Michael Serotte of Serotte Law

 

All right, well into second year of Rupp Pflazgraf’s Empire State Entrepreneurs, a New York Business Law podcast, a really fun and informative forum, , for us to showcase our great clients, strategic partners and community leaders to talk about relevant issues for entrepreneurs and business owners throughout New York.

Wait. Why am I here? All right. You interrupted me. You took me off my, my game. Wait business. I mean, I'm not sports business owners, community leaders. I know we were just talking about sports here. We're gonna get into sports for sure. , but before we do, , Michael Serrate, welcome to the show. , really, really appreciative.

Good to be here, to have you here today. We're gonna cover a wide range of topics and before we do special thanks as always, go out to my good friends, Mike and Eric. Everyone here at Incept, , they're so generous, , with allowing us to use this, really one of a kind podcast studio. Um, we've loved our partnership over the years with Incept and, and speaking with them this morning.

It sounds like they're gonna be really pushing, , our law firm in 2026, um, in new, in new ways. And so we're excited to share those ways, , with some of our listeners, , over time next year as we get into year three. Of this fun podcast and as I mentioned Michael Serrate dear friend, we go back a long, long way.

Um, both have a lot in common in terms of our entrepreneur. Yes, I remember when neither of us had gray hair, including that perhaps. And, , by the way, thanks for giving me a, a non-transparent glass. , this is really water tr truly Michael's enjoying our little branded coffee mug that's filled with some sort of beverage and, .

But happy to welcome him here today and, and hear a little bit about his story and his, his journey of, of being a really a, a one of a kind and I think a world class immigration lawyer. And I wanna know, I wanna know how're supposed to have fun today, right? This is like the Joe Rogan show. A little bit, a little bit like that.

And, , before we get to what you're doing today, or some of those fun topics that we were talking about involving Silicon Valley and AI and cloning and attention, I want to hear, and I think our, our listeners would benefit Michael A. Little bit about what, what brought you to this point and, and how your journey sort of began.

Where, where your roots were, where what your, you know, your. Parents were like, I know you're the son of a, of an attorney just like I was. But tell our listeners a little bit about sort of your, your formative years and growing up and, and yeah. All that good stuff. , born and raised in Buffalo, New York. My father was an attorney.

My grandfather actually was an attorney as as well, although neither of 'em practiced immigration law. There was a. A lawyer at my dad's firm who, , practiced immigration law, and I didn't really think much of it because, I mean, the borders sitting right there. We'd go into Canada, come back and go figure.

Yeah. I mean, you know, and, and plus it, it really wasn't of interest to me because I would see these clients come in and speak to Billy and they were speaking in Spanish or Hebrew. Russian had no interest in it, right? But I was always interested in finance. Wall Street, private equity, venture capital. , anyways, ended up, , going to the University of Miami.

I graduated from there a long time ago. The U Yeah, the U. The U. And I was at the first national championship game against Nebraska, 40 yard line tickets. I would say my most memorable moment at the U was playing intramural basketball with Jim Kelly, or I should say against Jim Kelly. That's, that's actually, that's like a little known fact about Michael Serrate.

That's a new one for me. I like that. Yeah, he, , he was, , I mean we saw him play football here in Buffalo and he wasn't the most athletic, but he. And jammed on me. I mean, granted, I'm like five nine at the most, and he's six three, but he went up high and boom. So that was my, , that was my most memorable moment at the, at the u.

, worked, , one year, about a year and a half in accounting, Ernst and Winnie, and then a tax firm in Miami, and came back to. To Buffalo, um, because my father got sick. , he asked me, Hey, look, if you're gonna go to law school, I know you got into Miami, but why don't you try UB? And, , it'd be good to have you here.

And it was, it was great. I, I had an opportunity to work with him and be with him the last couple years of his life. And I learned a lot. , it, it taught me the value of life, like as much as we enjoy it. We have to always remember how short it is, and it could always be taken away. Well said. And, and I have lived my life knowing that, you know, which irritates some people, but you know, it's the only life you got.

And, and it taught me a great lesson and, and I, , I. Through some, I would say some difficult times for a little bit, , eventually came back to Buffalo in 1992 and, and got involved with immigration. I'm like, what? Immigration? It's like, I, what is immigration? Right. So did, did, did you get a chance to work with your father or was it only during your law school?

It was only during my, my law school time. Um, but so you graduate and I do remember a fond moment. It was August of, . 1984 and we were doing an adoption and we were walking up the steps of the old courthouse, and he was only a few months away from passing away, but um, he, , he stopped in the middle of the steps.

It was a beautiful August, day 74, the sun was out. And he just looked at me and he said, look up, look up, look at the sky. It's just a beautiful day to be alive. Right. , what perspective? It always resonated with me. The fact that you've kept that with you is, is, , demonstrates the impact that it had on you as a young man, , at that time back in 84, so, yeah.

Yeah, it was. So I was, . Happy that I had those moments with him. 'cause he was a, he was a great man. Um, but it was also a great teaching moment. Again, going back to life and, , you know, segueing into immigration. It was interesting because I thought it was basically illegals coming over the border. , but when I got into it, , it was.

