Terri Adler | How to Build a Thriving Boutique in a BigLaw World

Elise Holtzman: Hi, everyone. It's Elise Holtzman here, a former practicing lawyer and the host of The Lawyer's Edge Podcast, where I sit down with successful attorneys, legal marketing specialists, business leaders, and authors to talk about how lawyers and law firms can grow and sustain healthy, profitable businesses.

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I'm really excited to welcome today's guest. She is a superstar and has lots of fun to talk to. Terri is the managing partner of Adler & Stachenfeld, a real estate law boutique with nearly 50 attorneys. Over nearly 25 years, the firm has grown from nothing at all to become one of the top real estate law practices in New York City, which is a tall order. There's a lot of real estate going on in New York City.

Terri is a talented and creative attorney focused on the real estate industry, listed individually in chambers, and someone who was recently named as one of 2023 Crain's New York Business Notable Women in Law, recognizing women for distinguished careers and exceptional civic and philanthropic activities. Terri, welcome to The Lawyer's Edge.

Terri Adler: Thank you for having me. I'm excited to have a fun discussion with you.

Elise Holtzman: I'm excited to have you. When you and I first met at an event in New York City a few months ago, we just talked and talked. I was really excited to talk to a woman who was in the real estate industry and had really made it to the top because, as you may remember, I was a commercial real estate lawyer when I was practicing law. Tell me a little bit about your background and what made you decide to go into real estate law in the first place.

Terri Adler: Well, I've done articles and things like that, I'll give you the clip-note version of my life, but I'm originally from Utah, I'm not from the East Coast. I moved to New York to go to law school.

I didn't have any money. I didn't know anybody. I showed up with my suitcase and hope and a dream and went to law school at night and I worked at an entertainment law firm during the day time and that's how I paid for school, paid for my top ramen that I ate and things like that.

I worked at that firm for an attorney who did basically residential real estate transactions for movie stars when they were buying X or Y or an apartment or a compound or whatever.

It was relatively straightforward work, but I was also doing some of the transactional stuff. I worked for criminal defense attorneys when I was an undergraduate in Utah. This was the 80s, that's how old I am. I was in the undergrad portion.

I was somebody who was just naturally like, “Give me more. Tell me more. I want to do more.” I wasn't just typing out letters and doing things like that. I was helping them prep for cases. Then when I got the job in law school, I basically took over the guy's practice.

I was like, “Okay, I can draft the contracts. I know how to do this. I would talk to people and I would give them to him.” I was functioning like an associate. When I was finishing law school, one of the attorneys at that firm was like, "Hey, I know this guy who has his own firm. It's a small firm. I think you would really like working at a smaller firm.”

Because I was never somebody who was very good at politicking so much and waiting and going through like, "Oh, you're this. This is what this category does. This is this, and you do this, and don't try to usurp the hierarchy."

I met someone whose name was Mark Shapiro, who was this other attorney's friend, and interviewed with his firm at the time, which was called Shapiro, Shapses, Block & Stachenfeld. They were a small firm and three of them were doing really finance work and Bruce Stachenfeld was doing equity work.

They hired me. I was supposed to work for Mark. I didn't. I ended up working for Bruce. After about a year and probably billing about 3,000 hours, we said, "This doesn't work." Couldn't hire people. It was a different vision for how that firm would go.

So Bruce left, took me with him, another associate, and started what was ultimately this firm. As I made partner when I was a fifth year, again, I don't understand boundaries, I'm not very good at them so I just was doing more trying to take over the world as much as I could with my competencies and the rest was history.

Can't say that it was easy. I don't know if it was a perverted version of fun, I suppose, but my background was really neither of my parents went to college. It was really just, I wanted more and I wanted to not be in Utah. I wanted to take the opportunities that were presented and do as much with them as I could.

Elise Holtzman: You probably can't get more different than Utah to New York.

Terri Adler: In the 80s, certainly that was the case. Yes and I grew up in a town that was Sandy, Utah which has now been gobbled up by Salt Lake, but when we lived there for a while, it was like farms and cows and stuff like that.

