36 Vexing Problems Facing Clients: Everything Else is Low-Rate Noise

Ambitious legal decision makers want to move their careers forward. They are looking at moving into business leader roles and top positions in the C-Level suite. They want to prove their worth through bold decision making. They want to stay ahead of business unit needs and help them define the path to new success.

These decision makers want law firms bringing the same ambitious thinking. They believe the collective mindset will bring them to where they want to be. Brand new thinking can be transformational to these leaders.

These clients want to eliminate what could be a bigger problem. They want to ensure a pending matter doesn’t open the floodgates for more litigation. Clients are also thinking about opening new pathways — trying to set a precedent to enable new business strategies. Both demand new thinking and fortitude to challenge conventional thinking.

The VUCA (volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity) is filled with risk. Top legal decision makers want to identify and minimize risk. Every geopolitical, financial, technological, and social change brings more risks. Successful risk management demands new ideas and new approaches — especially with the multitude of changes in the US and around the globe.

Transformation is the new normal in corporate America. More companies are transforming themselves than ever before. They want to break new ground, define new products, redefine markets, and streamline operations. Clients become frustrated with law firms who don’t help with the journey. This often requires new approaches and new strategies — some untested. Clients believe brand new ideas can help them reach their goals faster. And they believe a new idea will help their own thinking.

New phenomena like deglobalization demand new ideas. Clients of all sizes are either reconfiguring their supply chains or finding a place in the new supply chains. These organizations face a broad array of legal needs in a space with little experience on which to draw. This high value counsel has high impact and is deeply appreciated — and hard to find.

It’s essential for law firms to ensure client data is secure. But strict security protocols (like multi-factor authentication, secure portals, or encrypted communication) can sometimes be seen as hurdles by clients. Top legal decision makers believe tech-savvy delivery expedites access while maintaining security.

Clients face law firm-induced administrative burdens. This can be chasing down updates, invoices, documents from prior matters, and changing points of contact. But it doesn’t stop here — a single law firm can have numerous platforms and access points for digital access to key documents and information. This is a case of less is more.

Law firm matter startup time can be extensive. This includes conflict checks, engagement letters, setting up financial arrangements, and extends to staffing and planning. Clients express concern about urgency when they experience delays. To clients — the startup phase is often an indication of how well organized the team is — something they don’t want to worry about.

Delays in communication leave clients in the dark — and chasing information. They believe automated notifications, collaborative platforms, and single-entry client portals will keep them up to speed. Clients will enjoy on-demand access to key information — but only from tech-savvy firms.

Every work step introduces the possibility of error. Every minute of rework costs more time and money — and easily throws timelines off. The tech-savvy law firms automate more work steps — reducing the need for rework — and the client’s unproductive time in catching and fixing errors.

Clients will tell you many law firm billing systems demand disproportionately large amounts of time. In addition, they rarely understand why they receive multiple invoices for multiple matters performed by the same firm. The late invoices can easily cause client underreporting of costs, and poor cash flow projections can make corporate counsel appear to lack the knowledge and skill to manage law firms and budgets. Clients firmly believe tech-savvy firms will not have — or have less of — these issues.

Law firms are split on what to say about AI. Clients are busy sorting out the implications. They want multiple viewpoints and opinions. Clients report the majority of law firms remain silent on both the risks to clients and how the firms plan to use Generative AI. This silence leads corporate counsel to believe these firms are not embracing the new technology — and cuts off a source of ideas and insights into new arenas.

While law firms are offering their own AI sites — clients are looking for more. The value of these tools is not obvious to corporate counsel. Clients also want to know how law firms will use generative AI to be more efficient and deliver better outcomes.

Top legal decision makers are sorting out the risks. The risks cover a broad front including potential litigation from employee use; privacy concerns; disclosing trade secrets; copyright infringement, change in work environment, and relying on inaccurate data for decision making. Clients want ideas and strategies to assess and plan as best they can.

Generative AI hallucinates. It can make up cases and facts. Clients want assurance these hallucinations are not part of their legal work product. They also want to understand the implications of relying on AI results or data in their own decision making and operations.

One of the largest client concerns is the unintentional sensitive data leak. Clients not only want to understand the liability — they want to ensure compliance with privacy regulations — and protect their data and secrets. Clients are looking for a combination of regulatory insight and best practices. Industry nuance and impacts are especially valuable in this arena.

Questions of efficiency run rampant in the face of Generative AI. It saves time and money. Clients now wonder if any budget overrun or late deliverable could have been helped by Generative AI. This is especially acute as clients face peak workloads.

Corporate counsel are trying to track a dizzying array of proposed and real regulations and their impact. This understanding is core to client decision making around the use of Generative AI.

Sharing ideas illustrates critical thinking about a matter — the lack of ideas suggests an absence. This critical thinking enables clients to develop preventive strategies, improve compliance, or move their business forward.

It’s rare for corporate counsel to want to go beyond statutory requirements. Clients are convinced a literal interpretation at face value can result in unnecessary costs and burdens on the business. They believe a lack of interpretation and assessment introduces these unneeded demands.

