Nurse Consultant

Congratulations to Shari Diorio, RN, BSN, CLNC who received her first cases at the CLNC^® 6-Day Certification Seminar in Las Vegas. Watch Shari tell her story of how she received cases from two different attorneys, the first literally just minutes before the CLNC^® Certification Exam started and the second case just after the exam, while she was at the reception!

In Shari’s own words, “It doesn’t get better than this!”

Success Is Inside!

Recently, I had dinner at one of my favorite restaurants. I’ve eaten just about every variety of food in restaurants around the world. I’ve dined from the humble carts of street vendors in Saigon and in ultra-modern Michelin-starred restaurants in Paris, but I keep returning to one chef’s place every chance I get. The food is exquisite, tasty and such a sensory experience that I have devoured every dish he has ever put in front of me. This guy is a perfectionist not only about the food but also the plates on which each course is presented. Here’s one of his creations – a one-bite crab salad – served on a series of Rosenthal china plates that the chef himself commissioned.

This crab salad demonstrates one of his most important secrets to success – less is more. You won’t find an over-flowing bowl of pasta or piece of beef that looks like it was cut from a brontosaurus on one of his tables. His dishes are small, so small that each one can usually be eaten in a bite or two and they burst with intensity. The experience starts when you first see the dish, continues as you smell its aroma and savor the too-quickly gone burst of flavors and ends with you hoping no one is looking so that you can lick the plate clean. The chef’s goal: he never wants you to be sated by one of his dishes. In other words, after you’ve had that bite or two, he wants you to want more after you finish. I’ve dreamed about having more of some of his dishes. I would gladly scrub pots and pans in his kitchen for just another bite of the oyster dish he creates.

As a Certified Legal Nurse Consultant, that’s what you should strive for with your attorney-clients. You want them to always want more of you, to never feel that they’ve had or gotten too much. Don’t over-stay your welcome when you visit their office. If you’re on the phone with them, remember their time is valuable. Come up for air and don’t talk more than you have to. Don’t use 10 sentences when you need two. In your reports give your attorney-client relevant detail but don’t comment on everything in the record. It’s the rare case that will be as thick as your Core Curriculum for Legal Nurse Consulting^® textbook. If you feel you’re writing way too much, you probably are.

I’m already plotting my next dining trip and wanting more. I hope your attorney-clients are wanting more from you as well.

Success Is Inside!

Last night I roasted a chicken for dinner and Tom declared that it was the best roast chicken he’d ever eaten. Even I had to admit it was darned good. But I didn’t set out to roast a superlative chicken; I set out to make a quick and easy dinner. So how did I get to superlative? Easy. Cooking, like legal nurse consulting, starts with the right tools. The right tools, whether it’s my favorite antique cast iron roasting pan or your CLNC^® Certification Program, can enhance even the most inexperienced person’s abilities. The right tools make me a better cook and they can make you a better Certified Legal Nurse Consultant. 

I rarely use recipes when cooking and if I do, I make them my own, modifying them on the fly. But before roasting last night’s chicken I looked to Thomas Keller’s cookbook for his recipe. There I found two small tweaks that made a huge difference – first drying the chicken completely and then roasting it at 475 degrees instead of at 350° or 375° which makes the chicken very crispy on the outside and juicy on the inside. 

Today, I challenge you not to roast a better chicken, but to go back to your CLNC^® Certification Program and Core Curriculum for Legal Nurse Consulting^®, pull out one or two instructions for anything from marketing to report writing and use them, not just to tweak your CLNC^® business, but to propel you to the next level.

 Success Is Inside!

Yesterday someone I met asked me: “Vickie, of the places you’ve been, what is your all-time favorite trip?” I’m not a fan of this question because every trip is a favorite in its own way. My response yesterday was the same as it’s been for 12 years: “If I can only pick one, it would have to be Nepal.” Nepal was my first expedition, so I felt daring, rugged and adventurous. I also fell in love with the incredible contrasts there.

The Himalayas were the most stunning mountains I’ve ever seen and I hiked on trails that were carved by generations of use and felt like sacred ground. The dramatic mountains and 14,500 feet of altitude took my breath away. With every step I took I simply marveled at what I saw. To this day I’ve seen nothing that rivals the beauty or the thrill of my first view of Mount Everest.