Elise Holtzman: You found your way into real estate then, it wasn't something that you said you got out of college and said, “I love real estate. This is something I want to go into.”

Terri Adler: I was an English major with a minor in German. I view and I tell the associates here and I'm sure they're like, “Yeah, whatever, Terri,” I tell them our words are our art. It's our craft. We live and die by our words. I'm very into not dangling participles and ending sentences with prepositions and stuff like that.

I think there's this myth that some lawyers come out of law school or go into law school saying, "I want to do this. I want to be an environmental lawyer." But then they get into the mill of what law school is and summer associate programs and whatever and the compensation grind and all of this, and they end up getting slotted in.

“Oh, you're going to be a finance lawyer. You just did your rotation at XYZ big firm. This is the group that you're going to be in.” How many lawyers that you know picked what they actually practice?

Elise Holtzman: I think that's right. I've seen people change their minds so many times. You've been in real estate all these years and you said that you are not somebody who likes to color inside the lines, it sounds like.

What do you like about the practice of real estate law? What do you enjoy about it? How does it align with who you are, and perhaps what do you find annoying or frustrating about it?

Terri Adler: Well, look, I think the great thing about real estate is it's adaptive, and it intersects with every component of life. It's where you live, it's where you eat, it's where you work, although where you work and where you live now have become conflated.

It's where you go on vacation. It's everything. It's everything and nothing at the same time. It's not in your consciousness. I think what I appreciate about the real estate industry and what I've been able to do with my career is it has to evolve. It's deal after deal.

When I started, there weren't a ton of private equity firms that were doing real estate. It was not one of these recognized sectors. It was developers. It was operators. It was rough and tumble.

As an industry, it's fascinating because historically, it was something that the white shoe firms wouldn't touch. It was an industry that was populated with immigrants, Jewish people, Greek people, Italian people. It wasn't one of these things that was sort of the elite, if you will, we're investing in.

I think because of that mentality, there was always this adapt, adjust, adapt, adjust, it evolves and that appealed to me. As I was doing deals and as the industry shifted, I could shift with it, I could adapt, and I could do a deal that was a dirt deal. Then, okay, "Well, now we need to get dirt through equity and now we need to do finance or we're going to do preferred equity or we're going to do anything."

It just speaks to my brain, frankly. I was never daunted by the fact that my career has evolved and frankly, today still evolves. I really appreciate that about the industry. What I don't like about the industry is that it's too insular.

No matter how much we talk about more women, more people of color, I still sit in rooms where it's all the same looking people, the same background, went to the same business school. There is still a lot of that prevalent. I just think that's not a good base for getting different ideas and different concepts into the industry.

Elise Holtzman: I noticed that too. I haven't practiced law in a long time, but when I started, I was one of very few women doing commercial real estate transactions. I absolutely loved it and I thrived in that world, but I've often wondered, I know obviously a lot of lawyers and I know some real estate lawyers, but it doesn't seem that the real estate biz has changed that much. There's certainly more women in it, but it's interesting to hear you say that it still looks similar to how it always looked.

Terri Adler: Yeah. I mean, look, there are companies who've done really well and it's great and awesome to see there are people out there, there are women who've started their own hedge funds or private equity groups, they're Blackstone.

There are women in high positions, but it's just when you look at the population index and you look at the number of women entering business school or that, and then you look at the senior management and it doesn't have any diversity in it with very few exceptions, unfortunately, still. I just think there's still ways to go. I could wax poetic on some of this stuff in terms of why that is the case, but it's probably too long for this podcast.

Elise Holtzman: You thrived in this world. You're well known for the work you do, your firm is well known, you're considered a heavy hitter. I can say all those things in this field. What do you think are some of the reasons that that's true for you?

Terri Adler: Somebody once told me, we did a deal with a client who was referred to us on a ground lease deal. They were doing a ground lease deal and didn't have familiarity with it. Another client said, "Oh, you should talk to Terri. She's done a bunch of ground lease deals.”

