“I’m a solo marketer at a small firm and I’m hungry for the ‘big law’ experience. What do I need to be aware of with this career move?”

I love working with solo marketing and BD professionals who come from smaller firms. Why? They are typically resourceful, relationship-minded and client-centric professionals. They have also had to be solutions-focused in an environment with minimal marketing and BD leadership, and with little to no resources under and around them.

But I find some of the small firm solo marketing professionals in my network feel that they may not have what it takes to go up against their bigger firm peers. And yet, many big law firms seek out skills unique to smaller firm candidates.

There are certainly pros and cons to working in both small and large firms. As an eternal optimist, I focus on the pros, but I am aware of the cons. After this, my best advice to the solo marketers seeking a bigger firm is to leverage the things that make you different to your competition (not the things that make you the same). Firms like different. They embrace that perspective and seek it out. And, if you are a great cultural fit for them, then it often does not matter what size of firm you are coming from.

As a person who spent her early years in smaller firms before also getting hungry to work in the bigger firms, consider this as you contemplate your ‘big law’ move:

• As the solo marketer, you will have likely either set, or helped to set, the strategic direction of the marketing and BD effort at your firm. Think about all the consensus building you had to do for that. Use this example when interviewing to show your input and influence.
• Think about what resources you have had to use to help you do your role. For example, some of the administrative professionals, or outside vendors, or firm consultants. You will have helped to manage those people. You can talk about your skills in delegating and managing on a shoestring budget to get results.
• Consider which partners you have worked with. (Likely all of them.) From named equity partners to executive committee partners to junior partners. Each has a different focus and a different set of BD goals. Working within all of this shows you can flex your style and capability and then execute for different causes. 

​

As you all know, professional services marketers and BD’s love to share and learn. In that spirit, I’ll be continuously updating this post with common challenges and solutions that I hear from my network. Check back each month for new ideas.

 “I lead the marketing team in my firm and I struggle to keep my senior BDs challenged.”

Proactively managing team members is a hard nut to crack. Not only does your management style has to change and resonate with each individual team member, you have to do this on top of your day to day technical remit. Here’s two tactics to help ensure your senior BDs are engaged and challenged:

(1) Add to their duties a responsibility around client relationship management. Specifically, empower them to have their own relationships with the firm’s clients as a means to enhance the client experience overall. Some senior BDs and their firms then feel comfortable introducing revenue targets around new business that is brought in as a result of these relationships. Apt senior BDs ready for this challenge love the client facing role and responsibilities and feel like they are contributing to the firm at a much higher level.

(2) Give them their own team or people to manage. Odds are you have too much on your plate already, so let the tier below you take some of that burden. Managing people requires a different skill and leadership capability that your senior BDs can learn from you and sharpen as they get more comfortable. 
 
 “We’re hiring a BD professional, but the candidates we’re seeing don’t have enough ‘true BD’ experience.”

The words “business development” mean something different in each firm, and sometimes even to different people in the same firm. There are also numerous ways BD is practiced and executed. For example, the preparation of proposal documents versus responsibilities around bringing new clients into the firm. Often, the gap between the candidates and hiring manager expectations is related to different definitions of the catch-all term “BD”. As a hiring manager, you need to specifically spell out what the role entails to attract the type of BD-focused professional you’re seeking. Consider these two tips:

(1) In the job description, explain the proportion of time that will be spent on each task and get specific about this apportionment. Additionally, try to define what you mean by BD. This tells the professional applying to your role exactly where the time will be spent, and that it will – in your case – be spent on true BD initiatives and projects. True BD professionals will be drawn to a role that shows it has true BD.

(2) Look at the potential of the BD professional in addition to what they have done. What I mean by this is just because a candidate hasn’t done something you were expecting, doesn’t mean that they can’t do it. Consider what happens if you hire a candidate who can do your role perfectly, where is the challenge in that role for them? Similarly, do you have the capacity in that role to expand it and grow it to accompany the candidate’s learning curve? 

