Meet The Disruptors: Jordan Isrow Of PureCounsel + ISROW LEGAL On The Five Things You Need To Shake Up Your Industry

Personalize and Customize. By using data analytics, businesses can tailor their offerings to cater directly to customers’ needs. Amazon has mastered this approach using complex algorithms that analyze purchase patterns and web history to create personalized marketing and unique shopping experiences.

As a part of our series about business leaders who are shaking things up in their industry, I had the pleasure of interviewing Jordan Isrow.

Jordan Isrow is a distinguished attorney, dedicated public servant, and visionary. Known for his extensive expertise, strong community leadership, and commitment to improving the legal industry, Isrow is a jack of all trades who has developed the reputation of being a powerhouse trial attorney and trusted advisor with a wealth of knowledge and experience across a diverse range of practice areas.

Born out of the frustrations associated with the traditional business of law, Isrow set out on a journey to create an innovative platform where legal talent and demand for legal services intersect seamlessly. His goal was to enable clients to easily access quality legal services at competitive flat-fee pricing while providing attorneys with a more efficient and productive way of generating new business. A true legal pioneer, Isrow founded PureCounsel, the premier digital marketplace for on-demand legal services, with transparency, predictability and accessibility as its core pillars. These ideals, combined with his commitment to empowering businesses and individuals to effectively manage their legal needs, lie at the forefront of PureCounsel’s mission. Isrow firmly believes in the value of flat-fee legal services and aims to make them the standard, not the exception.

In addition to PureCounsel, Isrow also established ISROW LEGAL P.A., a forward-thinking law firm that challenges the status quo and redefines the traditional practice of law. He leads the firm’s efforts in embracing alternative fee arrangements and adopting new technologies to enhance efficiency, streamline communication and provide exceptional value to its clients. Specializing in complex litigation, commercial transactions, and corporate counseling, ISROW LEGAL combines the formidable strengths of Big Law, the personalized service of boutique firms, and the sophistication of an experienced General Counsel to create a unique and unparalleled approach to serving clients in the real estate, hospitality, technology, finance, and manufacturing industries.

Isrow received his Bachelor of Science in Advertising from the University of Florida before earning his Juris Doctor, Cum Laude, from the University of Miami (UM) School of Law.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dig in, our readers would like to get to know you a bit more. Can you tell us a bit about your “backstory”? What led you to this particular career path?

My journey to becoming an attorney and entrepreneur was anything but conventional. When I was younger, being a lawyer was the last thing I imagined myself doing.

Growing up, my only exposure to the legal profession was through books, movies and TV, which portrayed attorneys in the traditional sense. You know… overly serious, stuffy and boring. As someone who was always into arts and entertainment — so much so that I once wrote a script for The Simpsons and mailed it to Matt Groening in the hopes of getting a job on the show — I envisioned myself doing something creative, like being a comedian or a writer. I mean, I was voted class clown in highschool, so clearly I was destined for comedy greatness!

When I got to college, I was still unsure of what I wanted to do, but I made the decision to major in business, because I wanted to be like my father, a natural born entrepreneur whom I always greatly admired. But, after a year of learning the basics of finance, economics and marketing, I decided it was time to pursue something that was more in line with my interests, which led me to the school of journalism where I ultimately majored in advertising.

As I neared graduation, I began applying to different advertising agencies and shared my plans with my mother. She strongly encouraged me to go to law school, stressing the value of a law degree and how I would be able to apply what I learned to any career of my choice. Recognizing that she had been right about most everything else in my life, and with no responses from the ad agencies, I took the leap of faith and applied to law school. Ironically enough, I excelled in my first year and found myself actually enjoying learning about the law. But, still not convinced that I was meant to be a lawyer, I enrolled in the J.D./M.B.A. program to keep my options open.

My 2L year I participated in the On Campus Interview (OCI) Program, where I was fortunate enough to land a coveted summer associateship with one of the premier boutique litigation firms in Miami. But as fate would have it, my cause for celebration was short lived. I was at a friend’s studying for my last exams before summer when my phone rang. It was my brother. He called three times before I finally broke my focus and angrily answered, “What do you want?!”.

“JORDAN!”, he yelled. “Dad is dead.”

My father, my role model, and my best friend had passed away suddenly from a heart attack at the age of 60. My world got completely turned upside down. And while I tried my best to push forward and complete my summer associateship, knowing that’s what he would’ve wanted of me, it was practically impossible to focus on my work. At the end of the summer I was politely informed that I unfortunately “was not a good fit,” and that the firm would not be extending a job offer for me after graduation. The decision weighed heavily on me.

