I'm Attorney Christopher A. Pearsall and the focus of my law
practice is on Rhode Island Divorce and Family Law. I would like to
preface this article by stating that what follows is my opinion
regarding divorce and family law practice within Rhode Island. There
are countless divorce lawyers in our state that would not only disagree
with me but would also prefer to see me disbarred rather than sharing
my experience with hundreds of lawyers throughout the state simply
because my articles inform the consumer and prospective client. With
that said, let me begin.
My philosophy about the practice of law is what I have come to call "Client-centric."
What is that, right?
It is a divorce law practice centered on your needs as the
"client." Now, since clients are the life-blood of a lawyer's
practice. A divorce lawyer must abide by all legal and ethical
requests made by the lawyer. Now, you may be thinking. . "Wait a
minute, isn't every divorce lawyer's practice "Client-centric".
My answer is a resounding "No". Yes, Rhode Island Divorce lawyers
like myself rely upon clients in order to put food on the table for
their own families, to pay their own bills, and to provide for their
own retirement. However, the question I put to most Rhode Island
Divorce Lawyers is this. What standard of living are you creating for
yourself at your clients' expense? This is partially what I mean by
"Client-centric."
Let me give you an example. I drive a 1998 Chevy Cavalier with
130,000 miles on it. I have this car because it fits my goal of
maintaining a "Client-centric" divorce law practice here in Rhode
Island.
The car has working air-conditioning for the summer season. The
heat comes on quickly in the winter. It is comfortable, looks
reasonably professional, and it gets me from here to there. It gets
excellent gas mileage and because it is an older car, the automobile
insurance costs significantly less than a BMW, Mercedes, Jaguar,
Hummer, and other status symbol cars driven by many of today's Rhode
Island's divorce and family lawyers.
In truth, as a Rhode Island Divorce Lawyer I am proud to drive this
1998 Chevy Cavalier because it is one of the best examples of my
"Client-centric" divorce law practice. That is why I drive it and that
is why I choose to keep it. Why? Because it is better for my clients
that I do so.
Could I get a newer car that gets good gas mileage, is comfortable,
has air-conditioning and heat and looks professional? Absolutely, but
that comes at a price. More money would have to be spent to get a
newer car. More money has to be spent on insurance. More money may
have to be spent on gasoline at today's outrageous prices. That money
would have to come from where? My clients! If it's not a necessity
and doesn't benefit my clients then it doesn't get purchased, plain and
simple.
Certainly I wouldn't mind a newer car with new bells and whistles,
but NOT at the expense of my clients. When I have a car that does its
intended job there's no need to get a new one. My standard of living
and my ego do not require a fancy car. After all, whatever car I have
comes from income and benefits received through my clients . . . and
let's face it. . . when the chips are down it's not a lawyers's fancy
car that gives you legal advice or goes into court to argue on your
behalf at a divorce hearing.
In my opinion, most Rhode Island Divorce Lawyers are not even close
to being "Client-centric." In fact, most divorce lawyers in Rhode
Island seem to be "Lawyer-centric", a practice concept I have chosen to
depart from with great haste. A "Lawyer-Centric" approach does not fit
into the philosophy of my divorce practice because I choose not to
achieve a higher standard of living if it means doing so will be at the
expense of my clients' hard work and hard earned money.
In my humble opinion, as the title states, I believe that "Clients Deserve Better!"
The idea is whether you as a client want to engage or remain with a
Rhode Island Divorce Lawyer or Family Law Attorney who is
"Lawyer-Centric" or "Client-Centric."
The difference is relatively straight-forward. In a
"Lawyer-centric" law practice, the focus is upon meeting the needs of
the lawyer(s). For instance, the needs of the lawyer include the
lawyer's overhead expenses of having an office, telephones, facsimile,
internet access, legal reasearch services, office rent, paper, copiers,
office supplies, secretarial support, grounds maintenance, electricity,
heat, water and sewerage costs, town/city equipment taxes, long
distance charges, bank fees and any other expenses the lawyer must pay
for before he or she even receives a dime in income.
Secondarily, the lawyer must consider how much he or she has to pay
for his or her own personal expenses for their own family, including a
home mortgage, car payment, equity line, credit cards, gasoline
expenses, home heating costs, central air-conditioning costs,
electricity, telephone costs, high-speed internet costs, cel phone
costs, home insurance, life insurance, auto insurance, business
clothing, student loan payments from law school, possible
daycare/childcare expenses, possible health insurance payments and
monthly co-pays for medications, etc... to say little of entertainment,
vacation costs, summer homes, boats, even airplanes for those lawywers
with a higher standard of living.
