From Chaos to Clarity: Scaling a Property Business Without Losing Your Sanity

Summary

The Amazing Authorities Podcast

Episode: From Chaos to Clarity: Scaling a Property Business Without Losing Your Sanity

Host: Mitch Carson
Guest: Hadley Nightingale
Date: May 1, 2026

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Episode Overview

In this episode, Mitch Carson sits down with Hadley Nightingale, founder of "Lean and Mean," a boutique property business in New Zealand. The conversation unpacks Hadley’s evolution from rough beginnings—including business stumbles, personal upheavals, and family challenges—to building a profitable, systemized property company with a tight-knit, remote team. Hadley shares candid lessons about scaling without burning out, the power of relationships, mindset shifts, and the essential process and people strategies behind his success.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

Building and Scaling a Boutique Property Company

• Business Size and Sweet Spots

  • Hadley's firm operates with 13-14 employees—what he calls the "sweet spot": “We’re still really profitable and that’s great… if one person leaves, there’s a portion of the company that departs with it.” (Hadley, 01:46)
  • Discusses the intimacy and agility benefits of a smaller team versus the vulnerabilities (“If Sally leaves, Jenny can’t always just step up”).

• Cross-Training & Systems

  • After losing their head accounts person, robust SOPs and playbooks prevented chaos.
    • “Twelve months ago, it would have been a scramble… But now there’s a playbook we can just jump in, checklist, follow…” (Hadley, 03:55)
  • Emphasizes the pain of “everything sat in my head”—and the importance of documentation to decentralize authority and avoid bottlenecks.

• Right-Hand Support and Leveraging Time

  • Hadley regrets not hiring an executive/virtual assistant (EA/VA) sooner:
    • “If I could turn the clock back, the first person I’d employ is an EA or VA… so I could then focus on delivery, marketing, sales.” (Hadley, 05:52)
  • Mistakenly prioritized hiring for delivery before admin support, leading to imbalanced work and profits.

Entrepreneurship Journey & Mindset

• Nonlinear Pathways

  • Started out as a farmer, then stumbled into property after making poor investment choices influenced by misleading advice.
  • Rescued himself through hard-earned “learning points” and gradually designed a business responsive to underserved market needs (New Zealand buyer’s agency).

• Serendipity & Seizing Opportunity

  • The business pivoted when an expat client requested consolidated management for 20 properties:
    • “Being the opportunist that I am, went, yep, cool, no worries. Let's go.” (Hadley, 08:50)
  • Hadley candidly shares about building new service arms on the fly—sometimes having to "build the plane as we go," balanced by his wife’s process-driven approach.

• Rapid Growth, Real Challenges

  • Initial “simple math” on scaling (“if I can just get property management to 20 grand a month…”) proved naive when the reality of unpredictable projects and operational demands set in.
    • “Except it doesn’t work like that. Murphy comes into place, doesn’t he?” (Mitch, 11:12)
    • “You have one that goes really well, and the other two suck all the profit out of the one.” (Hadley, 11:15)

Lessons in Leadership and Relationships

• Human Connections in Business

  • “No one knows how much you care until you show them how much you care.” (Hadley, quoting a client, 14:25 & 25:25)
  • Shares how being accountable with clients (“hey, look, I got this wrong, here’s how I’m going to fix it”) builds trust and long-term loyalty.
  • Regular, authentic networking: “If you meet 15 people a week, 52 weeks a year, you’ll be known as the guy that does X…” (Hadley, 17:10)

• Mindset for Enduring Adversity

  • Hadley’s business journey overlapped with a protracted, painful divorce—including custody battles.
    • “You can only control what you can control.” (Hadley, 18:36)
  • Mindset shift: Let go of the expectation to “win” in court, and don’t let legal battles overshadow business or life progress.
    • “It’s only money, and you can always make more.” (Hadley, 21:32)
    • “As soon as we let go of the outcome… everything in my life can move on.” (Hadley, 21:31)
  • Advice when in tough situations—especially divorce and business breakups: Pick your battles and don’t let ego or the illusion of fairness drive ruinous decisions. (21:31–22:50)

