Meet Jason Lindamood | Attorney and Owner of Lindamood Law Firm, PLLC.

We had the good fortune of connecting with Jason Lindamood and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Jason, what was your thought process behind starting your own business?
Such a great question. I was a trial lawyer for 15 years before opening my own firm. I had my first jury trial working as a prosecutor for a small county located outside of Houston about a week after I had received the results from they bar exam and became a licensed attorney. I spent 4 years here, getting a lot of trial experience under my belt. My mindset coming out of law school was to help people that weren’t in a position to stand up for themselves. Working for a small county allowed me to ‘wear different hats’ and not be driven by anything other than simply trying to do the right thing with the folks I was dealing with. After four years there I took a job with a large law firm based in Houston, but had more of a national practice. I spent 9 years there traveling the country, taking depositions, in hearings, and — if a case was on the verge of going to trial — I was one of a few “courtroom lawyers” that they would send out to pick the jury, put on our witnesses, cross-examine the other sides witnesses, and do closing arguments. These were cases that sometimes took up to two years to finally culminate in a jury trial so there was a lot of prep work that went into it before we actually got to the courthouse steps. I enjoyed helping our clients, and that was the most rewarding part of my job. During this time, my grandpa passed away suddenly of a heart attack and, almost at the same time, my grandma developed severe dementia and had to be placed into a memory-care facility. A year later I had another loved one develop a rare autoimmune disease and realized that the importance of ‘working for a large firm’ and all of the travel that came with that paled in comparison to missing out on sharing time with my loved ones, having conversations with them, and simply being in town and able to see them. That was a large catalyst in opening my firm. Being able to help my clients, do rewarding work, and do it all without spending 3 weeks out of the month on the road was something that influenced that occupational pivot in a sense.

Can you give our readers an introduction to your business? Maybe you can share a bit about what you do and what sets you apart from others?
I own a law firm located just north of Houston (in The Woodlands, Texas) called the Lindamood Law Firm. We focus on ‘Estate Planning’ (meeting with clients, determining what their needs are in terms of Wills or Trusts, Powers of Attorney, and documents such as that) as well as ‘Probate’ (when someone passes away and families need assistance navigating the probate court system). There are many lawyers out there that do what I do, but what sets us apart is a couple of things: (1) I bring a “trial lawyer’s perspective” to how I draft my clients’ Wills and other documents. Having tried over 100-plus jury trials, hundreds of trial depositions, and countless hearings, I tilt the prism in a way that I know what judges are looking for as well as what will cause impediments to a case. That helps inform how I design, engineer, and draft my clients’ Estate Plans in a way that can, to the best of our abilities, “future-proof” them and allow them to stand the test of time for many years down the road; (2) Having worked in large law firms I know firsthand how clients can quickly become ‘case numbers’ on a spreadsheet. And this may work perfectly well for some folks and some law firms, but when I opened Lindamood Law Firm the first words I wrote down on a legal pad the first day I started putting my initial “business model” thoughts down was “DEVELOP AUTHENTIC RELATIONSHIPS WITH PEOPLE AND THE BUSINESS WILL FOLLOW”. And that’s something that I firmly believe. It’s not a marketing tactic to come across as “folksy” or “relatable” — it’s the truth. I want to treat everyone that comes into my office the way I’d want someone to treat my parents if they were looking for guidance. I wake up everyday with that in mind; (3) “Knowing what I don’t know and have an occupational identity”. What I mean by that is that, for instance, I focus solely on Estate Planning and Probate. That’s all we do. I don’t try to use other types of law as ‘business filler’ to make extra money on the margins because that type of business model just isn’t congruent with my thought process. Nothing against general practitioners who do a little bit of everything because they may feel called to do that, but, in my case, I feel that having a true “identity” and being able to spot issues that general practice lawyers may miss (because they’re handling 5 other types of law…) is the type of firm I needed to be. Think of it like a restaurant that tries to be all things to all people. It’s difficult to be equally good at serving, for instance, top-notch Mexican food, barbecue, pizza, sushi, seafood, and top-of-the-line steaks all under one roof. I’d suggest that any restaurant that does that is unlikely to be great at any one of those types of food because they don’t have an ‘identity’. Some lawyers are the same way: If you go to their website, click around on what their “Practice Areas” are, you may see that they handle “Personal Injury cases, Immigration cases, Bankruptcy cases, General Business cases, Criminal Defense cases, Divorce cases, oh, and ‘Estate Planning and Probate’ cases….”. For some clients, that may be perfectly acceptable. But it’s hard enough to be REALLY good at one area of the law, much less two. Or three. Or, heaven forbid, five or six. So focusing solely on Estate Planning and Probate (and they go hand-in-hand when you think about it….you may draft a Will for a client then, years later, they pass away and the family needs help navigating the probate process, etc…) just makes sense to me.

If you had a friend visiting you, what are some of the local spots you’d want to take them around to?
I think the Houston area has so many things to offer that people don’t necessarily think about. We have an amazing community of creatives — whether it be theatre, live local musicians, or art. We also have some absolutely tremendous restaurants ranging from those helmed by some of the best chefs in the country to smaller, hole-in-the-wall eateries that I love to try out that may be a little off of the beaten path. And, being the fourth largest city in the country gives us the luxury of having professional and collegiate sports teams whose games we can attend virtually year-round. The possibilities are endless here in Houston.

Shoutout is all about shouting out others who you feel deserve additional recognition and exposure. Who would you like to shoutout?
I’ve been so fortunate and blessed to have been raised by the best parents anyone could have. They never pressured me to go into any particular vocation as I got older (I’m the only lawyer in my family…) but they sacrificed to make sure that my brother and I grew up with a foundation built on faith, wisdom, common sense, and a desire to pursue what we felt called to do with our lives. Teachers I had growing up, loved ones that gave me emotional support through college and law school (and even brought food to me while I’d spend hours at night studying) were all vital to where I’m at today. My first ‘lawyer mentor’ out of law school — Josh McCown, who was the elected District Attorney in Wharton County for over 20 years — gave me the latitude to figure things out without micromanaging, the confidence to expand on whatever innate skills that I brought to the table, and the technical knowledge on how to “think like a trial lawyer” in terms of planning for contingencies that may or may not occur leading up to trials. As I pivoted from trial work to “estate planning and probate” (think of estate planning as when folks need Wills designed and drafted…or Trusts…or Powers of Attorney…things like that….) I’ve been extremely fortunate to have a mentor who was willing to share his knowledge with me, answer all of the questions I have, and essentially ‘open his proverbial playbook’ to show me how to not only become a better Estate Planning lawyer but also how to run a law firm business. And — spoiler alert — they don’t teach you how to do that in law school, so there’s definitely an entrepreneurial learning curve.

Website: www.LindamoodLawFirm.com

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