Certified Legal Nurse Consultant

I was in the gym working out with my trainer Jerome this morning, and after finishing my bench press, Jerome exclaimed “We did it!” That cracked me up and I joked “We? I’m the one moving that weight and hey, I don’t see you sweating.” He came right back at me with, “But I was right there with you, Vickie. I’ve got your back so you can concentrate on feeling strong.”

I like to think I’m your “Jerome.” Whether you’re just starting your legal nurse consulting business or simply trying to take your CLNC^® business to the next level, think of me as your trainer. While you’re concentrating on the work ahead, I’ll be right there with you. When you read my blog, stay connected on Facebook or receive my mentoring advice, remember the “we” in your efforts. Yes, I’m right there watching your back and if you hang with me, the CLNC^® mentors and your CLNC^® peers in the NACLNC^® Association I promise you’ll always feel stronger.

Success Is Inside!

P.S. Comment and share what makes you feel stronger.

In honor of my favorite quote by Laurel Thatcher Ulrich, “Well-behaved women rarely make history”, my New Year’s resolution for 2012 is to be less well-behaved.

Whether it’s in an interview, a CLNC^® 6-Day Certification Seminar or an individual mentoring session, you’re going to see more of the real Vickie in 2012. I’m going to let go and tell it like it is and in so doing, I hope to inspire you to realize your own best self as a Certified Legal Nurse Consultant.

Know that I remain in your service – it’s just going to be service a little more “Vickie style.” While mentoring one of you it hit me that I was holding back to spare your feelings. I owe you an apology. I not only wasted my time; I wasted yours too. I hung up the phone and vowed in 2012 to bring more of the realistic, optimistic, buck-up Vickie that my staff, friends and family know and many (or some) days love. This is the style that’s served me for 30 years in my legal nurse consulting business and now it’s time to crank it up a notch for you and your CLNC^® businesses. Here’s to being less well behaved in 2012.

Success is Inside!

P.S. Go ahead, comment and tell me what you really think.

One of the marketing strategies I teach in the CLNC^® Certification Program is to network with everyone who comes within three feet of you. In this quick video, Catherine Cass, RN, CLNC shares how she used this marketing strategy right out of the Core Curriculum for Legal Nurse Consulting^® textbook to land a lucrative testifying expert position – even before she’d left the CLNC^® 6-Day Certification Seminar in Las Vegas.

It doesn’t get any better than this.

Success Is Inside!

As we move into the holiday season, our role as CEO becomes even more pronounced. Sure we’re CEOs of our Certified Legal Nurse Consulting businesses, but you might be the “Chief Everything Officer” of your family as well, in charge of your business and housekeeping, childcare, homework, shopping, meal-planning, cooking, carpool and finance, to name just a few departments.

So how do you juggle your career and family without going insane, and still enjoy the holiday season? That’s the million-dollar question and here’s my million-dollar answer: stop being the Chief Everything Officer and learn to say no. That might mean saying no to the people you love the most and no to doing all the laundry, all the housework and all the errands. Learning to say this one word, the most powerful word in the dictionary, can have a revolutionary effect not only on enjoying the holidays but also on your CLNC^® business.

For example when Edie, who was very career driven, got married, her husband said “I don’t do laundry.” She smiled and said, “That’s okay, neither do I.” In her 14 years of marriage, she has raised their son, gone back to college and risen to an executive position.

It’s okay for your spouse and kids to do some of the housework. It’s not going to kill them, but it is going to kill you if you keep doing it all. Get your family behind you and your career goals in the same way that you’re behind each of them. That’s the best way to handle your legal nurse consulting business, the holidays and the day-to-day we call life.

And while you’re at it, stop saying yes by default. Too many nurses fall into the traps of “if I don’t do it, it won’t get done” or “it’s faster to do it than explain it.” When you agree to say yes to an additional chore or project, think about what you’re saying no to as a result.

You’ll have a much happier life, holiday season and productive CLNC^® business when you learn to say no, delegate some of those myriad responsibilities and initiate on-the-job training programs for your spouse and children. As long as you’re the CEO, you may as well put those skills to use!

Success Is Inside!

Recently I was negotiating a deal with a company I’ve been doing business with for a long time. It became obvious that we had reached an impasse and we each settled on our “final” offers. A note about my negotiating philosophy: while I consider myself a strong negotiator, I’m not one to bluff very often in a business setting. I save my bluffing for poker games with my twin brother Vince (don’t tell him that’s how I won that last jackpot from him, LOL). I pride myself in creating and maintaining strong business relationships and always coming from a place of fairness and integrity in my dealings with other people – that’s why many of my vendor and business relationships are long-standing.

In this situation though, I got the impression that the other party was bluffing and was holding back more than they had put on the table. It wasn’t a “put up so you don’t have so much” moment; it was a “you can do better than you’re telling me” moment.

So in my own words, I let the other party know that I was willing to walk away from the deal if they didn’t step up to the bar. I made my case and offer and signed off from the negotiation. The other party had never experienced that from me before, so they knew I was serious. They waited, but I waited longer; they finally came back with an offer that was fair to both of us.

That reminded me of one of the most pivotal days in my legal nurse consulting business – the day I realized that if one attorney wasn’t willing to play according to my terms (terms that were favorable not to just one of us, but to both of us), there were more than a million others who might. As a Certified Legal Nurse Consultant, you’ve got to learn when to walk away from a deal because it isn’t meeting the needs or goals you’ve set for your CLNC^® business.

When that moment arrives, pull out your iPod^®, crank up Kenny Roger’s song “The Gambler,” sing along with the words, “you got to know when to hold ’em, know when to fold ’em, know when to walk away and know when to run” and give yourself the courage to make the decision that’s best for you.

