How Humor Improves Client Experience in Law Firms (Full Transcript)

[00:00:00] Speaker 1: Hi, I'm Chad.

[00:00:02] Speaker 2: And I'm Stephanie, and this is The Lawyerist Podcast, one of the many ways we help lawyers build healthier firms, better businesses, and more sustainable lives.

[00:00:12] Speaker 1: And today, Stephanie is going to talk with Jennifer Cargo about how humor is a great communication skill.

[00:00:20] Speaker 2: It's kind of a fun conversation, humor, with something we don't always talk about, right? Being funny.

[00:00:25] Speaker 1: Humor is the best remedy, so they say, or the best medicine.

[00:00:30] Speaker 2: Absolutely.

[00:00:31] Speaker 1: Yeah.

[00:00:33] Speaker 2: Yeah. So, I don't know how to segue into that, but I'm like, speaking of medicine, speaking of laughing a lot, we have an event coming up every year where I do think we laugh a good bit when we have our LabCon conference.

[00:00:45] Speaker 1: Mm-hmm. Oh, yeah. LabCon coming up. Excited about it. It's going to be my third LabCon, I think.

[00:00:52] Speaker 2: Yeah? Yeah. Awesome. I know a lot of people don't blab on about it if they've listened to the show for any amount of time, but what's your take? What do you love about the event, and why do you think people should want to come?

[00:01:06] Speaker 1: One of the favorite things that I love about LabCon is the collaboration that happens in the room, where you're getting, especially in our remote world, all of our Labster calls are on Zoom for the most part, and getting everybody together and seeing them learn from each other and bouncing around to the different tables and talking to each other and getting to collaborate and learn what's working from other people. I think that is hugely important, and I think it's one of the things that our Labsters love so much about it, too.

[00:01:40] Speaker 2: Yeah, absolutely. If you are new to the show and you're like, what are they talking about? We have this community of lawyers that we help build better businesses, and every year we get together for our in-person event. It's called LabCon. It's in Atlanta, September 28th through the 30th, and we always open it up. We have some spots for some special guests to come, and what I always tell folks, just like you were saying, it's not about sitting and listening to a bunch of speakers and figuring out. It's not a typical CLE. It's about rolling up your sleeves and spending a couple of days outside your office actually working on your business and collaborating with those other folks and moving the ball forward, getting some stuff done.

[00:02:22] Speaker 1: Yeah, and people do really do get some stuff done. We ask them to come in with kind of an idea of, well, if you could get one or two things done in your business, if you had that time to do it, what would they be? And they get it done. They come in and they roll, like you said, they roll up their sleeves and they walk away with something, something finished and ready to roll.

[00:02:44] Speaker 2: Absolutely. And obviously we're there to help them through the process and working with them. And so it's super fun. We also throw in a few wild card things that we like to do and mix it up and have some fun. And I think it's just a really cool environment and a cool community of people. So if you're listening to this and you're like, yeah, I could use two or three days away from the real world to work on my business and to do these things and hang out with the cool folks at Lawyerist, then hit us up. The easiest thing to do is maybe just email me or Chad. So Stephanie at Lawyerist.com or Chad at Lawyerist.com. We'd be happy to connect with you and give you some more details. I'm sure there's a page somewhere on the website, but since I don't know the URL right now, I say just email one of us and say, hey, can I hear more about that thing you were talking about on the show? And we'd love to connect with you and see if there's a space for you to come join us this year.

[00:03:39] Speaker 1: We can send you the page.

[00:03:41] Speaker 2: Exactly. Even better.

[00:03:43] Speaker 1: Yeah.

[00:03:44] Speaker 2: All right. Well, let's check out my conversation with Jennifer on being funny.

[00:03:48] Speaker 1: All right.

[00:04:03] Speaker 3: Hi, I'm Jennifer. I'm with Rose Law Firm of Napa Valley. I'm recently with them. I just celebrated one year and I do have a little bit of history of comedy 101 and 201 and doing a little bit of amateur standup on the open mic nights up in Sacramento. So that was pretty fun.