Team Culture & Remote Leadership

• Remote, Human-Focused Management
  • Hadley’s entire team works remotely; he fosters connection through curiosity about their lives, attentive check-ins, and personal touches.
    • “Just having those conversations and checking in with them to check they are okay. If they are sick, is there anything I can do?” (Hadley, 25:06)
    • “If there’s not that human element… it makes things very stale. You can just feel the resentment and the tension when it’s like that.” (Hadley, 26:57)
  • Admits he was originally more transactional; now values his wife’s natural networking and people skills to balance the culture.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Systems and Delegation:
  • “At our size... everything sat in my head. And then... Let me know if you’ve got a problem. The poor people we employed at the start probably sat there and went, jeepers, what have I come to?” — Hadley Nightingale (04:38)
• On the Cost of Growth:
  • “Most of our staff were making more money than we did for the first couple of years.” — Hadley Nightingale (12:54)
• On Networking:
  • “The more hands you shake, the more money you make.” — Hadley Nightingale (16:43)
• On Client Focus:
  • “No one knows how much you care until you show them how much you care.” — Hadley Nightingale (14:25 & 25:25)
• On Mindset During Adversity:
  • “You can only control what you can control.” — Hadley Nightingale (18:36)
  • “It's only money and you can always make more.” — Hadley Nightingale (21:32)
• On Treating Employees:
  • “Like a human. Is probably the [most important thing].” — Hadley Nightingale (25:02)

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Important Timestamps

• 01:46: Hadley on the “sweet spot” of his company's size and its people challenges
• 03:55: The value of playbooks, SOPs & cross-training
• 05:52: Why he should have hired a VA/EA first
• 08:50 — 10:41: The leap into property management (and how his wife reacted)
• 11:12: The reality of business scaling (“Murphy comes into play…”)
• 14:25: The importance of care and relationship in client work
• 16:43: Networking philosophy: “The more hands you shake, the more money you make.”
• 18:36: Divorce, adversity, and controlling your mindset
• 21:32: Shifting focus away from legal battles to building business and life
• 25:02 — 27:12: Remote team culture and employee relationships

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Connect with Hadley Nightingale

• Instagram: @hadleynightingale
  • “H A D L E Y N I G H T I N G A L E – just like the bird.” (Hadley, 27:44)
• Has resources and coaching programs for those looking to scale their property business

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Tone & Final Thoughts

This episode was open, practical, and often vulnerable, blending hard-won business lessons with the realities of personal challenge. Hadley’s approach is direct, system-focused but always underscored by humanity—whether dealing with crises, clients, or his team. His story offers a real look at the messiness of scaling a business and life, demonstrating that clarity and success are possible if you focus on systems, put people first, and keep your perspective in adversity.

Transcript

[Mitch Carson]

Welcome to the Amazing Authorities podcast, where game changers, visionaries and category leaders share how they built their brands, platforms and global influence. Your host is Mitch Carson, international speaker, media strategist, and creator of the Instant Authority system. If you're ready to learn from those who've done it and want to become the go to expert in your space, you're in the right place.

Hadley Nightingale is our guest today. Now, what's interesting about Hadley is he's from a very small country, but he's growing and expanding in a big way. So sometimes big packages start out as a small package and grow internationally. We were having a little bit of a pre chat about his property business and he's got some tremendous sayings and cliches that I took notes on already. We're going to unpack these. But Hadley, welcome to the Amazing Authorities podcast. You've certainly earned a spot right here today.

[Hadley Nightingale]

Awesome, Mitch, thanks for having me. Looking forward to the conversation.