If there was a counterpoint to the beauty of the surroundings, it was the places we stayed. I’ve done the camping thing. It’s great; I love being in nature no matter the weather and I don’t mind getting really wet or dirty. But after a long day of hiking I enjoy a hot shower, a good meal and nice surroundings. There were few of those in Nepal. Some of the places we stayed were downright dirty. The communal toilet (if there even was one) was often overflowing and covered in a combination of excrement and urine. Luckily, my hospital experience with all sorts of bodily fluids helped me to cope and being a nurse I knew how to use a toilet without touching anything but I quickly started looking forward to using a hole in the ground instead of a Nepalese toilet.

Then, there were the uncomfortable beds made from 2x4s covered by mattresses stuffed with “local materials” shaved from a zopkio. They didn’t bring me joy. When Tom and I zipped into our sleeping bags at night, it was for protection from the mattress and whatever was living in it more than the elements. It almost made me wish we were camping outside, not tea-house trekking. Next there were the four minutes of luke-warm, sun-still-heated water per person. Tom and I made the most of that one. Don’t get excited though – any flames of romance were quickly extinguished when the water returned to freezing in the 9th minute.

Finally there was the food. Being an Italian gal from New Orleans I live to eat, so Tom was shocked to find that not only was I not eating, I had no appetite whatsoever. After three days he watched me practically have a foodgasm at the discovery of a dubious-looking jar of American peanut butter.

Despite the worst food and the worst accommodations of my life, Nepal was my favorite trip.

Sometimes the most rewarding and enjoyable things come with some discomfort. This applies to our legal nurse consulting businesses too. We can be working away in a business we love, on a case we’re interested in or a challenging project and then something happens and suddenly the day turns bad. What do we do – lose our momentum and quit? No, we have to push through it. When this happens at my office, I’ll joke with my staff and say “Hey, if this business was easy everyone would be doing it.” I think that’s what makes any business, especially legal nurse consulting, so rewarding.

We often think easy or soft is what we want, but what we really want is something that will challenge us and in the challenge we find a special reward. To be in Nepal, I needed to work to get there. Enjoying the Himalayas involved not only bad food and accommodations, it also included training for long and high-altitude hiking we’d be doing and traveling almost halfway around the world to get there. One day we walked for 12 hours to get to the next tea-house (breaks not included). At first I resisted the discomforts but on Day 4 of the trek I woke up very hungry for even bad food and on that day had the epiphany, “Without the discomforts I wouldn’t be having this wondrous experience.” Suddenly I was all in, truly alive and savoring each and every moment.

Embrace the discomforts of your own CLNC^® expedition, whether it’s a prospect call, writing a challenging report or simply emptying the trash can in your office. When you embrace the discomforts you’ll wake up to each and every moment and opportunity available to you for your legal nurse consulting business.

Also, vow to do something each day that makes you uncomfortable. It could be offering a new CLNC^® service to your attorney-clients, finally attacking and organizing that mountain of paperwork or simply making a call to retie the connection with an attorney-client you haven’t spoken to for some time. Pick something that you’ve been resistant to and see how it makes you feel when you’ve completed it. There just might be a greater payoff or reward than you expect. You may feel like you’re climbing Mount Everest but think of the view from the top!

Success Is Inside!

My staff at Vickie Milazzo Institute is strong, opinionated and sometimes even mouthy – just the way I like them. When we hire a new employee I sometimes notice that at first they’re reluctant to give an opinion that’s different from the majority of the outspoken staffers. They are often a little slow to speak up and when they do it’s obvious they’re just tagging onto the others. It’s like the new person is afraid to get off the fence and jump down onto either side until they know what side everybody else is on. Here in Texas, if you’re sitting on a fence in a pasture full of longhorn cattle that may be a good idea. But when you’re in my conference room, it’s not a tactic for success with me or with the rest of the staff.

Here’s what happens when someone is just sucking up to me or a manager or the group at large and not really speaking for themselves; they get zero credit for their input. Their light, if any, may as well be under a bushel. If I wanted to hear a parrot, I would have hired one. Instead, I hired them for their expertise and I want to hear their opinion – whether I agree with it or not.

This sucking up temptation also applies to you as a Certified Legal Nurse Consultant. When you’re in an attorney’s office discussing a case, that attorney doesn’t want you to be a “yes” person.