[00:04:18] Speaker 2: Yeah. Hi, Jennifer. Welcome to the show. And we should also add, like, I think we helped find you and hire you for the firm, right? Absolutely. You did. Yes. That's fun. I don't know if many people know that we don't talk about it very much, but we have this hiring package that where we help law firms do the first round interviews and help kind of screen everybody and help that process so that they just get to meet the final folks. And we then that's how we first met you. So that's super fun. Yes.

[00:04:47] Speaker 3: Yes. Paige recruited me. And it was awesome because we didn't even speak again until my one year anniversary, ironically, to invite me to this.

[00:04:54] Speaker 2: Oh, nice. And she was like, hey, that's how's it going? That worked out. That's awesome. Yeah. Well, yeah, we're going to dive right into the comedy stuff, because honestly, we were on a call a few months back and you mentioned your comedy training. And it was sort of like record scratch for me. I was like, wait, what? You do stand up? I love comedy. I'm just so curious. Like, tell me about that. How did you get started down a comedy path?

[00:05:17] Speaker 3: So this was actually crazy. I was working as a compliance officer at the time. And I went to a business conference down in Las Vegas. And there was a gentleman there, Ben Nemetin was the speaker. And I don't know if you've heard of him, but basically he talks about bucket list items and how people should have bucket list items, right? Have bucket list goals and have a journal. And I believe he sells those kind of journals now. And I'd never even heard of him. But throughout the course of the event, people were asked, you know, what do you have on your bucket list that maybe you would be interested in doing someday? And I have a million things, right? So I threw it up there. I threw comedy on the board and there was a million little post-its throughout the few days. And then at the very end of the event, they started calling people up on the stage and they're like, you, you're going skydiving, you, you're going to learn to play guitar. And next thing you know, my name came over the microphone. They said, get up here on stage. And they said, we're sending you to comedy school. And so I was actually awarded comedy school lessons at this event. It was pretty cool, you know, and then the market took a dive and I got laid off. I was no longer with the company shortly after, but I still got to enjoy the comedy lessons and, you know, take my turn on stage and, you know, know what it was like to get booed off the whole deal.

[00:06:29] Speaker 2: Yeah, I think, okay, there's so many questions here, but first, like, I would imagine there's a lot of fear. For me, there would be a lot of fear going on to a comedy stage and that idea of being booed off. How do you deal with that?

[00:06:45] Speaker 3: It was practice for sure. And it was an unusual kind of practice. I got one of those cheap little amps with the microphone, you know, like the, just the cheapest kind you can get for kids. And I was doing standup outside in my backyard with this microphone and I would look into sort of the mirrored image on the slider and I could see myself pacing around and kind of the way I was acting and looking and, you know, and it was awesome. The cats are watching and it was all about cat humor at first because you don't know what you're doing and you don't realize nobody really wants to hear that yet. And so you have to start somewhere and, you know, and it really was just a lot of practice.

[00:07:22] Speaker 2: Do you have to be, I mean, I would imagine some people are just funny and some are not. So when you go to comedy school, like is their theory like, no, anybody can be funny. It's a skill and you learn it or is it some, what's the natural talent level need to be?

[00:07:37] Speaker 3: I think for improv, you'd have to be naturally funny. So for improv, you have to be just on the spot funny. Everything has to have some semblance of humor. And with standup, it's a little different, you know, it's a lot more scripted. And so you can have this little pet peeve in your head that's been going on for days and kind of just run on a tangent on that. And you don't realize it's everybody else's, right? But it's one of those things that, like, I'm not naturally funny. Like in conversation, unless I know you, I'm not going to typically be naturally funny. You know, what people are expecting, like, oh, you do standup, you're going to be naturally hilarious in conversation. And that's not really the case. It is, it's like a sport. You have to practice, you have to learn, you have to educate yourself, you know, and you have to actually pay attention each and every day in your normal interaction to try to find the absurdity in everyday life. Whereas improv, yes, I think you have to be naturally funny. I think that's a lot more difficult because it literally has to fly out all the time. You have to have just that character, you know? So it's more than like tapping into a creative genius on occasion. It's literally your character or your being when you're doing the improv.

[00:08:42] Speaker 2: Yeah, I love what you just said about you have to pay attention and be intentional about finding the absurdity in everyday life. Yes, yes, like literally everything. And so how do you do that?