A couple things that interest me. One, there's a lot of business people involved, investors, entrepreneurs, and I like dealing with people like that. Number two. You didn't have to deal with the, the local legal stuff and, and maybe kowtowing and going to political events and, and contributing money, which a lot of lawyers have to do because that's the system.

Sure. It was a federal practice, so it didn't matter what happened locally. The third thing that was really interesting to me from a business standpoint, and remember David, I have an accounting and finance background, was it's a flat fee business. Interesting. So what does that mean? Interesting. Yeah. So, you know, I personally don't like to keep track of my time, but, and as a lawyer, that's what we do.

We sell our time. , but in this business, if you can improve the process, improve the procedure, you have a great opportunity to either increase your profit margin. Or lower your price and capture more market share. So there's a real business to it, , which is fascinating to me. And I, I sort of carry that on within our firm today.

I always try to teach our lawyers and our senior paralegals. I look, this is a business, right? And the better we are at doing what we do. The more capital we can maintain, which means we can expand and also pay more money to, to our team members. And, and that's important to me, right? They, we have to create an environment at the law firm that people learn, , that they're compensated well, that very well.

And that they have a desire to, to, to do better, to keep thinking about how can we do this better? So, we'll, we'll, and we'll get into how, , transformative AI is making the practice law general, but, but in particular immigration. But, but before we get to that, 'cause that's, that's a, a topic I wanna dive.

Deep into the, the formative years. When you, when you get outta law school, oh, you, you sadly lost your father. You, you go where, where's your first job? And, and how, how does this thesis around this? Yeah. I got fired from four jobs, not surprisingly. We don't need to go through all of 'em. , but, but like the, apparently I didn't, I didn't, I didn't take, , , I didn't, didn't take well to direction people.

Why does that not surprise me? It's like, what? That's, that's bullshit. Come on. You can't do that. Did you, so you developed this passion for the three reasons in which, which I think are, are good reasons why you got into immigration, but that, that happens pretty early on in your career. You're not, , doing insurance defense work.

You're not. No, actually, when I, when I graduated, I, I stayed in Buffalo for a year. I, I worked in an old firm called Falcon Seamer. Sure. Good old, great old firm. Yeah. Yeah. , arch, , Alvin Glick and Mahoney and a bunch of other guys. And, and, um, they, I had me doing corporate business, some real estate. Um, I got fired from that job too.

Interestingly, I, I had a, I met a developer out in, , Chautauqua, and I was helping him put a financing deal together. I had friends on Wall Street. And I was working with the real estate partner, and then the senior guy comes in one day and he says, this isn't working out. I said, what do you mean it's not working out?

He says, we don't have, we can't have exposure. Are you putting on a, putting together a condominium financing deal? I said, what are you talking about? About, I'm working with the real estate partner. He says, no, no, it's not working out. Sati, you're gonna have to leave. I said, you're firing me. Oh, I mean, early lessons, right?

It's like, um, oh, well, okay. I guess corporate law doesn't fit well. Did you, you then, did you leave? You left? Yeah, I left Buffalo. I actually took a job, , in real estate development down in Tampa, St. Pete. I don't think I know, I didn't know that about you. Yeah, I, I wanted to get out. Um, I was a little disillusioned with law at that point, and I was like, real estate took a job.

With a development company that was based out of Albany, New York, but it had an office in, in St. Petersburg, and we were building multi-family apartments. I didn't know anything about hammering nails, , but on the financial and development side, , and more strengths. Yeah, it, it was fun. And, and, and interests.

Yeah. And I remember 1987, I, it was my first cell phone. And it was like this piece of metal box that they screwed underneath the seat with a cord and, and, and a phone, right? And, and so I would drive around looking at sites and, and doing market research because back then we didn't have the internet. We certainly didn't have ai.

So you had to actually use your sneakers and go in and pretend you're gonna be renting apartments to get market survey. Yeah, that, that, that was fun. But another memorable moment in my time in, in st. , Petersburg was, , Motorola came out with the flip phone. Right. And so I was one of the first to get traumatic development.

Yeah. Not the big one, but it was like a, a flip phone. And, and I remember. I was single, you know, going to a bar and putting the phone on the top of the bar and, and then, you know, people wondering what the hell that was. Women would come over. It's like, what's that? It was a good, it was a good en entry point, for sure.

Did. When, when you're in Florida doing sort of finance, real estate development, you still have this sort of, you know, sort of on the. Back burner. But, but thought that that immigration or your, your, your sort of connections to, you know, finance and, and ability to think about a flat fee approach to the practice of law versus a traditional bill by the hour approach.

Do you begin to refine that thesis? Or how is it that you first start? Not really, because immigration, immigration wasn't really in the thought. It was about real estate finance. I eventually, the market tanked in 80, 90, I think it was. , I moved, , briefly to Chicago. Um, that didn't work out, didn't, didn't like it too much.

Eventually moved. Too calm. Yeah, it, it, yeah, it was a tough market. I didn't wanna practice law. I was looking at real estate. The real estate market was not good. , eventually I, I moved to Washington, DC, got a job at a law firm. Closing real estate deals and the lawyer makes sense. Some friends with, um, envy Homes, and that was the company that eventually ended up buying Ryan Homes, which is I think one of the largest in the Buffalo for sure.