The ground leases are structured in that really sometimes they're family owned buildings that are maybe not being operated in the right way and their family wants to hold the ownership or whatever.

It was me and another woman in the firm who at the time was an associate who's now a partner, who's now on parent leave actually, Danielle Ash. She's awesome. She's amazing. She's going to run the world.

We went through this whole deal, we're opposite a big firm, and at the end of the deal, the client said to me, "I love working with women. You guys just get shit done." I think that there's not a lot of it. I have an ego, I'm sure I'm not the easiest person in the world to deal with, but there's a way I think that why people like me is because I understand the point. I understand we're here to facilitate a transaction. We're not here to tell people why they shouldn't do them. We're here to troubles, issue spot, we're here to strategize, we're here to do a lot of things.

I think my reputation, I can get a deal done. I can act quickly. Nothing kills deals like time. I can get, as the client said, pardon my French, I can get shit done. I'm smart, and I draft well, and all the skill set stuff.

Elise Holtzman: Terri, you sound very confident about your abilities and the work that you do. You also sound like you have fun with it, as I think you've made pretty clear already. Were you always confident from the beginning?

Terri Adler: Look, I think it's human nature for everyone to have a certain amount of imposter syndrome or whatever that phraseology is. To be honest with you, when I moved to New York, I was 24 years old, maybe. I knew no one. I went to University of Utah, no credentials, nothing.

Bruce went to Harvard, this one went here, that one went there, they're all connected. Even to this day, it's amazing to me how many people walk into me like, “Oh, I went to high school with him,” or, “I went to business school with him.” I didn't have any of that.

I remember going into negotiations and I'd be opposite, men who were 20-plus years older than me. I looked much younger than I was. They would try their best to just intimidate the crap out of me. I was nervous. I had questions as to, “What am I doing?” I would joke. I was like, “Bruce, why are you sending me into the room with these people?” I am like,” I'm a first year. I'm a second year. What's going on?”

But I have faith in my intelligence. I know that if I work hard, I can figure shit out. I swear a lot. I'm sorry. I can fake it till I make it in some ways. I had a dad who was in the military. I grew up in a setting where I was an outsider because I wasn't Mormon. I grew up in a setting where I was an outsider because I was a woman. I grew up in a setting where I was an outsider because I was a smart non-Mormon woman.

So people would throw stuff at me and I would realize that I can do this. I don't know that I have false confidence hopefully, but I think it's faith in myself.

Elise Holtzman: Well, I think that's what confidence is. I think there are a lot of definitions out there. For me, the one that has resonated with me the most is this idea that confidence is, I don't know exactly how I've put it in the past, but confidence is essentially this belief that you can handle whatever comes along. If something goes wrong, it'll be okay. You'll figure it out, like you said.

Terri Adler: Right, yeah. I think moving from some place like, I was always like, “Well, if I don't like this, I'll just do something else.” I was broke, I had no money. I walk into my life every day and like, “I am the luckiest person on the face of the earth.” Look at my life. Look where I live. Look what I get to do. Look where I came from.

I really have that constant acknowledgment that this is not gifted to me but I was given a lot by the world and I feel like part of my duty is to give that back. That's important to me.

Elise Holtzman: That's a great segue into a question I wanted to ask you. I noticed on your firm's website that you have a page that clearly outlines the firm's values. You list the core purpose of the firm, the core values, the core business goal, and the mission of the firm. What made you and your colleagues decide to list those things on the website?

Terri Adler: Well, first of all, we have a very strong culture. There's zero question about that. You probably also notice the hedgehog. We have a logo that's a hedgehog. How many law firms have that, let alone a little furry creature?

When we were starting out, Bruce had that same mentality. It's like you need to have a purpose. We're not doing this for money. If we were doing this solely for money, we'd all go work in a big firm and we'd do something else or have gone in a different path.

There's some commonality that we are sticking, we like working here, we want to be here because we have a common set of values. Well, what are those values? Why are we in this business together? What are we trying to achieve? If you read the Jim Collins, which we've done, if you read Michael Porter, you read all these management books and it talks about the heart of a company.

