2  Working effectively with clients

Most legal professionals communicate with clients as a part of their role. For some, such as a solicitor or legal executive in private practice, this can be a large part of their workload. For others (such as a barrister or advocate) it may be that some communication is via a third party. Clients may also range from individuals with little or no legal knowledge to lawyers acting for large corporations. Regardless of who you are communicating with, and how often, it is important that your communications are effective. Developing your emotional competence and professional resilience (two concepts described in detail in Managing and understanding yourself) can assist you in this in the following ways:

• Help you identify and understand the emotions your client is experiencing that are connected with their issue and/or their communications with you.
• Help you identify and understand the emotions you are experiencing when communicating with your client and/or dealing with their issue.
• Assist you to regulate your own emotions appropriately and manage those of your clients, including communicating appropriately, managing their expectations and establishing appropriate boundaries.
• Enable you to understand the wider emotional context and factor this into your advice and approach.

It is important to remember that there is usually a significant emotional component in every legal issue. This may result from the facts involved in the issue, the client’s relationship with a legal profession and their (current or prior) perception of, or experience with, the legal system (Barkai and Fine, 1983, p. 506).

The next activity is designed to assist you in identifying and understanding the possible emotions that clients may be experiencing.

As well as thinking about how the client is feeling, it is also important to be aware of your own emotional state. Something as simple as being hungry or tired can affect your emotions and therefore your feelings towards a client and their file. You may also find there are certain scenarios you need to be aware of in your work that may provoke an emotional response – if you experienced a difficult divorce, working with a client with similar issues could potentially affect your emotions and may influence your judgement. This was explored in the course Managing and understanding yourself.

Continue to 2.1 Identifying and understanding client emotions.

The following video highlights the importance of emotions when interacting with clients, and the emotional impacts such interactions can have on you as a legal professional.

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Transcript: Video 2  Emotions and clients

VLAD VALIENTE

I think without going into the academics of emotional intelligence, I think for me, what it means is people relations, I guess, is what I would suggest. It's that kind of social skill, in terms of dealing with people.

What do I mean by that? So for example, I think, empathy, so understanding where that we are all humans, we all have feelings, and that we all come from different perspectives and we all might react in different ways, so we need to understand that. And we also need to adapt the way that we deal with people in a different way, depending on their character, their skills, and recognising what their feelings may be at that point in time, and not to dismiss those feelings. You take them on board and you try and adapt to it.

KHYATI JOSHI

So the client getting upset and crying is part of immigration law practice, whether it be when you tell them your fee, or whether you tell them what the Home Office fee is, or whether you tell them you were unsuccessful, because Home Office made this error. We have to take more steps to resolve their problem. They have to be financially prepared. They have to be physically, emotionally prepared.

So, of course, they tend to break down from now and then. And my job there is look, to tell them, don't get upset. You have xyz time to think about it. There's no pressure. Communicate with them how much time they have within which they need to make a decision.

STEPHANIE BELL

I've conducted conferences with clients with excrement smeared up the walls because I've gone down to the cells. There's no conference room available. You're told, well, you can wait half an hour, or you can go into your client's cell with them. And you go into the cell. The door is locked. And you sit there and have a conference with your client. You have to do that because the judge has made it clear you've only got 10 minutes and you've got to be back up in court.

And so you make these, it's a process of always making these little decisions. And I think criminal barristers often take it on themselves to do the thing that makes life easier for everyone else, for the judge, for your client, for your lay client, for your professional client, for your clerks.

If your clerks call with another case, and they say, can you take this case on, you want to help out. You want to be seen as someone who's a high achiever, who has a can-do attitude, who can take anything that's thrown at them. And you do have to be like that to do the job. And there's a great sense of satisfaction that you get from getting to the end of that day having handled a load of cases and done them well and done a good job for your clients.

But on the other hand, it's extremely difficult to say no. And that has a very detrimental, long term, those little decisions, those little choices you make has a really significant impact on wellbeing.

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Video 2  Emotions and clients

When communicating with clients, you are likely to receive both verbal and non-verbal cues that indicate their emotions. Activity 1 demonstrated that identifying and understanding these cues means you can use this information to inform your approach to your client and their file.

In some situations, a client may be very vocal about their emotions. This may be because they are hard to regulate, or because they feel this will assist them in some way (e.g. expressing anger about the management of an issue to obtain faster completion of a task). However, some clients may be seeking to suppress or ignore them. This is where non-verbal cues are important. Such cues could include:

It may well be that a client’s non-verbal cues become clearer while a meeting or interview progresses as they become more at ease, and you become more familiar with their reactions and responses. Therefore, it is important to continue to monitor these throughout your time with clients. Pay particular attention to how they respond to you during the communication to determine the communication patterns and style that the client is positive about, as well as the instances where you are communicating in ways you think the client may be less used to, or may not like.