[Mitch Carson]

Yeah. And you have a property business that's called Lean and Mean. You said you have about what, 13, 14 employees and that's not an easy task. It's probably more painful than having or more challenging. I don't want to say painful. More challenging to run a smallish boutique type of business, albeit any type of business. It could be a dentistry practice than two employees or a hundred plus. So you're in that sweet spot of how big can I go and tell us about where you are and what you. Where you want to go.

[Hadley Nightingale]

Yeah, I mean, I think it's the sweet spot from the perspective of we lean, that we're still really profitable and, and that's great. The downside to that size and where we are is, is that if one person leaves, there's a, a portion of, you know, that the company that departs with it. So it's not a case of Jenny leaves, then Sally steps up.

[Mitch Carson]

It's.

[Hadley Nightingale]

It's a case of this, this key person's gone. You know, we need to go and find someone that's going to be able to take that person's spot rather than we've got two or three other people that we're training up in line for that. At the, at the same time with that though, is it. It also allows you to be really personable with the people that you've got. You've got really good relationships. I know everyone that works for us. I know their families, I know their, you know, their kids, their situation. And it's not a case of a hundred people. We, you walk past someone and you Go, who's that person? What exactly?

[Mitch Carson]

Yeah, they're in accounting. Are they in person?

[Hadley Nightingale]

Yeah.

[Mitch Carson]

Where are they?

[Hadley Nightingale]

Yeah, so, so there's, there's that side of it that, that's nice. And it's nicer than two people as well. Because you can't go on holiday when there's two people.

[Mitch Carson]

No.

[Hadley Nightingale]

So, so there's, there's that. It gives you some continuity around and you were able to put people into, into their strengths and where they sit. Well, but as you say, there's, there's also the, the pain point of you. You're trying to develop your systems and your processes and everything else along the way, as well as still being the, the delivery or the face of what you're doing, which is also the challenge there too.

[Mitch Carson]

Do you believe in cross training? Because I had a similar size company before I sold it in 2008, and that was all because of a divorce. I had to pay off my ex, do that whole thing, and we chat a little bit of that experience. But one thing I found that worked was when someone leaves, and I completely agree, if you have a key person that leaves, man, you're scrambling. You know, you gotta plug that hole in the boat or it's gonna sink or it's gonna take on water. How you cross train does Judy train to do Bill's job and. Because if Bill's gonna go on holiday, as you call it, we call it vacation, but that's the difference.

[Hadley Nightingale]

Yeah, yeah. In terms of like the cross training thing, one of the things that we've really built out in the last 12 months and it's been our focus is, is getting our playbooks and our SOPs, and it sounds so generic and everyone talks about it, but the fundamentals of that become vitally important. We had one of our or our head accounts lady depart us a few weeks ago. And if it had been 12 months prior, it would have been a scramble to say, well, jeepers, what does she do? What are the steps? What happens? Because it's not something I'm involved in every day. But when she left, there's a playbook in the system that we can just jump in, checklist follow. Right, here's the things that we need to do on a daily basis so someone else can step in. And I think that's really. At our size is probably. Or was our weakness was that everything sat in my head. And then it was a case of, right, right, I've got someone new that starts here. You're in the job, all the best. Let me know if you've got a problem and the poor people that we employed at the start probably sat there and went, jeepers, what have I come to like, what am I supposed to do? Because this guy's just said to me, hey look, here's your laptop, here's your phone for me. In my head I'm like, well, it's not that hard. I've been doing it for the last six months, just get up with the job. But not everyone thinks like that obviously. And so you, you end up, you know, you're either forced to do it or you, you stay small and you're the one that has to do everything and then become the bottleneck because everyone relies on you for the, for the output. So it's really about those systems and processes and getting them in place and having our sort of global index, I suppose would call it. So that if Sally leaves then Jenny can go and look at, you know, what she does and then we can just fragment, you know, a couple of different people to go, right, I just need you to take on a little bit of this. You do a little bit of this and then that, you know, folds into, into what we're doing.

