Tune in to be inspired by Francés Jones, Knox, as she shares her career journey uniting the law with her passion for championing artists and creatives while highlighting the importance of soulful and authentic connections in her career and personal life.
Join us for an inspiring podcast episode where we explore Francés’s remarkable journey as a lawyer—building a bridge between corporate business talk and the language of creatives. She connects the two worlds of intellectual property law and artistic creation to educate people on their rights. Hear how she maintains her commitment to serving and the significance of soul and vision in her work as she strives to maintain a higher level of expectation and create authentic connections.
Discover the impact of her Tri Delta experience, her Women of Achievement recognition, and her dedication to diversity and inclusion. You’ll walk away with an appreciation for her advocacy and commitment to creating a more inclusive and equitable world.
Welcome to another episode of our podcast, Let's Talk Tri Delta. I am your host, Mindy Tucker. I'm so honored to be here today with Tri Delta alumna, Francés Jones,
who joined Tri Delta at Knox and who was named one of our 2023 Women of Achievement. And in a minute, you're gonna understand why this woman is very accomplished and very impressive.
Among her long list of accomplishments, Francés is the principal and managing attorney of her own law firm in Austin, Texas, where she maintains a boutique private practice.
In addition, she is the chief possibility officer, the founder and the executive producer for Soul Matters Media Group, a select company where Soul Matters. I cannot wait to dig in more on that.
Austin Woman just described her as a guide to help local creatives secure their intellectual property. Her entire legal career has been focused on helping diverse visionary founders and their allies build secure,
build, maintain, and monetize their trademark and branding, copyright music and media and business interests. There is a lot going on there. We are gonna dig into it now. - It's a tongue twister. - It is.
Well, Francés, welcome to the podcast. We are so glad to have you here today. - Thank you so much. - It's been really fun to read about your background and everything that's going on in this latest media output in Austin Woman and all the great things that you're doing.
You have so many interesting pursuits and I really wanna dig into all of it. I wanna start with your legal career. So tell us kind of how you got into law and a little bit more about the specific kind of law that you practice.
- Sure. Well, in general, I've always wanted to be an attorney since I was a young child. I grew up noticing my environment,
my community, how people's lives were affected when they didn't know the law, and I always wanted to get that knowledge so that I could be able to help people who did not have access to that information.
So I remember at the age of four, deciding then that I wanted to be an attorney. Fast forward through undergrad and then to law school,
I was at New York University and decided that I wanted to focus on copyright and trademark law, and so I initially went to work on Wall Street during corporate insecurities and international trade and finance,
and then I segued into working with advertising agencies, record labels, and now primarily focused on trademarks and copyrights, which I love.
That's got to be really interesting, especially in that industry. When you fell in love with the law, did you understand the breadth of it?
You talk about how it impacted you when you were younger. As you got into it and you were in school and learning more, how did you gain the love of the creatives?
I mean, there's two different things to put together, the law degree and the creativity. Those are very different things. So how did you get to the point where you were like, "This is going to be great. I'm going to marry these two things up." Well,
it happened somewhat fairly naturally because I'm left brain and right brain, and it's almost like speaking different languages.
So I can speak the language, the corporate business talk, and I can also speak the language of creatives, and I saw a real need in the creative community.
Amazing artists, creative talent, particularly I was focused initially primarily on the music side of things, but people not understanding their rights and understanding how the law can help them.
If they were more aware of their rights and my love of the arts. All types of arts really motivated me to,
to seek that out and, and create that, that bridge between those communities. So, I know one of the things you focus on with your clients as generational legacy.
Yes, and I'd love to talk more about that and what that means for them. Sure. Well, historically, as I said, generally a lot of artists and creatives are not aware of the laws and things that protects them and so because of that lack of awareness that lack of understanding lack of access.
Sometimes, oftentimes creatives have not received the type of acknowledgement the type of compensation. And the longevity in their field that they would have if they had that that knowledge and so,
for example, a lot of people nowadays understand, if possible the importance of owning real estate and investing in real estate in terms of having properties that they could pass down through inheritance in their family,
and as a way to generate wealth for themselves, but a lot of people don't understand intellectual properties another type of property,
copyrights, trademarks, patents and things like that. And so, I really love helping visionary founders secure their intellectual property,
you know, while they're launching their businesses are even very well established companies don't understand the importance of securing that. that. And so, for example,
trademark, which I love, is something that can last forever. As long as you continue to use a trademark, it patents generally last exclusively from 14 to 20 years depending on the type of patent.