“I’m a solo marketer at a small firm and I’m hungry for the ‘big law’ experience. What do I need to be aware of with this career move?”

I love working with solo marketing and BD professionals who come from smaller firms. Why? They are typically resourceful, relationship-minded and client centric professionals. They have also had to be solutions-focused in an environment within minimal marketing and BD leadership, and with little to no resources under and around them.

But I find some of the small firm solo marketing professionals in my network feel that they may not have what it takes to go up against their bigger firm peers. And yet, many big law firms seek out skills unique to smaller firm candidates.

There are certainly pros and cons to working in both small and large firms. As an eternal optimist, I focus on the pros, but I am aware of the cons. After this, my best advice to the solo marketers seeking a bigger firm is to leverage the things that make you different to your competition (not the things that make you the same). Firms like different. They embrace that perspective and seek it out. And, if you are a great cultural fit for them, then it often does not matter what size of firm you are coming from.

As a person who spent her early years in smaller firms before also getting hungry to work in the bigger firms, consider this as you contemplate your ‘big law’ move:

• As the solo marketer, you will have likely either set, or helped to set, the strategic direction of the marketing and BD effort at your firm. Think about all the consensus building you had to do for that. Use this example when interviewing to show your input and influence.
• Think about what resources you have had to use to help you do your role. For example, some of the administrative professionals, or outside vendors, or firm consultants. You will have managed those people. You can talk about your skills in delegating and managing on a shoestring budget to get results.
• Consider which partners you have worked with. (Likely all of them.) From named equity partners to executive committee partners to junior partners. Each has a different focus and a different set of BD goals. Working within all of this shows you can flex your style and capability and then execute for different causes. 

​

Firms share with me each day what is happening inside their marketing and business development teams. The conversations have changed subtly over the last couple of months in particular. They are noticeably less about the technical aspects. Firms are looking for professionals who can achieve results inside of a partnership model with other valuable skills. Below I share four common themes that are emerging and are fast becoming key influencing factors to firms as they grow their business development and marketing teams further in 2019:

• A client centric approach. In the past, business developers have been hidden behind the scenes. They focused on helping their partners talk to clients about the partners’ subject matter expertise, trying to find areas that resonate. Now, business developers are heavily ingrained in the efforts of the clients of the firm and are leading client growth efforts with targeted, subject-matter driven questions and strategies to help clients problem solve their business needs. This means active listening to the firms’ clients to create a tailored dialogue. For senior business developers, this includes them having their own relationships with the firms’ clients to bring in new revenue streams.

• From order taker to innovator. Partners have shifted their mindset from what they want and expect from their business developers. For the most part, they are recognizing the specific and different expertise of their business developers and are asking them to contribute this expertise to their client growth strategies and challenges. This is different to the days where business developers were hoping to simply convince partners that they had to do BD. Partners of firms now see the value of business advisors and generating fresh ideas from client interactions (see above), to proactively issue-spot and problem solve. BDs aren’t reacting to partner-driven leads, they are instigating opportunities.

• Overcoming obstacles and achieving outcomes. Having marketers and business developers who don’t get caught up in politics or red tape, and who can quickly and easily find ways to get the important priorities achieved, are – quite simply – irreplaceable in firms right now. Let’s face it, sometimes partnerships can be challenging environments. Similarly, finding a way to cut through the busyness (a problem common to everyone) is critical to achieving outcomes. Put simply, there’s value in people who “get things done”.

• A cultural fit. The right type of BD professional who matches your team and your firms’ work ethic, value system and personalities are still right at the top of the list for firms when they hire. I’ve seen time and time again where firms will hire the professional who is a better cultural fit. If the cultural fit is right, everything else can be taught and learned. A cultural fit stays for the long term, whereas an ‘on paper’ fit will typically move after one to two years.

Why? Firms who hire based on the above typically experience a better and longer-term fit. Similarly, candidates who bring these elements into a role are quickly and effortlessly integrated, and soon become higher performers.
​

Happy new year one and all!

