Not all clients are the same.

The legal counsel of a corporate client thanked me for the advice I gave. I thought it was very nice of this legal counsel as I was merely doing my job i.e. providing legal advice. The matter was pretty straight forward but it went back and forth a few times because there were various stakeholders to be satisfied. In the end, we managed to find an amicable solution.

This reminded me of a C-suite executive of another corporate client long time ago. That was a very different experience.

My team conducted legal due diligence for a corporate exercise for this second client. We requested for banking documents to check whether banks’ consents were required for the corporate exercise.

The banking facilities had been renewed, supplemented and amended over a long period of time. The documents provided to us were incomplete. We were trying our best to piece the documents together. Mr C-Suite Executive ranted about our request for outstanding documents. His subordinates told us not to copy him in the emails whenever we requested outstanding documents for fear of being scolded by their superior. I could imagine the kind of stress they went through daily when working with him. Needless to say, our efforts to ensure the client complied with the terms of its banking facilities did not get a word of thanks from him.

Many years later, another colleague who worked with him on another project told me similar encounter with him.

I suppose it’s all in a day’s work.

I try my best for all the work that come to me. However, polite and appreciative clients definitely make me want to go the extra mile for them.

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This post was originally posted on Linkedin on 11 February 2022. Follow me on Linkedin.