Points to think about to encourage clients to share verbal and non-verbal emotional cues include:

The impact of your physical environment

Legal professionals traditionally have often been associated with offices filled with law books and with a large wooden desk. This may project an air of knowledge and status, but it can also be very intimidating for clients, discouraging them from disclosing emotional aspects of a matter. Small adjustments to the room, or to your use of it, could make a significant difference to clients, for example, putting a picture of your family on a shelf and ensuring you get up and move around the desk to greet your client. If you have a number of positions to choose from, you could also ask the client where they want to sit, e.g. they may find sitting next to you less confrontational than sitting opposite you. Clients might also prefer to sit near the door rather than have a barrier between them and the door so they don't feel trapped.

It is also worth inviting the client to comment on the room temperature and to let you know if the room is too hot or too cold. At points you could also offer a comfort break and ensure they are aware of the position of the nearest bathroom. Being able to offer water, or tea and coffee, could also help generate a less intimidating atmosphere.

 

Focus on putting the client at ease as quickly as possible

This is about using your facial expressions, body language and movements to put the client at ease like smiling, maintaining good eye contact and nodding at appropriate points in the client’s explanation. It may be helpful to pay attention to the factors and things in the client’s life that seem to be a priority or seem important to them. For example, a client who perceives themselves as high status (e.g. a Company Executive Officer) may mention this to you early on in meetings. In doing so, they may be signposting that they don’t expect to be spoken down to. They may also be indicating their fears that they lack power in the lawyer–client relationship because they don’t hold legal knowledge. Such a client may be acknowledging discomfort at the power imbalance and you may want to be wary of this so that your early communication does not show superiority over them, or contribute to feelings of perceived disrespect. Ensuring you are not disturbed and making sure email or telephone notifications are muted can also help the client feel prioritised and more secure.

 

Be intentional with the language you use

This may involve asking open-ended questions such as ‘How do you feel about this?’ or ‘What impact has this had on you?’ and including terminology that has links with emotions to model its use (e.g. ‘I am happy to hear that’). This short article on ‘overcoming language barriers in lawyer–client communications’ demonstrates the importance of language.

It’s important to pause regularly to check the client’s understanding, and also to emphasise to clients that they are welcome to ask questions. As lawyers, it can be easy to slip into using ‘legalese’, like using contract law terms such as ‘consideration’, which clients may well struggle to decipher.

 

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Figure 1  Thoughtful and intentional communication

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Traditionally, many legal professionals have communicated with clients via letters. In recent years, an increasing amount of communications with clients are also by email, telephone and/or via online platforms. This has been exacerbated by Covid-19, with working from home or blended ways of working becoming more widely accepted within the legal profession.

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How not to communicate in writing with clients

This video explains more about what empathy is and why it is important.

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Transcript: Video 3  Raj on empathy

RAJ

Empathy is about understanding another person's perspective, emotions, or experiences. It's useful in the workplace because it helps us develop relationships with people. And in the legal workplace, that will be developing client relationships and co-worker relationships. People with good emotional regulation can use empathy to strengthen bonds, and also diffuse difficult emotional situations, which will be helpful with clients, too. Research also shows that if you have an empathetic manner with clients - that they're more trusting of you and more willing to share information.

There is a difference between sympathy and empathy. Sympathy comes from a perspective of caring. And it can be defined as concern for another person's well-being or welfare in the face of a threat or an obstacle. But empathy is about understanding and recognising another person's experience or perspective. And you're not required to feel the same feelings as them.

If you experience a lot of sympathy in your role, it's important to note that that's not that productive for you or the client. And it can contribute to burnout. So it's important to note that you should be working within your professional role and thinking about how you can make a positive difference to someone using your training. And that's legal. And you're not there to be their therapist or friend. And so just focusing on your professional role -

It's also important to note that our feelings of empathy or detachment or sympathy will change over time. This is known as professional desensitisation. So materials and cases and clients and encounters that we experience - we may not have the same reactions as we get more experience in our role. And we may become desensitised to them.

So if you find something particularly difficult, the light at the end of the tunnel is it may not always be that way. However, it's also important to note that if you have a lot of experience in your role, then you may be desensitised to something that is very difficult for the client. And so you have to be aware that you have to offer that empathy because they may not know that you've experienced this many, many times and you've heard the story. So you have to take note of that.

