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<b><i>Voice of the Client:</i></b> Getting to Wow!
The old-school term is Client Satisfaction. It's been replaced with Client Delight, which is defined as beyond satisfaction. No matter what you call it, best-in-class client service is where it's at ' and where it will be going for some years to come.
But, just how good do you have to be, anyway? If you're a law firm Relationship Partner, do you need to earn an “A” from your clients? Or, what about a rating of 9.0 out of 10? Is that good enough to delight?
Instead, I'd like to introduce the metric, “Wow!” Please let me explain and offer some suggestions about how to find out whether your firm has earned this ultimate evocation from any one of your most important clients. But first, I digress …
Your Competitors Don't Do It
I took a look at the website landing pages of 20 major law firms and read them to see if client service, in any form, was mentioned. Most of the firms' websites were showing off the firms' subject matter expertise. A few firms did at least mention their commitment to diversity and sustainability on the landing page.
But, I didn't find any firms acknowledging that clients wanted, in addition to outstanding legal advice, outstanding client service. So, what if just one of these firms, right up front on its home page, made a promise that it would attempt to provide exceptional client service along with its exceptional legal work?
Room with a View
I have been involved in in-person client satisfaction assessments at over 350 clients of professional services firms. This has included thousands of individual in-person interviews with the clients of law firms, Big 4 accounting firms and management consulting companies.
Most of the client feedback that I have heard has been good, some of it ecstatic, with much of the rest being in the pretty-darn-good to very-good range. However, some of the clients were not happy and, therefore, required remedial initiatives by the serving firm to win back approval. And, a few of the relationships into which I was introduced were afflicted with unbeknownst life-threatening (for the firm, that is) conditions. For these, the serving firms needed to “roll all the fire engines.”
New Fields of Competition
Clients of law firms now want more. However, their expectations about what constitutes an excellent result when they engage a law firm probably hasn't changed that much. Clients still want to win that case, close that deal and protect that asset.
But, client expectations regarding what constitutes effective and pleasing client service have risen. Clients now want not only good, but also really great client service ' and are feeling entitled and empowered enough to demand it.
Once, where law firms competed by which ones had the best lawyers, now almost all significant firms have equally great lawyers and can a provide an equally high-quality legal product, at least to the degree that most clients can discern. So, it is now becoming obvious that law firms must compete with each other in some new way ' by their levels of service quality. What's a law firm to do?
What Do General Counsel Want?
This, I believe, is more or less useless information. Go to a panel discussion where the seated corporate law department representatives are asked, “What do you expect from your law firms?” The problem with the ensuing pronouncements is that these in-house counsel are often merely speaking their frustrated minds in general terms, rather than specifically referring to any one of the law firms that serve them. But the reality is, different clients may have different expectations for their law firms and any particular client may have differing expectations for one firm versus another.
What Needs Fixing
Unless you formally ask for feedback, you may never know what's on your clients' minds. It's human nature to be reluctant to give negative feedback when sitting face-to-face with the service provider (or, worse, his/her boss), and this seems especially true when clients consider the professionals who serve them. After all, that professional might have worked many nights and weekends on the client's matters, so why hurt his/her feelings? It's easier just to quietly move the work elsewhere.
Russian (Client) Roulette
Where does all this lead? Answer: in order to enhance the relationship that a firm has with any one of its most important clients, the firm has to approach the client and formally ask ' I repeat ' formally ask for feedback. This is the only way that the firm can find out, apart from guesses made by the firm's lawyers, about how the client rates the service it is receiving, what the client expects in the future, and an indication of how loyal the client will remain.
Getting Going
Try it, you'll like it. That is, commission a pilot client feedback study in your own firm, focusing on two or three clients. Listen for a “Wow!” or even multiple Wows. If you don't hear these, then ask your client, “So, how do we get to a Wow!?” Nobody knows the answers better than the person to whom you have just posed this question.
What you might hear in response could be worth millions of dollars to your firm and provide you and your partners with some well-earned professional pride!
Bruce D. Heintz heads Heintz Consulting LLC. Reach him at 781-891-6850 or via e-mail at [email protected].
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