[Mitch Carson]

Do you have a right hand person?

[Hadley Nightingale]

Yeah, one of the, it's probably the thing that I didn't do. The one thing I didn't do soon enough when I first started out, I went for, I thought, right, if, if I can get someone to deliver what we need to do and then I just focus on sales, then everything will be cool. But the issue that I had was is that the person that I bought in was on more, it turned out to be on more money than I was to go and deliver the product. But I didn't have anyone to look after my calendar, the emails, the accounting, that was all me. And so, but it took three or four years to realize and go, well, why am I the one doing the $20 an hour job and paying someone else 40 for lack of a better example of it. And so if I was to turn the clock back, the first person I'd go and employ as an EA or a VA to help me get started to do those lower hanging fruit tasks so that I could then focus on delivery, marketing, sales and do it that way rather than, you know, me doing the admin stuff, doing a bit of delivery and then trying to do marketing and sales while paying most of your profit out to someone else.

[Mitch Carson]

So true. So true. Outsourced, that's, that's a leverage component. When did you decide, when were, where were you in your business starting out, I presume you were a rep first working for another property agency, or did you just leap into this out of. Out of university?

[Hadley Nightingale]

No, this. This is.

[Mitch Carson]

No.

[Hadley Nightingale]

So, so what happened? Was initially asked when I left school, started out farming, then moved to Australia because I bought a property in 2007 that wasn't a great property. Learned the hard way about what not to buy. And how do you get some. Some bad advice and make some bad decisions? I suppose they weren't bad decisions. They were just decisions that got made with the best information that we had.

[Mitch Carson]

Learnified learning points.

[Hadley Nightingale]

Yeah. If I knew then what I know now, we. We never would have touched it. And so moved to Australia for a period of time, trying to dig myself out of the hole that I created. Came back to New Zealand and worked with like, Legacy Education, Robert Kiyosaki, his brand for a period of time, and then saw an opportunity to start up a buyer's agency business in New Zealand, or sourcing agent, as they call it in the uk because there's just none here. So then started that. And then we grew. We started to grow that. And then I had some clients that were expats or one. One client in particular who turned around and he said, hey, look, I've got. I've got 20 properties. I want them all managed by one person, not five different companies and five different areas. Can you manage them for me? And, and me, being the opportunist that I am, went, yep, cool, no worries. Let's go.

[Mitch Carson]

Oh, boy. And they were international.

[Hadley Nightingale]

So he lived. He lived in. He lives in Qatar. He's a Kiwi guy, lives in Qatar. And these are across, you know, parts that we were operating in, in New Zealand with our, Our team of two.

[Mitch Carson]

And. Oh, so it's only New Zealand. He had these properties.

[Hadley Nightingale]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Mitch Carson]

Okay. Okay, that's easier.

[Hadley Nightingale]

All right, yeah, sorry. Yeah. So only. Only New Zealand. And. And I, I said to him, look, this is the first time that we're doing it. And he goes, look, you know, everyone in life needs a hand up from time to time, or someone's always helped someone. So here's your opportunity. I'm willing to work with you so that we get this right. So I went home and. And I told my wife and said, hey, guess what? Just had a great chat this morning, by the way. We're now property managers. And she had a few choice words about it. And because she's like, in. In my mind, I'm like, look, this is great.

[Mitch Carson]

Was this your current.

[Hadley Nightingale]

Current wife yeah, my. Yeah, my. My current life. Yeah.

[Mitch Carson]

Okay, got it.

[Hadley Nightingale]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I was like, right, cool. Well, this is what we're gonna do. And of course, in her head, she's very. Systems process. How are we gonna do this? And I'm like, well, look, let's just build the plane as we go, whereas she's more. Hang on, let's just take the foot off the gas a little bit. And. And because she's the one that executes.

[Mitch Carson]

Okay.