And we would be just closing real estate deals, home deals pretty boring, but it was a process and it was the first time that I understood. Yeah, really the, the value of improving processes to, to, to make it faster for the client and, and also profit margins, right? The faster you close a deal, the less time you invest in it, the more margin you get, you know, and that's again my accounting and, and finance background.

And, and then I left that, this is another interesting story, and I got a job on K Street with this accounting firm, , consulting firm. It was this Korean woman. And her father was high up in the Korean government, and she used to work for a guy by the name of Carlucci. Frank Carluccio, I think was the defense secretary under Carter.

Okay. And then back in the nineties, in the late eighties, early nineties, the US corporations were trying to mimic the Japanese trade global trading firm. Sears, if you remember Sears. I do. Right. They had old enough to remember Sears, but they had a company called Sears World Trade. And , she worked with Carlucci and then when she left, she formed her own consulting company on K Street in Washington.

And so her clients, her focus was helping us companies enter the Korean market. Korean companies enter the US market, like international Beef Processors was one of her clients and she was helping them enter the, the Korean market. And the Korean client that I had been working on there for a little bit was Kia.

So Kia was trying to enter the US market. So I remember she, she gave me this, , , assignment to some spreadsheets, right? So I did some spreadsheets. I gave it to her on a Friday. She said, wow, Michael, this is great. It's good work. Look, I'm having a dinner party tomorrow at my house in Maryland. Love for you to join us.

Oh, do you have anything going on? I said, no. It's like, great, you know, seven o'clock. I was like, okay. Sure. I mean, she's the boss, right? I'm working there a month. So, , yeah, I remember pulling up around five to seven huge house pillars, you know, colonial looking, no cars anywhere. This is like a wow moment, right?

Like 1:00 AM I walking into ring the doorbell, some butler answers the door, , and I'm like, is this so-and-so's house? Yes, it is. Like, are you Mr. Serrate? And I'm like, yes. Are we having a dinner party here? Yes. Come on in. Needless to say, I, I, I guess I was gonna be to dinner that night. Classic. Classic.

Yeah. Between you and me. Had she been halfway attractive? 30, right? It might have, your career might have taken, taken a different path, right? 30. Yeah. Yeah. But no. , so interestingly, I go. Halfway through dinner. I, I don't feel well, sorry, I don't feel well. I gotta go. Obviously. I was supposed to be the dinner that, so I go back to the office on Monday.

She calls me in. She says, Michael, I, I re-looked at your spreadsheet, the numbers I, I realized it's really not very good, I'm afraid. This relationship is gonna end. You can leave today. Gotta be kidding. I looked up and I looked at her. I'm like, wait a sec. Friday you said this was great work today. You said It's terrible.

This isn't anything to do with the fact that I didn't sleep with you on Saturday. It's like, what are you talking about? It's like, it was obvious. You told me you were gonna have a dinner party, which usually means like a, a party of people. She's like gathering. I had no intention of doing that. I, okay. She says, well, I need some severance.

It's like, I'm not paying you any severance. I says, yes, you are. I was like, no, you're not. I said, look, gimme four weeks. I worked there for four weeks. I said, gimme four weeks of severance. She says, no. I said, well, okay. You know, I am a lawyer. I was like, I have friends in law. It's like, I'm happy to bring a sexual harassment, a claim for sure.

A claim or something like that. She goes, I'll give you two weeks. I said, I'll gimme three. We'll leave writes me the check. And that's incredible. That's incredible. So you had three weeks to like catch your breath and figure out what Yeah, and I was really, I was really kind of disillusioned at that point, but , you know, I had to make some money.

So I ended up waiting on tables, which honestly David was probably. The best experience in terms of, if I can say, growth taught me humility, , taught me such an important quality for a leader. How people will look at you because of a position and think about you differently. They don't get to know you, right?

Oh, you're a waiter. What do you know? Right? I mean, here I was building $10 million projects a couple years ago. I was a lawyer and accountant and waiting tables, which is perfectly fine if you have to make money. But these people, a lot, not a lot, but enough of 'em would, would just look at you like in d And this is in DC still?

Yeah, this was in DC so I, I thought that was really formidable. It, it taught me humility and I think that's important, especially like in immigration. Right, because you have these people coming from all over the world, coming to America for education, to build their dreams, to build their company, to be with their loved one.

And we, as Americans born and raised here, have no idea what it's like to live any place else. We go there on vacations and stuff like that. It's not the same. And America, as I've learned over the years is, is still this shining light. To a significant majority of the population around the world, the, the freedoms that it offers from opportunities, economics, opportunities, religion.

Right. It's, it's crazy. Second to none, I mean, for sure mean your family probably came from someplace my family escaped Czars, Russia, , unfortunately many people didn't. But yeah, it all that. Came sort of together when I came back to Buffalo in 92. 92 was when you Yeah, I came back first, came back to Buffalo then.

