Todd Burnham 0:00
Hi, this is Todd Burnham. I am a licensed practicing attorney. But just because you're listening to me doesn't mean that I represent you. This is for informational purposes only. If you're good with that, then let's roll.

Chris Braden 0:19
Season One was about how Todd Burnham started Burnham Law in his basement and built it to one of the most prestigious law firms in Colorado by thinking outside of the box and surrounding himself with the best lawyers and staff in the industry. Now during a pandemic Burnham Law is still growing. How you ask? Walk toward the storm and face it head on and you empower the people that help get you there. It's time to execute. It's time to make some lemonade. It's time to burn the ships. This is Deep Bench with Todd Burnham. Hey, Todd, what's going down, buddy?

Todd Burnham 0:58
Chris, what are we up to man? What do we got?

Chris Braden 0:59
There's a lot. You know what? This season two is flying by. And I know you're going to Hawaii. But I've had people they don't want these to end. So we got to figure out a way to do some of these while you're overseas. And like I told you before overseas, in Hawaii, I've told you before, man, I'm more than willing and able to head that way. ,

Todd Burnham 1:24
You are welcome. You know, we have a pool but you know, pond's good.

Chris Braden 1:28
A pond is good for you. My favorite movie. So we talked about setting the standards earlier. And we talked about Russell Wilson, we talked about Peyton Manning, we talk about Kobe, a lot in season one. These are some of the people that I won't say you look up to but modeling great people is something that I think all of us need to do. Because it kind of sets the standard,

Todd Burnham 1:54
You know, Napoleon Hill's book Think and Grow Rich is like just, you know, from 1920s.

Chris Braden 2:00
Yes.

Todd Burnham 2:00
And he followed all the major, you know, entrepreneurs and they came up with certain things that they all do.

Chris Braden 2:06
Yep.

Todd Burnham 2:06
It's the same concept. You just identifying someone, like even if I'm watching a movie, I'm like, up like, we were talking about A Bronx Tale. And what I got from that was the importance of not wasting talent.

Chris Braden 2:18
Sure.

Todd Burnham 2:19
And so that resonates with me so much. And so all of these, like we have people in our lives that are going to, they're going to influence us if you are open to that.

Chris Braden 2:29
Sure.

Todd Burnham 2:29
So I'm just open to anything, really. So I think that you can find inspiration from anywhere.

Chris Braden 2:37
Well, it's funny, because like one of the most famous quote, and we've talked about Nike, their slogan's just do it. But for some reason, I'm thinking back, and I think they had a no excuses campaign, or maybe their slogan back in the 90s was no excuses.

Todd Burnham 2:53
Yeah.

Chris Braden 2:53
Just do it. And the funny thing is, is you know, whether it's setting the standard, or anything you're doing, I'll just tell you this, when you and I first met, you would say, you know, show me the baby, no excuses and stuff like that. And I really appreciated that. And what I learned was, I just have to communicate better. You didn't say communicate better.

Todd Burnham 3:15
Yeah.

Chris Braden 3:15
But I learned that because, you know, I'm not lazy. I work my butt off. But there's some things that I need people to call me out on.

Todd Burnham 3:23
And if I'm doing business with you, and I care about you, then I'm going to try to help you. And look, working with me, is not always easy. I've gone through more contractors at my house, doing like, I don't know, a sprinkler. These people just piss me off.

Chris Braden 3:44
Like, what are you doing?

Todd Burnham 3:45
Dude it's just gonna freeze, it's gonna freeze, and I've gotta blow these things out. And these people aren't getting back to me. And then I'm like, There's one guy wrote back yesterday, and he's like, up, guess I didn't make it. And I'm like, if you were in front of me, I'd strangle you, man. It's maddening. It's and this is a person that owns a business and I'm like, Oh my God, you suck. You suck. And I have nothing like I'm on to the next one. Because I'm like, Hey, man, can you please like, just show up for me? Like you said you would a week ago and, and I'm like, this is this is BS, but I'm just so tired. Like, and so I'm just, but if there's an intention to like, and I like you, right? So like, you're my friend and and I want you to be really successful. So you're like, alright, I did the episode and I'm, I'm gonna have it to you like Wednesday. Well, it's Wednesday night, man. And it's, I don't have it. So, and I told you, I'm like, to other people will just, they'll say, Oh, it's okay. But they won't tell you.