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Video 3  Raj on empathy

Empathy has been identified as a key legal competency (LETR, 2013; BSB, 2019). There are a wide range of different definitions of what empathy actually means, but a good starting point is this description:

This definition suggests empathy combines both an emotional and a cognitive response. By understanding a client’s experience or situation ‘affectively’ you are feeling something of the emotions they have or are experiencing in relation to it. By understanding it ‘cognitively’, you are able to think through the client’s perspective, and the emotions it involves whilst also retaining a sense of detachment (sometimes referred to as ‘perspective taking’). You still realise you are viewing the situation from the outside, enabling you not to be overwhelmed by emotions in the same way as the client might be.

The elements of empathy

There is evidence that empathy is a teachable skill or competency, making it a valuable part of client care (Samra and Jones, 2019). The next activity explores its use in more detail.

Legal professionals are sometimes concerned that experiencing empathy for a client will lead to them becoming less neutral or objective in their advice and representation (Jones, 2021; Westaby and Jones, 2018). This may be because they are conflating empathy with sympathy. While sympathy can lead to a strong sense of emotion at the plight of another, the cognitive element of empathy prevents the forms of over-identification that can lead to individuals potentially acting in inappropriate or unprofessional ways.

This clip by Professor Brené Brown discusses the distinction between empathy and sympathy in more detail.

Being able to identify and understand your client’s emotions will make it easier for you to manage them appropriately. This could help if you are defusing a situation where a client is angry or hostile, or encouraging a reluctant client to accept a particular piece of advice they are uncomfortable with.

Some useful strategies include:

Legal professionals have to do a great deal of work with emotions. They will often need to manage clients’ emotions at the same time as regulating their own responses. This can involve high levels of emotional labour (Westaby, 2014; Harris, 2002). The term ‘emotional labour’ was coined by sociologist Arlie Hochschild (2012) who carried out a study of air stewardesses and noted that their work required them to project a calm and composed demeanour at all times. Hochschild suggests that projecting certain emotional states or responses can be done by either ‘surface acting’ or ‘deep acting’. If an individual is surface acting, they are simply pretending to experience emotions. If they are deep acting then they will alter their own feelings and emotions to meet the expectations of their role. Although it is not always the case, both forms of acting can have a potentially detrimental impact on an individual’s wellbeing. If someone is frequently surface acting, it can lead to them separating their real feelings from their work life and can estrange them from their authentic self. Additionally, surface acting is linked to higher levels of emotional exhaustion and burnout (severe emotional exhaustion). LawCare’s recent Life in the Law report (2021) highlighted that burnout can be a significant issue within the legal profession.

It is important for legal professionals to acknowledge the emotional labour present in their role so that they can monitor the impact it is having on them. Workplace surface acting can have a knock-on effect on workers’ marital lives through relationship conflict and marital partner discontent (Krannitz et al., 2015). Not all emotional labour has a negative impact – it can help you feel engaged and invested in your work. However, if you are finding that the emotional labour you expend is beginning to have a detrimental effect then it is important to identify this as soon as possible. You can then think of strategies to lessen the impact, like reducing your direct contact with specific clients, building in breaks and periods of mindfulness, examining the boundaries and coping strategies you have in place, discussing particularly challenging clients with your team and ensuring you having peer support in place.

This video explains more about emotional labour and how to manage it.

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Transcript: Video 5  Mathijs on emotional labour

MATHIJIS

Emotional labour is part of every job. There's going to be periods in your own job when you're going to be stretched emotionally. It's the work of your vocation that has an emotional component. And this can be around supporting clients or colleagues when they're really feeling stressed and strained. And it can also mean that it really does feel quite pressurised for yourself because you're dealing with people that are really upset or very angry. And this can be - is - it's labour. It's work.

And three things that I can think of that can be helpful in managing emotional labour - the first is around reminding yourself about why it is that you're in the job that you're in. Ideally, people would say it's because they love their job or they feel it's their calling, it's very important. But sometimes, it can be really practical reasons that keep people in their work and remind them of why it's worthwhile. Some of those things - because they need to pay the bills or they have rent to pay. But other reasons can be that this job is a stepping stone for you in terms of the next stages for your career.

Another way of managing this emotional labour and the toll that it can take is about creative problem-solving - so how it is that you can structure your day or your week so you're not being worn out too quickly in terms of the working week - that you might pick to have clients that you know that are going to be quite draining at the beginning of the day. You might spread out certain clients in a way that gives you a good break so you don't feel as drained by the work.

Another point is that emotional labour is just going to be present in your job. And sometimes, this emotional labour can be really rewarding. So I've talked about it in terms of a negative - the negative ways it can have an impact. But it can also have a positive impact because some of the emotional labour that you might be employed in can be some of the most rewarding aspects of your work. When you see someone really making a breakthrough or you've made a real difference to their lives, this may have been really draining and took a lot out of you. But you can see that it has a real impact and a benefit for others.

