Legal project management (Part 11): End of matter evaluations

Communication is absolutely essential in project management, and systematically debriefing clients at the end of every matter is more important than ever before.  Indeed, the ACC Value Challenge Briefing Package suggests that clients should take the initiative on this and “Conduct ‘after action’ reviews at the end of each matter to help continuously improve performance” (p. 4).

Over the last several years, I’ve written a number of posts about how to assess client satisfaction (including here and here). My book, Legal Business Development: A Step by Step Guide, also has an entire section entitled “How to conduct a client satisfaction interview” (page 129).

But when it comes to end of matter evaluations, I strongly believe that less is more.  Unless there is a major open issue requiring an immediate joint review, or unless a client requests a lengthy discussion, I would assume clients have little time to spare, and you should limit the debrief to three open ended questions:

1. What did you like about the way we handled this matter?
2. What could we do better?
3. (optional) Working together, how can we, in the future, improve the value you receive on matters like this?

The first question is a classic “easy to answer” opening, designed to get people talking freely.  The second question is the one you really care about, since you are likely to learn far more from criticism than from praise.  No matter how much clients like your work, they can always like it more.  And in today’s highly competitive environment, it is in your interest to turn every client into a raving fan.

The third question is optional, and it focuses on the question which is most likely to lead to new business: how to increase perceived value.  This is a slight rephrasing of a key question suggested in the ACC Value Challenge Briefing Package (p.3).  Note the phrase “working together,” which stresses the the need to align interests and collaborate more closely.

Ideally, you should ask these questions in person, maybe even over lunch.  The phone is my second choice, while email is a distant third.  Email is better than nothing, but just barely.  You want to get people to open up and speak freely, and that is unlikely to happen via email. 

If you’d like to extend the interview, consider this fourth question:

4. On a scale from 1 to 10, how satisfied are you with our firm?

As I’ve explained in a previous post, asking for a numerical rating forces clarity and frankness.  We ask our own clients for this “1 to 10” rating at the end of every program we deliver. 

To be honest, not every client will give us a number.  Some simply don’t like to be pinned down in this way, and whatever the client wants is fine with us.  But when clients do rate you on a 1 to 10 scale, there’s a good chance the number will be lower than you expected.  For an explanation, see my post on the Lake Wobegon effect, named after Garrison Keillor’s fictional community in which everyone thinks they are above average.

The best place to see this effect in the legal community is in a series of surveys published in Inside Counsel magazine, comparing ratings of satisfaction from clients and the law firms who serve them.  In one recent survey, 43% of lawyers thought they were earning an A for their work, but only 17% of their clients agreed.  So if you think you deserve an A, you’re probably wrong.

And if your client gives you an 8 or less on our 10-point scale, you need to do something about it.  As noted in my post about Fred Reichheld’s research on the loyalty effect, you might think that 8 out of 10 is a pretty good rating.  But it is not good enough to protect you from aggressive competitors.

If you want still more questions for your end of matter debrief, see my list of 24 more questions to ask current clients, or Google "client satisfaction interview" and you’ll come up with dozens of forms like this.

When I discussed with LegalBizDev Principal Mike Egnatchik which survey forms to use, he suggested that Association of Corporate Counsel members search the ACC members-only database for more, including "Customer Satisfaction Surveys: Best Practices on How to Create and Implement Them" and the ACC Infopak "Outside Counsel Management" (page 57).  

At some level, it really doesn’t matter whether you prefer my three question approach or a long questionnaire.  The important thing is that you get feedback from your clients at the end of each matter.  If you don’t, your competitors will.

Comments

[Kimberley Williams, Williams-Wroe Law Management Consultants]

I would like to add that as a follow on from Question 4,
at our practice we use Question 5 "If not a 10, what could we have done differently to meet your expectations?" - After all, this is the crucial piece of information that we really need for the purpose of our continious improvement and client satisfaction.

[Paul C. Easton]

Good advice as always (I also like Kimberley William's twist on the 1-to-10 question posted in her comment above). One issue I continue to grapple with is coming up with the perfect system for measuring customer satisfaction when you work on many, frequent, short-term projects for numerous stakeholders in a large organization. I know this falls under the problems-that-are-good-to-have category, but it is important to keep taking the pulses of your client relationships. Yet not to the point where you annoy.

My approach is to wrap this into the a lessons learned (or matter wrap-up, debriefing, etc.) call at the end of the project. But even that can become excessive. Often we are left with periodic relationship checks during our regular in-person meetings with the GCs/VPs/Directors who hire us. I must admit that I'm not always capturing the satisfaction of lower-level stakeholder--you know, the ones with whom we are actually working.

I'm still working on creating the perfect feedback loop, which balances my desire for feedback and my respect for my clients' time. Generally, I find that including these kinds of questions in regular communications with all levels of stakeholders during a project more natural (less process overhead) than formal end-of-project surveys.