The McKenzie Method
October 2026

Building an Elite Team

When I started McKenzie PLLC two years ago, I had to learn to become a builder as well as an attorney. I devoured books, asked mentors questions, and studied what makes a team successful.

One lesson became clear: the future of our firm depends on the people we bring into it.

The same holds true whether you lead a claims department, an in-house legal team, or a corporate risk operation. Your team’s trajectory depends on who you hire, how you position them, and the system you build around them.

What’s Working: Great People Running a Repeatable System

In Who: The A Method for Hiring, Geoff Smart and Randy Street emphasize that hiring is a fundamental leadership decision. Their introduction, “Who, Not What,” captures the point: the people you choose determine how well everything else gets done.

Think of your team as an airplane flying straight ahead. A players lift its trajectory. B players keep it level. C players pull the nose down. Small differences compound over time.

There is also an ego trap in hiring: choosing people who make us feel smarter instead of people who make the team stronger. We have to be willing to hire people who are smarter than we are, better at particular tasks, and capable of taking real ownership.

One conviction has become central to how I lead: You can’t motivate people—you can only steer motivated people. Training, encouragement, and clear expectations matter. But the desire to do excellent work has to come from within.

Those people also need a dependable system.

Michael Gerber’s The E-Myth helped me understand the importance of building repeatable processes that allow a business to grow beyond its owner’s personal effort. We applied that principle to preparing cases for trial: define the steps, assign responsibility, establish reporting expectations, and identify when an issue needs to be escalated.

Your team can apply the same approach to a claim from first notice through resolution.

Once the process is clear, AI and workflow automation can help put it into practice within your Microsoft environment or claims platform. Tasks, reminders, reporting milestones, and escalation rules become easier to repeat consistently.

That gives leaders useful visibility. A dashboard can highlight overdue work, missing information, and decisions requiring attention. Routine progress becomes visible without asking everyone for a status update on every detail.

The right people take ownership. The system gives them a shared direction. Leadership focuses attention where it is needed.

Where We’re Trying to Improve: Finding the Right Seats and Trusting the Rhythm

In Good to Great, Jim Collins describes getting the right people on the bus, removing the wrong people, and placing the right people in the right seats.

In our last newsletter, we discussed the importance of getting the right people on the bus. Our next challenge is becoming more intentional about where they sit.

Instead of squeezing someone into a role simply because we need it filled, we are paying closer attention to natural strengths, personality, work style, intensity, and the types of cases in which that person thrives. Conversations about tools like the Enneagram can help us understand one another; demonstrated strengths and performance help us make assignments.

Some people excel at detailed analysis. Others thrive in depositions, negotiations, or the pressure of trial. Better alignment helps each person contribute more fully and makes the entire team stronger.

We are also learning to trust the rhythm of our process.

If you have handled claims or lawsuits for more than ten years, you know the facts change, but many of the steps remain familiar: investigate, evaluate, communicate, develop the evidence, and make decisions.

That consistency creates a rhythm you can depend on—like tapping your foot to music.

When the routine steps are dependable, you have more bandwidth to think creatively. You can recognize an unusual settlement opportunity, develop a stronger trial theme, or find a solution tailored to the particular claim.

Without that rhythm, the day becomes reactive. Chasing updates and remembering the next step consume the attention you need for judgment.

Our goal is to place people where they thrive and trust a process that makes room for their best thinking. The system handles the recurring work so the team can give each case the individual attention it deserves.

In Closing

Thank you for trusting us with your matters and partnering with us as we continue to build. We hope these lessons help strengthen your team, too.

William McKenzie
McKenzie PLLC | Elite Advocacy