Success Is Inside!

Imagine being able to get dozens or even hundreds of attorney-prospects at the push of a button. Then you’re able to start marketing to them, knowing that you have a solid hot lead.

I found a tool that wasn’t designed with Certified Legal Nurse Consultants in mind; however, it could be a great weapon in your arsenal. It’s software called The Localizer Leads Tool. The Localizer Leads Tool is an Adobe Air-based marketing software program, which simply means it will run on both Macs and Windows PCs.

The Localizer Leads Tool pulls specific information on attorneys from Google, giving you access to their address, email, website, phone number and more. This tool allows any Certified Legal Nurse Consultant to instantly generate massive lists of attorney-prospects.

This video explains how a CLNC^® Consultant would use this tool to generate attorney-prospect leads with the push of a button.

Click here for a free trial of The Localizer Leads Tool and click here to purchase.

P.S. Comment and share how you find attorney-prospects on the Internet

Guest Blogger Profile

Brian Horn is an Internet marketing consultant who specializes in search engine marketing, site optimization, social media marketing, link building and web data analytics. Brian has consulted with Vickie Milazzo Institute for more than five years.

Brian also speaks at seminars and conferences throughout the U.S., Australia and Canada on how to use the Internet to improve business.

I started my legal nurse consulting business with the intention of testifying, but working behind the scenes with attorneys was how I really built my business. Despite that fact, I was always open to testifying and did so occasionally. And that’s exactly what you should do when your attorney-client asks you to testify. That’s right, go ahead, say yes!

Testifying is free advertising and an instant credibility-builder with attorneys. When you’re up against the opposing attorney remember: that attorney is not the enemy, he’s just another potential prospect. If you do a great job, that attorney will never want to go up against you again. The result? He will be sure to hire you first on his next case.

Next time an attorney asks you to testify in a case don’t reject it outright, go for it all the way! Remember who you are, a registered nurse with valuable knowledge and years of nursing experience. And if you start to panic, remember that 95% of the cases will settle before trial anyway so your likelihood of reaching court is exceedingly low (really).

When you “just say no” to testifying, you’re not only missing a huge opportunity to demonstrate your proficiency, but missing out on the opportunity to gain new attorney-clients for life!

Success Is Inside!

P.S. What are your biggest fears about testifying? Comment here to share.

I just left New York City after my appearance on FOX & Friends. Alisyn Camerota, who interviewed me about my book Wicked Success Is Inside Every Woman, is a pro. It was such an honor to interview with a strong woman who’s interviewed newsmakers like President George H.W. Bush and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. The entire crew was professional and fun. Everything went so smoothly it would be hard to imagine a better experience.

Contrast my fun day at Fox studio with an earlier experience at a different, unnamed, TV network. Start by imagining yourself in a hot TV studio waiting for an interview. Your host is in New York City and you’re in your hometown (in my case Houston), sitting in an uncomfortable swivel chair wearing an earpiece that allows you to hear some of the chaos going on behind the scenes. In front of you are the camera, an ultra-bright spotlight shining into your eyes and some tech-types running around trying to pull everything together and make it all work. This goes on for 45-50 minutes while you sit there with your best interview face on, trying not to act bored or to allow the people in the studio back in the Big Apple see you fidget.

Unlike my spectacular experience at Fox, everything that could have gone wrong that morning did – connections failed, the lighting was off and cameras malfunctioned. I was sitting in front of the unforgiving eye of the camera the whole time, not knowing who was watching me because while they could see me, I could not see them. I was trying to smile, hold my bladder (nursing experience came in handy) and resist the temptation to pull out my iPhone^® and check email.

Finally, the voices in my ear became serious; someone shouted “Live” and we were rolling for another interview related to Wicked Success. Minutes later we were done and the interview was in the can. As we were leaving, Tom remarked that he was surprised that I sat there so long without visibly fidgeting. He’s used to seeing me move a lot.

It wasn’t easy nor was it my idea of a fun way to spend 45 minutes. So, I just sat there quietly when I preferred to fidget and struggled to practice the interview in my mind instead of focusing on all the things that aren’t getting done while I sit and smile.

The principles that I apply in a TV studio apply to you as a Certified Legal Nurse Consultant when you go into an attorney’s office (whether for an interview or presentation). Appointments will be delayed, important phone calls will come up for the attorney and sometimes you can sit there for what seems at least two eternities before the assistant finally summons you into the attorney’s office. In the meantime, under the watchful eye of the receptionist you can work yourself into an agitated state, squirm, check the time repeatedly and make faces at each passing minute, or sit quietly or start up a friendly conversation (they’re called the gatekeeper for good reason!). Either way, your behavior will be reported to the assistant and maybe even the attorney herself.

Remember, from the moment you walk into that law office, you’re already in the interview or presentation. It’s just not enough to show up on time; it’s how you show up as a CLNC^® consultant.

Success Is Inside!

Today’s professional athletes cross-train to reach their next level of success. For example, a professional football player doesn’t just do football drills – he lifts weights and might even practice yoga or ballet, all with the intention of performing better on the football field.

Cross-training can create synergistic benefits, and this just might be a strategy for taking your CLNC^® business to its next level. Choose a category, preferably one you are weak in or typically avoid altogether, and ask yourself how your CLNC^® business could benefit from expanding that category. It might be technology (if you find yourself struggling to do more than read your email), public speaking (if you’d rather be in the coffin than give the eulogy) or self-development (if you find yourself constantly obsessing over everything that is wrong with your life).

Now spend the next three months cross-training in that category and watch your CLNC^® business soar!

Success Is Inside!

P.S. Comment and share where you need to cross-train and when you’ll start.