Like many, I find the new year is an ideal time to do some reflecting and reassess your professional – and personal – life and milestones.

For me, 2018 was an immensely satisfying year professionally as my business KHS People took off. I had the privilege to work with some wonderful and insightful clients and market leaders. And, my network never ceases to amaze me. Every candidate I work with allows me the opportunity to continue to learn and grow. And for that, I thank you.

Secondly – and on a more personal note - in 2018 my husband and I welcomed our healthy, happy and beautiful baby girl. She is a true joy to be around and inspires us each day. As with every new parent, figuring out a healthy balance with work and home life is a challenge. But it’s a challenge we are pursuing and are up for.

For those of you who know me well, you know that I’m an eternal optimist. And in that spirit, I’ve developed a short check list to help you kick start your new year.

Take yourself out for a coffee, read these bullets, and think and reflect. Similarly, I’m happy to discuss any of these with you over a coffee or a call.

Professional services marketing checklist for January 2019:     
        

• What did you learn in 2018 and how are you going to leverage that in 2019? If you’re not learning you’re unlikely to be growing and developing. Marketers must be constantly growing.
• Does the size and composition of your team adequately match the level and type of work that is being produced? Think about your team and who is doing what work and why.
• What skills gaps do you have that you want to dedicate some time to this year? Be honest with yourself and address what you need to. Its not a failing, it’s simply a development point.
• Is the vision of your team being fulfilled? Now is a great time to re-evaluate leadership’s vision and put that into action. Remind your team of that vision and where they are headed.
• Update your resume. This is for both internal and external use. You never know when you will need it, and you don’t want to forget all the good things you’ve achieved and accomplished.
• What professional relationships need nurturing? What team members or partners do you need to work a bit harder – or differently - with? Put in the time to work on these relationships.
• What projects allowed you to be successful last year? Figure out a way to continue to seek out those types of projects to keep showcasing your expertise. 
• What personal activities make you happy? Ensure you incorporate them into your busy work weeks. Both professional and personal projects and goals are equally as important to each other.

Make 2019 a different year. Strive for something you didn’t think possible. Set those goals and take all the satisfaction in the world when you achieve them. And remember to have fun. May 2019 be a truly fulfilling year for you, your teams, your firms, and your families.

Have you ever written a marketing or business development job description (JD)? If you are a hiring manager for business development and marketing roles, then the answer to this question should indeed be ‘yes’.

Now ask yourself: Is your JD an effective marketing tool? One that communicates with impact and is on-brand? If not, it’s a missed opportunity. I outline some do’s and don’ts to help you answer ‘yes’ again.

Don’ts:

• Putting everything into the JD. Seems intuitive, but in fact it sends a message to the reader of the JD that you don’t know or understand what the priorities of the role are. Additionally, it can send the message that the team is not well staffed or structured so everyone in the marketing and BD team does everything.
• Churning out the previous JD. Chances are the role description will be similar to its previous version (assuming it’s not a new role), but it won’t be exactly the same. Responsibilities and team members change constantly. Ensure to revise and update the JD each time you’re recruiting for the role. This refresh will help both you and the candidate you’re trying to attract.
• Being too specific on the qualifications for the role. If you list a certain amount of years or a specific degree that this person has to have, then unless that is set in stone, list these criteria as being flexible. For example, I’ve seen very good and capable candidates be turned off a role because they don’t have the “JD preferred” or they have 9 years’ experience rather than the “must have 10+ years experience”. Many candidates do take these requirements literally.
• Sending an unbranded or word JD. The JD is another marketing opportunity for your role. Take a moment to brand it with your logo, font, colors and style. And always PDF this document. It should only take 15 minutes. And it sharpens the document and elevates it to a new level.

