Your firm’s reputation isn’t shaped by your best work. It is shaped by the inconsistent moments that clients remember most. One variation in service quality can unravel years of trust.
In professional services, consistent client service is essential for firms to successfully innovate, evolve or scale with profitable growth. Clients expect a seamless, predictable experience across every touchpoint in their customer journey. Yet too many firms overlook the critical role of client experience consistency and service delivery consistency in driving loyalty, referrals, and a sustainable pipeline of work.
“It is often said that if you want consistent quality service start with consistency,” says Matthew Lee, partner at Beaton. “The guru of quality management W. Edwards Deming emphasised the importance of consistency as the first step to delivery quality.”
This article explores how to deliver consistent client service, the risks of inconsistency, and the systems, feedback, and roles that can make or break your firm’s reputation.
Why consistent client service delivery matters
Beaton’s two decades of research into client preferences shows a clear pattern: firms that deliver consistent client service are the ones that achieve the highest overall ratings from clients.
Our annual Beaton Benchmarks survey gathers direct feedback from tens of thousands of clients across Australia and New Zealand, asking them to rate firms on a wide range of attributes tied to the client experience. The result? There’s a clear link between service delivery consistency and client satisfaction, as shown in the charts below. The higher the satisfaction score, the lower the standard deviation in service consistency tends to be.
Our research finds firms with higher Overall Client Service (OCS) scores tend to show a much lower variation in how their service is experienced – meaning clients know what to expect and trust they’ll receive it, every time. On the flip side, firms with widely fluctuating service quality – ranging from excellent to poor – see much lower satisfaction. Because inconsistency kills confidence.
“We know that higher levels of client experience drive client satisfaction. This becomes a virtuous cycle that impacts growth, cost to grow and loyalty. But as Deming said, start with consistency,” Matthew Lee adds.
The relationship between consistent client service and scalability
Keeping client service consistent can be like keeping a family home neat and tidy. It becomes harder to keep the house in order during times of growth or change. Especially when life gets stressful, and the family members are busy. In firms with large numbers of staff, divisions and offices, there is a risk that groups within the firm begin to operate in fiefdoms. As David Maister, a leading authority on the management of professional services firms, describes it, these fiefdoms begin to act as “firms within the firm”.
How does this situation arise? In their early growth stages, many professional services firms thrive on a high-touch, personalised service delivery model. Teams go above and beyond to tailor their services to each client’s needs. Relying heavily on individual effort and manual processes may work for a handful of clients, but it quickly breaks down as the firm expands.
We know that higher levels of client experience drive client satisfaction. This becomes a virtuous cycle that impacts growth, cost to grow and loyalty. But as Deming said, start with consistency.
Growth breeds complexity.
As the firm adds new people, offices, service lines, and teams, maintaining a consistent client experience becomes harder. This is when cracks start to show. Teams begin to operate with decentralised autonomy, developing their own ways of delivering services and interacting with clients. Clients who engage with different parts of the firm may receive different levels of service – this is a clear sign that client experience consistency has been lost.
Firms that successfully scale without sacrificing quality have one thing in common. They prevent the fracturing by building systems and cultures that reinforce consistent service delivery. We explore these further below.
The danger when client service is inconsistent
Inconsistent client experiences, where service quality varies between excellent and poor, can significantly damage a firm’s reputation. Beaton’s, as well as many others’, research shows dissatisfied clients are more likely to share their negative experiences, overshadowing the positive efforts of other teams within the firm.
When one team delivers brilliantly while another drops the ball, clients get a poor impression of siloed teams working separately within your firm. These internal silos shatter the client experience, weaken relationships, and open the door to your competitors who offer greater reliability.
Our research shows a high correlation between inconsistent service and dissatisfied clients. This finding is borne out not only in business-to-business (B2B) professional services but in business-to-consumer (B2C) services: Salesforce found 75 per cent of customers desire a consistent experience, regardless of how they engage a company (through social media, in person, by phone, etc.).