Companies that know who they are I think have a better likelihood of surviving and thriving. Yes, the market forces batter us all around, but to us, it was just super important that if you're going to come and work at our firm and stay at our firm, then you need to understand who we are in our hearts, what are we trying to build, and how do we expect people to act? Then you need to live it.

Elise Holtzman: Right. Well, that's the difference because sometimes people, law firms, or other organizations will put together their values. They do this exercise and then they throw it on a shelf and don't live it and don't remind people both internally and externally of what those values are.

One of the things that I noticed also on the website, and I thought this was a great explanation, is that it says somewhere on that page, “Ultimately without our values, all we are is roughly 50 lawyers sharing office space until someone gets a better offer. Our values are what makes us us.” I think it's interesting, particularly in light of the fact that most law firms these days are talking about talent retention.

You and I talked just before we got on the phone about this idea that there's so much lateral movement. Another person put it to me, somebody, Mariana Loose, who's the chief marketing officer at Alston & Bird, said to me something along the lines of, "In today's world, you can be working at one law firm, close your laptop, 60 seconds later, open another laptop or the same laptop and be working for another firm.”

Terri Adler: Yeah. It's a competitive market, I get it. Like I said, the lawyers who work here could all go out and get jobs somewhere else, but I don't know that they want to. One of our initiatives, attract, train and retain talent.

You got to get them in the door, you will have to keep them, and you have to give them the skills and the platform where they can thrive and build a career that they want. I tell people this all the time, I'm like, “My job is managing partner, yes, I'm running the firm, but it's really about how do I build a platform that people want to be in, they want to stay, I give them the tools necessary to grow and to continue to thrive.”

So culturally speaking, we do a lot. Those values, we just had, if you go on the LinkedIn for our LinkedIn page, you could see it, but we did the A&S Olympics when the Paris Olympics were going on and we divided up into teams. You probably can't see in the background, there's a t-shirt over there that was the Olympics logo. I was on the blue team. We got third.

Elise Holtzman: All right. Well, that's a bronze.

Terri Adler: It's a bronze, but I wanted gold.

Elise Holtzman: Of course.

Terri Adler: I want to be Simone Biles, the goat. One of the competitions was to come up with your team name, and it had to tie to a value. So it's like we're constantly trying to find fun ways and engaged ways to bring the values into the conversation so that everybody knows them.

Like if I know them but the first-year class doesn't or the fifth-year class doesn't, then I'm not really creating the culture. I'm thinking it'll just live because I'm alive. No. So we do a lot to try to make sure that people know what the values are, they know the mission, that it becomes part of their thought process, and then, again, we try to live it. If we see something that's not consistent with the values, then we try to change it.

Elise Holtzman: Terri, you as a managing partner seem to have a very clear vision of what you want the firm to be and also what your role is. You mentioned this idea of talent development and creating a culture where people want to stay.

As we both know, and all the listeners know as well, lawyers aren't typically trained to be business owners. They're not trained to be leaders, they're not trained to be managers, they just teach us a little bit about the law and then push us out the door and say congratulations, you're a lawyer, figure it out yourself.

Where does this recognition and this philosophy come from? Is it something that you just figured out over time watching what other people did? Are you a student of leadership? How do you know how to do this? How did you become ready to take on this role?

Terri Adler: I mean, I've only been doing it for, I guess, five years at this point. I don't remember. But it hasn't been, I will tell you, I became managing partner and then COVID and GFC.

Elise Holtzman: Surprise.

Terri Adler: It was like all these calamities so I can't say that it's been such an easy process. But look, this is something that I think is plague in the legal industry now. I'm on different managing partner roundtables. I talk to a lot of people who run firms. We're unique. We're like the last boutique standing.

Firm after firm after firm has been gobbled up or gone to the wayside, firms that I've known my whole career gone, or merged or whatever. That's your profit a million years, who you probably remember, but if that's your profit disappeared when the GFC happened, but this last year, this last cycle, there were tons of firms that just disappeared.

