Thought leader

Client-relationship management (CRM) has been around for some time, but we are still far from getting it right. It seems to me that the biggest problem is that commercial clients, in particular, are just becoming more demanding and I have a nagging feeling that the legal sector is not quite keeping up.

I know that a lot of effort (though often not enough) is being made in most firms to be more responsive and flexible to clients, to listen to them, anticipate their needs proactively, and understand their businesses and industries. Even so, client-satisfaction levels in the legal sector seem at best to be static and according to one survey, even appear to be falling.

To an extent, we have only ourselves, and our self publicity, to blame. Commercial clients have access to the headline earnings of major law firms, and they do not like what they see, especially when they compare what they pay to the service they get. What’s more, we are doing little to shrug off the old perceptions that we are highly resistant to change. The brutal truth is that many of our services are no longer seen as unique. As one commercial client asked recently: “If it is not a life and death decision, why should we fund the lifestyles of the partners, as well as an incredibly inefficient way of working?”

Complacency can, of course, be one reason for deteriorating client relationships. Reliance should not be placed either on past glories or on observing the processes of a client-relationship-management programme. As Napoleon once famously said: “The greatest danger occurs at the moment of victory.” For many clients of law firms, memories are short and you are only as good as your last piece of work. It also continues to astonish me how often highly skilled practitioners, for all the excellence of their technical work, let slip the basic and avoidable, but highly visible tasks: answering phone calls and correspondence, listening to clients, and delivering on promises on time.

There is another contributory factor. All commercial clients themselves have clients or customers, who in turn are becoming more demanding, both in terms of price and service. Passing the parcel becomes instinctive and cost effective, and is not going to disappear – the trend for slimmer panels and tighter pricing has some way to go. In the face of this, the client-care challenge has rapidly become an imperative and not, as it has so often been in the past, an optional extra. It ought to be of some comfort to know that superior client service, with its many ingredients, is still the leading reason why clients will stay satisfied and remain loyal. But you simply cannot rest on your laurels when you think you have achieved a high degree of client satisfaction. After all, client care is a current, not deposit account.

Nick Jarrett-Kerr is a consultant at Edge International and former chief executive at Bevan Ashford. He will be chairing day one of the Best Practice Law Firm Management conference on 23/24 February 2004, as well as running a third-day workshop on how to retain your key clients. E-mail: jarrett-kerr@edge.ai.