Jim Calloway has had numerous lawyers tell him they didn't realize what clients experience until they hired an attorney themselves. One of those so testifying suggested to Calloway, director of the Oklahoma State Bar management assistance program, that every law student should have to become a client on some matter. "It would turn out a better crop of lawyers," he says.

Michael Belleau can relate. The training, learning, and development manager at Taft, Stettinius & Hollister in Chicago, and formerly of Winston & Strawn, Belleau once hired - and then fired - an attorney for a real estate transaction that was a bit more complicated than usual because it involved documents for a construction loan.

Why the parting of the ways? "He did not use e-mail, and you could not leave a voicemail," Belleau says. "His secretary had to write down a paper copy of your message. It was extraordinarily frustrating. The reason it was set up this way was because it was convenient for him, or he was comfortable with the process. The experience of someone like myself wasn't taken into consideration," he says.

"Why should it be in the legal profession that you should have to call and schedule an appointment and then wait three weeks to see if I can help you and what it's going to cost?" Calloway says. "It's basically [about] sitting in the client's seat." Learn tips for creating a client-centered practice in the November Illinois Bar Journal and at a live noontime webinar on Tuesday, December 1.