Even when the interpretations don’t work — clients appreciate the engagement and effort. A lack of interpretation equates to a lack of engagement.

Each one of the flood of new regulations demands attention. Clients rely on outside counsel to screen, interpret, assess, and filter the array of new rules. They are most interested in how they do and don’t apply — and how to implement them if they do. All this demands new thinking and translation into action steps. It is easy to miss the subtlety of applicability and is expensive for clients. Interpretations solve this issue.

It only takes one of your client’s competitors to find a loophole or new interpretations of regulations to gain a competitive advantage. Clients want to make sure they are on the right side of this phenomenon. The first organization to find a regulatory opportunity has the potential to offers tremendous advantage. This client can be first to market, establish industry standards, and boost share prices or valuations. The clients who watch competitors create this advantage have to explain what happened to their management.

Regulatory infractions beget more litigation. Top legal decision makers report a single regulatory infraction attracts other agency inquiries — but that is just the start. Clients tell us they immediately worry about class actions, and if they are a public company — securities litigation. And — a federal infraction attracts state agencies. It’s a large amount of litigation — and sound initial interpretations avoid all this.

Clients are sorting their DEI initiatives and want help. In 2022, the Dobbs decision motivated a large number of clients to rethink their health care benefits. Add in the implications of copyright and patent issues associated with Generative AI — and you have an ongoing stream of court decisions changing legal strategy. Top legal decision makers expect more major court decisions. Clients want quick and creative solutions to assess reversals and changes.

Clients believe traditional legal approaches may not be best or even appropriate. They want to evaluate alternative strategies to pick and choose from the best ideas — and use idea cross-pollination to come up with the best approach.

The past 3 years taught clients how each regulation applies to them differently. This means industry impact and specific impacts to their organization. Top legal decision makers tell us generic solutions not only don’t help — but can hurt if they miss an industry-specific nuance.

Some clients are as aggressive as the day is long. Others have policies precluding any agreement to settle — believing this gets them a more favorable outcome. At the same time, a large number of clients want to stay out of the news — and avoid risking damage to their stock price or brand.

Clients want outside counsel to understand and incorporate these sensitivities at the start. They want them to ask and be sure to understand. This ensures a better outcome for each client.

Every company has a different risk profile, it’s easy to find clients with different risk profiles for different matters. Top legal decision makers report outside counsel rarely adjust their approaches and recommendations to their risk tolerances.

They feel the strategies are often out of sync with their risk profile — requiring more time and effort to rework suggested approaches — pushing the endpoint further out — and adding cost.

It takes what it takes. Clients want strategies and ideas to define a clear scope and budget. Budget overruns are rampant. It makes clients blow their budgets. Budget overruns serve as red flags to clients about a lack of clear strategy and direction. And — it makes clients look bad outside their departments.

True institutional knowledge goes well beyond understanding the industry and company — and the risk and sensitivities discussed above. Clients want you to know their communication protocols — who to keep in the loop — and who to keep out of the loop. When do you cc the client and when do you not. What info do they want in their updates?

They want outside counsel who understands the chain of command in the legal department — and the culture.

This knowledge makes for great client experiences. Institutional knowledge eliminates non-value-added work and instills client confidence in the process. And perhaps most important — makes them more successful.

Clients always want to know where things stand. Even if things haven’t changed — they want to know they haven’t changed — and want it actively affirmed. Corporate counsel track a multitude of matters and pending matters — they expect outside counsel to keep them advised — actively and in near real time.

Clients report their progress at least quarterly if not monthly to executives outside their department. Your timely updates make this process easier and more reliable. Outside counsel silence risks making clients look bad to their core constituency

Corporate counsel often learn what law firms are doing when they receive the invoice — long after the work is performed. The time is gone, and the cost is incurred. An opaque approach to client work — intentional or unintended — undermines confidence in the firm, the work, and the value.

These clients understand miscommunication among attorneys with whom they work is easy. They want to ensure everyone working on their matter is on the same page.

The flood of hybrid work issues, union activities, and new regulations taught clients how they were impacted differently by industry and location. They are impacted differently by their products and customers. They all want to find the exemptions and exceptions — and learn how similar companies handle similar situations.

Clients will play by the rules. But — they know rules can be interpreted and defined in creative ways. The lack of ideas suggests outside counsel is following the written rules — and not looking for the interpretation to help clients reach their goals. These same clients understand there may be no leeway in interpretation — but the lack of trying is the pain point.

Generating ideas for clients demands investment. Clients want invested attorneys. Invested attorneys have a vicarious stake in the outcome. The lack of ideas tells clients their outside counsel is not invested and dispassionate about the results. All this results in a benign and transactional relationship.

And — clients feel burdened knowing they will have to generate ideas elsewhere and have to hire a new firm for the next matter.

In a perfect world — clients want outside counsel more engaged than they are. Meeting client engagement levels is the minimum standard. Sharing ideas shows engagement — and engagement begets more engagement. A lack of ideas translates to a lack of engagement.

The lack of ideas suggests the lack of a clear plan — which wastes client staff time, money, and elapsed time. All of which increase cost and risk.