Do’s:

• List the priorities of the role. List the top 3-5 priorities of the role over the first 12 months, and no more. This piece tells the reader you know exactly what the role will be doing. And the candidate’s expectations are managed. If you don’t yet know this information, challenge yourself: are you truly ready to recruit for the role?
• Include information about the greater team. Most organizational charts are confidential documents, and I’m not advocating you reveal them in a publicly available JD. But do provide some context around the role. This can include where it sits in the team, who it reports to, and who it will have reporting into it. Geographical locations of team members are also helpful to people, particularly if you’re recruiting in a satellite office.
• Virtual collaboration and travel. Most marketing and BD teams are geographically dispersed across numerous offices. Include some brief information on how the team collaborates and discusses projects given these geographical challenges. I get asked this question by just about every candidate I work with currently. It is a reality and candidates simply want to know how this works in your team – especially for sole managers in a satellite office. It might be as simple as saying how frequently the team catches up virtually or in person (or both).

Some bold ideas:

• State the salary range. Some will disagree with me on this point. But I’m a firm believer in being transparent on the salary range. You know the range, so state it. In this tight market and with the change in salary history laws continuing to come into play across the US, this piece will affect hiring managers more and more. It saves you a lot of time wasting at the end if everyone is not on the same page. Additionally, it makes you think and ‘rank’ your candidates according to where they fall within that range, which you should be doing as a matter of course in any event.
• Write with personality. Yes, JDs are formal documents. But that doesn’t mean they have to be boring, or ignore your team’s culture. This is a chance to recruit a new colleague, so capture who will enjoy working with your team for the long term, and market it accordingly.

I personally love writing and collaborating with clients on JDs. They are an opportunity to frame and shape a role that will have a lasting impact in your team. They make you think critically about your needs, the team structure, and how best to deploy your team. Take the time to get them right, and they will pay dividends down the road.

Updated 9.19.19

You will have likely seen the recent news that the unemployment rate in the US is at record lows. The current unemployment rate is 3.7%. To give you some quick context, five years ago at this time, it was 7.3%. Post-financial crisis it was almost at 10%.

Regardless of your view on whether these low unemployment rates are a positive or a negative on the economy, this tight market certainly affects our pocket of the world. It is much harder for firms to find enough quality BD and marketing professionals.

Below I share some insights for both firms and candidates on how to deal with recruiting good quality BD and marketing professionals in this tight market. Both perspectives are equally important, and different insights apply whether you’re recruiting or being recruited.

For firms:

• Waiting for people to notice your role? Some market conditions allow firms the luxury of being passive when they are adding to their BD and marketing teams. If there are more great candidates than open roles, typically a passive approach still means you can miss a large percentage of candidates but still be successful. That is not true now. My best advice to you given the current tight market is to find a way to proactively and purposefully go out into the market and recruit the right person for you.
• Move quickly and purposefully. Executing efficiently is even more necessary in a tight market as other firms typically have the same hiring needs as you. Waiting too long to secure the best candidates will likely see you missing out on good people. Consider these tips: plan out the interview meeting process and don’t let it run over 2-3 weeks from start to finish, don’t involve people who are too busy to quickly and meaningfully participate, and, know which of your interviewers have upcoming time away from the office (and plan accordingly).
• Manage your candidate. Frequent and purposeful communication with your best candidates will keep you constantly tapped into their timeline and what else they are dealing with (read: other pursuits or offers they have). You want to be fully informed and ready to move quickly when you need to. Ideally, you want a relationship with your best candidates. Frequent check-ins and updates are a great way to achieve this status with them. Remember that other firms have these practices and candidates are influenced by this.
• Be good to those who already work for you. Are you at risk of losing your top BD and marketing professionals? Think about which BD and marketing professionals in your current team are likely to be approached in this tight market. Do you have a good read on who is fulfilled, challenged and, ultimately, happy? Are you looking after your top performers? If its been a while since you talked about these issues, now is the time to address these questions with your team. They are likely being approached by other firms and you should be nurturing them and letting them know their value in your team and your firm.