In the worst-case scenario, clients who receive an inconsistent experience will choose to leave your firm, opting for one of the many competitors that abound in the professional services market today. This is a problem because losing clients is incredibly costly – while on the other hand, retaining them is a key driver for profitability. Research done by Frederick Reichheld of Bain & Company (the inventor of the NPS) has shown increasing client retention rates by just 5 per cent can increase profit by 25 per cent to 95 per cent.
Factors that cause poor service delivery
1. People inconsistencies
In professional services, your people are your product – so when internal inconsistencies arise, the ripple effects on the external client experience are immediate. High staff turnover is a major risk for client service inconsistency. It breaks continuity and forces clients to have to re-explain their needs, eroding trust and causing frustration. Inconsistent training, skills gaps and low employee engagement should also raise alarm for firms as they are symptoms of people inconsistencies that can frustrate clients.
2. Inadequate communication and handovers
Related to the above, service breakdowns frequently occur during transitions between team members, departments, or phases of a project. Without a clear client journey map and defined handover points, details get lost and the service quality drops – especially in larger, multi-disciplinary firms or projects. This is understandably frustrating for clients, who spend a lot of time developing relationships with the firm and their point of contact, only to have to re-explain everything.
3. Leadership problems
Leaders who sit in “ivory towers”, who are out of touch with their teams and removed from day-to-day realities can breed inconsistency. Ineffective leadership can send mixed signals, shifting priorities week to week, and usually results in employees not walking the talk when it comes to equal service standards. Teams aren’t sure what’s expected and that’s when they start working as “firms within the firm” operating on their own rules. To your clients, the customer journey feels anything but seamless.
Consistent leadership is the spark that drives consistent client service – when leaders set clear expectations and model the behaviours they want to see, teams follow suit.
4. Lack of standardised processes
Shared systems, templates, and agreed ways of working across teams or service lines are fundamental for delivering a smooth, repeatable client experience. A lack of these things can be worsened by technology failures or gaps, or an absence of strong culture and strategic goals. When things inevitably go wrong, there’s no clear process or principles to fall back on. This is a major risk to your brand as clients expect the firm to act as one, not a patchwork of disconnected units.
5. Lack of client feedback loops
Firms that don’t actively seek or act on client feedback miss valuable insights into where the inconsistencies lie. They cannot identify issues early and resort to reactive problem-solving. Feedback, in our experience and research, is one of the most impactful ways to correct and improve your client experience to iron out inconsistencies.
If clients provide feedback at a transactional or project level firms will know when to adjust processes to drive consistency but also to more promptly feedback remediation actions.
6. Poor (or non-existent) key account management strategy
Without a strong key account management (KAM) strategy to foster consistent communication and client relationships, responding in a tailored way to your most important clients’ needs tend to fall through the cracks. Different teams might duplicate work, deliver conflicting advice, or miss opportunities to add value. From the client’s perspective, this feels chaotic and disjointed – it’s a clear sign of inconsistent service delivery.
7. Cultural misalignment
Modern clients are very aware of choosing firms that have strong environmental, social and governance (ESG) principles. If your values are all over the shop, they will likely take their business elsewhere. Making matters worse, when your teams don’t share cultural values, they will often be resistant to feedback or improvement – making change or correction much harder.
8. Over-reliance on individuals
Consistent client service requires systems, not just star performers. Yet many firms depend heavily on key individuals to manage relationships and deliver value. This poses a high risk for your client service consistency. When those individuals are unavailable and no one else can step in, there are inevitable gaps in communications and a feeling of dropping standards for the client.
9. Rapid expansion/larger sized firms
Plenty of large firms tell us having many staff, divisions and offices makes consistency well-nigh impossible. Indeed, firms that experience rapid growth before they have repeatable standards and processes in place may find client service consistency more difficult. However, it should be noted this is not just a challenge for large firms. In some smaller firms, we observe differences in service culture between departments, offices, and even between floors in the same building.
10. Acquisition without a clear plan for integration
Mergers and acquisitions are one of the biggest threats to your client service consistency if there’s no clear strategy for integrating systems, processes, and culture. Without alignment, newly combined teams often continue operating as separate entities – leading to conflicting client experiences, duplicated work, and confusion. This siloed way of operating prevents opportunities to cross-sell and upsell to clients, denying a research-backed method to boost the client experience by consolidating services.