I think for the most part, the unfortunate thing with law firms is that the people who end up in management are really probably the people who are also the best lawyers. They're the biggest book of business, they're this, they're that, and there's sacrifice that you make to become managing partner, do the work that's necessary, and you have no training, to your point.

You oftentimes get the job in a time of tumult or something in that regard, and you become an agent of change or those sorts of things. I did a lot of, A, I talked to a ton of people. I do think most law firms, there's a real problem of leadership succession where succession planning is plaguing a lot of firms. It has been the end of some firms.

Then the thing that's happening, which is a common discussion among managing partners, is there are not people down the chain who express an interest in being a leader. So now you're seeing this gap where somebody says, “Oh, I want to see who's going to come after me,” and there's nobody interested because they're all like, “I don't like your job. No, thank you.”

So I think we have to build leaders. We have to be more, “It's not going to be the way it was. It's not going to be just the person with the biggest book of business and the most buddies at the firm become managing partner.”

I think you're seeing that with a lot of firms getting C-suites, you're getting an acknowledgment that we need to be run more like businesses and less with just this law firm mentality that work will reign from the sky.

Elise Holtzman: I'm hearing that more and more. I certainly didn't hear that in the beginning of my career as a lawyer or in the beginning of my career as the founder of The Lawyer's Edge. It is starting to take hold now.

I am also hearing about this vacuum of people who are at the more junior levels who are striving for leadership positions. I'm not totally sure where that comes from, although I suspect it's something along the lines of what you said, which is they look at what the law firm leaders are doing and how hard they're working and how many hats they have to wear and how difficult it is.

They say, “You know what, I'm going to do really good legal work and I'm going to go home every day.” Also, the generation ahead of them, maybe our generation or the one just slightly older than us, ran themselves into the ground just generally, whether they're managing partners of law firms or not.

Terri Adler: Yeah. I think that I always look at situations like this and I don't want to sound like the old, like, "Eh, these kids, these dang youngsters." My kids are senior and junior in high school so there's a generation that's ahead of them. I didn't have kids when I was younger. I had kids way later in life.

What is appealing to them? Well, just culture shifted. The 80s was a cutthroat, vicious land. The world evolved into maybe a softer, nicer place. There's more concern about how people are treated and integration and wanting to be sure that people feel included and all these other things.

That's all super positive. I think what we have to do as leaders is not say, “You need to lead like me. You need to just get on, just muscle it in, and suck it up,” and all those fun things that people used to tell me.

We have to say, “What are they seeking?” Again, it's like, okay, yes, there will be people within the organization who want to become leaders, but they're not going to be you. They're going to do it their own way. You have to give them space and grace and training because what their vision of the world is, is different.

My vision of the world is different than Bruce's vision of the world, his office is over there, that's why I'm motioning. I guarantee you, the person who's going to succeed me, their vision is different. I think that that's the struggle is like people are trying to create—and this is how I think the world was—they created cookie cutters. It was the same kind of person who ran one after the other after the other, and that's just not happening anymore. I hear a lot of people say, “There's no one. There's no one.” I'm like, “I am sure there is someone, but you gotta find them.”

Elise Holtzman: Terri, you mentioned that so many law firms have gotten gobbled up over the years. I mean, I remember so many names of law firms that the minute I say the name of the law firm, I sound like I'm 100 years old because they've been gone for so long or they got sucked up or the names changed or whatever.

You're in a 50-person firm, you're in a boutique, and you mentioned that there are not a lot of those around anymore. What are you seeing shifts in the legal industry? What changes have you seen in terms of being able to compete in a marketplace where big firms are doing the same kind of work that you're doing? What do you think is going to happen in terms of how many big firms there are versus whether the law firms that are tiny or midsize or boutiquey can survive?

Terri Adler: Yeah, it's a real bifurcation in the market. It's, to me, a little troubling in the sense of you're competing now, your billing rate disparity is gigantic. Big firms are charging over $2,000 an hour.

