“For successful partnership, clarity of communication is vital.” — Priti Shetty, GC, ICICI Bank

Let’s start with why lean communication matters. As anyone who’s been in private practice will know, your firm can spend all the money in the world on consultants and technology, but if the GC doesn’t like you, you’re out. We all get that, so let’s think about the quality and nature of our engagements with clients. If you can be concise and helpful, the chances are that will translate into likeability. If you badger, bore or bewilder clients, the chances are you’ll be seen as just annoying. That’s one key reason why lean communications matters.

We have discussed how ‘lean’ is largely about effectiveness (correct outcome) efficiency (on budget and on time) and overall transparency. Efficiency means finding waste and eliminating it. In all areas of legal practice, waste accumulates around valueless activity and the usual suspects always include communications.

Find out just what matters, focus on that, and communicate it concisely. This is worthwhile and applicable to all communications, written or spoken, with all people — colleagues, opponents, judges, and most of all, clients. Clients have businesses to run and problems to solve. That’s what they care about. Truth is, they don’t care about external counsel, nor should they. Private practice isn’t all about you, it’s all about the client. This is why lawyers who find lean ways to engage with clients have a competitive advantage over those who don’t.

Buyers of legal services are very astute. They don’t actually want to be dazzled. Deploying a coherent analysis of what things are, harnessed to an insight into the way forward and a robust well charted process is what clients actually want.

So how do we communicate concisely? Whether the task is investigation, analysis, knowledge management or reporting, the guiding principles of lean communications are always the same: Keep it relevant, direct, and concise. One way to accomplish this is to write little and write small (see Lesson 1 in this module for more discussion about this topic).

‘Write little’ means write concisely, only when necessary. Get out the key nuggets first and in order of importance. The rest is waffle that the client doesn’t want to hear, read or pay for.

‘Write small’ is different. It means avoid hyperbole.

➤ REVIEW RELATED TOOL: Lean Communication Checklist