Attorneys are used to thinking for themselves and they expect the same of their CLNC^® consultants. They are used to intelligent disagreement and are trained to see both sides of an issue. They don’t need you to suck up; they need you to give them your professional opinion which should include both the strengths and weaknesses of the case (what I call “the good, the bad and the ugly”). That will help them cover all the issues and give them the ability to make their own intelligent decisions and judgments about the case. Knowing the strengths of the case is of little value if the attorney is blindsided by the “bad” side of the case at trial or in settlement conference.

When your attorney-clients get to trial, they’ll thank you for being your own person, even if that means sometimes giving opinions they clearly did not want to hear.

At Vickie Milazzo Institute I encourage people to speak up. New attorney-clients might not be as kind in helping you to develop your confidence. Don’t keep your light under a bushel – speak up and speak out.

Success Is Inside!

I’ve just returned from what Tom and I call our Great Christmas Migration. Every year over Christmas and New Year’s we crisscross the country visiting family and friends, and then we close out the year with renewal time for just the two of us. On one flight, after putting away our electronics and during the landing pattern, I was catching up on my reading. I was struck by an article on the Great Migrations in the November, 2010 issue of National Geographic Magazine. The article spoke to the way migrating animals become so focused on their mission that they pass up the opportunity to eat. It mentioned one of my least favorite birds, the Arctic Tern. Remembering being attacked by them in Iceland, I talk about them in the video below.

Now, unlike those birds, I’m not one to pass up a meal, but I strongly believe that there are times when we must place ourselves in a state of discomfort in order to reach the next level. As we start 2011, I’m asking myself, “What must I give up or do to take my business to the next level”? Now that we’re no longer worried about our New Year’s resolutions, it’s time to ask yourself “What am I willing to do to take my business as a Certified Legal Nurse Consultant to the next level”?

Success Is Inside!

Vickie,

I am learning how to breathe again. You will never believe what happened. I called an attorney’s office last week to get an appointment. I spoke with a receptionist who accidently sent the attorney-prospect a note saying I needed a consult for a medical malpractice case. He called me and left a message giving me his direct number. So when I heard his message I couldn’t pass up the opportunity. I returned his call, got him on the phone and explained that I was a Certified Legal Nurse Consultant and explained the CLNC^® services I could offer. His firm had just lost their legal nurse consultant. He asked me to come and make a presentation. So I am going to knock this out of the park.

After I hung up the phone the mind-numbing fear set in. I requested mentoring and the CLNC^® mentor at Vickie Milazzo Institute was incredible. There are 20 attorneys in this firm and not all practice medical malpractice or personal injury. I also wonder if all 20 will be in the meeting. In preparation for my CLNC^® presentation, I am practicing my answers to the questions on the NACLNC^® Association membership section of the LegalNurse.com website, and I think I am ready.

Vickie, do you think I should start now to call on other Certified Legal Nurse Consultants who might be willing to subcontract? I want to share my blessing if any of the cases are outside my area of expertise.

Sandra M., RN, CLNC

Hi Sandi,

Congratulations on your awesome news! Be prepared for 20 attorneys, but do not express disappointment if only one or two show. My best law firm started with one attorney and one case. Once he saw what I could do for him he recommended me to the other attorneys in his firm. 

For the attorneys who attend, be prepared to focus on the types of cases they manage. In other words, keep the presentation focused on them and their needs. You can follow up with the other attorneys in the firm at a later date, but for now it is imperative that you are relevant to the ones present.

Following your presentation and discussion with these attorney-prospects, you will know whether you need to call on another CLNC^® subcontractor and also the credentials they require for specific cases. I invite you to post a call for CLNC^® subcontractors on my Facebook page. And of course you can search for subcontractors in the NACLNC^® Directory by specialty and location. I do recommend subcontracting outside of your geographical area to avoid future competition issues. Be sure to keep me posted and I look forward to reading your CLNC^® Success Story soon. 

Success Is Inside!

The weather has finally turned to fall here in Houston. This means that for a too-short period of time, those summer days of 104+ degrees are gone. Our recent mornings have been in the low 60’s, what we currently consider “crisp.” Morning is my favorite time and Tom and I are out well before the sun comes up for a walk around our “hood.” Yesterday morning was a little extra crisp so I went to get a light jacket and also noticed my hiking gear, my arctic gear, my rain gear and even my diving gear.

