Fear is a big part of running your own law firm. If you can manage it, then you’re golden. If you can’t, then you’re likely looking for a job. Different strokes for different folks. Owning a business is not for everyone.

Can you manage the fear?

Sometimes I think I can. Sometimes I’m the master of the universe. I’ve got it all under control and nothing can go wrong.

And then something goes wrong.

My Top Panic Button Triggers

Usually, it’s one of these three things that happens, and I completely unravel.

1. Bad Month

I can cope with a bad month if it’s predictable. Sometimes we have a bad December. With the holidays, it’s tough to get people to call, plus our team takes lots of time off. Oddly, some years, we have a great December. It’s weird, but I can handle it if I know it’s coming. I’ve conditioned myself to be ready for a tough December.

But when I don’t see it coming, it’s devastating.

When, out of the blue, it’s the 15th and we’ve done next to nothing in revenue, I freak out. The fear overtakes me. I start catastrophizing. I do crazy things like dial our phone numbers to be sure they’re working. I click on our pay-per-click ads to see whether they’re going where they’re supposed to go. I pester the crap out of our website people. I freak out.

My meltdowns come once or twice a year, and I try to keep it to myself, but the fear can be intense. How will we meet payroll? Is this the end? Have we screwed up something major?

I wake up in the middle of the night and do math. I calculate when we’re going to run out of money. How soon we’ll be evicted. Whether we’ll be able to meet payroll.

An unexpected bad month pushes all my fear buttons.

2. She’s Leaving

The loss of a key employee is devastating. It happened to me in 1991 when Elizabeth left. It was horrible. I relied on her for everything. Back then, it was me, her, and one other team member. We were tiny, and she knew how to make the trains run on time. Losing her scared the crap out of me.

I still feel the fear of losing someone important.

I used to have dreams about not doing my homework. You know those dreams. Now I have employee departure dreams. For a long time, it was associates I worried about. Now it’s managers. They’re critical. They know things that sometimes aren’t written down. I feel the fear when I detect unhappiness among them.

Key people are, well, key. They’re important. Losing them causes disruption, and it’s a setback. I worry about that happening. Even writing about it makes me queasy.

3. The Phone Stops Ringing

I get a daily report of the number of initial consultations set. I like to see the report when it shows me lots of calls and many resulting consultations being scheduled.

I get nervous when the daily report says something like “zero.” It’s even worse when it says “zero” and shows a cancellation or two. On those days, we’re not just stuck: we’re moving backward.

The fear strikes, and I worry about it until the next day when a better report shows up in my e-mail. Two bad days in a row, and I really feel the fear rise up in my stomach. It’s especially wonderful if bad day number two is a Friday, so I can worry all weekend.

What’s weird about this particular fear is that it often strikes even when we’re having a pretty good month. It’s hard for me to enjoy the good month when I’m worried about the impact the low number of consults will have on the next month. I’m good at letting fear ruin my day, week, month, or whatever.

Can You Manage the Fear?

I know fear. It’s not my friend.

Fear must be managed. It must be controlled. It’s coming, it’s expected, and it’s part of what you experience as a business owner. You can’t let it stop you, but it’s not going to ever stop completely.

Sure, you’ll adjust to the fear. As your business changes and grows, your capacity for managing fear will change and grow. Your vision, your dream, and your drive to get from here to there will help you manage the fear.

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When you see something you want on the other side of the river, it’s much easier to swim across. The fear is one reason that having a clear vision is so critically important to the future of your business.

It’s tough to manage the fear when you’re not driven to achieve your vision. Your dream must be bigger than your fear. The dream must be sufficiently emotionally desirable that the fear is set aside. It’s a tricky balance, but much of the fear is resolved by continuing to clarify and solidify the vision. The more vivid the vision, the less potent the fear.

Action helps as well. Sitting with the fear and letting it consume you doesn’t solve the problem. You can, in fact, make things happen so that you’re resolving the concerns that trigger the fear.

Your 3-Step Action Plan for Managing Your Fear

Here are some action plan suggestions.

1. The Bad Month

Build the reserve fund in advance. Know that bad months come, and they’re not always when you expect. Assume they’re coming, and build the reserves so you’ll be ready. Of course, if fear is a big problem for you like it is for me, then building the reserve fund will simply shift the fear to concern about having a couple of bad months in a row. Yeah, fear is tricky.

Regardless, building a reserve fund is a very good move. It has helped me tremendously, and I feel—sometimes—much better.

2. The Departing Employee

Systems, coupled with management, are the answer. Get it all written down and then stay engaged with your team. Regular one-on-one meetings keep you in the loop and build a business instead of a collection of individuals. We recently released a course on building systems that’ll help you get going and get the fear under control.

Management is an essential element. You’ve got to stay connected to your people. That connection reduces the likelihood of turnover, and it makes the process smoother when it happens. You need to know what’s happening. Delegation is good; abdication isn’t. Regular, systematic meetings with your key people are essential.

3. The Quiet Telephone

Feast followed by famine is a fairly typical cycle in many law firms. We engage in marketing activities until we get too busy to market. Then we stop and do the client work. What happens? Yep, the phone stops ringing.

The solution?

Never stop marketing. Even when you’re busy, you’ve got to set aside time for meeting referral sources, adding website content, and employing the tactics that make your phone ring.

It’s essential that, even on your busiest day, you take some time to market your practice. That might mean e-mailing a referral source to stay in touch. It might mean turning up the volume on the pay-per-click advertising. It might mean calling a Rotary Club member to arrange a lunch speech. Use that extra money flowing in when you’re busy so you don’t have the fear you’ll experience if famine strikes.

It’s Time to Embrace the Fear

Over time, you start to see and expect the up-and-down cycles. You’ll know that slow days don’t mean disaster. When will you have that confidence? Apparently, it takes a bit longer than 29 years (I started in 1987). I’ll let you know when I find out.

Fear is an element of owning a business. No matter how long you’ve done it, no matter how big you get, no matter how many great months you have, fear will creep in. It’s like air. It’s always out there.

Don’t try to suppress the fear. Don’t ignore it. Just know that it’s part of process. It happens, and it’s unavoidable. Use it motivate you, use it to inspire yourself to take action, and use it to help you visualize your objectives. Fear is here. Managing it is something you’ll get better at as you go. Welcome to the club.