Copyrights generally are 70 years life of the author plus 70 years if it's a work made for hire, it's a 95 -year term of exclusivity.
Trademarks can be forever as long as they continue to be used. So, I try to help the founders secure those that intellectual property as well as their real estate.
I love that. And that is making such a huge impact. I can see if that hasn't been done in the past. I mean, the difference you're making for them and their families is huge. So, I love hearing more about that.
Thank you. Let's talk about this media group, Soul Matters Media Group. This idea of Soul Matters is really important to you. How do you carry that into your work?
Well, Soul Matters is a brand. The tagline is a select company where Soul Matters. So, that tagline applies to the media company.
It applies to the law firm and other companies that we work with. And it has a double on tone,
the word Soul. For me, I'm a very spiritual person and I like to infuse all of my projects, my work with joy and gratitude.
And Soul means just that. It's also a play on words with myself being a black African -American woman with soul, but also soul in a larger global sense in terms of ethics and caring.
And just the idea of maintaining a higher level of consciousness when I'm trying to show up for my clients, when anybody on my team is trying to show up in the world.
Ideally, my goal is to try to be a beneficial presence in the world and also a beneficial presence in my community. You know, that expression,
think globally, act locally. And so when I think about soul matters, that's just a brand so that it can constantly be reminded of the goal that I set for myself and for our entire team.
And also along with that is the idea of being a visionary because we refer to the law firm as the visionary law firm. I'm the visionary trademark lawyer and so soul and visionary.
Just the idea of trying to maintain a higher level consciousness and a higher level of expectation when we're trying to serve people. It sounds a little bit weird,
but it really resonates with me. - It's like that extra special sauce that you bring to the conversation and to the relationship and to the work. And I love that.
I think it's a great also entree into talking about Tri Delta because Tri Delta has that little sort of extra, you know, we like to think that we think a little differently and that we bring a little something extra and that we're focused on some values that are special and different.
And so I'd love to hear your perspective on your Tri Delta experience and a little bit about how that has impacted you through friendship and what your collegiate days were like.
- We don't want to talk about all of the collegiate days. - Not everything about it. - It's like, no, I'm joking. Well,
everything was wonderful, fabulous, very memorable. Some of my closest friends today, many, many years later, we won't say how many years,
but many, many years later, are friends, friendships that I developed during my college years as a Tri Delta. We actually didn't have a house at Knox College.
It was the Epsilon chapter, which is the third chapter ever formed, but it was a small group, a small group of girls,
but we were very, very close. And just really, to this day, I've maintained those friendships, learned the concept of volunteer work through Tri Delta,
being exposed to service, community service through Tri Delta, and just really gained a lot of important life skills,
habits through those early years of being the collegiate there. And so even to this day, I'm very involved in a lot of non -profit community service work and that impetus began as a Tri Delta collegiate.
So I'm very thankful for that experience. Yeah, I do think it gives you that framework to sort of walk out of college with it. This is something that should be part of my experience at every stage of life that we're always giving back.
Well, congratulations on being named a woman of achievement by Tri Delta. I know I've no doubt you've earned numerous recognitions from other organizations and other people in the world,
but what does it mean to be recognized by Tri Delta? Delta? It's an incredible honor. I simply put it's just an incredible honor because Tri Delta means so much to me.
And because of the composition of all of the Tri Delta sisters, you know,
it's really, it could be any one of my sisters because we have such a wonderful group of members who run the gamut in terms of their contributions to their communities,
whether it's on a local individual level or on a more national or global level. So I feel very honored to be in the company of such a wonderful group of women and and very honored to be selected.
So I can imagine over the last three years, the DEIB Conversation, Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, Access and Belonging and Tri Delta,
we use all five of those words, has been way more at the forefront of people's conversation. We talked about generational legacy.
I think that's definitely an impact you're having on a marginalized population. How else do you see your role in that ongoing conversation?
I mean, you're obviously, you're an invaluable voice in the entertainment industry. You have a diverse group of clients. How do you really see your voice in that bigger conversation that's going on?