Chris Braden 4:46
Sure.

Todd Burnham 4:47
Everyone wants their work product done. Like, I want this thing posted right now simultaneously as we're doing it.

Chris Braden 4:52
Yes, you do.

Todd Burnham 4:53
Right? So like, that's just how I am. And that sense of urgency which you wanted to talk about patience today, and I nixed it.

Chris Braden 5:01
You did.

Todd Burnham 5:03
And so like, but at the same time, I'm still gonna want that, that product to be awesome.

Chris Braden 5:08
Sure.

Todd Burnham 5:08
And tight. And that's where you say, Look, man, do you want it done fast? You'd want it done. Right.

Chris Braden 5:14
Exactly.

Todd Burnham 5:14
Right. So and that's, that's just like me learning too and growing.

Chris Braden 5:18
No and it's cool. And I so wish I was sitting here when you got that text or email.

Todd Burnham 5:22
Yeah, right. Oh, it was awful.

Chris Braden 5:24
Was there anyone around?

Todd Burnham 5:25
No, no. And I'm starting to boil right now just thinking about it. And because in the past, I would have honestly, I would have just called the dude and just ripped them.

Chris Braden 5:34
Yeah.

Todd Burnham 5:34
Cuz I'd feel better. Yeah, what it's all about, right?

Chris Braden 5:38
Sometimes.

Todd Burnham 5:38
So, and I'm just like, No, I'm not. And then I, and then maybe four years ago, I would have written a review.

Chris Braden 5:44
Oh, you're that guy.

Todd Burnham 5:46
I was, I was. And so now I only write positive reviews.

Chris Braden 5:50
That's what I always do.

Todd Burnham 5:52
And, and I just like, that's the lesson, you know, like, alright, if that's how it's gonna be, then that's I'm just going to keep, I'm not going to settle. Right. It's how I work. That's how I do everything. Like, and sometimes Stephanie will talk me off the ledge.

Chris Braden 6:05
Sure.

Todd Burnham 6:06
Like, let's just get away from that. Well, we can't that's the only practice management system. We have Todd, you know, okay, fine. You know, but I just I'm not, I'm just not.

Chris Braden 6:15
You know, the cool thing is, though, but that, that that shows growth, just talking about, honestly, reviews, people don't realize, but reviews is a heavy handed tool.

Todd Burnham 6:26
It is man.

Chris Braden 6:27
If you want to destroy a restaurant. Yeah. Just because I read some of these reviews. And I'm like, How petty and like, you literally have to insult me personally. Yeah, I actually have never left a bad review.

Todd Burnham 6:39
That's good.

Chris Braden 6:40
I will leave good reviews. I'd leave those like, all the time. But you know what, I just I'm one of those guys where I'm like, you know, I'm just not going to go there. And if my friend asked me, Hey, man, you want to meet for lunch at X I'm like nah, I'm good.

Todd Burnham 6:53
And I think that's the better. I think that's more organic. And I think that's more truthful. I think people have bad days.

Chris Braden 7:00
Yeah.

Todd Burnham 7:00
But if you have a bad approach, then it but I'm not going to go out there and try to hurt you.

Chris Braden 7:06
Sure.

Todd Burnham 7:07
I'm certainly going to tell my friends not to use you. Right. And because I care about my friends, but

Chris Braden 7:12
And that gets around.