[Hadley Nightingale]

Stuff. So. Yeah, so. So that happened. And then we. We got through that, and then about four months later, the same guy said, oh, you've just bought me another five properties. I've got. I've got renovations that need to be done, so if you. If you can project. Manage them for me, that'd be great too. And just tell me, charge me now

[Mitch Carson]

you're in project management.

[Hadley Nightingale]

So once again, now you guess what, when. And she. Yeah, she wasn't amused. And. And I look back at that and it's a great story. And we survived and it's profitable now and life's good. And I wouldn't trade the. The property management for the world,

[Mitch Carson]

but

[Hadley Nightingale]

the thing with it is, is. Is that it's. And. And I think it. It's. The really easy thing to do is you're like, right, we're making a little bit of money here. Oh, if I can just get that, you know, at the time, like 20 grand. If I can get the property management to 20 grand a month, and then I can do 20 grand a month with the projects, then that's going to give us about a hundred and then we're going to make 1.2 million.

[Mitch Carson]

Right. That was your quick math.

[Hadley Nightingale]

Yeah. And. And you've got like, it's simple, simple roadmap, except it doesn't work. Like that is the.

[Mitch Carson]

Is the thing Murphy comes into place, doesn't he?

[Hadley Nightingale]

Yeah, yeah. You have one that goes really well, and the other two suck all the profit out of the one.

[Mitch Carson]

That's.

[Hadley Nightingale]

The one that's making you money. And yeah, so it was. It was an interesting learning experience, but that's. That's how we got to where we are.

[Mitch Carson]

Well, did. So you don't regret the experience of getting there. Sometimes you have to throw a lot of mud at the wall so it sticks. And does your wife acknowledge today that it was a good move because you may have gone through the pain of learning the business that you had no business getting into at that time.

[Hadley Nightingale]

And.

[Mitch Carson]

But now it pays the bills and

[Hadley Nightingale]

then some 100% yeah, okay. Most definitely. I think we're. Yeah, I mean, we've just had a little one. Well, she's just had a little one six months ago. Yeah, she doesn't need to. She doesn't need to go back to work, so. Which we're very, very fortunate not to be able to do. So. No, she's. She's now very, very happy with where things are at. It was just sort of, at the time that this happened as well, is that we were at, I say, like a team of like, three people, and then we're just taken on two new sort of startup roles that were like, didn't really know how to run, but the guy was like, I'll give you a chance. And so we didn't have the people to scale that. And I remember having a conversation with my parents, own a business, and I said to them, I said, what do you do? We're at the situation where I've got all the stuff, I'm busy. We're working 13, 14, 15, 16, 17 hours a day to try and keep everything going. Plus, like I said, the divorce stuff was happening as well.

[Mitch Carson]

Oh, man.

[Hadley Nightingale]

I mean. And like, what do you do? And their. Their response was, well, you've just got to work harder. And it doesn't, Doesn't. Doesn't quite make sense. There's only one. One hand you're telling me I'm working too hard, then the next sense you're telling me I need to work longer. And so it really comes down to the thing of. Is that you've just got to change your thinking and go, well, you know, how are we going to do this? Who do I need to get on board? And like I said earlier, it really came down to most of our staff were making more money than we did for the first couple of years. And I mean, things have changed with that now, but it was that initial growing thing of hire operators and then me take care of the admin, where if I could reverse it, it would have been done in the opposite way to get the VA to help me out with those base tasks and then step up the ladder.

[Mitch Carson]

Yet you wouldn't be sharing about it on this podcast today had you gone perfectly. And I haven't met. I've interviewed quite a few people in my years, known a few people, because as you said, the more hands you shake, the more money you make. And I love that expression or saying, it's so true. Where did you create this opportunity with this man that said, I'm going to give you an opportunity. You had to have done something. Let's go back to where did you meet this guy who's now living in Qatar, who is a New Zealander like you?

