I find that as I get older my interest in what motivates people is increasing. I want to understand the whys behind the choices people make and have pretty much lost all interest in who has the most toys. The whys in life are far more interesting than the collections of stuff that people have managed to gather. I share this because I believe that failing to consider the thought processes and motivations that are driving client decisions and actions can be a tremendous mistake in the practice of law. For clients, the best outcome isn’t always about maximizing the amount of money they’ll receive or minimizing the amount of money they’ll have to pay. Attorneys who overlook this do risk doing a disservice to their clients.

I first learned this lesson years ago when I was involved in a real estate transaction regarding pristine property on the northwest border of Glacier Park. I approached the transaction as so many would, let’s get the best offer on the table and make this happen. I soon learned that the seller’s concern wasn’t in how much money he’d make. While price was a factor, the true concern was in finding someone who would emotionally invest in maintaining the property in accordance with the seller’s vision for it. The seller had personally invested in making the property something special and he didn’t want to see is efforts go by the wayside. Once I understood this, the sale moved forward rather quickly as I knew what to look for in a buyer and understood how to bring the parties together. I was able to get past viewing this solely as a financial transaction and that was what made the difference.

I have also been involved in mediations where both sides were far apart on numbers. During those times, I have tried to step back and consider other options. I hoped to be able to identify what the driving motivations were for both parties. In the mediation of a malpractice case sometime ago, we were able to reach resolution when I was finally able to determine that what the plaintiff really wanted was an apology. That was it. The plaintiff wanted the perceived wrong to be acknowledged and her position validated. In truth, this is what would allow her to get past what had happened and no amount of money, in and of itself, was ever going to allow her to do so.

These experiences were important to me because they challenged my assumptions about how things should be. Initially I wanted to come at all problems from a legal perspective. After all, I knew how to handle the legal matters. I wasn’t remembering, however, that people were involved and that was unfortunate. Resolution might have happened earlier had I taken the time to try to understand the motivations behind the decisions and actions that parties to a matter were taking.

Here is my point. Attorney/client relationships are just that, relationships. This is true whether the client is an individual or a corporation. If you don’t know and understand who your client is and the whys behind their decisions, you are taking a risk. You are failing to invest in them. The non-verbal message that you risk sending is that you are interested in the legal work but do not care about them. Your work on any given matter may in fact be exemplary but you also may never know about the referrals and other work that went elsewhere due to the lack of personal investment in the client.

Of course, the investment that the attorney and the client have in the attorney/client relationship is necessarily a two way street. Perhaps trying to determine the degree to which a client is investing in the attorney/client relationship with you is a good barometer of how well you are investing in them. This is worth some thought. From a risk management perspective, I see the effort placed into getting to know your clients as one of the most, if not the most important risk management effort that can be undertaken because this is what helps to build trust, and in the practice of law, trust is a good thing.