Okay. And started, , started working in immigration and, and it was just like, it just, where was that start On your own or it, it, it, no, no. It was with my father's, , former partner, Billy Reich, who taught me a lot. It was a great firm. Billy Mark Kenmore, Jerry Sipe. Tony Barone, um, focusing mainly on immigration.

That's all they did was immigration. All they did was immigration. So it was a, a great intellectual group of people, brilliant lawyers. Billy was a very smart businessman and I understood, I learned what immigration was and I also learned about the business of immigration. And , you know, unfortunately Billy liked to take and keep control of his firm.

He didn't know how to. Grow partners. Sure. So, I mean, after five years I left and it's been a great ride. You launched, so you, in in late, in the late nineties you launched? Yeah. Angela was April 1st, 1997 was when Fools Day. That was the first day that Sati Law was in existence. Yeah, I, I was living in Kenmore.

I had a little computer sitting in my basement. I had five clients. Incredible. Incredible. And, and interestingly. And I remember sitting there with Billy, okay, we're leaving here are these seven clients. We agreed that we would pitch the seven clients individually and let them all go choose. They all went with me, thank goodness, one of them Lev.

Right? That was the reason why I got into Silicon Valley and this is, this is a wonderful, I think it's a great story, so. And this is the, to me, the, the uniqueness about immigration law, the relationship that you have with your client is very, very different than most lawyer clients. I believe that. Yeah.

Because you what's at stake Exactly. It's what's at, at at stake. And, and I remember meeting Lev, he had called me 'cause I did a case for his wife's business in Rochester. And at the time, in 1994, I think I'm still working with Billy. Um, he had a sister who had cerebral palsy. She was a permanent resident and she was at a, a home in Rochester and it was expensive and the government was paying for it.

And then there was a change in the law that said you had to be a, an American citizen in order to get these subsidies. And at the time, Lev was just a working man in telecom, right. So we had to get her. To become an American citizen. So normally it's pretty easy. You answer 20 questions about American history and government.

You have to demonstrate the ability to read and write English. But because of her disability, she couldn't talk very well. She would mumble words and her hands. She, she would be like this, right? So how do you, the law says communicate right, answer questions and communicate. So how do you answer the question?

So we came up with an idea, remember the old Ouija boards? , for sure. Yeah. Yeah, for sure. So we, I can't remember her name. I remember Lev, but we designed it so that she'd come in, he would ask a question, who's the first president of the United States? GE? You know, she'd point to all the letters. Great. And then can you write See Spot Run?

So again, she, she, she would point to the letters and then dribble over here, but it was clear that she understood what she was doing, the English language. Sure. Now these exams take about 15, 20 minutes. That's it Normally. Um, this was two hours into this example. Wow. Yeah. And it just by chance, the week before I was at a gym and I ran in to this particular immigration officer and we worked out together.

So there was that, that little connection. Right. And we're sitting there for two hours and Mr. Newman says to me, Mr. Serrati, I mean, I don't know if I can approve this. It's close. Right? And Lev's sitting there and she's sitting there and I'm like, well. Mr. Newman, I, I said she's answering the questions correctly, right?

He says, yeah. And, and, and she's clearly understanding what you're saying. Right? And she can mumble the words, and, and you know, when she points to it, you know what you're, yeah. But it's not communicating the way we're used to communicating and, and I'm, I'm at this like, block, what, how do I convince this guy right?

So I, I look out the window. It was one of these beautiful May days. Literally it was like, again, 72 Quint, sunny, quintessential, sure quintessential buffalo, right? No rain, right? The window was open and I looked outside and I said, Mr. Newman, he goes, yes. Says, look outside. He looks outside and said, isn't it a beautiful day?

He looks at me and he goes, yeah, it's a beautiful day. And I go, isn't it a beautiful day to become an American citizen? And he just, he cracks up. He goes, all right. He says, fair enough. Pass. And he approves it. It ends up being a precedent case. It it, it ended up going to Washington and they developed a policy for developmentally disabled individuals.

That's remarkable. Michael, I, I, I didn't know that. I, I know Lev from you, but I didn't know that that was sort of the early beginnings of the relationship and how strong a relationship it is today is in part, based on and to go full circle. So a couple years when I, when I left Billy to form my own firm, Lev came with me.

He was doing a new company, a startup called Lightspeed. Lev was a Russian immigrant, brilliant. He was a computer science engineer, and what he developed was what they call a universal protocol converter. So in the old days when the internet was just expanding, you might remember all these companies were laying cable.

Across solution for sure, for sure. To transmission data for sure. So in, in layman's terms, when you take data from the United States or voice from the United States, it has to convert to a protocol, and then you ship it over to England, they have to reconvert it, and then if you send the same data to Germany, you, you have to convert it, right?

So you'd have to go to Bell Labs and buy a piece of equipment for about two and a half million dollars in each destination. So it was very expensive to transmit data. Lev invented what they call the universal protocol convertible. So the data would go into this chip and it would automatic a, a circuit, right, and it would convert it to the protocol at the destination.

So it was software. So he started this company called Lightspeed and, and about Pretty cool, two years later. S sold it. He raised $12 million. He sold it for $183 million of Cisco stock stock, which a year and a half, two years later is worth $1.2 billion. Right. Incredible story. Needless to say, Lev, you know, did very incredible story.

