April 10, 2005

Rethink(IP)

Meaningful and Nonbillable Conversations with Clients

by Douglas Sorocco

One comment from LexThink has stayed with me (haunted me) the entire past week. 

The story I overheard went something like this:

After setting up my company, I sat down with my lawyer and asked him to walk me through what I should be looking for problem-wise in the future.  My lawyer’s response: “don’t worry about it, if you have any problems just give me a call.  It would cost you too much for us to sit and discuss possible future issues.”

This is just so wrong on so many levels:

• The lawyer is patronizing the client – they would have been much more honest by just saying “Now don’t you worry your little fuzzy wuzzy little head – I will take care of all the bad boogey men for you.”
  
• The laywer was not invested in the client.  The lawyer heard “talk to me” and shot out of his mouth “it will cost you”.  The concept of investing in the client didn’t even pass through their mind.

Intellectual property is a complex area of the law – I could never bill for every explanatory conversation I had with a client.  Part of my ethical duty as a lawyer is to take the time to explain the issues in a manner that any client can comprehend and use as the basis for decision making.  If the client doesn’t understand an issue – it is my problem, not the client’s.  It is my obligation to make it clear and I have to spend as much time as it takes.

I could view this time spent as wasted or I can view it as an investment in my client. 

I choose to see it as an investment.

I choose to empower my clients to act in the face of a problem – prior to calling me.

I am investing in their business, their enterprise and their knowledge.  As the Legal Marketing Blog says, you gotta Take the Time to Have Meaningful, Nonbillable Conversations with Clients.