Todd Burnham 7:13
It does. Like if you're great at something, you're going to be successful. There's the honest to goodness truth of everything. It will it'll just take it just takes a certain amount of time. And if you make certain decisions, that expedites it a little bit,

Chris Braden 7:26
So let me ask you this, because excuses can usually be avoided if you communicate correctly. So like if I would have said, Hey, Todd, I told my guys, since they worked so hard on this one that I gave them till Wednesday to do that, you would have you would have known that. And that was like all on me. You know what I mean? So like, as far as the communication? Do you think that if you communicate correctly, and you're honest in your communication, exactly. Like you said, I can do it faster or I can do it good which one do you want? Do you think that is the best way to avoid these excuses?

Todd Burnham 8:03
I think it's the only I think it's the only way people want to be informed. Right? I want to know when something's going to happen, because I'm excited about it. And then I want to know if if like if we have a deadline for something, and we're all like, we're talking to partners, and we're like, Alright, we're gonna have this done by this day.

Chris Braden 8:20
Yeah.

Todd Burnham 8:20
and it's not done.

Chris Braden 8:21
That's a problem.

Todd Burnham 8:22
That's a problem unless you'd said, Hey, here's an update. It's just basic stuff.

Chris Braden 8:28
Sure.

Todd Burnham 8:29
And I think no excuses. Also, it goes hand in hand with work ethic, you don't want to always be communicating why you didn't get it done.

Chris Braden 8:37
Right.

Todd Burnham 8:37
You want to also follow through. And so I look at those things and a lot of people that I've come across are really good at selling in the beginning. They're really good about telling you what you need to hear they think you need to hear and they know that you want to hear.

Chris Braden 8:54
Sure.

Todd Burnham 8:54
That I'm on top of this, this I'm committed to this etc. And but if you always regularly at least find that they are really good at communicating why they didn't get it done. You also be able to be aware of that too. That might be the work ethic piece.

Chris Braden 9:10
Sure.

Todd Burnham 9:11
And so people have natural talents we were talking about the movie A Bronx Tale and I love that movie. And you know Sonny talks to C about the wasted talent there's nothing worse than wasted talent and so that's where the we talked last episode about you know Russell Wilson I'm sure that Russell Wilson once in while he's gonna He's gonna communicate effectively why he didn't get something done.

Chris Braden 9:34
Sure.

Todd Burnham 9:34
But that dude is he has a regimen you know what you're getting from them. Same with Manning same with Brady all these guys that just

Chris Braden 9:41
All the greats.

Todd Burnham 9:41
All the greats. And those are things that you can use in that concept, these concepts in running a business. And I think that it I've tried to find exceptions to these rules. I've tried to say well, that doesn't apply here. And I haven't yet so having like if you're really talented at what you're doing with podcasts. And but you take three times as long. How good does that product have to be? To wait three times as long where maybe it's just people can push something out there faster. For me, I would wait three times as long.

Chris Braden 10:13
Right.

Todd Burnham 10:13
I would grind my teeth every week waiting for it. But in the end I want the better. I want the better product.

Chris Braden 10:21
For sure.

Todd Burnham 10:22
So I think that that there's a balance between no excuses, and also having a work ethic where you're going to minimize excuses anyway.

Chris Braden 10:30
Well, and it's funny and I know you're not a huge baseball guy. I'm a giant Dodger fan. And the way that the World Series set up this week is that their ace besides Clayton Bueller wasn't available to pitch game two, so they kind of had to piece together a bullpen game. They ended up losing the game it was still a good game, but you didn't hear a single one of those players say you know what we lost because Bueller didn't pitch tonight if we had our starter going with a smoke these. You know what I mean?

Todd Burnham 10:58
How many times do you think how many times do you think people are going to count out the Broncos because of all the injuries.

Chris Braden 11:05
Exactly.

Todd Burnham 11:05
But at the same time this still like it's next man up?

Chris Braden 11:08
Yep.

Todd Burnham 11:09
So if you have people that are just are making excuses for not succeeding or not trying hard, then those are people that you don't want around you.