When Tom and I walked out of the house, we were laughing about the fact that we have all the right gear for just about everything and that we are committed to putting it to more use this winter. There aren’t many mountains to climb here in Houston and I can’t remember the last time I needed a parka that’s best suited for the Antarctic winter. The boat pants and high boots I use for climbing in and out of zodiacs have come in handy with some of our rain storms – but the rest of the gear sits and waits for the proper vacation.

You have gear (tools) in your legal nurse consulting business too. Putting all the gear you have to use is just as important to your legal nurse consulting business as is using all the clothing and gear in your life. Vickie Milazzo Institute gives you the CLNC^® gear you need to create a successful business as a Certified Legal Nurse Consultant. Many of you buy computers, set up home offices and with the help of the CLNC^® LaunchBox, turn out perfect promotional materials. But then, in the words of one CLNC^® consultant, you get “professional bradycardia” and you don’t put that gear to use.

I’ve joked in the past about a souvenir t-shirt from one of our diving trips that says, “You can run out of air and die. You can get bitten by a shark and die or you can fall off the couch and die. Get off the couch!” You won’t fail, but more importantly, you can’t succeed until you take your tools and get to work.

Between your nursing knowledge and experience and the CLNC^® Certification Training Program from the Institute, you’ve got the all the right gear you need to succeed. Make a plan and get started on the path to CLNC^® success today, even if that means getting off the couch first or pulling the gear you need out of your legal nurse consulting closet.

I look forward to seeing you at the top and hearing your CLNC^® Success Story.

Success Is Inside (once you get started)!

Citing references and formatting bibliographies are an important aspect of preparing your legal nurse consulting reports. This increases the credibility of the opinions you render to your attorney-clients. Here are seven tips to use when preparing your legal nurse consultant reports.

1. Follow the standard format for presenting references.
   • Textbook
     Schul, Patricia Dwyer. 2010 Nursing Spectrum Drug Handbook, Fifth Edition. New York: McGraw-Hill Professional, 2009

   • Journal article
     Jahromi, Afshin, Clase, Catherine M., et al. “Progression of Internal Carotid Artery Stenosis in Patientes with Peripheral Arterial Occulusive Disease.” Journal of Vascular Surgery^®. 50(2): Aug 2009, 292-298.
2. Provide a complete reference – including the author’s name, title of the article and journal or title of the book and complete publication information (volume number, page and year for a journal; city, publisher and year for a book). Be sure the publication information is accurate. Make sure your references are complete and accurate.
3. Put book titles and the names of journals in italics. Put article titles in quotation marks and not in italic type. You may be used to seeing the article and even the book titles with only the first words capitalized, but the standard format is to capitalize the first word and all major words in the title of an article or book. Do not capitalize “a,” “the,” “and” and short prepositions (unless they’re the first word in a title). Follow these formatting techniques and your reference list will be easier to read.
4. List your references in alphabetical order by author’s last name. In a reference with multiple authors, alphabetize by the last name of the first author listed. In a reference with no author listed, double check to be sure there’s no author on the work, then alphabetize by the name of the publishing organization.
5. When listing website references, if no author is listed, alphabetize by the name of the organization or title of the site (not by the URL).
6. Be sure website listings are current and correct. If you haven’t used a site in a while, recheck the link to make sure it still works and still takes you to the same information you used in formulating your report.
7. Group references by type of source – for example, textbooks, journal articles, websites.

Success Is Inside!

Marketing is one of the simplest subjects you will ever study. So, why do some people fail miserably at it? Because they just don’t do it.

Wayne Gretsky, the famous hockey player, once said, “You miss all the shots you don’t take.” These words of wisdom apply as much to marketing as they do to hockey.

The easy part of launching your Certified Legal Nurse Consultant business is developing your marketing plan. But a plan without action won’t get you attorney-clients. Develop a plan, set measurable, results-oriented objectives and target dates, then act on it.

For example, if you set a goal of marketing to five attorneys each week, you can meet that goal without accomplishing any results for your CLNC^® business. Instead, set a results-oriented objective for your CLNC^® business, such as marketing to a minimum of five attorneys weekly until you get a new attorney-client. This results-oriented objective not only propels you to act, but requires you to act until you achieve the desired result for your legal nurse consulting business.

Most people know what they need to do, they just don’t do what they know. Get out there and just DO it!

Success Is Inside!