I went from having it all figured out to feeling like a failure who had no idea what I was going to do with my life. Having never heard back from Matt Groening, I opted for a fresh start and moved to New York City, with the goal of utilizing my legal and business skills to become a talent agent. I submitted my resume to the top talent agencies who politely informed me that no positions were available. After working odd jobs while preparing for the New York Bar Exam, I took a chance and applied for an Assistant Attorney General Position. To my surprise, I was offered the job; and just one day later, received an email from a top talent agency presenting me with a newly open position. There I stood at the proverbial fork-in-the-road of my life.

After immense consideration, I accepted the position with the Office of the New York State Attorney General in their Litigation Bureau, where I worked with incredibly bright and talented attorneys on an array of interesting matters. I was fortunate enough to get the opportunity to do my first oral argument on a case that became favorable binding precedent on a newly enacted statute governing the investigation of professional misconduct.

During this time, I met my now wife, Jessica. We eventually made the decision to move back to Florida after I accepted a new job as an associate practicing complex commercial litigation at Arnstein & Lehr. From there, I joined the ranks of Berger Singerman LLP as an associate on their Dispute Resolution Team where I learned from some of the sharpest legal minds I’ve ever come across.

After successfully representing a client, Oxygen Development, in a contentious litigation dispute, I was asked to join the company as its first ever General Counsel and build out its Legal Department. In that role I gained a deeper understanding of the intricacies of the corporate world and the importance of collaborating with stakeholders to achieve objectives in a practical and cost-effective manner. More importantly, I experienced the challenges of finding, hiring and working with outside counsel to accomplish goals and solve problems within a defined budget.

After serving four years as General Counsel, I made the decision to return to private practice, joining a boutique firm where I chaired its Litigation Group and leveraged my extensive business, legal and governmental experience to assist clients in both the public and private sectors.​​ Most notably, I won a significant victory in a five-day bench trial in federal court against the City of Boca Raton on a constitutional claim of due process violation.

All of these experiences were pivotal in shaping my unique perspective on the legal industry and inspired me to make it my mission to modernize the practice of law, revolutionize the business of law and improve people’s access to legal services.

Can you tell our readers what it is about the work you’re doing that’s disruptive?

With experience as an Assistant Attorney General, practicing complex commercial litigation at some of South Florida’s premier firms and my role as a General Counsel of an international conglomerate, I have worked in just about every capacity imaginable in the legal profession. Through it all, I’ve not only honed my skills as a trial lawyer, strategist and trusted business advisor, but I’ve also experienced first-hand the many frustrations associated with the legal industry.

I understand why lawyers have the reputation that they do. Not because they’re bad people, but because the business of law is broken. The billable hour and the constant pressure to generate fees has forced many attorneys to burn out and take advantage of their fiduciary position for the sake of “moving up the ladder”. But it doesn’t have to be this way.

It’s for this reason that I developed PureCounsel, the premier digital marketplace for on-demand legal services, which enables people to easily obtain competitive proposals for quality legal services from a curated network of prescreened and approved attorneys. Users can simply post a project with a description of the legal work they need help with, identify the state they’re located in, define any budgetary, deadline or language constraints, and then let our PureCounsel network of attorneys bid on the project on a flat-fee basis.

Once a bid is selected, the user’s identity and contact information is shared with the winning attorney to perform a conflict check. After conflicts are cleared, the parties are then free to commence the engagement on the agreed upon terms just like any other traditional attorney-client relationship. And the best part is that it is free to post as many projects as you wish, with no obligation for users to accept a bid if the terms are not acceptable.

PureCounsel covers a broad array of practice areas and offers a range of services including drafting legal documents, legal document review, legal advice and in-depth legal research and analysis. Our mission is to revolutionize the legal industry by empowering businesses and individuals to manage their legal needs efficiently and effectively by fostering transparency, predictability, and accessibility, and making flat-fee legal services the standard — not the exception. At the same time, we aim to provide attorneys with a more efficient and productive way of generating new business and freedom from the billable hour. No more games. No more nonsense. No more billable hours. Just PureCounsel.

