Why boutique firms risk losing momentum when trying to do too much at once

Candidly reflecting on the early days of building his firm, d’Apice recalled how his initial dream of a highly diversified legal business soon unravelled into a series of headaches during the honeymoon period of launching the practice.

“A lot of the mistakes I’ve made, especially in the honeymoon period, have related to leaning in too heavily to projections, plans and kind of good ideas,” he said.

d’Apice revealed his early drive to push both himself and the firm to innovate, ambitiously aiming to do it all and pursue what seemed like endless, diverse revenue streams across legal and educational offerings.

“At the start of this firm, I had the idea that we’re going to do a little bit of legal work directly for clients, then we’re going to have a revenue stream that’s going to be online education. We’re going to apply, upload all these amazing resources, and that’s going to make money,” he said.

“Even when I’m not on the tools, I’m going to get accredited as a mediator, and because we’re building a reputation for shareholder disputes, I’ll be going around the place mediating, and then I’ll do some training about how you have a professional career, but also have some competence at using TikTok.

“We’re going to have a million revenue streams, and it’s going to be a business that does all these different sorts of things, and it’s going to be very futuristic and new age and weird and flexible.”

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However, while the idea had looked appealing on paper, d’Apice stressed that reality soon hit, quickly steering the practice in a very different, more grounded direction.

“What it’s turned into has been a fairly black letter. I’ll use the word typical if I can frame it that way. But a fairly black-letter commercial litigation law firm that does shareholder disputes as its specialty and almost literally does nothing else,” he said.

Looking back, d’Apice admitted his biggest misstep was chasing endless tangents and what he called a “million different tentacles” of ideas, when, in truth, the firm’s real path lay in a time-tested business model he already had the skills to master.

“But the mistake and the way I perceive it now was investing a lot of time and energy in the idea that, oh yeah, we’re going to have a million different tentacles, and there’s going to be all these different tangents,” he said.

“I’ll allow myself to be distracted and allow myself to spend time and all these other kinds of tangents, when, in fact, what was in front of us was a business model that’s been around for a few centuries now, and one that I have the skills to engage in.”

Reflecting on his experience, d’Apice noted that while flashy, creative ideas might dazzle on paper, true wisdom for boutique firm owners lies in humility – focusing on the numbers on the board and paying close attention to the signals the market is sending.

“There’s a degree of humility needed to say all these fancy creative ideas I might have had up front might be great on paper, but what’s even better on paper is sort of numbers on the boards and what the market is telling us,” he said.