The Firm's Goals In Each Client RelationshipFor the Firm, who and what its Clients are and the relationship between the Firm and its Clients are issues of major importance. The Firm views the professional services that it provides not as a business but as a profession, a vocation. While the Firm necessarily cannot ignore the financial aspects of its profession, the Firm is founded on a fundamental belief that if the Firm remains focused on serving its Clients in the truest professional sense, the dollars will take care of themselves.The Firm is in the profession of law, not in the business of law. The Firm prefers to operate on a handshake. The Firm does not ask its Clients to sign engagement letters except in those discrete instances required by the Canons of Ethics and in the transition of a professional joining the Firm who is serving clients under unexpired engagement letters. The ties that bind the Firm to its Clients are not contractual. The Firm is first and last a “relationship” law firm. The Firm is not the right law Firm if there is not going to be a real relationship with the Client. Once the Firm decides to accept a Client, the Firm is making a commitment to that relationship which, for the most part, is a commitment that is made regardless of the Client's ability to pay for the professional services provided by the Firm at various points in the relationship. The Firm serves its Clients through good times and bad times. The Firm is not a "fair weather" law firm. If the Firm is going to make that kind of commitment and is prepared to give up the evenings, the weekends, the vacations, and the personal lives of its professionals and staff, the Firm needs to have a relationship with its Client that motivates the Firm to want to subordinate its own time and financial interests to the needs of the Client. From the Firm's point of view, that motivation needs to be driven not by the desire to be paid a fee, but by the desire to carry out the professional commitment to serve its Client and solve the Client's problems. The Firm would like to think that a Client cannot buy the Firm's commitment with a check. In each Client relationship, the Firm has certain common goals. The Firm can share what those goals are. As to the Firm's performance in meeting those goals, the Firm leaves that assessment and evaluation to its Clients and others. The Firm invites any prospective Client to speak with any existing or former Client and seek that existing or former Client's input on the Firm's track record in meeting these goals. Some of the goals that the Firm has for each Client relationship include: 1. Carry out the commitment to the Client regardless of the Client's ability to pay. 2. The quality of the Firm's professional services and the responsiveness of those services not vary in quality because of the Client's ability or inability to pay. 3. Give the Client the Firm's best advice regardless of whether the Client agrees with that advice and regardless of whether the Client wants to hear the particular advice. 4. Do not send the Client a final invoice the Client has not first approved in draft form. 5. Do not have the Client make a payment to the Firm that does not fit the Client's budget. 6. Do not have the Client make a payment to the Firm that does not fit the Client's sense of the value of the services provided by the Firm. 7. Do not bill based on time. 8. Do not bill for routine and non-substantial disbursements. 9. Do not let the financial consequences to the Firm of its advice to the Client affect what advice and counsel the Firm gives to the Client. 10. Do not be anything less than a “relationship” law firm. 11. Be open to constructive criticism and do not be defensive in the face of criticism. 12. Do not put the Firm’s interests ahead of those of the Client. 13. Be responsive to phone calls, faxes, other communications, and the time frames of the needs of the Client. 14. Be thorough and comprehensive. 15. Be intellectually precise, practical and realistic. 16. Do not treat issues as intellectual abstractions but instead as real world problems in the context of the Client's business. 17. Do not negotiate points for the sake of negotiating or the sense of winning but instead because there are real business reasons why the Client needs the point? 18. "Add value." 19. Share the Firm’s relationships with the Client where and when appropriate. 20. Invest the time to help when the Client needs debt or equity capital, to buy or to sell, additions to its management team, strategic or capital partners, and introductions to potential major customers. 21. Invest the time to understand the Client's business and its industry. 22. Do not experience financial benefits from the Client disproportionate to the benefit the Client experiences from the matter. 23. Do not allow the Firm to "win" when the Client does not. 24. Each year sit down with the Client and review constructively the relationship and the Firm’s performance on these Goals. 25. Invest the time and the money every several years to attend a principal trade show or industry gathering for the Client’s business to better understand the Client’s business, the other participants in the industry, the issues and problems facing the Client’s industry and the competitive landscape. 26. Have the humility and commitment to the Client to recommend to the Client to hire Special Counsel when a matter arises for which the Client would be best served if the Firm involved Special Counsel instead of the Firm handling the matter. 27. Contribute the time, professional services and expertise to assist in the selection of Special Counsel and to serve as “ad hoc” internal general counsel to coordinate and manage Special Counsel, the tactics, strategy and the decisions to be made until the matter is resolved. 28. Offer to contribute the professional time to have a Firm professional sit at and work out of the Client’s offices or facilities (all the professional needs is a desk, access to a phone and computer hook up – a secretary’s cubicle is fine) for a full or part of a day on a regular or periodic basis, e.g. once a month or week, to facilitate communication, the connection between the Client’s management team and staff and the Firm, regular access for the Client, and heading off issues before they become major issues and problem resolution.
|
|||
| |||