In parallel, I also established ISROW LEGAL P.A., a forward-thinking law firm that redefines the traditional practice of law by embracing alternative fee arrangements and adopting new technologies to enhance efficiency and streamline communication to provide best in class service and exceptional value. ISROW LEGAL is all the things that I would want if I were to hire a lawyer or work for a law firm. It combines the formidable strengths of Biglaw, the personalized service of boutique firms and the sophistication of experienced General Counsel to help clients navigate the complexities of the legal, business and governmental landscapes with sophistication, professionalism and precision.

Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?

When I was living in New York and still keen on breaking into the entertainment industry, one of my favorite professors, Anita Cava, was kind enough to introduce me to her cousin, a CNN producer at the time. He told me about an open position in their digital news division and asked if I had any experience with Final Cut Pro. Despite having never used it before, I’ve always considered myself to be quite tech savvy and figured I could wing it. I watched instructional videos the night before to try and learn the basics. When I arrived the next morning, I was guided to a computer workstation and sat beside a young woman who was interviewing for the same position. We both were told to take some digital footage of a new Rolls Royce model and create a one-minute video for the CNN website.

For hours, I spliced and diced just like I saw in the how-to tutorials and made what I thought to be a decent video. I proudly showed the interviewer my final product, a compilation of choppy and sloppy cuts, with audio inputs overlapping at times and other times no audio at all.

He just smiled at me and offered to show me the video my fellow interviewee finished hours earlier. It was one of the most impressive displays of video editing master classes I had ever seen. The interviewer didn’t have to say anything else — I knew she got the job. At that point, all I could do was laugh and thank him for the opportunity and his time.

I learned a very important lesson that day. A critical component of figuring out your purpose and path in life is to be honest with yourself about who you are and what you’re capable of. Desire alone is not enough to get you what you want in life. Desire must be backed up by the requisite skills, experience and expertise necessary to obtain what you want.

We all need a little help along the journey. Who have been some of your mentors? Can you share a story about how they made an impact?

I’ve been very fortunate to have a number of incredible mentors in my life, but there are two who stand out above all the rest.

The first is my late father, Allen “The Car Phone King” Isrow. Having come from nothing, he taught me the value of hard work and instilled in me the entrepreneurial spirit that helped get me to where I am today. He was a consummate salesman and true pioneer in the tech industry as one of the first movers in the cellular phone space. Before Zach Morris had the brick phone, my Dad was one of the first authorized dealers of cellular phones with BellSouth in Florida.

He used to take me to work with him as a kid where I’d watch in awe as he engaged with customers of all different backgrounds and sold them on why they needed the latest new phone. He had the type of charismatic personality that allowed him to talk with anyone and sell them just about anything. He taught me so much about life and showed me early on that business isn’t just about having the greatest product or offering the best service. It’s about people. And there was nobody better at connecting with people than my father.

This is what I believe has made me successful as an attorney. My ability to clearly articulate a client’s position and tailor it in a persuasive manner to the target audience, whether it be a judge, a jury or opposing counsel, is thanks in large part to everything I learned from him.

The second most important mentor in my life was my late father-in-law, Michael Moskowitz, who graciously picked up the mentorship torch right where my Dad had left off. He was a brilliant trial attorney, political mastermind and community leader. He had so much wisdom to offer me as I tried to make my way in the legal profession and became much more than just my father-in-law. He became the professional mentor I never had, my consigliere and ultimately one of my best friends. Whereas my Dad forged the sword, Michael was responsible for helping me to hone it and polish it.

I would often call him up to talk out a complex legal issue I was facing in a case or get his advice on how to deal with the internal politics at work or in my role as an elected official. He taught me a great deal about being an attorney and a businessman, but even more so about service to others. As a devout Jew, he was a strong believer in the concept of Tikkun Olam, which essentially means to repair and improve the world. This guiding principle, which he consistently impressed upon me, played a large role in my decision to go into public service and to create PureCounsel.

In today’s parlance, being disruptive is usually a positive adjective. But is disrupting always good? When do we say the converse, that a system or structure has ‘withstood the test of time’? Can you articulate to our readers when disrupting an industry is positive, and when disrupting an industry is ‘not so positive’? Can you share some examples of what you mean?

Disrupting an industry is positive when innovation increases efficiency, enhances accessibility, spurs healthy competition, lowers costs, and leads to better products or services that provide greater value and benefit to respective stakeholders in an ethical and sustainable manner. A prime example of this would be PureCounsel.

On the other hand, disruption is “not so positive” when it leads to unintended negative consequences, with the perfect example being the news media industry.