[Hadley Nightingale]

Yeah, so it was just, it was a referral through a mortgage broker. We tend to work heavily with them and he was looking for someone that could help him out with, with what he was doing. And I think the, the key for him is, is that he's got a saying that no one knows how much you care until you show them how much you care. And so I think the thing for him, he's, he's big on relationships, he is big on people delivering on what they say they're going to do. And I, I think for him, we, we at the time when we met him, he had two properties or, sorry, three properties and about sort of 13 doors at about a $2 million valuation. We've grown that out now to 35 and just under 10 in terms of portfolio growth in the last three or four years. So we've under promised over delivered on that. We've always done what we've said we've done and I think the biggest thing with that too is that if something's not quite right or we have made a mistake along the way, like everyone does, there were always the first people to go, hey, look, we got that wrong. This, that's. I got this wrong. This is my mistake, this is how I'm going to fix it. And it, it happened yesterday with a client where there was a missed invoice, there was some, some penalties that got put on it and the client rang up about it and we're like, well, the, our person was talking to the client. We're like, right, we made the mistake, we'll just pay for it, get it done. It's not great having to pay it out, but at least it's not, there's no battle between us and there's. You can't, no one can get fired up at you when you're like, hey, look, I've got this wrong. This is how I'm going to fix it. This is what we've done to repair it. Let's, let's move on to the next. So I think that attitude and working with him that closely is the, it was sort of the base for that. Plus he's a likable guy like me and yeah, I made him a heap of money. So he was also a happy man with that.

[Mitch Carson]

Well then there, there was truly a win, win. But I like this, this saying and I, I want you to comment A little more. The more hands you shake, the more money you make.

[Hadley Nightingale]

Yeah.

[Mitch Carson]

Tell us, is that called networking or is it just being a good guy or what?

[Hadley Nightingale]

Both, I think it's. It really, for me, what it comes down to. And, and I, when I first started out, I had a guy that said to me that if you go out and you meet 15 people a week over 52 weeks of the year, you'll be known as the guy that does X in, you know, in the area that you're, that you're working.

[Mitch Carson]

Ah, okay.

[Hadley Nightingale]

And so that was, that was his base premise for that. And then I've, I've only picked the saying up in the last sort of 12 months with the more hand you shake, the more money you make. But to me now it's really a thing of, with the likes of social media, with podcasts, with that sort of thing that if you can go out and you can get your name out there, get your voice out there, talk to more people that way, then you're not time constrained to saying, look, I can only do 15 meetings a week. You've got more options to go and do that. But then I think you can also add a lot more value to a lot more people as well through the, the channels that we have now as opposed to sort of what was available five or 10 years ago.

[Mitch Carson]

Let's talk a little bit about the mindset of a winner you went through or are going through. Still got through a seven year divorce. I thought my situation was horrible. I liken it to the old movie called War of the Roses. Mine took five years to go through the property settlement and I was rich. And then I became unrich through the process. It was, I laugh about it now, it was 20 years ago. You're still enduring, I don't know, too many people that can handle it. Most people crack.

[Hadley Nightingale]

Yeah.

[Mitch Carson]

Because it's painful. I'm sure the legal system is on. It is no fun in your country versus America.

[Hadley Nightingale]

