Spotlight on Steven Mather

Steven Mather is a lawyer for SMEs – he helps business owners make thought out decisions on legal risk, contracts, staff, disputes and helps sort legal issues out quickly. In this interview he opens up about his journey of starting a business just before lockdown.

From a young age, my family have always been running businesses, so I’ve always had that within me.

What had you choose the legal profession way back when? The basics of it is I pretty much failed maths at A-level. At that time I was a geek at heart - I was into computers. I had a business doing websites and website designs for people - my first website in fact was built before Google. I was going to do computer science at university; so I did A-level maths and it was quite frankly the hardest thing that ever I’ve ever done in my life. It was a completely different language; worse than Mandarin or anything like that! It was completely off the scale. I remember going to pick up my exam results. I got an E – barely passed!

I went and saw the teacher and the teacher said, “Hey Steven, I’m so pleased. You’ve done so well”. And I said, “Miss I got an E!”, she went “Yeah I know. I didn’t expect you to do so well!”. So I had to drop maths - I wasn’t going to do it in the second year. I had to pick another subject. I think the choice was something like media studies, psychology or law. I thought I’ll do law. I remember the teacher saying it’s a bit of a hard subject - you’ll have to hit the ground running - there’s a lot to do. I remember my reply to the - I said, because this is me and I’m an idiot, “Don’t worry, I’ve got running shoes”.

It turned out that actually it was really enjoyable. I got a 100% in the first exam. At that point I thought I quite like this, I’ve really enjoyed learning about law. I’d already subscribed to doing computer science at university and so I spoke to them and said I really enjoy law. This is what I’m predicted to get on my AS-level - do you want to take me on? And they said, yeah. And then the rest is history!

You used to work for a quite reasonable sized legal practice before you became a solopreneur, if that’s a word. So what had you make that step from going from working for a company which is more comfortable and less risky to starting your own business? Pretty much being a terrible employee! From a young age, my family have always been running businesses, so I’ve always had that within me. Even in the school playground, for instance, I was selling sweets at break times - I was effectively, running a tuck shop out of my sports bag! I’ve had a few different businesses that I’ve ran as well. I’ve done a letting agency. We bought a mobility scooter and devices shop, I ran that for a while. That entrepreneur was always inside me. Being a lawyer that helps because I understand how business works. I understand how the clients work. But being a lawyer in a traditional partnership doesn’t work with the entrepreneur-type ethic. That’s where the decision to really set up on my own stems from. It got to a point I was at the legal practice for a long time, expecting to be the top guy and run it. But in a partnership that doesn’t happen because all the partners are making decisions. You have all the partners there and everybody has a say. And while I did that for nine years, when it comes down to it - I want to be able to do what I want to do now, how I want to do it. If I want to have Friday afternoon off, I’m going to do that. If I want to work all day on Tuesday and work 15 hour days, I can do that. It’s about having that freedom, that flexibility to do what I want.

The second point is I didn’t just want to be a lawyer. Being a partner in a law firm meant that all I was doing was law - it was seven days a week managing a law firm. We turned over quite a lot of work and had a lot of employees, it’s a big organization. The whole week, including Saturday and Sundays, was taken up by that. I wanted to step away from that, reduce my hours down in law and then be able to get back into the business world to run and explore other business interests and opportunities that I’ve got as well.

You’ve got a young family and you’ve got to put bread on the table as it were. When you go into the small business world, you’re on your own effectively, you’ve got to generate your own business. Did you see it as a risk for you or how did you perceive it? The honest, truthful answer is that I’m a man of faith. I knew and firmly believed that I would be okay that I’d be provided for. That’s probably a little bit. The reality of it is of

course I’m human, so I’m looking at it thinking contractually I’m not allowed to take any clients. I’m not allowed to contact any clients that I’ve had for the last two years. I’m not allowed to make any contact with any of those. I’m starting from scratch. Come January the 24th, I think it was - I had zero work, zero clients. So yes, practically speaking, there was certainly a risk.

There’s a fine line between arrogance and someone with my sense of humour.

I guess it was a little bit different for me in setting up a business because I’ve been doing it for 12 years that I’ve got enough of a reputation, enough people know me, a big enough network, that going and leaving and setting up on my own - it wasn’t as if I just starting from scratch from day one.