Chris Braden 11:19
Well, the thing is, is like the Broncos have all the excuses in the world, their best defensive player Von Miller's out for the season. Yep, the number one wide receiver Courtland Sutton's out there starting quarterback Drew Lock gets hurt,, they were injured across the board, DBs like it was a big mess.

Todd Burnham 11:35
Yeah.

Chris Braden 11:35
And you know what, like, as a Bronco fan, I was just proud of him. You know what I mean? Go out there ball out. Like they didn't even look good against the Patriots. It was like frickin six field goals. Who wants to watch that? Watching paint dry is more fun.

Todd Burnham 11:47
Totally.

Chris Braden 11:47
But it was cool. They went out there. They figured it out. And they got it done.

Todd Burnham 11:50
And this is what excites me about the Broncos is that they're just a bunch of football players playing together. Hmm. That is a team.

Chris Braden 11:57
Yeah.

Todd Burnham 11:57
This is so much more interesting to me than having full strength and seeing what Elway's group would have done.

Chris Braden 12:03
Sure.

Todd Burnham 12:04
Now I get to see a little bit like, what does coaching look like? What kind of effective coaching is this? Are these guys self motivated, or Vic Fangio have like an inside track on what motivates them? Those things are inspiring to me. That's exciting. I would love to see a 12 to 6 game. If if it's a bunch of people that are usually on the bench, playing up and raising their standard. Tim Patrick coming out of nowhere.

Chris Braden 12:27
And how good is he?

Todd Burnham 12:28
Exactly! So I mean, like, it's these are opportunities in like, now you get to see what a football team looks like. And I'm really excited to see how they respond on the defensive side, especially playing against Patrick Mahomes. I think they win mark this down. I think they win.

Chris Braden 12:43
Now, October 22.

Todd Burnham 12:44
If we If they lose, I want you to cut this thing.

Chris Braden 12:46
I will. Okay, so I'll hold on to this one. You know, the funny thing is about it to Vic Fangio. He is the leader of the Broncos. He's the head coach, but he's never been in that role. And I gotta be honest with you, like, some of the mistakes he's made. Just drive me frickin nuts. Like, knowing when to call timeout. Yeah, basic thing. Yeah, calling out Von Miller like, I wanna get pissed about it

Todd Burnham 13:09
So was I, but even not even like with the timeout thing. And the first game, didn't own it.

Chris Braden 13:14
And he did it again.

Todd Burnham 13:15
Right. And so like, then those are the moments where it's like, that's an excuse dude. So if you hear it over and over again, then he's tone deaf, he's not getting it. But you see the result on the field. These guys played hard. They played hard, and that's what you want.

Chris Braden 13:32
And he's figured out how to be a head coach, and everyone forgets about that dude was up in the booth forever.

Todd Burnham 13:37
Yeah.

Chris Braden 13:38
And even it was a thing last year they were talking about, he's like, I don't know where to stand on the field, like basic stuff that you don't think about until you're in it.

Todd Burnham 13:45
Yeah.

Chris Braden 13:45
Every job looks so awesome. And then you go do it. And there's so many things that happen that I didn't think about this. I wasn't prepared for that. And I think he's, he's learning to so yeah, I'm excited about the the future but just watching these young guys. Jerry, Judy, with all his drops. I'm like he's gonna have a good week. You talked about Phillip Lindsey in the last one. Phillip Lindsey is always had a chip on his shoulder. I used to love him all the time when he was at CU. Probably the best interviews I've interviewed, like, plenty of pro athletes. Phillip Lindsey was literally probably the favorite interview we did.

Todd Burnham 14:18
I love it

Chris Braden 14:19
Cuz he was like, those are my dogs, man. And you could hear the passion in his voice.

Todd Burnham 14:22
I love that.