So that created this kind and, and, and during this time when I was representing the company, you know, I really didn't have much interaction with Lev. But afterwards, when he sold the company, left Cisco. We became great friends and then we went fishing together. I knew his daughter since they were seven.

One of them ended up going to Wash U, became an engineer. She went out to San Francisco. She teamed up with a Romanian girl who was at Stanford to start a company. Right. And they were start X's second cohort. Now StartX is basically Stanford's accelerator program. Okay? Started by this guy, Cameron Edelman, who's a friend of mine now.

So this was their second cohort and Lev calls me one day and he goes, look, I need your help. What? He's like, Stephanie's got this founder, co-founder who's not getting good answers on her immigration. She's gonna get kicked out of the country. Can you help them do your thing, right? Yeah. And I'm like, sure.

I, I mean, sure. I'll help Stephanie talk to them. And we came up with a pretty creative solution and we solved on this problem. And eventually she, she continued to grow the company and, and I'm still friends with her. , but as a result and on being somewhat of a, a star, even by Stanford. Measurements. , she introduced me to StartX and then StartX said, okay, anda says, you guys are pretty good.

We'd like to meet you. So we fly out to StartX. Well, we'd like to consider you to be our immigration council. So they vetted me, David, and I remember they asked for like five different client referrals and they would call 'em up. And at that point we were one of maybe four immigration firms at StartX. A little Buffalo, New York based.

Yeah. And, and going out to Silicon Valley today, were the only immigration firm at Tarbucks. We still partner. Remarkable with them. We're going out there in a couple weeks. It's incredible, Michael, but that literally was the seed. And you know, it just before then, we were representing these big companies outta Canada, investors, entrepreneurs, border cases, and all of a sudden this whole world opened up because it was, hey.

I got a problem, by the way. I have money 'cause I just raised $5 million. I gotta hire this person or I gotta stay in the country, solve the problem. And it was just my kind of environment when you were telling the story about Lev and his sister probably said too much. I, no, I was almost gonna use the phrase you just used, which is a problem solver, and it, it sort of transcends, it's, yes, it's our role as a, as attorneys or as a lawyer to, to do problem solving.

But, but think of it as a business owner or an entrepreneur or Lev or, or anybody. Lev's daughter like ul. Ultimately, I, I admire that like. The, the, the, you know, the project you did for Lev's sister wasn't a sexy project, or it wasn't gonna put you on, you know, the front page of the news or anything like that, but you knew that it was critically important to a dear friend and a, and a and a client who could open up, you know, doors and, and so you, you did something very unique and it was not something you read about in a textbook or that, you know, bill No.

You, or anything that was, I had no. You know, at the time he was working for MCI communications, I think it was. Um, so I didn't have any idea that he would start a company a couple years later and then that would lead me to Silicon Valley where, you know, I got a partnership in a venture capital firm. I mean, it's crazy.

It is crazy actually. I mean, from this, you know, a little guy in Buffalo, New York doing immigration work and, and, and now the firm is well known in Silicon Valley to South. We work with big firms out there who refer clients to us, and every day I am getting three or four referrals from other startup founders.

And the stuff that I see is just fantastic. And you know, I mean, I could sit here and talk about technology and most of my friends who are like, you leading firms and companies, and they're like, what? What are you talking about? What is the shit? Let's, let's get into that. But real, I wanna get into tech. , but before we do so 30 years.

Going on 30 years. Oh shit. 30 years. An incredible run for Sati Law. Um, how do you feel today about sort of the, the pace of change and tech will, will, I guess this will lead into tech, but, but could you have ever imagined, Michael, looking back to 1997, when you launched on April 1st, when you launched Sati Law to.

What you're doing today and sort of this non-traditional approach, it's very different than what you know, Billy Reich was doing, or your dad, or my dad is an estate and tressler in town, or even big firms in town. But look at how sati is sort of, you know, sort of a symbolic of opportunity or, um, get out of your own way and take some chances or risks.

I mean, do you think, you know, for our entrepreneurial, um, leaders and listeners. Lessons learned over those 30 years. I mean, could you ever have imagined where you're sitting today compared to where you were back then? No. I mean, I still sort of joke about being one of the little leading immigration firms in Silicon Valley, and I'm still based in Buffalo.

Right. That's amazing. I love it. I love it, actually. But I mean that, that's technology too. If it wasn't for the internet, if it wasn't for, . Mm, applications like Zoom, email, text messaging and everything else. , we wouldn't be able to do what we do. I mean, can you imagine sending faxes and doing phone calls?

You know, people want instantaneous responsiveness. They want to see you, they still want that personal interaction. And we couldn't do that. I mean, there was a point where I was going out to San Francisco every two months for like 10 days and you know, that's what it took. We would meet people. Right, right.

, and people wanted to meet you. And you would solidify that relationship through that interpersonal connection. And then they develop that trust. And so, and then when you solve their problems and their employee's problems, they just continue to, to grow. And, and, and the immigrant community, like every community has their, all circles, their own circles.