Then, just to scupper things - you started about two or three months before a little bug came along - did that have any impact on you? Did that worry you? No. Again, for similar reasons, if anything, it kind of re-solidified the way I was proposing to work. I wanted to leave behind the old-fashioned way of lawyers working, that traditional partnership model, the High Street firm, the working on an hourly rate basis - all of those things that solicitors get criticised for. I wanted to scrap all of that and start from a blank slate. I do things differently. I was always intending to do virtual meetings, use phones and video for meetings, because it saves you traveling time and costs attached to that; as well as environmental issues.

The coronavirus, like with everybody, had some impact when it first hit in March - things went a little bit quiet. Actually the clients that I’ve got now are seeing it as an opportunity rather than a threat - a lot of people are buying a businesses, they’re entering into contracts, they’re doing stuff that needs legal support as a result of the pandemic.

What drives you to do what you do? What would you say your ‘why’ is? I actually spent a bit of time on this. I went on a Simon Sinek course to try and work out what that was. I always thought it was about winning; helping clients win. But actually what I prefer is just getting the right result, the best result for the client. And that’s not necessarily winning. And most of the time it’s not winning it’s about trying to get the best result. What I’ve realised is my why is to create a happy and supporting legal environment, so that everybody involved gets a better night’s sleep. That sounds a little bit strange for a lawyer but it really works for me because any legal services are quite stressful for the clients.

I see lots of people that come to me and it’s a massive problem for them. It’s something that’s really stressful and it’s something that keeps them up at night. If I can then take away some of that pressure, take away some of those issues and genuinely help them sleep a little bit better at night because they don’t need to worry about it anymore - I’ve sorted it for them or I’ve settled with one or whatever it is - that’s really what gives me my kicks. That’s why I do what I do.

What would you say makes you different from your competitors? This one’s always a hard one to answer without sounding incredibly arrogant and anybody that knows me will hopefully realise that I’m not incredibly arrogant - there’s a fine line between arrogance and someone with my sense of humour. But the real

Clients want a fixed price - no surprise bills.

difference between me and my competitors is me and my approach to providing the legal services. So I’m happy. I know I don’t look happy and sometimes my dry sense of humour might not come across like I’m happy, but I’m happy. And I want the clients to be happy. I want clients to come to me and actually enjoy working with me and vice versa. What makes me different as well is the delivery of the services - we do things in a digital way. We sign contracts digitally, everything’s on email, all in the cloud – I can work wherever. That’s something that lawyers don’t do. Walking away from the traditional billing method of a lawyer as well, it’s is a difficult one. Clients want a fixed price - no surprise bills.

At that time I was a geek at heart - I was into computers

You decided to create a podcast. Why did you start it up - what were the reasons behind it?

It’s called The Business Herald podcast. Setting up a podcast is something that I’ve wanted to do for quite a long time, probably more than a year - but getting around to doing it - it wasn’t something that quite fitted in with my previous practice. There are lots of law firms that do legal based podcasts and they’re as boring as hell! I knew that I didn’t want to do a legal podcast. Also I’m probably not clever enough!

I was trying to figure out how I could do a podcast to get further exposure to people and expand the network. What I realised I was reading the business news stories every day. I started just writing those headlines down. I thought I’ve got a big mailing list, so I thought if I could email them something that was useful. I now email people about the business news stories. Then on the podcast on a Friday, we talk about some of the main ones and how they will affect small and medium size enterprises each week.

I love putting it together and doing the editing. I do it on a Friday and by the time I’ve finished, I then knock off and call it a day. It ticks all my boxes: working hard, doing well - but having time to enjoy other things: spending time with the family. It just means I’m a bit more rounded.

If there was one top tip given your experience that you would give for a business, what would it be? Read contracts. Last week I had a new client who wanted to exit a contract that they signed in March, 2015. It has a six month notice period and they gave their notice and the supplier turned around and said that that the six months needs to end on the anniversary of the contract - you’ve not given enough notification. So the contract is now is going to carry on running until March 2022; effectively meaning they’ve got an 18 month notice period now until the contract expires.

They came to me saying that can’t be right - we must be able to get out of it? Unfortunately I had to say to them no, it’s right. In a business-to-business scenario, you can pretty much put whatever you want into a contract. In this case the court would enforce it. There’s not much you can do about it. Next time read the contract.

So my top tip - read contracts. If you’re not sure about it, get a lawyer to have looked at it and explain some of the key issues for you.

Watch the interview

This is an extract of a video interview – to watch the full session, visit: https://youtu.be/1yrI82vw8Yw

The honest, truthful answer is that I’m a man of faith. I knew and firmly believed that I would be okay