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Video 5  Mathijs on emotional labour

The following video highlights the centrality of client expectations and their potential impacts on wellbeing, as well as giving useful tips on how to deal with unrealistic expectations.

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Transcript: Video 6  Managing client expectations

PATRICIA WHITE

I think, with clients and their expectations, it can often be difficult in managing their expectations, particularly in a litigious setting. Most clients expect to be able to win in a claim. That's not always possible. And it's about managing those expectations and explaining to them that, potentially, you could lose this case. And it's also about making sure that you are very much aware of, you can't win every case, and therefore, you make sure that you provide the best that you can within the circumstances and accept that.

I find the best way to deal with more demanding clients and, in fact, all clients that I assist in their litigation matters and employment matters is to make sure that I keep in control of the situation. And that means by making sure that I contact them on a regular basis and provide them with updates. That provides them with the confidence and the assurance. And I think it is important with all clients to make sure that they know from you that you have their best interests at heart.

And I find, also, that it is important to make sure that you're open and honest about them. An example would be, perhaps, if you're not going to be available, maybe, for a couple of days or so, and you're approaching a court hearing. Then, you would make sure that you would contact the client and let them know and provide the assurance to them that they are having their matter dealt with.

VLAD VALIENTE

In the modern world, I think that the IT has moved on so much that people expect an immediate response, and we very much get frustrated when we don't have that immediate response. And I think that's just in the nature, ultimately, of what the new modern world brings with it. But that has an impact on our professional lives.

And ultimately, our clients expect an immediate response. Our colleagues expect an immediate response to things. And that's not always viable. But that, more importantly, adds a significant amount of stress and anxiety to all of us, this extra pressure of unrealistic expectations and also not understanding our jobs. And that's also very important. And that comes in play with the immediate response that people expect.

But they don't recognise that, actually, lawyers don't have all the answers immediately from their brain. We have to go. We research it, look it up, and potentially have a sounding board, somebody else that we speak to and see whether that's come up before, et cetera, before we give the best solution that we can. And that doesn't take five minutes. That takes a while to get to that bottom result.

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Video 6  Managing client expectations

Clients often have high and/or potentially unrealistic expectations of legal professionals. These can range from expecting an instant answer to emails to wanting firm assurances on the outcome of a claim. This means that an important part of being a legal professional is developing emotional competencies, including learning how to manage the client’s expectations, so they are as reasonable and achievable as possible.

Ways to manage these expectations include:

Some legal professionals focus on meeting client expectations at the expense of their own wellbeing. It is really important to put in place strategies to prevent yourself from feeling overwhelmed by these expectations and to manage the pressures involved. In the long term, doing this will benefit both you and your clients as you will be well enough to represent them as effectively as possible and, as such, looking after yourself is necessary and important to looking after your clients.

One of the reasons legal professionals are sometimes reluctant to acknowledge their emotions when working with clients is because they feel it may encourage clients to be over-emotional or blur lawyer–client boundaries. The reality is that there are emotions involved in all lawyer–client interactions and that learning how to identify, understand and manage these can be highly beneficial. However, it is understandable that legal professionals are concerned about establishing and maintaining emotional boundaries, particularly where a matter is highly emotive or a client appears particularly emotionally volatile or vulnerable. Such boundaries protect both lawyers and clients, so having emotional boundaries in place is important. This article provides some interesting insights into the need for boundaries.

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Figure 2  Appropriate and inappropriate emotional boundaries between client and legal professional

The next activity is designed to provide strategies to assist you in setting or asserting appropriate emotional boundaries.

This video discusses setting boundaries in more depth.

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Transcript: Video 7  Mathijs on emotional boundaries

MATHIJIS

Setting appropriate boundaries might seem quite straightforward with both clients and colleagues. But actually, it's quite sophisticated because we'll have different rules and ideas in our minds in terms of what is an appropriate professional boundary.

I think what makes boundary setting really difficult is if it isn't really clearly communicated from the outset. An example that stands out is around communication - so emails, phone calls. What can the client, what can your colleagues expect in terms of the frequency of these and your timeliness in terms of responding? That's - can be quite difficult to set those boundaries. But if you set the boundaries right from the start, it's easier to manage that.

The other thing to consider in terms of boundaries is the power imbalance between yourself and clients. And sometimes, it's a power imbalance between colleagues and yourself with a - in a more powerful position that dictates somewhat around expectations around boundaries in terms of what people will expect of you, just being mindful that that will have an impact. And so if you're feeling that people are being inappropriately close to you, you're feeling pressured into doing things that you feel uncomfortable about, then those are usually a warning sign that boundaries are being encroached upon.