For candidates:

• Know how to handle a recruiter call. You’ll likely have to deal with recruiters calling you. And it helps to know a few quick, effective and professional ways to handle these calls. Like any professional reach out, a quick response goes a long way. Whether that response is to express your interest, or to let the person know you are happy and not looking for a career move at that time, people appreciate your engagement. And, if you feel you’re being unnecessarily bugged, simply say “Thank you, I appreciate the call, I’m not looking to consider a move for at least two years, so please note that going forward”. You can control the level and amount of interaction if you wish to.
• Leverage the situation, but beware. As a BD and marketing candidate, you know your immense value in this market, and you know you are currently highly sought after. Most savvy people leverage this situation, particularly when it comes to salary negotiations. But be careful here. Firms have competitive ranges they work with, and they know when someone is over-priced. Firms do get turned off (and remember) when you set the salary bar too high.
• Ask the right questions in interview meetings. In these market conditions, it’s easy to be flattered. If you are entertaining a role that a recruiter or firm has reached out to you about, ask the right questions. You need to know if the opportunity is right for you and the right next career move; versus entertaining the role because it is easier to be flattered in this market. Consider these questions: find out more about the senior leadership at the top of the marketing and BD team, find out about the cultural aspects of the team, the likelihood (and prior history of) internal promotions, people management responsibilities, and a thorough breakdown of the technical components to ensure you are both on the same page.
• Don’t move just because its easy to. One of the first things I ask a candidate when they’re looking to move is: why? Keep in mind that you have invested so much in your current role and firm, and the first thing you should be looking to do is to seek out internal promotion opportunities if they exist. Now, if those internal opportunities don’t exist, it’s a different conversation. But, moving just because the market might be friendlier to you, in my experience, doesn’t get you where you’re going any faster.

​
Summing up     
 
Whether you are recruiting, or being recruited, there are different factors to take into account in this tight market. Deploying a few easy and quick methods to adapt to this market is key. And, importantly, if you as a firm or a candidate need help with these factors in this market, your search professional knows how to handle these issues on your behalf to still generate a successful search or career discussion.

Best practice recruiting involves two things: a sound strategy, and good execution of that strategy.

Earlier this year I outlined an approach to ensure best practices are applied when recruiting the interpersonal roles of professional services marketing and BD people. I now share some key factors to help implement that approach.
​
Recap on strategy
             
By way of a quick cap, an effective best practice recruiting approach to attract the right marketing and BD professionals includes:  

• Conduct meetings, not interviews
• Plan out the meetings
• Set your candidate’s expectations
• Include the key people from the start
• Have one meeting out of the office
• Ask questions that give you the right information

 
Effective execution

Here are some ways you can ensure effective execution of this approach. Keep in mind that all of these require only minimal planning, and will ensure a seamless, sophisticated and thorough interview meeting process for all involved:

• Assign different questions and discussion points. There will likely be marketing and BD team leaders, HR professionals, and partners all involved in these meetings. Whoever is coordinating the touchpoints with a candidate should assign different questions and discussion points between these people. This ensures candidates aren’t being asked the same question multiple times throughout. And importantly, you can learn more about your candidate as each question will have a different focus, allowing you to gain a complete picture of the candidate.
• Consider the logistics. Consider any interruptions to the meeting process. For example, who is going on vacation and can’t participate, who is traveling to other offices and will be hard to reach and follow up with, and who is simply too busy. Plan this going in, and then talk to your candidate about the logistics and timing.
• Who is assigned with the follow up. Someone needs to take the lead on communicating with the candidate. Particularly when there’s marketing, BD, HR and partners all involved, often everyone assumes someone else has the lead. The candidate deserves to have a central point of contact and also to understand where they are at in the process. I see too frequently candidates getting disengaged from the process as the firm forgets to do these simple updates. And that’s when candidates will look to other firms who do have these best practices in place.
• Interview training. Most people don’t conduct interviews as a part of their daily lives. Particularly partners in law and accounting firms. When people are not used to conducting interview meetings, they can be unnatural or overly formal. Others mask their own unfamiliarity with either aggressive tactics or by talking too much. The role of the firm here is to prepare people who will be speaking with the candidate on how to conduct an interview meeting. It should involve these things: information gathering, information sharing, testing on technical abilities, and cultural alignment discussion points. Attempting to ‘catch the candidate out’, or proving you know more than them aren’t conducive to an effective interview meeting.
• Formal v informal. Hopefully time permits for you to have one interview meeting out of the office. Mirror the circumstances of these meetings with your style. For example, an in-office formal interview meeting will naturally be more structured. An out of the office coffee meeting should be deliberately more casual, trying to build rapport and get a sense of who the candidate is as a person. Find out what they do outside of work, what community efforts they’re involved in, what sports they like to play. All of this tells you more about the candidate and who they will be each day in the office.
• Share as much as you ask. Candidates often have just as many questions as you do. They have thought at length about the potential of the opportunity (and how it fits with their personal career goals), your team structure, the firm leadership, and the future goals and trajectory of the firm. Don’t make the mistake of thinking these meetings are just for you to gather information. Purposefully make a point of allowing a good amount of time to ask them what you can share with them.

