I Want to Build a Legancy of Spiritual and Financial Wealth
In the last year Brett's law firm went bankrupt. Brett graduated from law school in 1998. He got his first legal job with Dan Corbin in Killeen TX. After a year or so Brett decided to go out on his own and open his own Law Firm.
I'd like to say he built a thriving business but that is not what happened. His reputation of being an extremely aggressive attorney spread throughout the county very quickly. Work started to pour in. He went to court and his employees did the rest. He did not manage his employees at all. Reports were never written and follow up for better customer service was never thought about. No one ran the business side of his law firm.
Brett became a master at CPS cases. He loved helping little children get into the best homes as possible. Each case usually brought in 5,000 a piece. He took in more cases than most attorney's in the state.
People came from all over for his services. We quickly bought a building on town square with 100,000.00 cash that we had on hand from a big personal injury case. Then the market crashed and the courts changed the options for CPS cases.
The public could now get a court appointed attorney for CPS cases for free. Between the market crashing, the courts changing, our big expensive building on town square and the fact Brett never, not even once looked at the business side of his firm, he went bankrupt.
All this time I was home raising our family. Reading stories, changing diapers, soothing little hearts, washing dishes, washing and folding laundry, and cleaning and recleaning our house that was still never clean. While I did all this, I stood by and watched his firm fall apart right in front of my eyes.
I knew he didn't have time to build a thriving business, and go to court at the same time, but I didn't know what to do about it. How could I possibly keep house and run his business? The first time he wasn't able to bring home a pay check was the scariest day of my life.
I felt helpless and vulnerable to starvation. I kept asking myself, "How can I help his business if I have laundry to do, dishes to wash, groceries to shop for and meals to make?" Then the next week came and he didn't bring home a check again. Now I was terrified. I was also angry at him. How could he do this to our family? He was suppose to take care of us in every way.
I learned after the third week and still no pay check that I was going to have to help him figure out how to run a successful firm. He had gotten up and gone to work for 14 years whether it was rainy, sunny, ice, snow, sick, depressed or even down right exhausted, he kept going to work and doing everything he could think of to provide for our family.
As the years passed I could see what would eventually make us go bankrupt. I remember telling Marilyn Stoner, Mariela's nurse, "We are going to go bankrupt, it's just a matter of time." I knew Brett was not taking care of every detail of his business, and no body else was either.
I knew there was no accountability for any one at the firm. I talked to him until I could talk no more. He wouldn't listen to me, he couldn't listen to me, he was swamped just going to court and crippled with stress just trying to bring home our next pay check and pay his staff, who were also counting on him.
When he quite bringing home regular pay checks, something happened inside me, I knew I had to get to that firm and turn things around. In February 2014, I started by putting my two little boys in day care a day or two a week and went to the office to start making a list of all the problem areas.
I quickly found out from Lisa, who essentially had assumed the role of the mother of the firm, that very little was running efficiently. She would sit with me for hours and describe how every area of the firm was running, or not running would be more accurate.
When summer came I increased my hours at the firm. I took my lists of problems that I had been writing and started making changes. The first thing I did was fire every one that was not dedicated to their job, and replaced them.
I'd like to say he built a thriving business but that is not what happened. His reputation of being an extremely aggressive attorney spread throughout the county very quickly. Work started to pour in. He went to court and his employees did the rest. He did not manage his employees at all. Reports were never written and follow up for better customer service was never thought about. No one ran the business side of his law firm.
Brett became a master at CPS cases. He loved helping little children get into the best homes as possible. Each case usually brought in 5,000 a piece. He took in more cases than most attorney's in the state.
People came from all over for his services. We quickly bought a building on town square with 100,000.00 cash that we had on hand from a big personal injury case. Then the market crashed and the courts changed the options for CPS cases.
The public could now get a court appointed attorney for CPS cases for free. Between the market crashing, the courts changing, our big expensive building on town square and the fact Brett never, not even once looked at the business side of his firm, he went bankrupt.
All this time I was home raising our family. Reading stories, changing diapers, soothing little hearts, washing dishes, washing and folding laundry, and cleaning and recleaning our house that was still never clean. While I did all this, I stood by and watched his firm fall apart right in front of my eyes.
I knew he didn't have time to build a thriving business, and go to court at the same time, but I didn't know what to do about it. How could I possibly keep house and run his business? The first time he wasn't able to bring home a pay check was the scariest day of my life.
I felt helpless and vulnerable to starvation. I kept asking myself, "How can I help his business if I have laundry to do, dishes to wash, groceries to shop for and meals to make?" Then the next week came and he didn't bring home a check again. Now I was terrified. I was also angry at him. How could he do this to our family? He was suppose to take care of us in every way.
I learned after the third week and still no pay check that I was going to have to help him figure out how to run a successful firm. He had gotten up and gone to work for 14 years whether it was rainy, sunny, ice, snow, sick, depressed or even down right exhausted, he kept going to work and doing everything he could think of to provide for our family.
As the years passed I could see what would eventually make us go bankrupt. I remember telling Marilyn Stoner, Mariela's nurse, "We are going to go bankrupt, it's just a matter of time." I knew Brett was not taking care of every detail of his business, and no body else was either.
I knew there was no accountability for any one at the firm. I talked to him until I could talk no more. He wouldn't listen to me, he couldn't listen to me, he was swamped just going to court and crippled with stress just trying to bring home our next pay check and pay his staff, who were also counting on him.
When he quite bringing home regular pay checks, something happened inside me, I knew I had to get to that firm and turn things around. In February 2014, I started by putting my two little boys in day care a day or two a week and went to the office to start making a list of all the problem areas.
I quickly found out from Lisa, who essentially had assumed the role of the mother of the firm, that very little was running efficiently. She would sit with me for hours and describe how every area of the firm was running, or not running would be more accurate.
When summer came I increased my hours at the firm. I took my lists of problems that I had been writing and started making changes. The first thing I did was fire every one that was not dedicated to their job, and replaced them.
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