Is client onboarding actually working for your team?

At a high level, it’s expected to be a clear, structured process – one that allows matters to get started efficiently and with confidence.  

But for many fee earners, the reality feels very different. 

While client onboarding may look simple on paper, the day-to-day experience of managing it often tells another story. It’s not necessarily the complexity of the work itself that creates challenges, it’s how that work is structured, delivered, and managed in practice. 

What onboarding looks like in practice.

In most firms, onboarding sits alongside everything else fee earners are responsible for. Unless there is a dedicated new business team managing it, it becomes part of the day-to-day workload – something to fit around active matters, client communication, and deadlines.

Instead of moving through a clear, joined-up process, it can often feel more fragmented: 

• Switching between tasks rather than following a single flow 

• Chasing missing or incomplete information 

• Repeating requests when something hasn’t come back correctly 

• Working across multiple systems that don’t fully connect 

Individually, these steps may seem small. But together, they create friction. What should be a straightforward starting point can quickly feel harder to manage than expected. 

The hidden impact on time and focus. 

Much of this work happens in small moments, quick follow-ups, checking details, switching between systems. 

But over time, it adds up. 

Focus is broken, time is lost, and momentum becomes harder to maintain. Instead of onboarding supporting the start of the matter, it can begin to slow things down before the legal work has even properly begun. 

Why it often feels this way. 

Client onboarding processes are typically shaped around compliance, risk, and operational requirements – all of which are essential. 

But the experience of using those processes every day isn’t always considered in the same way. 

As a result, something that works in theory doesn’t always feel efficient in practice. Steps may be correct, but not always easy to follow. Systems may exist but not always connect. Communication may happen, but not always in a way that supports the overall flow. 

Even where technology has been introduced, the experience doesn’t automatically improve. Tools can help, but only if they work together in a way that feels clear and consistent. 
 

Adapting to the process. 

Over time, fee earners adapt. 

They find ways to keep things moving – following up earlier, double-checking details, or managing parts of the process manually. While this helps in the moment, it can also mean inefficiencies become part of the routine. 

And because onboarding still “gets done”, the experience behind it isn’t always questioned. 
 

Why this matters. 

The internal experience of onboarding has a wider impact than it might seem. 

When it feels slower or more fragmented, it affects how work flows through the firm. It puts pressure on workloads, makes it harder to maintain consistency, and can influence how quickly matters get moving. 

It also shapes the client experience, often more than expected. 

And because onboarding happens right at the start, it sets the tone for everything that follows. 
 

A moment to rethink the process. 

Onboarding doesn’t need to feel like this. 

The challenge isn’t what needs to be done – it’s how it’s brought together in practice. 

That’s exactly what prompted us to look more closely at the experience from enquiry to onboarding for law firms and their clients. 

If any part of the process feels slower, more manual, or more fragmented than it should be, it’s worth taking a step back and looking at it differently. 

Download our guide today to explore the experience gap in more detail.