 
Summing up     
 
Interview meetings, and the whole process of conducting these meetings, is not easily done. There’s planning, logistics and effective execution to all happen at the right time. But importantly, you, at your firms, have to judge a candidate and make a call about whether they are right for you while they are doing the same in return. If you follow this approach and execute effectively, this hard decision does become a little easier. Make it as easy as you can: arm yourself with the right information and plan accordingly, involve the right people, and ask the right questions. You will then feel fully informed to make the right decision. 

Co-authored with Trisha Daho, Founder & CEO, Empowered

What confounds Managing Partners?

In so many conversations that we have with accounting firms, law firms, and similar professional services firms, managing partners seem confounded by a series of challenges affecting their firms:

• How do we grow sustainably and create a powerful brand presence in our market?
• Once we have a strategy, how do we make sure it’s implemented well?
• Who is going to do all the work to make sure we are accountable as a firm to our vision?

Stopping the cycle

Many firms, even smaller to medium sized firms, have contemplated how to best attract the clients they most want. They get training on business development, they go out into the market, and they hustle to put into practice what they have learned. Sometimes. Until they get busy. And then, marketing and business development fall quickly off the table for a while. By the time most firms come up for air, they are hitting another dip in revenue growth, and the cycle starts all over again.

In order to create sustainable, long term, vibrant growth, firms (no matter how small), need to focus on creating a brand that is clear, desirable to key target clients, and executed with precision and diligence. Few firms manage this to an outstanding degree. But it is absolutely possible and the best firms have already figured that out. It all starts with a strategy. 

The importance of strategy

Firms must create a strong and compelling vision, one that speaks to every single stakeholder. Clients, of course, but also targets, networking partners, alliances, and their own team. This can seem daunting, but with the help of a strategist or management consultant, firms can determine how to communicate a vision that sings directly to their ideal clients and targets.  

Once a firm creates that vision, the work of living it begins. This means creating a strong brand presence in exactly the right market. Most firms see this phase as “marketing,” but it is so much more than creating a website and some marketing collateral. In professional services firms, every single person, from the janitor to the managing partner, must be living a clear, consistent brand for that firm every single day. The firms that do revel in their successes, and experience exponential growth. Those that don’t, flounder. And because most humans tend to focus on what they are extremely good at most of the time, those of us in professional services firms don’t focus on making strategic decisions about how to live our brand. We’ve got billable hour requirements, after all. 

How to move this forward

So, what to do? Hiring an expert who can knowledgeably drive the bus on execution is a powerful tool for professional services firms of all kinds.  But you have to do it in the right way for it to make a real difference in your results.  