[00:08:55] Speaker 3: Well, like for here at work, for example, one of my favorite things is when they go to their signings. So we have this really small office and I'll tell you, this is top secret. I don't know if Rose Lawn Firm wants this out why they have five star reviews, but we have perfect five star, probably a hundred reviews as of the other day. And it's because our office is a maze. It looks really tiny from the outside. And when we get you in here, you have to make a right followed by another right, then you hit a dead end. You're going to want to make a left at that dead end. There's another dead end. You make another left. There'll be a third. At that time, when you make that left, you're actually going to reach the end of a hallway and that's the signing office, right? And no matter how serious somebody is, they start to get weak when they realize that they're helpless to the person in front of them. They're not going to make their way back to the car. And so they all kind of lighten up and go, gee, tee hee hee, I don't know where I'm at. This is a maze. Are you helping me back out? You know, it's like this concern comes in and whether they're laughing or they're concerned, it's this opportunity for us to break the ice. And we love to do that. And so of course, you know, we have paralegals here and the three, when they take people back to sign, they make jokes about it, you know, like, oh no, we're not going to tell you where the car's at, you know, or, oh no, but you could use that door over there. A bell will sound, but that's okay. It happens all the time. But it's cute. You know, it's one of those things that breaks the ice. And I think that just hearing the women just outside my door do it, I'll tell you, it's hilarious because the reaction that they get out of everybody, they're so comforted by us and they leave with laughter, you know, and even the attorneys are making jokes about how ridiculous it is to try to find your way back in this small building and how many twists and turns you have to take down, how many hallways to get to where the signing office is. And so just that in itself has been an icebreaker for us.

[00:10:44] Speaker 2: I love that how you guys, how you're now, because that's what I wanted to get to, obviously, in this conversation is like, okay, you have this formal comedy training and how do you use that in a law firm? How do you use that with clients and translate it into business success? And you've just shared this one really interesting way. It's like, hey, comedy and jokes is a way to break the ice. It's a way to make people come off edge. They're coming into a law firm, they're probably nervous, you know, maybe they haven't hired a lawyer before, they don't know what to expect and, you know, people, and then you sort of can just, okay, we can relax because we're laughing.

[00:11:23] Speaker 3: Yeah, it's great. You know, I almost feel like the nurse, like you get a sticker, you know, the Band-Aids offer something when they're coming out of that room because they feel this sense of relief like, okay, I'm done signing, I've got my estate plan and now I can try to find my vehicle, you know? And it's just, it's great, you know, it really is. And just the little twists that everybody puts on it because I can hear it from my office, I'm right next to the signing office, and I get a kick out of the different jokes that come out of, I mean, it's not the same thing every day. These paralegals are coming up with new material without realizing it. Like, they're literally comedians, you know, the attorneys, same thing. They're cracking jokes, you could hear the laughter roaring and they don't even realize they're just naturally doing it because this hallway is so funny to us and everybody else. It's great.

[00:12:06] Speaker 2: Are there other examples where you find that you use this comedy training in your life and what does that look like?

[00:12:14] Speaker 3: I think you do. You have to make light of everything. I'll be honest, I actually recently had a sudden medical emergency on a family camping trip and our son was there and he was really scared, obviously, he doesn't want to see his mom like that, you know, and our, you know, our son's 19, he was going to go hiking with us and I woke up sick in the morning and I was like, oh my gosh, I'm really sick, I think I need to go to the hospital. And he was really scared, you know, and next thing you know, I felt like, you know, dizzy and all of this, you know, I do have a minor heart condition. And so I stopped, I said, find a medic, you know, my husband finds a medic and, you know, they took care of me, everything, and, you know, and it was just one of those things, you know, what do you say to your son, you know, what do you say? Because I'm out of it, I can't talk to him and, you know, my husband, he's just like I am and of course he uses the same little twist, let's lighten this whole thing. And he goes, man, son, I was really disappointed when they canceled the airlift, I really wanted that free helicopter ride, you know, and just him saying that at this, you know, national park, you know, it just softened everything, you know, but that's, I mean, you have to find that in everything and it really, it did, it helped the situation, it helped my son to realize mom's not dying, she's sick, you know what I mean? You know, and it really did, it helped the situation and I tend to do that with everything and I tend to gravitate towards people that do because I feel like they kind of have the secret to life, you know, you're able to find joy and not let anybody take the stress off of, you know, or take you into a stressful mode, you know, and especially with, you know, difficult clients, difficult situations, you know, if somebody says, man, she was really hauling off at me, I just look at her and go, man, that's terrible, she must be having a bad day, you know, it's nothing about you. And so you've got to realize that and kind of take it in and go, man, you know, she's having a wild time, huh? You know, and when you lighten it like that, it just, it changes just your whole being and your whole mentality and it helps other people to realize, you know, like maybe not to personalize something so much, to let it roll off, you know?