And the last is around the practical supports around your boundaries and the ways in which you can recognise this with the support of your colleagues. So if you're questioning something and you've got a gut feeling that's telling you that the boundary is not appropriate or something's happening and it feels odd, then colleagues can be really useful, ones that are trusted, to talk to about a situation to get from them whether or not they think this is as an issue around boundaries.

A way in which you can tell if a colleague needs further support can be just observing differences in their behaviour in terms of how they're managing at work. It might be that they've become more irritable or they've become more isolated, they're not their usual selves. Often, it's not actually recognising differences in others that can be challenging. But usually, what's more challenging is that conversation about encouraging colleagues to get help.

Pretty much no one wants to be told, I think you need to see a psychiatrist, or I think you need to see a psychologist. So it's about drawing that out in themselves and getting the person to recognise the issues for themselves. That becomes personally more meaningful. But it also means that they're more likely to get help if they are struggling.

There are a number of ways in which you can protect your own well-being when working with vulnerable clients. One is around supervision. I mean supervision in the broadest possible sense. That can be quite informal. And it can come from colleagues that you respect in terms of their management of working with clients that are vulnerable or clients that might be seen as being difficult to work with. This support can help you manage that situation as best as possible and think about the strategies that you can - practical strategies that you can employ to help support that person.

Another important point is to consider practically what you can offer, the limits of what you can do in your own role, because sometimes, it can - you might feel quite powerless or you might feel that you have a job that's, more or less, impossible to do. And you have to think about the aspects of that work that you can do as best you can given the circumstances and what you're going to be able to do in your current role and vocation.

And finally, I think it's about pacing yourself and that you don't take on too much and that you consider what you do outside of work to manage this. So it's general things in terms of your well-being and health in terms of having enough sleep, having enough to eat, and having interests outside of work that help keep you balanced so that you're not unduly bogged down in some of the real nitty-gritty work that you might be having to do in terms of your paid work.

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Video 7  Mathijs on emotional boundaries

Most, if not all, legal professionals will work with difficult clients at some stage in their career. This could include clients with unrealistic expectations, clients who are rude and aggressive and clients who refuse to accept appropriate legal advice.

An important starting point is to assess why a client is being difficult. A client whose demands stem from being highly upset and feeling out of control in a difficult situation may need different treatment than a client who assumes they are entitled to certain treatment because of their financial position. Therefore, it is important to read both the verbal and non-verbal cues the client is demonstrating to assess the underlying emotions and feelings driving their behaviour. This can involve demonstrating empathy (see ‘Using empathy in communication with clients’) despite feeling frustrated or even angry with the client.

The table below shows some potential underlying causes that could be prompting difficult behaviours from a client, and highlights possible approaches to take to tackle this.

If a client makes a complaint about your work, it is likely that there are procedures already in place you can follow to deal with it. These tips may assist if you are required to respond and/or continue a relationship with the client:

A vulnerable client can be described as ‘someone who is at a higher risk of harm than others’ (Solicitor Regulation Authority, 2016). Many parts of the profession provide detailed advice and guidance on assisting vulnerable clients. Instead of replicating these, this section is focused on the emotional aspects of such work.

It is important to understand that people from different backgrounds may have had different and more negative experiences with the justice system and legal professionals, through stories from friends and family members and what they have seen through the media. Therefore, you may have to be sensitive when building trust, rapport and respect with people from backgrounds where there is a history of mistreatment and marginalisation. Some individuals may experience double marginalisation, such as women from ethnic minority backgrounds or sexual and gender minorities from ethic minority backgrounds. Likewise, some legal professionals are similarly subject to mistreatment or marginalisation based on their social identity categories (e.g. race, religion and sexuality), something highlighted in LawCare’s recent Life in the Law report (2021). Therefore, being aware and mindful of social identity categories and trying to be sensitive to individuals’ experiences of marginalisation is important for the wellbeing of yourself, your colleagues and your clients.

When individuals mention these negative experiences, they may be seeking validation by being listened to and to have their experience acknowledged, so it will help to listen and take the time to let the client know you are listening intently and will not in any way dismiss or denigrate their experiences. You should ensure that you are interested and engaged in what the client is saying, even if it’s a particular narrative that you have heard many times as you may cause offense to the client if you are not paying attention. Where further support could be beneficial to the client, you may want to signpost some resources like Samaritans and MIND at an appropriate time.

Continue to 3 Working effectively with colleagues.