For example, if you hire a marketing director or manager and then give that person no real authority to do a great job, it’s going to a be a giant disaster. The firm leadership must be comfortable with full empowerment to these people in these roles, especially with leading the strategic marketers that they hire. If this doesn’t happen – put simply – firms are wasting their dollars on these valuable assets. One of the most common reasons we see why senior marketing professionals leave their firms is because they lack the necessary authority and empowerment to do what the firm has asked.

If your firm is committed to creating a role for a person with the muster and acumen to execute a clear strategy, partner with the top brass of your organization on evolving that strategy over time, and inspiring the execution of that strategy by everyone in your organization. Then you really will have a powerhouse.  

You’re creating history in your firm

Think about this: When you’re hiring this powerhouse with the strategic vision required for your firm’s future, you’re creating history in your firm. And the effect of this is more so when you’re a small or medium sized firm. What you’re doing actually sets the scene for years to come. The pressure to get this right, and to get it right on the first try, is huge. You’re hiring someone who will set the pace and progressiveness of the overall marketing function.

Taking this one step further, you’re hiring this powerhouse to set the marketing culture in your firm. Many have (unfortunately) experienced a negative firm culture and know all too well the long-lasting effects a bad culture can have on the day-to-day reality and perception of working and living in a law or accounting firm.

Creating the right effect
​
The effects of a good or bad marketing professional can be felt more significantly in a smaller firm. First-time Marketing Directors have a big role to both curate and create. But both big and small firms always struggle when hiring the wrong person at any level of the marketing ladder.

The most important consequence is that the firm partners and leadership lose confidence in the marketing function and what it should be. They ultimately back away from investing in the function because they ‘have been burnt’ and are not sure how to course correct. Common consequences we see on this include creating a marketing culture that is only reactive in nature, a ‘yes’ machine, or a function that wrongly resembles something that is more administrative or junior in nature than it should be. More junior marketing roles often are administrative in nature, but the senior roles can and should be far from this.  Again, without a real and executable strategy, and without understanding what the end game looks like, this can be an expensive debacle.

Firm leadership is often not equipped with the knowledge to empower their senior marketers; so, they partner with a consultant or search professional to know what to look for and – importantly – what it should look like in their own firm.

How important is partner involvement?

Partners need to be involved from the very first steps in adding to or implanting the marketing function. This function should report into a marketing savvy partner who can advocate and help them in their success. The most senior marketing professionals in a firm need to have the eyes and ears of the firm leadership so as to help with accountability, empowerment and progress.

Partners must also get comfortable in hiring these powerhouses who they can learn from. Counter-intuitive to some, but absolutely necessary to give the authority to these worthy leadership roles.

Is resistance inevitable?

Given we should know all of this, why is there still some resistance from partners when working with marketing professionals on implementing and setting the marketing strategy? Is it because this function is still not a bona fide function of the revenue of the firm? Or is it that unless and until marketing roles are considered and remunerated with equal importance as the billable hour, they will always take a back seat?  

Whatever the justification, these perceptions must change. Business minded and client centric professionals – as marketing professionals are – have cemented their value in most firms. Firms and their partners who resist this are risking the future of their firms and undermining the value these respected players have earned.

In conclusion
​
These issues go to the very heart of your firms. It affects their structure, their culture, and their future. Non-accountant and non-attorney roles in these firms are here to stay and are gaining momentum at a significant pace in most large and global firms. The most successful firms already know this quite clearly. Hire the right professionals to help you get these leadership roles right from the start, and then enjoy the rewards. Trust us, they absolutely come.

As featured in the Chicago Daily Law Bulletin on July 19, 2018

Attorneys and accountants are undergoing a seismic shift from being technical specialists to business problem-solvers. Professional services marketers — like Esther Bowers, Director of Client Service Initiatives from Barnes & Thornburg LLP, and Brian Duffy, Regional Sales Leader, Midwest market, at Grant Thornton — are helping their firms accomplish the former. Below, they share their perspective and advice to others facing this challenge.

The need to be client-centric

Attorneys and accountants are trained to be technical, subject-matter specialists. They advise and provide counsel on specific issues and are trained to solve a specific problem or mitigate a specific risk.