[00:14:13] Speaker 2: My husband's been known to say that you can't take the fun at a funeral or something. He has some, you know, like, you know, funeral starts with the word fun and he's been accused of being a little too, having a little bit too much fun. But I think for him, it's kind of the same thing, like we're in this intense situation and that's how he sort of deals with it, is through comedy, through laughter. He'll make jokes. He's always, you know, lightening the mood that way. So I totally can see that.

[00:14:43] Speaker 3: And I think that it is something with comedians where you like to see people smile. So like if I'm at the grocery store and I can think of anything cheesy to say to the lady at the checkout, I'm going to say it. I'm going to say it and let everybody hear me. I don't care, you know? And it does. It tends to brighten everybody's day. Then the person behind me smiling, I'm smiling. The person ahead of me smiling, that's what you do. But people don't realize that going through life with sort of that mentality, it does. It gives you a kind of a better day.

[00:15:13] Speaker 2: Yeah. How else do you think that you've used this like, okay, let's go back to the actual training. So you went to class and like they actually teach you like, is there timing? Like what does a comedy class like have to like, what do you have to learn to be funny?

[00:15:29] Speaker 3: You have to stand on stage for five minutes without fainting, right? Puking or fainting, really. So that's going to be the hardest part. You're going to have to realize that cat humor is not getting anywhere. And then cursing is basically like a cheap, I don't know, you learn right off that it's one of those cheap things where if you're throwing out a lot of curse words just to make people laugh, you're not necessarily funny, you're just using potty humor. And so, you know, you have to learn that. But it's definitely a lot about timing. You have to be able to pause. A lot of people don't realize when they speak, they speak rapid when they're nervous. And when you're doing comedy, you'll notice those people on stage are very smooth. But I'll tell you one of the top secret things that any comedy course will tell you, even if you take Steve Martin's masterclass, is that all the jokes are the same. There's a setup where they're going to set you up with, okay, this is what I'm talking about. And then there might be some little things that make you chuckle and they call those tags, right? And you may have one or two tags. And then at the very end, there's the punch. And that's where you're expecting the laughter. And what I found interesting about the comedy class was that you don't notice in everyday life when somebody's joking with you or you're watching your favorite sitcom or comedian, that they're all using this setup, tag, and punch, setup, tag, and punch. So when you find anything, you know, the irony in life, you literally just use that to kind of flesh it out. And that's how you create the draft of your standup.

[00:16:54] Speaker 2: That is cool. I know we actually went to a standup show, I think about a week or two ago. My husband gifted it for me for my Mother's Day present. And he knew that I would like the comic in part because he's clean. And I, you know, I've been to the other comics too, but, you know, I appreciate that because I do think it's harder. And then what struck me after we left is I was just like, this guy, I don't know how my husband finds it too, but I was like, this guy, it feels like he just knows my life. Like all the things he was joking about, like things that him and his wife do, it just resonated because I was like, that is us. Like, we have that same conversation. Like he did this whole bit about how they watch TV and they'll be watching TV on the couch and then they look at each other and they're like, I mean, we're only half lying down. What if we were all the way lying down? Like what, at what point can we go to bed and watch TV? And I was like, that is a conversation my husband and I have nightly. Like that's ridiculous because we're already, it's not like we're walking, like we're already in a pretty comfortable seated position, but we're like, but we could be all the way lying down. Yeah.

