When I launched my law practice back in about 1994, one of my first purchases was Foonberg’s excellent book How to Start & Build a Law Practice. The advice given in Foonberg’s book is timeless and enduring. To this day I urge anyone who is launching a firm to buy and read this book.
One of Foonberg’s most important messages was to bill a client promptly, while it is still fresh in the client’s mind that you did a good job. Foonberg offered the concept of a Client’s Curve of Gratitude. Just working from memory the curve looked something like this. (Buy the book and look at the original curve as Foonberg drew it — it labels the various places on the curve in a much smarter way.) What Foonberg was getting at is that if you drag your feet and mail out a bill late, the client will long since have forgotten what a good job you did.
Our habit at OPLF is to try, when possible, to mail out a bill within one day of when the work got done. And it’s Foonberg’s book that inspired this.
Thank you. This is a very significant issue. RICK
I was fortunate to inherit a copy of not only the book, but the tapes (if one can find a player). What an invaluable resource.
Bill Richards
Patent Attorney