No, not, not a whole lot of fun at all. I, I think that the hardest part for me because the first three years of that was, was custody of my daughter. Oh boy. And so, yeah, so, so that, that was the part that, that was probably the most painful out of all three. And then from that, what I suppose what I learned from that was is that you can only control what you can control. And that from like a parenting perspective is that I can't parent the other parent and what they decide to do. So I just need to control the controllables, do the things on my side and just focus on that. And then when the emotional side of it got taken away in terms of the, the custody side was settled, that's all good, everything's happy and fine. It then just came down to money. And then this is, this is where, sorry, the partnership and the team that I've got with my wife now really came down to it. And we sat down and just went, we just need to let go of the outcome as is sort of airy fairy as that, that sounds as soon as you, as soon as we sort of let go of expectation of we need to win, expectation of this is how this is going to go. Because I've been to court that many times now with this, that if I go in there with an expectation if I'm going to win or the competitive side of me comes out, I just end up looking unhuman. And generally those expectations, no good. No matter how good your attorney is, there's something there that doesn't go to plan or because you're relying on another human's perspective from the outside. And so once we sort of dropped expectation and went, right, it's just going to be what it's going to be. It's going to play out for as long as it's going to play out for. There's no point trying to stoke this fire anymore. And it will finish when it finishes. But while that's happening, we can go and build something. And I think the problem that you have when you're going through the divorce side of things is the divorce becomes the main focus because it's my house, it's my money, it's, you know, this is what I'm entitled to and this is how it should be. And I was talking to someone the other week about court cases and, and things like, he's a lawyer in Sydney and he was saying that most of his clients, that they could win $10 million or they could have a claim for $10 million, they get awarded seven and a half million and they're not happy that they've got seven and a half million. They're disappointed they missed out on the other two and a half because in their eyes, it's unfair.

[Mitch Carson]

Right?

[Hadley Nightingale]

And so it's, it's the injustice that that tends to get you riled up as opposed to the dollar figure. So that's, that's been the big shift for me over the last 18, 24 months is how do I, how do

[Mitch Carson]

I look at this?

[Hadley Nightingale]

As it will be what it will be. And then from the other side of Things going, well, it's only money. And that may, that may not sound great to some people, but it's only money and you can always make more. And so once you take that, that main focus off, the court thinks everything in my life can't move on. And the business is there and that suffers to, hey, here's my business, let's grow this. The court thing's there in the background, but it's not going to ruin my life. That's the big shift that you've got to go through. And I've got a friend that's going through something similar at the moment, and it's just about perspective on him and going, well, mate, you've just got to pick your battles. Is, is that, that you're going after really worth going after? Is it going to change your life? And, and what do you need as opposed to, you know, what you're happy with? Because those are the other two, those are the other two things to, to balance out that if, if you only need a certain figure and you can get out of the case a year early, two years early, you're far better off to do that than just to try and have a moral or a victory. You know, be on the victory high ground and spend another $300,000 on lawyers. It just, it makes no sense. But when you're in it really, really hard to see your way out of that.

[Mitch Carson]

Oh, it's. Your eyes are muddied. And I went through three attorneys and then realized they don't want to settle. They make money by dragging it on. They collaborate at the golf course and say, yeah, let's, let's take a third out of each of them and then we'll split 1 6, 16 each, and we'll, we'll crack them. And they, this is how they make their money. They're not motivated. There's no incentive to settle. That's the problem with the profession.

[Hadley Nightingale]

Well, the other interesting thing on that, just on a side note, it's always interesting and, and I know a few lawyers now through, through time, but without. They'll sit there and they'll send angry emails to each other all week telling each other how much of a bad person they are. Then you see them at the, at the pub on, on Friday night having a beer together.

[Mitch Carson]

Exactly.

[Hadley Nightingale]

It's, I mean, it's all satire and theater.

[Mitch Carson]

It's theater. It's theater. It's all theater. I mean, it's just the character. That's the nature of the beast, of the attorney. They're there to beat on each other the illusion of. But they're friends. They might have. They might be roommates, but during the day. But they're celebrating their monies together and all the rounds on me. Yeah. You know my client, Hadley? Ah, he's good for another 10k this month. Mitch.

[Hadley Nightingale]

Yeah.

[Mitch Carson]

Yeah, let's get him for 10k and let's drink on it. Yeah. They're not motivated to settle. So once that reality hit me, I thought, oh, my God. And what you said is so true. You have to pick your battles if you're going to win the war. Know where to. Where do you engage. And sometimes you got to throw the hat in. And that's. That's true on partnerships. Not just marriages. It's in partnerships. I've had some business partnerships and it hurts, you know, when you go through these separations. Not meant. Or. I. I don't know. Too many marriages and, or divorces that went smoothly.