Your smaller firms are getting squished and getting into commodity work and the profit margins are much more difficult to obtain, to sustain. You have everybody trying to get the golden ring and you have lawyers, I mean, we have a lot of people who have been at this firm their whole career. That used to be the norm. That is now the exception.

I know lawyers who've been at five, six, seven different firms and are still not settled. It's just going from, “This platform is going to woo me and this platform is going to woo me and this platform is going to woo me,” and they're upgrading their comp and they're upgrading maybe their team or maybe they're getting a disparate this.

But it's like there's a real loss, I think, of that quality, kind of like culture-driven smaller boutique type firm that is providing services to clients at a sustainable cost and can still do the high-level work.

That to me is a loss. I think you see it in the business side as well, where it gets bigger and the small is staying there, and that middle is getting squeezed. I just think it's something that as lawyers, why are we doing it, I suppose? If you're in it for just the name brand and the money and all those other things, which is a wonderful thing, don't get me wrong, then you will continue to see that lateral revolving door from firm to firm to firm, and it will get harder and harder to have a culture in those environments.

I just think lawyers, our jobs are tough, we work hard, we have a lot of intensity, everything is faster now. I got people texting me, I got people calling me, I got everything. Every possible means to communicate with me is now a completely fair game. I just think it's so important, at least for me, to have a place that has a sense of itself, a culture, a purpose beyond just “How do I accelerate my career? How do I make the most money I can?”

Elise Holtzman: A few things were coming up for me while I was listening to you talk about this. One is that you and I are based in New York. Certainly in New York City, we see these enormous firms all the time. We see this kind of competition. I try to remind myself that throughout the trade throughout North America and the world, most lawyers are not practicing in those enormous firms.

But it does feel, especially when you're in a big metropolitan area, that those are the firms that are dominating the landscape. I also think that a firm like yours has to have that sense of values and purpose and what makes us different if they're going to survive.

Because to your point, people could just be leaving for more money or more prestige, not that your firm doesn't have prestige, but you know what I mean, some of these enormous firms, thousands of lawyers, but there's a downside there too. Because as you say, there's a revolving door, they may not know what their values are.

Also in those big firms, some of which are not even real firms, I don't know what we would call them, they're conglomerations of firms or a bunch of firms under one name, most of these people don't even know each other.

Terri Adler: Yeah, look, I guess I'm probably a little old school, I'm funny, I'm non-traditional in so many ways, but I'm also a little old school, which is law firms are partnerships. I think once you get past a certain number, you could be a partner name, but you're not truly a partnership.

It's a corporation, and that's fine. That's a model, they do fine. There's no issue about it. It's just to me, there's something that's lost in that boutique, a world where both of those dichotomies, both of those models can thrive and survive, and how do you find a home if those places don't appeal to you and you want something different for whatever reason and all of the other smaller options or mid-sized options are really just getting chewed up and spit out?

It's a loss, I think, for the industry in some ways. I think a lot of really good firms, I mean, Struck was an amazing firm. I loved all the people at work there and I'm sure they're all doing great at Hogan Lovells and Hogan Lovells is a great firm, but it's a much different, and Stroock was not a small firm by any stretch either.

By the way, it's funny because I'm on these women managing partner roundtables, I see a lot of women spinning out of firms and creating their own, and I think that's an interesting thing because I think what's happening is that a lot of women who are really successful in their own right are finding that these firms are not giving them something.

I don't know what it is. I haven't had that kind of conversation, but they're not giving them something so they're spinning out and they're starting their own firms. I love to see that, I think it's great.

I think the legal industry is in a little bit of a tortured mode right now in terms of trying to figure out, like as a lawyer, where am I going to be? Where's my home and is my home really not my home? Is it really just a stopping ground for the five to seven years until I get a better offer or my group move somewhere else and then five more years, I'll go somewhere else, and five more years, I'll go somewhere else? Sounds exhausting to me frankly.

