A brave new world

There is little doubt that one of the impacts of the current recession within the professional services world is the way in which clients have become more critical buyers.  At MSI Global Alliance (www.msiglobal.org), we certainly welcome this shift because it has forced buyers to look more critically at the service offering available from mid-sized firms, and realise that it is often broader than they had perhaps anticipated.

But just as much as the recent downturn has caused a refreshing change in the way in which the more enlightened clients buy professional services, it should also serve as an overdue reminder that the providers of professional services need to review the way in which they provide those services.

Michael Tuchman, a senior partner in Levenfeld Pearlstein LLC, MSI's Chicago-based law firm member, was interviewed recently by the Chicago Lawyer Magazine.  He wrote:

Last year’s economic shocks and the tremors since then have prompted most of us to review the value propositions in our business relationships. Lawyers have not often had to prove up and defend their value quotient at a relationship level. It is interesting to see how clients have made do with less lawyering. Part of it, of course, is a function of a slower economy and a diminished need for legal services, but increasingly it is because clients are doing a more rigorous cost-benefit analysis before they pick up the phone to assign a task or address a potential problem.

The impact on the profession is broad and deep, and goes well beyond finding the correct hourly rate. I know some lawyers think that things will return to “normal” once economic activity picks up, however, I do not believe this will be the case. Prosperity will require lawyers to apply themselves more selectively, that is, only where they add meaningful and perceptible value. If a lawyer can proactively engage a client on how to most efficiently use his skill set, the client is less likely to view the lawyer as merely a toll collector he would rather detour.

Relationships are two-way processes.  It would be a foolish and short-sighted person who thought anything else as businesses move forward out of the current trough.

James Mendelssohn (jmendelssohn@msiglobal.org)

Chief Executive
MSI Global Alliance

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