Sure. You referenced my diverse group of clients really specifically. I love working with founders who historically have been been underrepresented,
whether that's women, black, African American, indigenous, Latinx, Asian, disabled, and founders who are part of the LGBTQIA communities,
all of that. And I have a lot of personal intersectionality that I belong to a lot of those different communities myself. And in terms of being involved in terms of helping to have an impact in terms of diversity,
equity, inclusion, belonging, all of that. Well, first of all, I say that that's not my official training. There are people who are officially trained in that capacity,
who do amazing work in that capacity. But obviously, that's my unofficial lived life experience. And so because of that,
and because of the opportunities that I've been able to be afforded, I've been blessed. I try to whenever possible, make sure that when I look around the room,
make sure that I do what I can to open up the doors to make sure that there is some inclusivity and representation in rooms that I'm in.
Oftentimes, I'm the only person representing wearing a lot of hats. But when I'm there, I try to introduce a conversation so that in the future,
I'll be there or someone else will be there in addition to me. And I'm really loving what I'm seeing Tridelton doing. Obviously,
I don't know everything that Tridelton is doing, but from what I've seen compared to other organizations that I've been involved in, I am very,
very happy. I see courage to have difficult conversations. I see actual steps being taken.
And I'm just really proud of Tri Delta that's taking the lead that it has in this area because I'm very involved in a lot of organizations and I'm not saying that Tri Delta is where it needs to be,
but it is going the right direction. And I think that intent is incredibly important. And I really applaud organizations and individuals who show up with the right heart space and the right intent.
And then when you put action behind that, it can only be positive. So I'm very hopeful. - I appreciate you saying all of that.
It's been a journey and I think we know a whole lot more today than we knew several years ago. I think we also know that we have a lot of work to do still. And it is a continual journey of learning and doing better each time you learn something new and moving forward with the new knowledge and trying to build a really welcome,
inclusive space for women where they all women feel belonging here. So I appreciate all the comments that you made on that and the feedback.
I think it's definitely a priority. There is good intent and we know we still have a lot of work to do. So I wanna ask you, if you could go back to your 18 or 19 -year -old self and you were just getting to Knox and just joining Tri Delta,
what's one piece of advice you would give yourself? - I probably would advise myself to do exactly what I did which was join Tri Delta.
And I guess I'm fortunate in that regard because I don't have any regrets about that because that opened up a lot of other doors from that particular activity.
I think that one thing that a lot of collegiate don't really understand is that you are really laying the foundation for lifelong friendships and those friendships are incredibly valuable on an emotional level and they can also be valuable on a professional level and what I love is that at the time I was just innocently developing personal friendships and then to see how that has blossomed and has also impacted me and
assisted me on a professional level as well has been really fun and not all of my friends have gone on to become professionals in the traditional sense of the word they may have gone on to become parents and which is no small task.
I can imagine or all sorts of other things so don't mean to discount all of the different varied life choices that people make but I'm just amazed at how that foundation of an 18 -19 year old building those friendships,
how those friendships have continued to assist me and be beneficial to me throughout my entire life. So yeah I'd say join us already if you can and just try to develop genuine,
authentic relationships and friendships that can serve you well. Well, thank you so much for joining us today and giving us a little insight into what you do and how you do it and just letting us meet you as a woman of achievement and just a bright star in our Tri Delta crescent here.
I know people might want to learn more about you and what you do. Is there a website or a place they can find you? Sure. Our website is visionarylawfirm .com.
Visionary was a V, visionarylawfirm .com and I can be found on social media, LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram,
etc. The Soul Matters Firm or Francés Jones Law. Awesome, awesome. Thanks for the time and the insight. So glad to have had you with us today.
Thank you so much. I really appreciate the opportunity to sit down and talk with you. For our listeners, wow, what a great interview. What a great person to hear from. I hope you will check more out about her.
You can find a little bit about Francés on our website under Women of Achievement. If you search that on the Tridelta .org website. We are so thrilled to have had her here today. It's just one of the examples of the amazing women that we have in our sisterhood.
We hope you'll like, subscribe, and rate our podcast. We have three stars in our crescent that we love those five star ratings. Thanks for joining us. Until next time, Delta Love.