[00:18:02] Speaker 3: And that's what appeals to most people because like with me, with the cats, let's just say that's what I started out with. It was horrible. Trust me. You know, but I had to start somewhere. I had to learn how to write and nobody laughed, of course, you know, because you're dealing with cat haters, cat dislikers, kind of cattish people. It's not going to be everybody's cup of tea, but when you can find something that everybody resonates with, like their, their trauma in an Uber or something like that, then you've got it all, you know, you know, what they deal with at a restaurant, with the server, when it's busy and it's a fancy restaurant, that's an important event or something. And, you know, you just find something and then the other part is that you find a way to overreact or over exaggerate kind of what it is, you know, like, obviously we don't ponder what we're doing on the couch at night. That's what made it so funny is that we don't ponder it. So just hearing somebody ponder it was like, Oh, you know, that, that, you know, it perks your ear up because it hasn't been done, you know, it's fun.

[00:18:56] Speaker 2: Yeah. Curious, just any other like ways that you see using this in your, you talked about the client experience and we talk about that so much here at Lawyerist, like how do we get intentional about creating a great client experience? And I'm just curious if you have any other sort of tips or things you've noticed from this comedy training that you bring to your client experience?

[00:19:19] Speaker 3: I think for the client experience, it's really all going to be about doing everything with a smile. If you always have a smile on your face, the client's going to be happy. And I don't know if anybody realizes it, and it's not even to be funny. And let's face it, funny people are not stupid. They're actually really witty. They're really intelligent to be able to draft it out, flesh it out, or even to come up with it just on the spot, you know, when you're dealing with improv. And so to me, if you can just say everything with a smile on your face, you notice there's a different reaction out of people than just being dead faced. Even in everyday life experience, like I'm saying, with your server, with your cashier, whoever you come in contact with, when you contact people with a smile, it's different. And so when you're one of those bubbly people, like a comedian, you're either smiling the whole time or you're grieving the whole time to try to be funny. People tend to have different personas when they're funny. But what I have noticed is that if you just talk with a smile, it's a totally different reaction out of everybody you're dealing with. It really is. And as long as they know you're not mocking them, you're being sincere, I think it definitely just the smile is what lends it all.

[00:20:27] Speaker 2: I love that. It's so simple and so true. And just sometimes I think like in life, it's not difficult, but it's just being intentional and remembering and being like, oh, yeah, these are little things, but like, are we smiling even when we're on a call and somebody can't see us? Because it does come through.

[00:20:45] Speaker 3: Or with employees. It's a stressful place on occasion. They get yelled at. You know what I mean? And with me being the office manager, I like to try to make light of everything, you know? And same thing, just getting to know them. You know, if they're saying, I'm not feeling well today, you know, I think I'm going to need to go home. And I'm like, oh, man, don't stop by here first, whatever you do. You know? Or the other day, you know, somebody said, I think I'm going to need to go home early. And then before I head home, I'm thinking, well, I think I'm having what she's having tonight, you know, because I felt sick too or something like that, you know, but just that little amount, it seems to lighten the load in the office as well. And I've noticed that like with my personality, I'm typically one of those annoying people, you know, that's always happy or always in a good mood or trying to find a really cheesy joke. You know, they call it dad jokes or whatever. And I tend to do that all day. So it's like people tend to have a love or hate with me. But with the employees, it seems like when an employee is dedicated and they're around somebody like that, and that's our office manager, do you know how much easier it is to come to her when you have cramps that one day? You know what I mean? It really is. I'm sorry. You know, but when you're that person that can make light of everything, it's a sense of relief for them. They can tell you they got yelled at. They can tell you they got chewed out by that client. They can tell you when they need to go home. You know what I mean? And it doesn't, you know, it doesn't instill a sense of fear in them just to be able to talk to their manager. And I've noticed that definitely. I've had 10 subordinates in my last position, and it was easily, to me, what kept me connected to my team and what kept the team running well, running smooth, was the fact that they were all able to approach me. They could come flying in my office and say something very serious, and they knew I'd probably poke fun at them, soften it, and then give them a response that was, you know, maybe a resolution to what they were looking for. And I think that really helps.

[00:22:31] Speaker 2: Absolutely. And yeah, you're speaking to that just like caring about people as individuals, as humans, and that is so important as leaders that we do that because then we build that trust and then they will come to us.

[00:22:44] Speaker 3: Exactly. Yeah.

[00:22:45] Speaker 2: All right. Well, I got to, you know, I got to ask before we wrap up, what, like you said it, so do you have a favorite dad joke? Maybe it's a mom joke. I don't know. But what do you?