How to maintain and improve client service consistency
Former PwC CEO and Chief Executive Partner of MinterEllison Tony Harrington summed up the secret to consistent client service by making sure uniform high standards applied across “every touch point with every client by every PwC person every day.” Committing to client experience consistency doesn’t come from having a well-known firm name or ambitious partners in your team – it comes from firmwide culture.
Research into the service profit chain has found culture – not size – has a significant impact on client satisfaction. Firms should pay attention to ‘how things are done’ – setting standards and adhering to habits that keep the family home neat and tidy.
In firms where everyone knows what good service looks like – and is empowered to deliver it – consistent client service delivery becomes a shared standard rather than just a lucky outcome. These firms build habits and rituals that keep the client experience calm, consistent and always of high quality. Most of the top-performing firms have clearly defined client values, which are often written into a client service charter.
Leaders model the behaviour they expect, and internal teams serve each other as well as they serve external clients. They listen through structured feedback collection and handling processes and act on what they hear. Most importantly, they measure client experience regularly, using real data to stay on track.
Key success factors for service consistency
In our experience, these are the key success factors that consistent, high-achieving firms display:
- Clear client values backed by explicit behaviours (e.g. a client service charter)
- Leaders who consistently walk the talk
- Staff treated like clients to model expected service standards
- Proactive complaint handling that listens and acts
- Regular, objective measurement of client experience
The critical role of feedback in ensuring consistent service delivery
Delivering consistent client service requires visibility. Visibility across teams and departments but also visibility over what clients are experiencing, from their point of view. This is where regular, structured feedback systems are critical.
Real-time feedback collection systems provides visibility by helping identify potential service consistency issues early – before they create chaos for your clients. Sending scheduled surveys at key points in the customer journey (from onboarding to midpoint and project completion) can help you keep a live pulse on how clients are experiencing your firm at every stage.
“Building a consistent feedback process not only engages your clients in the service improvement process but in account planning and innovation,” says Lee. “If clients provide feedback at a transactional or project level firms will know when to adjust processes to drive consistency but also to more promptly feedback remediation actions.”
Using consistent survey questions and scoring frameworks, you can quickly identify which teams or offices are underperforming and where client experience consistency may be slipping. Your system must ensure that once problems are flagged, they’re acted on immediately. This builds trust and loyalty.
Tools like Beaton Debrief make this process easy and scalable. It helps you collect data and bring to the surface recurring patterns of inconsistency that may go unnoticed internally.
The role of key account management (KAM) in service delivery consistency
KAM programs build reliability and trust into the client experience by coordinating effort seamlessly across teams. Central to this is the use of detailed, evolving account plans – these are living documents that align internal resources, outline client goals, and track delivery performance. A strong KAM strategy utilising account planning serves as a roadmap for client service delivery consistency and ensures that no matter who in the firm is interacting with the client, the experience is aligned and seamless.
“KAM programs align whole-of-firm capabilities with client needs using several strategies that include closed loop feedback programs,” says Lee.
“Our Beaton research shows that breadth of service delivery drives loyalty. The more of your service lines a client uses the more likely they are to demonstrate loyalty. Over time, strong KAM strategies build greater trust and loyalty.”
The best KAM models integrate structured client feedback, using insights gathered over time to refine their approach and stay aligned with client needs. Check out the Beaton KAM program here. When done well, KAM doesn’t just manage key clients: it elevates the entire client experience, creating a foundation of customer journey consistency that scales with your firm.
Conclusion
Consistency isn’t about perfection, it’s about predictability. Clients want to know what they’ll get, every time, no matter who they speak to or which office they’re working with. That level of reliability is what separates high-performing firms from the rest.
By embedding clear service values, investing in feedback systems, empowering leaders, and aligning through strong KAM programs, your firm can turn consistency from a pain point into a competitive advantage. Because in the end, your growth will be defined not just by how good your best people are – but by how consistently great your client experience is.
Complete a free self-assessment of your key account management (KAM) strategy here.
Try a free trial of our client feedback survey tool Beaton Debrief here.
For help enhancing your clients’ experience, check out our CX transformation services.
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