The advent of the internet and the proliferation of digital technologies have changed the way people consume news and information. As a result, traditional journalism is facing an existential threat, with newspapers declining in circulation or even shutting down due to financial pressure caused by fierce competition with digital media for advertising dollars. The never-ending battle for “clicks” and the rise of social media have resulted in serious concerns regarding the quality, credibility and trustworthiness of news and its sources.

Can you please share 5 ideas one needs to shake up their industry?

1. Embrace Technology. Whether it’s leveraging blockchain for transparency and security, utilizing augmented reality and virtual reality to redefine customer experiences, or adopting artificial intelligence to gain efficiencies, these technologies can transform existing processes and create a myriad of new opportunities. A great example of this can be seen in the legal industry, where law firms are actively exploring the implementation of AI tools to reduce the amount of time it takes to analyze documents, summarize transcripts and prepare forms to be used in discovery.

2. Prioritize ESG. In recent years, consumers and investors have shown increased interest in a company’s values, rather than the value of the company. Indeed, there is an entire industry founded on this revolution that audits and generates an ESG score, which measures the strength of a company’s focus on Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) matters and its implementation of related policies related to the same. A prime example of this can be found in the beauty industry, where cosmetics brands have spent billions of dollars on reformulating products and processes to be “clean”, “natural” and “sustainable”, and even require their entire supply chain to have a minimum ESG score to be eligible to work with the brand.

3. Personalize and Customize. By using data analytics, businesses can tailor their offerings to cater directly to customers’ needs. Amazon has mastered this approach using complex algorithms that analyze purchase patterns and web history to create personalized marketing and unique shopping experiences.

4. Adopt Sharing Economy Business Model. The adoption of resource sharing, collaborative consumption and peer-to-peer network services can revolutionize how industries operate and create a number of benefits for a business and its stakeholders. Uber, for example, has completely disrupted the taxi and personal transportation industry using this principle.

5. Use New Distribution Channels. Bypassing traditional retail channels can not only create additional value by eliminating intermediaries and cutting costs but can also create new markets for existing products by changing how products reach consumers. A great example of this is the mattress industry, which was historically always a brick-and-mortar business. Now, you can order a mattress online and have it shipped straight to your home at a lower price since the seller has been able to pass on some of the savings associated with reduced overhead to the consumer.

How are you going to shake things up next?

We have a lot of exciting things planned for 2024. Suffice it to say, we will be expanding PureCounsel into additional jurisdictions outside of Florida, incorporating new features to the platform and offering a variety of complementary services for businesses and legal professionals that will result in a more robust marketplace and comprehensive ecosystem.

Do you have a book, podcast, or talk that’s had a deep impact on your thinking? Can you share a story with us? Can you explain why it was so resonant with you?

I’m an avid consumer of all types of content, so this is actually a very difficult question for me. But there is one podcast that I can safely say has had a deep impact on my thinking — NPR’s “How I Built This”, which is about innovators, entrepreneurs, idealists and their stories about the movements they built.

Each episode consists of an in-depth interview with a founder of a company, many of which are the biggest names in their respective industries. It not only offers a fascinating peek behind the curtain into who they really are as a person, but also provides a much deeper insight into how they built their business.

This particular show has resonated so strongly with me because it proves that while success can be found in many forms through a variety of different paths, the one common denominator that every successful organization shares is having a clear vision and an intimate understanding of your “why”.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

“Be the change you wish to see in the world.” Too often we hear about people complaining about something they don’t like or how things could be better. But it’s rare when these same people take action to improve the world around them. This mantra played a pivotal role in my decision to run for City Commissioner and to embark on a journey to change the legal industry for the better.

You are a person of great influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be?

My parents have always emphasized and prioritized the importance of education in my life, and I have been extremely fortunate in receiving some of the best education possible due to their hard work and sacrifices. However, in my view, universal access to quality education should be a fundamental right — not a luxury — regardless of one’s background, socioeconomic status or geographical location. We certainly have the technology and digital infrastructure to implement such a movement, now we just need global cooperation and collaboration to make this vision a reality.

How can our readers follow you online?

Readers can follow me on LinkedIn and FaceBook, and I will soon be launching a podcast that can be found on my website: www.IsrowLegal.com. Additionally, they can follow PureCounsel on Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn, as well as ISROW LEGAL on Facebook and LinkedIn.

This was very inspiring. Thank you so much for joining us!