So they refer other people to you. Which is, which is same. Same here, for sure, for sure. , but um, yeah, no, I would've never. I would've never, , envisioned that happening. The platform you've built this incredible sati law that is, you know, wow. Knee deep in, in Silicon Valley and New York City and elsewhere.

It's also, I think, and this again, is something I, I admire about what you're doing, but it's allowed you to, to be even more entrepreneurial when it. Comes to things like Unshackled Ventures or doing business with clients like Lev. Well, te tell our listeners a little bit about your excitement or enthusiasm for, for jumping into deals or, so let's talk about entrepreneurs.

I, I think this is important, and you know this as well as crazy as I am and as outwardly facing, I am the, the firm which currently has 30 employees is all we do is immigration would not be successful. Where it is today, but for my partner Rita, and you know Rita very well, a hundred percent. I mean, she voluntarily sort of took the operational aspect of the business that allowed us to plant seeds in, in these different geographic regions and, and grow the business.

Um, I think when you look at some of the great organizations today. Every founder had that operational person. Excellent point. Who kept everything. I mean, jobs had, , I can't think of the guy's name, but, , , a cook, right? Well, you're out Chase and someone to, to implement and execute someone. I mean, even if fashion Calvin Klein had, , his operational guy, I mean.

So as much as you might want to design things and, and this, this is what we, we talk about often, it's like, I mean, shit happens all the time and you have to be able to adapt and often my first reaction might not be the right one. Having those partners that you can trust, Rita Raghavan and a few other key people at the firm.

To be able to bounce back ideas and, and often bring him back. Right. Okay, let's come back to Earth, Michael. Right, right. And your gut, you know, isn't always right. Certainly. No, no one's is, but, and but go ahead. I was, I was gonna say, even today we talked about ai. Like I, I see, I, I think the law practice particularly immigration is going in a direction.

And, and I'll tell you where a, to me AI sort of. Not evens the playing field, but narrows it from wider margins because it makes the good point. The not so good lawyers a little better. And it makes, and, and that means that the really good lawyers, you know, come back to not the media get, get marginalized a little bit.

Sure. Right. They're competing at a different level because ai. Gives those individuals access to information very quickly. And even though it's not always right, it, you know, you gotta do your homework. And it's amazing how many lawyers use AI to build their petitions and applications and, and, and it, and it's crap because they don't do their homework.

So where does that leave us? Right. And I have been pushing this in my firm. There's, there are two aspects to it. There's the ai, so who's gonna be successful? The people who use this new tool, who understand it, embrace it and understand how to manipulate it to their, our advantage and to the client's advantage.

The other one's hospitality, right? If, if you compete on price, you're gonna be a race to the bottom, but if you compete on service, that's a distinguishing factor. Doubt, and I still believe that humans are people. And they want that interaction, they want that trust. They don't necessarily trust ai. They use it as a tool.

So I've been pushing hospitality. Don't send three emails. If the first and second one doesn't work, pick up the phone and call the client. Great advice. Every time we sign up a new client, we do an onboarding. It's a team of three people and the client on a Zoom meeting, and we go 30 to 45 minutes asking all the questions.

Using an application that records everything and then transfers it into a summary. Wow. It, it's just, so to me, technology is this wonderful tool, but you still have to focus on the client relationship, which is something that you've always done very well. I mean, I know you're the managing partner of a firm with, I don't know, 200 employees, and when I text you at nine o'clock at night.

Or eight in the morning, or six in the morning about a new client. You are, you're there. I appreciate that. But I, I share your, um, values and, and the importance of client service is, is still, um, relevant in our profession. You ever get to this where you say client, you know, one of your employees, partners, or lawyers come to you?

I can't get, I can't get this person to understand what I'm saying. It's like, well, have you picked up the phone and called them? No. I sent them four emails. Well, one of two things are going on here. One is the language you're using, they don't understand. Two is maybe they're just too busy and they can't respond.

Pick up the phone and call them. Call them. Yes. Call them. There's a phone here. Everyone has one of these. Text them, call them. Hey, it's amazing what happens when you actually speak to, oh, couldn't agree more. I get it now. Couldn't agree more. It seems like that that art is, you know, not, um, embraced by all that, that skill is not embraced by all.

So I, I applaud you, Michael, for, you know, teaching and mentoring your lawyers to say that there is Yeah. But it's still the need to do that, that client service, that client touch. There's this weird divide amongst the generations about interacting with humans, right? There's like this generation that grew up and they, they didn't.

Really interact. I, I think the younger one, is it the, the new generation? Is that, what, is that like the 2025 beyond millennial or, they're great. Yeah. Yeah. They're, they're great. They're coming into the office, they wanna work. They don't mind picking up the phone and calling people. We, we are used to it because this is how we started.

And, and people, we like, people and people are, are, are, are, are fun and, and you know, frankly, I, I enjoy the, the fact of we get to help somebody at the end of the day. When, when we're able to deliver a successful solution, it still makes me feel pretty good. You know, you can't be in immigration unless you have some level of feelings and, and you think, you think, and we've talked a little bit about the impact of, of AI and, and you think.

Immigration, you know, the, the practice of law in general, but immigration in particular could be really disruptive in, in a, in a great way. If, if, if it's embraced and, and well, you, you see that, so there are companies out there that have been VC funded. That are trying to hack the immigration system. I think one of the 43 North winners someone told me was some sort of tech.