[00:22:55] Speaker 3: Oh, my gosh. Everybody always asks me that. Actually, one thing I would love to, I would love to end with was that I actually have used AI. I know that lawyers is really an AI, and I've used AI to help me to write comedy. And I honestly, if anybody's listening, please do so. Just watch what it says. I wanted to create a spoof of a, what is it, a GoFundMe. I wanted to make a GoFundMe here. I live in the Napa Valley, and an entry-level house is probably about $800,000, which is not common, right? But if I want to live where I work, I'm going to have to pay $700,000, $800,000 for a first time home here, right? And so I thought, well, let's make a funny GoFundMe. And let me tell you, the AI started writing jokes, and I had to stop it. And I was like, wait, stop writing my jokes for me. And then I was like, are you plagiarizing anybody? And then I had to do a search, you know, to look. And it was coming up with its own original jokes, and they were way better than mine, which was discouraging, you know, for me as far as writing goes, of course. But it also helped me. It inspired me because it made some of the jokes that I was creating for this spoof GoFundMe a little bit better. Because it was like, don't just ask for the pizza. The AI tells me, ask for the pizza, the tip, and a little bit to give the guy at the door, you know? It just, the fact that it threw it out there was just, I was floored by it, that it gave me so much detail, and it literally ran off onto these tangents of something that just sounded like an absurd mess. And to be honest, I think that the AI that assists me with the comedy writing has probably been funnier than most people I've seen on stage. Yeah. Interesting. And I don't want to steal it, obviously, and I know I can't, and I tell it that, you know what I mean? I'm like, I can't steal your jokes, just help me write them, okay? But you really have to prompt it to help you and not actually write for you. And when it does, and it comes up with something out of the ether, it's more impressive than what most humans come up with. So I've loved it. I've actually got a kick out of it. It's worth looking into. Yeah, nice.

[00:24:51] Speaker 2: I love it. It's like you're, and I agree, like sometimes it just helps spark ideas or kind of, it sparks creativity in ourselves that maybe sometimes it's harder to tap into, it sounds like that's what you're doing.

[00:25:03] Speaker 3: Yeah. And it's like, oh, you went there, but I want you to go way further. I want you to take it all the way out in the left field. And that's what it's coaching me to do, which was very impressive, you know, and it makes me feel like, oh, if I'm going to do standup again, I'm going to need my AI coach to help me to write for sure.

[00:25:18] Speaker 2: Nice. And so are you, do you try to get on stages regularly? You got to open mic nights?

[00:25:23] Speaker 3: I haven't in quite some time. I've relocated to Napa. And so I'm much further from Sacramento. And when I was doing that, it was actually on weeknights and it was after work, I would commute in bumper to bumper traffic up to the city, do the standup night. And then in the dark, find my way back to my car and get back home by 10, 1030 and try to get to bed for work in the morning. And so as of lately, I haven't been doing it. My most recent was actually, I was asked to do a roast and toast for a retirement party. And the man was very inappropriate during his, during his tenure. And I didn't know him very well, which was very interesting. And so, you know, I couldn't think of what to write, but they just happened to have a love seat in the corner that they were going to take pictures with. And I was like, well, is this where we sit on his lap to take pictures at the end of the night? And everybody was floored. I think people cried when I said that because I knew what kind of person I was dealing with and I knew what kind of crowd I was dealing with and I knew it was going to be okay for me to be that politically incorrect at that moment. And so, you know, it worked, but that, yeah, that was my last time actually enjoying it.

[00:26:27] Speaker 2: Maybe this will be a little encouragement to, you know, keep getting back out there and I love it. And maybe there's someone listening and you're thinking, I've always wanted to try it or I wanted to take an improv class or I want to do something on the bucket list. I love that they just kind of gifted bucket list items at the end of that conference. I would love to encourage anyone, like maybe go beyond your comfort zone and try something new and see what happens.

[00:26:51] Speaker 3: Absolutely. The courses are worth it. You meet wonderful people. We stay connected and we still laugh with each other online.

[00:26:57] Speaker 2: Well, thanks so much, Jennifer, for joining me today. It has been fun to have you. Yeah, you too. Thank you.