[Hadley Nightingale]

Yeah, it.

[Mitch Carson]

It happens in life. So what do you do to keep a relationship solid? Now that. I'm not even referring to your current spouse, but let's say you have a relationship with all of your employees, people that are part of your team. How do you treat them?

[Hadley Nightingale]

Like a human. Is probably the.

[Mitch Carson]

You check their pulse, do you?

[Hadley Nightingale]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, everyone. Everyone's remote that we. That we work with, so we haven't got a central office. Just how things are set up here. But I. I suppose it goes back to the. The client's analogy that he used the other day is like, no one knows how much you care until you show them how much you care.

[Mitch Carson]

Right.

[Hadley Nightingale]

And. And I think that's the thing of like, basic stuff. I had a chat with one of. And I said to her, look, two weeks time, you've been here a year. And she's like, oh, the time's flowing. She needed to. She's relocated to another part. She's like, can I still do my job there? Yep, sure. How do we accommodate for that? You know, how's. How's everything going where you're living and just, I suppose having a. Being curious and inquisitive as to. As to what's happening in other people's lives, knowing who they are, who their partners are. Like basic networking stuff, I suppose, is the. The thing. And, and just having those conversations and checking in with them just to check they are okay if they are sick, you know, checking that they're okay. Is there anything I can do? Is there anything that you need a hand with? I think makes a big difference as Opposed to, we're just here for business and let's just get the agenda out, get the, the notes out. Right. Call, meeting, done. See you guys later. If there's not that human element, and especially the size that we're at, I think it makes things very stale. You can just feel the resentment and the tension when it's like that. And I suppose earlier on for me and just how I'm wired, I've had to sort of learn that skill a little bit more because previously was probably a little bit transactional and I probably have elements of it today where I'm like, right, turn up. We're here for a job. Let's just get it done. We don't need a whole amount of small talk. Get on with it. So I think that's, that's probably been the, the key part. And as I said, my wife's the other key part for the relationship. She loves networking. She loves to check that everyone's included and everyone's happy. And so there's without. I think we work, we balance each other out. Really nice perspectives too.

[Mitch Carson]

So she's the glue?

[Hadley Nightingale]

A little bit. Yeah.

[Mitch Carson]

Oh, that's important. Get all the parts together. Hadley, where do people get in touch with you if they. Because you have a coaching program to help others duplicate the success you've created. Where do they find out more about Hadley Nightingale?

[Hadley Nightingale]

Yeah. Best places on Instagram at Hadley Nightingale. And then. Yeah, there's a heap of content there. They want to shoot us a DM and have a chat. They're more than happy to do that as well.

[Mitch Carson]

Why don't you spell that out? Because many of the people are audio only and yeah, it's important with your name both front and.

[Hadley Nightingale]

Yeah, so. So it's all, all one word. So H A D L E Y N I G H T I N G A L E. Just like the bird.

[Mitch Carson]

Nightingale.

[Hadley Nightingale]

Just like the bird, yeah. On, on Instagram's the, the best place there.

[Mitch Carson]

Well, flap your wings. Continue to flap, Nightingale, because that, the growth is there that keeps soaring high. And Hadley, you've been a great guest today on the Amazing Authorities podcast. Thank you for joining me. And many great gems were drawn out of this interview. Thank you so much.

[Hadley Nightingale]

Awesome. Thanks so much, Mitch. Really appreciate it.

[Mitch Carson]

Thanks for tuning in to the Amazing Authorities podcast. If today's episode inspired you, take a moment to subscribe, rate and leave a review. It helps more experts like you rise to the top for behind the scenes access and free resources to boost your authority. Head to MitchCarson.com until next time. Stay amazing.