Yeah, yeah. So immigration, tech disruptor thing. Right. You know, platforms, ai, just talk to it, it'll create your petition in, in whatever. And, and some of, and I mean there's a lot of competition out there and, and then, then you're getting into this sort of price war, right? , and. The clients that, a lot of the clients that come to me will say, yeah, you know, they ended up doing a decent job, but I couldn't get anybody on the phone.

It would take them two days to respond to me. And this goes back to the hospitality thing, and this is what I try to push upon our, our firm. So the, you know, hospitality, it's the difference between going into the Four Seasons Hotel versus the Motel six. I mean, they serve a segment of the marketplace. But, but you know, our clients, a majority of our clients, which are the Silicon Valley startups, you know, they're, they're getting a $3 million seed round, you know, a $10 million seed round.

, just had a client got a hundred million dollars series A. I mean, it's the, the money's out there and it's, it's such a race and it's all about talent, right? And so these founders want people who respond quickly, solve their problems, move on to the next one, right? And, and, and just be available like you are.

Be accessible. Be, be accountable, be responsive. , well, I like that. That's good. Before I let you go, we got a, a couple over done. No, no, not yet. A couple more topics I wanted to, , touch on. One is Bills, um, the bill. We could talk forever about the, our beloved bills, but no, you're, you're passionate about your profession.

You're obviously have, um, built this, you know, one of a kind law firm that's integrated in Silicon Valley and around the world. World, really, Michael, but I also, um. Respect and admire you for having, um, passions that go outside the practice a lot. You're, you know, you're a great relationship with Rita. A person I, I love and admire a ton, but physical fit, physical fitness.

Well, I know David, you wouldn't be friends with me, but for Rita that's true. You and all of our other friends in Buffalo places, sati. You and Rita break up. We're going with Rita. So, I mean, yeah. Alright. That's well said. Might be true, but, you know, but, but physical fitness and, and you know, your friend, strong friend, personal relationships and friendships, you know, this mountain climbing, , excursion, which I think is.

Totally insane, but I want our listeners to hear like, why, you know, doing things other than your core business or being a great immigration, okay, fine. You know, been there, done that. But, but tell our listeners about why you think getting involved in other, um, you know, challenges or, or things outside your core business has been important to you over the years.

By nature, I'm a competitive person. You think?

I think a little maybe, right? I think people like us hate to lose more than we like to win. Um, that's, I'm cut from that exact Yeah. I know exactly how I, and it, it does and, and I used to play soccer and basketball. Um, I got to a point where. I knew what I wanted to do from a strategic and mental standpoint, but my body just couldn't do it, and I was very frustrated about that.

Right. So. Other than working out, I, I needed to find something, right? What did I like to do? And I don't really like to swim, so the whole Ironman stuff was right, wasn't the first. I know. Rat says sati, you just go in the water, you can float and stuff like that. Ah, it's not that I can't swim, I just wasn't top of the list.

Yeah. It's just, it's not one of those exercises that I particularly like, but again, stemming from relationships, stemming, , coming from immigration. You know, all the work that we did at Stanford comes from, , one individual, or seated from one individual. Renee Kos. Um, he was 20 some odd years younger than me.

Um, funny story, we met on, on, on the phone. We ended up going out to San Francisco. He introduced us a bunch of people at Stanford. Our relationship there grew and, and Renee, Renee and I had, had a lot in common. Um, I said to him one day, Hey, look, , if you ever think about getting a house outside of where you are now, let me know because we're coming out here.

Why stay in a hotel? Might as well just share a house. And I remember he, he told me afterwards, he was like. I don't know if I wanna share a house with this old guy. I mean, he's probably gonna tell me to go to sleep at nine o'clock or some shit like that. And, , anyways, we, we got a house in Beno Heights in San Francisco and it was about a seven year run.

It was, it was great. And he got me into a lot of different activities and one of them is mountaineering. He, he knew I, we would go running in the woods and, you know, I would. Keep up with him if, if not surpass him every once in a while and he's like, what is wrong with you? It's like, I don't know, I'm just competitive.

He, so he calls me up when he got me to go to Burning Man. Right. Which is, which I'm familiar with, but never attended, so, which apparently, I'm not sure it's on my bucket list, but we can, right. Yeah. It was like, talk to some of these founders. Wait. You, you went to Burning Man? I said, yeah, I went to Burning Man.

Needless to say, Rita's still not happy about that. Nothing happened, Rita, nothing. I absorbed the atmosphere. Um, but he calls me up one day and he says, Hey, you know, I got into this mountaineering stuff. Why don't you climb Rainier with me? And I'm like, what's Rainier? He is like, ah, it's this 14,500 pretty serious climb.

Right. You know? And I'm like, well. Okay, why not? You know? So I, I started training with it and I remember he said to me on Summit Day, we're gonna hit about 12,500 feet. It'll be 4 30, 5 o'clock in the morning, and you will see the most magnificent sunrise you've ever seen in your entire life. And sure enough, we got up at one.