Elise Holtzman: I think it is exhausting. I think that there's a lot more choice in the legal marketplace than there used to be in some ways and a lot more choices for women than there were when you and I first got started.

So I think there are these different strokes for different folks' ideas, but I think people have to be aware of what's going on for them. If you're putting your nose to the grindstone and billing 3,000 hours and forgetting about what your own personal values are, then you're not really making the choices.

You're just going to either stay where you are or just jump at the next bright shiny object that comes along, which is, I think, something that you're suggesting a lot of people are doing, and sometimes for really good reasons, but I think sitting down and really thinking about what it is that you want is really important.

Terri, let me ask you a question that I ask all of my guests at the end of the show. There's a phenomenon called the curse of knowledge where experts sometimes forget that what is so obvious and natural to them is not at all obvious to others.

You're an expert, you're an expert in real estate, you're an expert in running a firm, you're an expert in creating a certain kind of culture, a certain kind of reputation. When it comes to doing those things—launching and growing a law firm, growing in your career, growing other people—what's a principle or piece of advice that may seem obvious to you, but is important for people to hear whether they're running their own law firms or perhaps just starting out in the law?

Terri Adler: Look, I guess that's a big difference, starting out in the law versus running your own firm or thinking about running your own firm. One of the things I had to learn, I suppose, was that when you're super driven and very intense and smart and you get the ideas quickly—which is like what I do. My brain is like—and I forget sometimes. I would forget that to your point, what was so obvious to me wasn't obvious to everybody else.

So one of the things that I think I had to learn was to slow down, to listen super hard for somebody who's like, “Gotta move, gotta move.” So slow down, listen, and exhale before you do something.

It's funny because I do a lot of breathing things like right where I'm thinking about something and you find you hold your breath a lot, they talk about how the phenomena of people who hold their breath and they don't get enough oxygen and they're not like in how sometimes just sitting, exhaling, those sorts of things.

For me, whether you're starting out in your career or thinking about running, starting your firm, or stepping into management, you definitely don't know what you don't know. You can't see your own self-deception. Somebody told me that the other day as a catchphrase of human nature.

So the only way that you can is to pause, breathe, listen, and then you can form your own thoughts. Yes, we all think we're smarter and better and whatever, but I think just recognizing then sometimes when you really listen to other people because you surround yourself with smart people, that's just the nature of what lawyers are, lawyers are smart, you really can start to see your own gaps and you can realize how much knowledge base is out there that maybe you're not tapping into. So for me, it's that humility of saying, “I don't know everything. I'm strong-willed. I need to check that.”

Elise Holtzman: I love it. I mean, I love hearing this, especially from someone like you. There are a lot of people who won't admit to that sort of thing. I think having that level of self-awareness and being willing to slow down and listen to other people, it's not necessarily easy for someone with that temperament. But it sounds like it's something that you're finding critical to being a good leader.

Terri Adler: It's critical, but it's hard.

Elise Holtzman: Yeah, it's hard.

Terri Adler: I have so many things to do, and I want to just boom, boom, boom, go, go, go, go, go. But I also realize “Can I run people over and I don't mean to?” but it's like to achieve the end, I'm like, “Oh, let me just go through this wall,” and sometimes that's not the right choice.

Elise Holtzman: Well, thank you. I think that's a great thing for people to hear and I wrote down, “You can't see your own self-deception.” I don't know who that came from, it has now come from Terri Adler. I love that quote.

Terri Adler: It wasn't from me. It was from a guy named Michael Brody-Waite who does some motivational speaking and a very smart and talented guy.

Elise Holtzman: Yeah, so we'll give him credit for that. Well, Terri, thank you so much for being here today. It's been such a pleasure hearing your story and hearing your great advice.

I want to thank our listeners for tuning in as well. If you've enjoyed today's show, please subscribe, rate, and review us at Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app. In the meantime, be bold, take action, and make things happen.

Thank you for tuning in. If you've enjoyed today's show, please subscribe, rate, and review us at Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app. In the meantime, be bold, take action, and make things happen. We'll see you next time.