One of the 5 key causes of claims and potential claims, these failures have nothing to do with your competence as a lawyer, but everything to do with how you manage the process of providing legal services. They break down as follows:
Not managing client expectations (50%)
You fail to appreciate the risk inherent in a client or their expectations of the legal process, who is doing what or how much it’s going to cost.
Not managing third party expectations (20%)
You don’t appreciate that someone for whom you are clearly not acting thinks that you are somehow protecting their interests.
Not setting the retainer up effectively (15%)
At the start of the retainer, you don’t adequately think through how you are going to deliver the legal services. This is where most conflict issues arise, because the lawyer doesn’t adequately consider whether or not he or she is able to represent all parties.
Not concluding the retainer effectively (10%)
These mistakes usually happen because once the legal work is done, the lawyer ‘moves on’ without ensuring that the final wrap up details are properly attended to.
Not managing emerging conflict (5%)
The lawyer properly accepts a joint retainer, but fails to manage a conflict that lawyer develops.
For a real life example from our claim files, watch this video or, for the full story and CPD credit, watch our webinar.