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January 25, 2006
Polling the Real Jury--Hassett Redux.
Jim Hassett at Law Firm Business Development has yet another nice post entitled "How To Review Client Satisfaction--Part 4" on the subject that I call client polling, or client interviews. For a variety of reasons, this is a truly important subject. I had commented after Jim's Part 3 post that I thought only third parties--to ensure more honest, candid results--should do polling. Both Jim and Pat Lamb suggested a senior member of the law firm should be present.
My new thinking is that Jim and Pat are right. Generally, you should have a senior partner, and one not involved in the work, if possible, to do the client polling. Jim's reasons are important here. While I think eliciting the maximum amount of candor is a key goal of the interview, he identifies an even more important, overriding objective. A senior lawyer with your firm has the most incentive to carry out the goals of the interview: protect revenue streams from the client, increase them from that client, and get referrals. These are the goals of a senior lawyer inside your firm. And aside from doing great work for clients, what else is there?
Again, this really is an important topic. Well-done client interviews not only get you the real skinny on how you are doing, but you can ask clients what they really want. I'd love to hear more commentary on this one.
Posted by JD Hull at January 25, 2006 10:47 PM
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