Chris Braden 14:23
He meant every frickin word he was saying. And it came across. And I think that Phillip Lindsey is not a guy that has excuses. They bring in an $8 million guy and Melvin Gordon, Phillip Lindsay's like it's all good, man. I'll get my chance.

Todd Burnham 14:38
Yeah, and he is and and you want people like that. We talked about last episode about who are actually natural leaders and people step up and does it become authentic?

Chris Braden 14:48
Sure.

Todd Burnham 14:48
I think when the hard part is is when you have management, that's not paying a guy that that is that important. It's kind of unfortunate that it's kind of still like this antiquated way of doing things. Yeah, right. And so that doesn't feel right to me. But I love the response. And so you're gonna not you have that kind of work ethic combined with a person that doesn't have that doesn't make excuses. And then you have coaches that are rising to that level also, probably by following players instead of players following.

Chris Braden 15:17
Which is possible, yeah.

Todd Burnham 15:18
I think that that is indicative of a team that's growing together. And that's really cool.

Chris Braden 15:24
Exactly. Go Broncos.

Todd Burnham 15:26
Go Broncos

Chris Braden 15:27
Go Dodgers too. I'm just gonna say we didn't have baseball here when I was a boy picked up the Dodgers. I'm like freaking huge Dodger fan.

Todd Burnham 15:33
Everyone has weaknesses.

Chris Braden 15:35
I hear it all the time, dude, man, people get mad at me. You're a Colorado guy, why don't you liked the Rockies? I go I like the Rockies. I just and I don't root against them.

Todd Burnham 15:43
Yeah.

Chris Braden 15:44
It's my childhood team, man.

Todd Burnham 15:45
I understand.

Chris Braden 15:46
Let me be a kid. I'm old.

Todd Burnham 15:48
I'm here to help man.

Chris Braden 15:49
Todd. No excuses. But you never had em I enjoy working with you.

Todd Burnham 15:52
Same here, buddy.

Chris Braden 15:53
You do you hold people to the fire a little bit higher standards, but that's how you make people better.

Todd Burnham 15:59
Hey, dude, that's what we're here for.

Chris Braden 16:01
Exactly.

Todd Burnham 16:01
There it is.

Chris Braden 16:02
That's your job.

Todd Burnham 16:03
That's my job, man.

Chris Braden 16:04
Are you gonna go like start maybe like, putting on like, go around and preach about getting better.

Todd Burnham 16:12
I don't know. I mean, I'm, I'm kind of like

Chris Braden 16:14
COVID it needs it. We need something dude, man. I'm freaking going bonkers.

Todd Burnham 16:17
I am too. I don't know. I mean, I don't want to. I want to like just, you know, we talked before like, I felt rudderless. You know, I didn't have like a direction of where I'm going and, and I've, I'm starting to feel like I have an idea and it's really more towards my family right now. So I'm just going to kind of roll with that and see where that goes.

Chris Braden 16:35
Todd Burnham's, keep getting better seminar. Vegas Caesars.

Yeah

We can go wherever Madison Square Garden.

Todd Burnham 16:42
No buffet anymore. That's, that's all gone.

Chris Braden 16:44
You know what? It's funny. My wife gets mad at me. Because I've always said you know what? I just don't like eating at restaurants where there's a sneeze guard.

Todd Burnham 16:52
Yeah.

Chris Braden 16:52
Well, it's different. Like when you're like an athlete. You're eating at the training table.

Todd Burnham 16:56
Sure.

Chris Braden 16:56
Who cares? If I'm paying like 30 bucks. And there's a sneeze guard.

Todd Burnham 17:01
I'm a big fan of masks right now. So

Chris Braden 17:03
Yes.

Todd Burnham 17:05
Like I'm I'm good with sneeze guards now. I'm fine with them.

Chris Braden 17:08
Yeah, but you know, no buffets. Anyway, no excuses.

Todd Burnham 17:13
There you go, buddy. Hey, thanks for listening. Make sure you subscribe, and until next time, keep getting better.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai