mind when using the telephone to grow your legal nurse consulting business.

First – the real key to effective telephone marketing is structure and organization. Winging it is a real bad idea. A script, an outline, notes, flip cards, some written tools to help you stay on track are important. The most experienced telephone selling professionals in the country use scripts and notes.

Second – courtesy is paramount. Remember that the person on the other end of the phone can’t see you; they can only react to what you are saying and how you’re saying it.

Third – recognize that some people will not respond well. They’ll cut you short, even hang up on you. You’ll just have to be okay with that. Don’t take it personally. Remember people throw out your mail pieces unread too. You just don’t have to be there to see it.

Fourth – practice makes perfect or at least better. You need to give yourself the benefit of at least twenty or twenty-five calls of a particular type with a particular offer before even beginning to be judgmental about yourself, your skills or the results. If you’ve never used a telephone this way before, you’ll be understandably uncomfortable with the process.

It’s important to remember that just about everything you now do well was once difficult and uncomfortable for you. Stretching comfort zones and mastering new legal nurse consulting business skills are important, reoccurring parts of living to be enjoyed not feared.

Learning telemarketing skills is a way to greatly enhance your personal worth and be able to increase the profits of your CLNC^® business.

Guest Blogger Profile

Dan Kennedy is internationally recognized as the ‘Millionaire Maker,’ helping people in business turn their ideas into fortunes. Dan’s “No B.S.” approach is refreshing amidst a world of small business marketing hype and enriches those who act on his advice.

I had a chance to stand in line and look at the iPad^® this past week. As I always am with Apple^® products, I was very impressed with its quality and its display. It seemed to be an iPod Touch^® with a monster steroid problem, a little big to clip to your belt and too limited to replace your laptop.

Other than the ability to use its 802.11n Wi-Fi connection (and optional 3G) to download books in full color (as opposed to Kindle^®‘s gray-scale), surf the Internet, do email, watch videos, listen to music and download Apps from the Apps Store, I’m not sure what to think of it. It still won’t multitask and doesn’t support Adobe^® Flash^® which is a disappointment. If you properly synch it, it will do the same calendar functions as your iPhone, BlackBerry^® or other phone so, I ask, is it the future or just another half-step?

I’d like Certified Legal Nurse Consultants to let me know what they think of the iPad and how they might apply it to their legal nurse consulting business, versus personal use. One thing I came up with would be its terrific ability to show graphics to an attorney-client when trying to explain an injury. I’m sure Apple will eventually authorize Skype for the iPad – that’ll change how we make video calls. What can you think of?

If anyone out there plans on buying an iPad, click here to comment and tell me. If you’re dead-set against buying one, click here to comment and let me know why not. Either way, I’d love to hear what uses the CLNC^® community will come up with for this nearly way-cool device.

Keep on techin’,

Tom

Take the Stage for Legendary CLNC^® Success. That’s right – take it. Don’t just wait for legendary success to happen to you.

You’re probably wondering: “Okay Vickie, how does someone just take what they want? Especially legendary success?” Easy. To have legendary success, you just have to be legendary. Likewise, to be legendary, you have to act legendary. So how do you act legendary?

First, ask yourself what would a CLNC^® legend look like?

How would they walk?
How would they talk to attorneys?
What would their marketing consist of?
What would their work product be?

And most importantly – what would you look like if you were a CLNC^® legend?
Even if to start, you’re only a legend in your own mind. Johnny Cash knew he was a legend long before anyone else knew.

Once you convince yourself that you’re a legend, and really believe it, you’ll find it easy to convince your attorney-prospects that you are indeed legendary. When you go to the attorney’s office, you’ll carry yourself with legendary confidence. You’ll stand apart from the crowd. Soon you’ll be walking out with more cases than you ever imagined.

People associate legendary with successful and so once attorneys perceive you as legendary, they assume you are successful and want you on their team. The more success you have, the more success you will have. That sounds unfair, but it’s true. Attorneys want to win so they want to hang with winners.

Once you’ve landed the attorney as a client, how do you prove that you are authentic – that you are indeed legendary? By being better today than you were yesterday. By being stronger and swifter each day. The same static behaviors day after day and year after year won’t cut it. Remember the definition of insanity? Doing the same behavior over and over again and expecting different results? To get different results, you need to change your behavior. In fact, just to get the same results year after year, you have to change your behavior.

That’s why I love what Geoff Colvin says in his book Talent Is Overrated.
His position is that high achievers are not just talented (i.e. have an inborn ability) – they might not be talented at all.

So what trumps talent? What separates highly successful entrepreneurs from the rest of the pack? Repetitive, focused and deliberate practice designed to specifically improve performance.

Now, if that sounds like hard work – it is. If you’ve ever watched American Idol or Dancing with the Stars you know it’s not always the most talented who advance. It’s the one who puts on the best show who wins. And to put on the best show requires repetitive, focused and deliberate practice.

Another distinction of people who are legendary – they are able to assess for themselves how they’re doing. They don’t need someone to watch over them or push them. You can only improve performance if you know what needs improving. That’s why honest and competent self-analysis is so important. You must act as though you’re on the outside looking in. You’re an active observer of your own actions.

We all know it’s easier to analyze someone else (like our spouse) than to analyze ourself. To analyze yourself objectively is truly a legendary quality. For example: if you’re about to interview with an attorney, you don’t just show up, you apply repetitive, focused and deliberate practice to make that interview the best one yet. Once in the interview, you need to be able to recognize if you’re off target and pull your act together swiftly. You must be able to self-analyze at the very moment something is going wrong, so you can rescue the situation. If you can’t competently self-analyze the situation, not only will you fail in that interview with that attorney, you’ll keep making the same mistakes over and over again in future interviews with other attorneys.

It’s no surprise that people who fail, fail often. And people who succeed, succeed often.

Practicing the answers to interview questions over and over is an important step to mastering your self-analysis skills. But, that only works if you’re practicing the correct responses. Repetitive, focused and deliberate practice is worthless if it’s the wrong practice. Practicing the same bad tennis swing over and over just produces more of a bad tennis swing. At first you need a tennis coach to straighten out your swing. And then you’ll be able to tell for yourself when your swing is off.

As Vince Lombardi said – “Practice doesn’t make perfect. Perfect practice makes perfect.” That’s why you must choose your mentors and advisors carefully. An inept coach doesn’t just fail to help you, they actually help you to fail.

I recently invested 8 months mentoring a woman at the Institute through repetitive, focused and deliberate practice on a job function I wanted her to master. I required her to do the job herself first. Then I gave her feedback so each time she was doing it more and more correctly. Sometimes we don’t know what we don’t know. That’s why the correct mentors are so important to the process of learning how to analyze yourself competently. And I didn’t just give her feedback. At first, I would ask her to tell me what she needed to do differently the next time. I wanted her to analyze herself, before I mentored her. My goal was – she would become me. In other words, it would be like Vickie was standing over her shoulder guiding her every step of the way. I wanted her to be able to assess herself in the same way I would assess her if I were standing there.

It was time consuming, and sometimes painful for both of us, but this investment has paid off in tens of thousands of dollars each year. She still occasionally looks over her shoulder to see if I’m there. And sometimes I am! But not to correct her, just to ask her how her day is going.

I challenge you to apply repetitive, focused and deliberate practice to key parts of your CLNC^® business (such as marketing, report writing or anything significant of your choosing). When you do, you’ll never be the same Certified Legal Nurse Consultant again. Hey! You might even become legendary. Any of you can, because after all, talent IS overrated.

Remember – We Are Nurses and We Can Do Anything^®!
Especially something easy like becoming legendary.

Success Is Inside!