Achieving a client-oriented culture: Creating a climate for performance

Such areas as financial management are essential components of the profitable and forward-looking firm. For long-term success, however, firms need to be looking further inward to their culture and how committed their people are to the firm’s core values. In this extract from Heather Stewart’s recently published book: Excellent Client Service, the importance of shared beliefs and attitudes is explained.

“It is attitudes that drive financial results and not the other way around.”¹

To survive and compete in today’s marketplace, a firm must be able to respond quickly to external change and think imaginatively about its services and the way in which it offers them to consistently meet clients’ needs and maintain profitability. Firms must recognise that providing legal services in line with those needs forms the core of their business: technical competence is no longer enough.

Considering the client first must be second nature to everyone in the firm. Those firms that remain complacent and continue to be inward looking will be overtaken by events and will lose clients. Innovation and a willingness to change are prerequisites for sustainable growth and firms must be receptive to both.

It is hard to sustain the delivery of excellent client service without an effective culture: one that is based on openness and trust, honest communication and feedback. Internal relationships must be good with the firm avoiding the politics and power struggles of so many organisations. For instance, team working will struggle to survive in an atmosphere of aggressive individual target-based competition in which fee earners are reluctant to delegate files. Every member of a firm should understand and feel secure in their role in the firm. Friendly, informal practices work if they are backed by adequate supervision and support. They fail if people are left to struggle on their own because partners are too busy to delegate well, to listen to the concerns of their staff or to appreciate what their staff are capable of.

Although Mark Hastings², policy advisor of the Institute of Management, was speaking of business-to-business services, his comments are equally relevant to steps to effect the development of relationships with both business and private clients of legal practices. He said: “Clients want to see a much greater involvement and commitment from their service providers in finding solutions to their business needs. Fees now reflect results, so suppliers have every incentive to manage those relationships well. Even when relationship managers are appointed, it often doesn’t work because the person doesn’t get the right back up. It requires a transformation of attitude to become a relationship-management culture.”

Andrew Brown³ describes culture as something that an organisation “is” rather than something that an organisation “has”. For a legal firm, it is the shared beliefs, attitudes and values that exist within it and, because the primary influences on its culture are the characters, personalities and skills of its partners and people, no two firms are alike. It sets the scene for the way in which the firm delivers its services to its clients, and the consistency of that service. The features of service that create confidence and value for clients relate back to a firm’s culture: its ethos, organisational structures, levels of supervision, continuity of staff and all the issues that lie behind client focus are influenced by the values of the firm, by, “the way we do things round here.” To give clients the added value they seek, firms must put clients at the heart of everything that the firm does. All its members should understand clients’ needs and giving a service that meets them should be second nature. It is up to the partners to create the climate for this to be achieved. This may involve a rethink not only of the way in which a practice is managed and structured but also of prevailing attitudes and behaviours.

Financial performance targets have become the conventional primary strategy for improving profitability in the profession but neglecting culture for the sake of driving up profits may be a very short-term approach. It may also be at a high cost to the firm itself: increased productivity does not necessarily lead to increased profitability. The cost of demotivated staff and consequent high staff turnover, poor client service and the potential risk of negligence claims must also be taken into account. How long can a culture that is solely profit driven be sustained in terms of people who are overworked and stressed and no longer enjoy work? Firms cannot rely on financial management alone because all information is sensitive to the context within which it exists. It is a question of getting the balance right, between the harder issues that are quantitative and measurable, and the softer issues relating to people and clients.

Successful firms do have sound financial management and the ability to interpret it but they also set and maintain high standards and have a culture that inspires and enables their people to give an excellent service.

Culture lies at the root of what a partnership is about. The leaders of any organisation are largely responsible for its culture; without leadership, there is no one to set a standard for others to follow. It is up to the partners of a legal firm collectively, as owners of their business, to decide on what they want the core values of their partnership to be. This does not mean the issue of a bland and meaningless mission statement, but requires a meaningful discussion of the type of practice they want and an agreement as to the shared values that they want their practice to have. Having such a discussion may not be easy and may involve addressing issues that have previously not been confronted, including levels of commitment from partners themselves. But it is worth it – taking this step will give a partnership a clearer vision of what the firm stands for and where it wants to be, rather than being bogged down in day-to-day activities. It is not a complicated process although it may create difficulties in some partnerships. Nevertheless, it should not be avoided. Where does the emphasis lie? Are there any desired values that are discordant with the majority? It is hoped that you will have consistency, but do not be afraid to have a full and open discussion of all views. Sweeping them under the carpet, again, will not promote long-term trust and openness.

Although many practices will share common values, the emphasis will vary in each. Delivering an excellent service to clients within the firm’s target markets must be a prerequisite for any firm. Similarly, values of openness and trust and the development of the firm’s people through consultation, participation and education are essential for success. Future decisions can be made against the agreed set of values and, although each department and office will develop its own subculture, all will share the common core values. It is up to all the partners to communicate actively those values, both internally and externally, directly and indirectly, and to lead by example. For instance, those values should form the basis of the competencies in appraisal or bonus systems. Without a clear statement of the values the partners stand for, other members of a firm will not know what to do or what to say to clients and how to say it.

Agreeing a set of values alone will not make you successful. A change of culture is an ongoing process that needs constant reinforcement by the behaviour and commitment of partners to sustain it. Partners are effectively role models from whom other members of a firm take their cue for their own attitudes and behaviours and to expect consistency in delivering excellent service from everyone in a firm, the partners themselves have to set the standards and be consistent in their own behaviour. Paying lip service to client services will not be enough. Partners’ behaviour and commitment must be genuine and authentic to motivate and influence others. Without leadership, there is no one to set a standard for others to follow.

The first task in the process of change to a client-oriented culture, however, may be to unfreeze the attitudes of partners so that they not only become receptive to innovation and change but are also actually committed to it. They must be dissuaded form considering these issues as the latest management buzzwords and convinced of the merits of viewing them as part of their ongoing thinking about the way in which they work. This may not be easy. Solicitors are autonomous professionals who, by and large, enjoy their technical work but whose training and the nature of that work naturally result in them being cautious and risk averse. An entrepreneurial solicitor is a rare thing. Few have had any formal management training and many view management solely as administration without grasping that it involves seeing the bigger picture of the firm within the context of its external environment, deciding appropriate objectives and guiding it on a route to achieve them. Many solicitors are overworked and uninterested in management per se. Some, however, are far sighted and prove excellent managers if allowed by their fellow partners. Unfortunately, the flat management structure of most firms can lead to resistance to progress and change.

To be successful, firms have to agree appropriate rights and responsibilities for their partners and those partners must be prepared to be accountable to the partnership for their delivery. Pretence that they are interested in supervision, communication or appraisals and that they have a commitment to client service is not enough. Writing a mission statement setting out the firm’s objectives will not achieve those objectives. There has to be genuine commitment and accountability.

Heather Stewart is a consultant at Otterburn Legal Consulting. She can be contacted on: 01943 601321.