If you take all of these financial expenses together (as I mentioned
in the previous paragraph), it's fairly easy to see how many divorce
lawyers in Rhode Island would focus on themselves as lawyers and their
financial burden rather than on their clients. After all, that's quite
a heavy load a lawyer might have riding on their shoulders and they
want to make sure they make enough money to cover all the office
expenses and home bills from their client fees.
Where does that money come from? Where else? You . . . their clients!
Now you might be saying, that my analysis is a bit unfair because
all divorce lawyers aren't (or can't be) like that. Certainly I must
say that my opinion holds true for most divorce lawyers in Rhode Island
who have a practice focused on divorce and family law on a full-time
basis.
Ultimately, if you see your attorney driving a Jaguar, a BMW or
Mercedes it might be a good exercise to remember that you as the client
are paying for that car.
It is certainly not a stretch for me to say that when you sit in a
fancy law office waiting room reviewing a magazine until the secretary
brings you to your Rhode Island divorce lawyer's office for your
appointment that you consider a few things.
If you are a client of that lawyer, consider that you are paying for
that secretary, you are paying for the central air conditioning that
keeps your lawyer and his or her other clients and staff cool during
the summer. You are paying for the heat in the winter that keeps your
divorce lawyer and her or her other clients and the lawyer's staff warm
in the winter. You are paying for the lighting in each room that you
pass by as you are led to your divorce attorney's office.
There may even be a direct correlation here. The fancier the
office, the bigger the building, the larger the parking lot, the larger
the grounds that need to be maintained, the nicer the car your lawyer
drives, the more your lawyers the law firm has intheir office, the more
you pay as a client to cover those expenses.
There may even be a correlation between your Rhode Island divorce
lawyer's hourly rate and retainer and his or her desired standard of
living. In either event, you . . . the client . . . pay for all that!
People often complain that lawyers "charge too much." Well this
might explain it. If you add all of this together for any lawyer, it's
a fairly huge financial burden to bear. Yet this is what people have
come to expect. Clients expect that it will cost "too much" to retain
a good divorce lawyer. Client's want to have an attorney with a fancy
office, free parking, nicely kept grounds and a sharp looking outfit
when you meet the lawyer in their office. Ultimately, clients cringe
as their initial meeting comes to a close and they wait for the
financial bombshell to drop as the Rhode Island divorce lawyer states
how much it will cost you for his or her services and what the initial
retainer will be.
There you go. The amount you pay a lawyer is not necessarily
determined by your divorce lawyer's time, skill, competence or
experience. What you are really paying is dependent upon the lawyer's
building, car, lifestyle, summer home, boat, airplane, vacations for
weeks to the Bahamas, Hawaii or some other exotic place, private
schools for their children, etc...
What does it cost you to retain the lawyer? It depends upon the
lawyer and everything the lawyer has to bear financially. That's what
I refer to as a "Lawyer-Centric" approach to Rhode Island Divorce
practice. Everything revolves around the lawyer in the
"Lawyer-Centric" approach.
Now let's change gears for a moment and consider a more modern
approach. We're in a recession and most divorce lawyers continue to do
the same thing they've always done for decades, with few exceptions.
Yes, you guessed it . . . the Lawyer-Centric approach to divorce
practice. Why? Because that's what they are used to. Noone likes to
sacrifice or compromise anything from their law office or from their
lifestyle. Everyone wants to move ahead and make more money, including
lawyers. Everyone wants to do everything without reinventing the wheel.
Yet here is the rub. Times have changed. Just about everyone has
affordable access to the internet, servers, computer programs and
technology that now allows us to take projects that once took two and a
half hours and compress them into one hour or less. Though we are in a
recession, we also have access to newer, more advanced technologies
that enable us to do things faster and more easily, the rates of
lawyers not only in Rhode Island divorce proceedings but in many other
areas of law have not budged.
The theory behind this is that many lawyers believe that simply
because they have taken advantage of these new technologies to speed up
their work, that they should not be deprived of the income that they
would have received if the lawyer had chosen not to use the new
technologies. So what happens? Lawyers end up billing the client for
2 1/2 hours of work when, in fact, the lawyers time may have been
reduced to 1 hour due to new advances in technology and new software
run on highly advanced computer systems.