We started summiting at two. We got to around four 30, quarter to five. We took our break. And, and I'm eating a candy bar. 'cause you gotta keep eating when you're going up there. And he said, look, and it was absolutely spectacular. Like the remarkable entire, I can, I've shown you the pictures, but the, the horizon was just start, you see this orange line and then it just sort of kept growing one of a kind.

It, it was great. And then it's physically hard. You're, it, it, it's, it's tech. It's mentally and physically hard. Um. Again, there was a summit, there was a goal, just like in sports and you know, we did, we got up to the top. The altitude didn't bother me at the time and it was just like, wow, I like this how you thought It was just, it was just great.

So then. Went down. Um, I'm thinking like, what else can I do? And he goes like, well, you wanna do Denali one day and maybe Everest? I'm like, I don't know. It's like, well, at least Denali says you should go do Ora, which is this 18,500 Peak Glacier in Mexico. So I'm doing that in January. That's amazing. Um, what I really like about it though, 18,500.

Yeah, I know. I mean, listen, Everest is 29,000, 32 feet. , I, I don't know about Everest, but the training to go into climbing and, and, and to do it effectively is very different from what I've used to in terms of working out. So the fact that there's a goal and there's a pattern that I have to continue to do, to me that's like my competitive game.

Right. Get on a treadmill, go for two hours. Hyper the backpack for 40, you know, 40 pounds out in the woods with Bella, my dog. You know, it's different than lifting weights with Jensen and Renzo. Yeah, it's, it's much different. You still have to do some lower body stuff, but it's more, more of that type of training.

Interestingly, I personally, I, I, I can't say that I haven't felt this good from a physical standpoint, you know, in, in 10 years. That's great, Michael. So. So that's great. I keep looking at that, , this picture of Zaa, right? You know, I don't know, did I show you this when you, when you had, when you, January what, what part of January?

That's in, that's a beautiful, beautiful photograph. Damn. Are you? And, and that's that. So that's on your horizon. That's January. That's not far away. Yeah. January. Hopefully won't miss any of the Bills, playoff games, and. Well, I looked at the schedule and I was either was gonna miss, , like the divisional and championship game and, and, and, and see the Super Bowl or the other way.

And I figured this is the year we're gonna win the Super Bowl. Okay, perfect. Of course, every year I figure we're gonna win the Super Bowl and. My kids are like getting sick of it already. It's like, dad, I'm just betting the opposite way, so I may miss the game. Tell me. So, we'll, we'll begin to sort of call it a day here and wrap it up.

And I so appreciate your time, Michael, but as you think about sort of what's next or what does the future hold, you've obviously done a, a shit ton in, in your profession and Well, I think there's some and climb mountains lit literally. And, and, , and so what, what, what, what does the future look like or hold for you?

I love. The business challenge, you're still passionate still, still in the trenches still. Yeah. I think building still what I like to, what I've always envisioned, all right, is, , the ability to transfer the knowledge that we've gained as a firm, and this is everybody, and convey it to, to clients at a lower cost, right?

Because there's, there's a lot of people who can't necessarily afford the full service. Right, but that shouldn't prohibit them from getting the best that they possibly can versus going to somebody who's, that's a great point. Bad and screws up their case and perhaps risk getting kicked out of the country or risk not being able to build their business.

And, and we see this, you, you see other lawyers. I mean, listen for a scale for there's a hundred lawyers. There's somebody at the bottom and somebody at the top. Well, if you're unlucky enough to pick somebody in the lower 50%, you may not get the result that you're looking for. So now with the technology that that's available.

One of our challenges is to, okay, how do we take this information and make it available to the public at a much lower cost, , where they can also benefit? I would love to be able to say, Hey, look, happy to provide you this service. It costs you $15,000. However, I if, if you're, you know, but you can do it yourself here.

Right? And it's much less, well, why would I. Pay you the 15,000. Well, some people will value their time more than others. It's, it's right. It's cost benefit. Sure. And they want the lawyer, but other people have more free time and they'd rather save the, the money, which is, and use the app or use that. Right.

Use, use the thing. So there's a lot of competition out there, , trying to build stuff like this. I mean, you see this, what we call these a a oh one mills. Um, I think the competitive advantage that we have is, is this IP and it's all sitting there in our servers, right? It's a matter of transferring.

Transferring that into. The ability to communicate to a client in an effective way. So, you know, that to me is exciting. Well, it seems like you're as passionate today as you were in, well, I mean, in 97, I gotta find a mountain climb somewhere with your dad. You know, I can't imagine just sitting on my ass reading the Wall Street Journal every day playing golf or something.

Dad, that does not surprise me. So look, Michael, thank you for your time today. Um, look, , for great things both from your firm, but also from. You personally climbing mountains and um, thank you for inspiring me. Yeah, David, let's being motivational. Let's remember something. You just finished the Iron Man, so I have, I have, I, I've got my sights on the, I'm not the only one who's competitive in this room here.

We'll get there both. We have goals plus aren't you like the best? Senior, senior squash player? Are you senior squash player? Probably, yeah. 55 and counting. Well, thank you again, Michael. I appreciate your time. Thanks David. That was fun. That was great.