Now certainly there is a cost to the lawyer for purchasing the
technology, perhaps maintaining the technology equipment and such, and
that needs to be paid for as well, yet at some point that should be
considered "paid for" and the client should reap a benefit from that in
the form of a reduced hourly rate, doesn't that make sense?
It reminds me of a toll bridge that pays for itself in its first two
years of use but goes on collecting revenues for the state for another
20 years without any reduction for taxpayers. Why? Because now the
monies are used to pay for other things in the state that the "powers
that be" see as essential to the Rhode Island lifestyle. Just as the
monies collected from clients that have more than paid for the
technologies used by the lawyers will go to pay for higher incomes,
better cars, longer vacations in Arruba, etc... Yet it's rare that the
client gets the financial benefit of these advances in technology even
if they are talked up as a selling point by the lawyer to get your
business.
Here's where I come in. You see, I don't like the "Lawyer-Centric"
approach. The reason I don't like it is simply because it continues to
promote the notion that lawyers are all money hungry, greedy, overpaid,
scam artists who are only out for themselves and everything they can
get from you.
The fact is, there are good attorneys out there who give their
clients the benefit of everything financially possible. Some lawyers
are generous to a fault with their time and have harnessed every
economical technology, software, product, and service for your benefit
as a divorce client. The ultimate result that you get is either a lower
rate or faster service reflected in the lawyer's billing. That's the
"Client-Centric" approach.
The Client-Centric approach to the practice of divorce law (or any
specialized area of law for that matter) is focused on the needs of the
client. The lawyer's focus then shifts to serving more clients for
less income and less rewards in order to reach his or her own financial
needs. Yes, it means the lawyer may have to work harder and longer
hours to achieve his or her personal financial goals. However, with
the Client-Centric law practice you end up paying for your divorce
lawyer's time, skill, and experience and the maximized resources he or
she uses.
I heard the term "Client-Centric" used by attorneys in a large firm
as far back as two decades ago. Unfortunately, the term was used in a
different context. As used at that time and by that firm, it meant to
network further into a client's existing ties in the community to bring
in more clients. In otherwords it was a networking technique which
continued to benefit the law firm by wining and dining the client and
by using financial resources of the firm to essentially "schmooze" the
client to build trust and get more client referrals, etc...
I will not say that this was a bad business move. After all,
businesses (particularly law firms) are out there to make money and to
continue to network and therefore survive. Yet at what point does the
client get a true financial benefit from today's technologies? The use
of a "Client-Centric" approach as I initially heard it used was merely
a means of manipulated marketing. It is not a wonder why lawyers do
not have a good name today if this is a marketing method being
circulated nearly two decades ago?
Well, it is a new millenium and perhaps I am a new pioneer and
advocate for the client. Money is not the "end all" and "be all" of
things. Personally I would rather make considerably less money and
reap the rewards of a child properly returned to his mother being
falsely accused of being a drug addict and of abusing the child. A
reasonable payment for my skills and hard work, a thank you card from
the mother and the hug from that child were payment enough.
Yet here is the problem? These Rhode Island divorce and family law
lawyers are hard to find. I will not say that I am a dying breed. I
will say that I am a growing breed and I hope that I can convince more
divorce attorneys to go the way of the true "Client-Centric"
practitioner, especially in divorce and family law.
Families here in Rhode Island are in need of help and healing. In
my humble opinion, most of the damage done today to our Rhode Island
families is within the divorce and family law practice. It can be
helped financially by taking a Client-Centric approach in a divorce law
practice and focusing on the needs of the client and the family unit.
I urge my fellow Rhode Island Divorce Lawyers and Family Law
Practitioners to adopt a practice philosophy focused on the needs of
their clients and not upon their bank accounts. Material possessions
are not the measure of a person's worth or the success of a person's
life. Though material possessions may provide enjoyment for a time,
they do not provide the happiness and fulfillment of living a good life
and helping our fellow men and women.
Turning around the idea of the stereotypical divorce lawyer will not
happen overnight. It will take time and the diligence of more than
just myself and a few other practitioners. In time I am hopeful that
the black eye that lawyers have with the public will dissipate and
people will see us for what we truly are and who we were truly meant to
be . . . servants of the people.
Authored By:
Christopher A. Pearsall
Money Making Entrepreneur and Attorney-at-Law
70 Dogwood Drive, Suite 304
West Warwick, RI 02893
Call (401) 632-6976 Now for your low-cost consultation.
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Copyright 2008. Christopher A. Pearsall, Internet Entrepreneur and Attorney-at-Law
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