These specialized technicians are now being challenged to apply their expertise in a new way: to become more generalist in their approach, and to be a “business solutions provider” who can predict, analyze and solve a client’s business need, ideally before the client knows it is an issue.

They have to change the way they brand and describe what they do, both internally within their firms and externally to their clients. What they do has to speak to and resonate with their clients — who are the ones demanding this change — not just to an attorney’s or accountant’s own insider language.

Being a business solutions provider is what these technical professionals must be. This is a profound shift for most attorneys and accountants. And few are making the shift with ease.

Role of marketers in this change

As a professional services marketer, you are primed to help your technical professionals be a business solutions provider. One of your main roles is to help them refocus to be client-centric and help them achieve that status.

Barnes & Thornburg is a law firm with nearly $400 million annual revenue, more than 1,000 personnel and 14 offices in the United States.

Bowers was one of a few chosen professionals to lead and instill client-centric efforts. This has seen Barnes & Thornburg through higher and consistent revenue growth than many of its AmLaw peers, despite a mostly flat market for legal service buyers.

Bowers said the key to this success is offering clients practical and holistic problem-solvers who are successful because they are “asking, understanding and then communicating the client’s business and legal objectives and keeping them front and center with everyone who touches that client.”

Grant Thornton is an audit, tax and advisory firm with $1.74 billion annual revenue, more than 8,000 personnel and 59 offices in the United States.

Duffy contributes to the firm’s go-to-market strategy and how a one-firm approach is part of instilling a client-centric approach.

He said his professionals need to be “problem-solvers for their clients’ most challenging issues. Whether it’s compliance (i.e. they don’t have a choice) or about strategic and organic growth, we must distinguish ourselves in the marketplace and assist in managing threats and risks within their business.”

Being client-centric is not a choice, it is the way attorneys and accountants need to behave in order to keep their clients and attract potential new clients.

Bowers points out that a “team-based and collaborative approach with the firm provides the best opportunities for client institutionalism.”

Duffy notes that they’ve moved beyond fee discussions with their clients, to a place where clients “trust us as fiduciaries of their money” to be out in front of their business challenges and help them avoid potential risks.

While some firms have already completed this transition, few empower their marketers to be an active participant on that client account. Simply maintaining or reacting to a potential client need or lead is not the same thing as helping to steer and control the experience a client has with the attorneys or accountants.

How can we move this forward?

Duffy said that at Grant Thornton it is about instilling a behavior: “On the journey to get to that point of trusted adviser status with our clients, one thing we do and instill in our people, is the importance of being engaging listeners. We teach them to ask thoughtful questions that are relevant to their business and their challenges.”

He said anyone can have a pleasant conversation about something generic. But there’s “an art to being conversant in relevant topics and tying that back to their business.” This behavior is now part of the Grant Thornton culture and helps with its one-firm approach at the frontline with clients. This allows the firm to deliver to their clients the best resources in the firm to address their needs.

Bowers says that Barnes & Thornburg have similar practices, and transparency from both sides is fundamental: “There is an overwhelming need for both firms and clients to share more information and have enhanced communication to deepen relationships.

“The two groups desire more collaboration but the first step is greater transparency which can lead to innovation and solutions.” This practice allows each side to share, learn and ask the right questions to achieve the client-centric model.

She said this means that a “client management approach includes understanding the primary drivers of value for specific clients and what we are doing to deliver.”

Practical takeaways

What does all of this mean for professional services marketers?

Bowers offered this:

• Have a holistic, team approach. Educate and empower everyone at the firm to be focused on the client’s business and creating solutions that contribute to meeting their business objectives — this is what enhances the overall “client experience.”
• Leverage firm resources and talent. Think outside of the day-to-day services your firm provides, and offer flexible solutions, resources, technology and data that your clients need to advance their goals.
• Check to see if it’s working. Conducting value audits and having an accountable feedback loop, which all ties into individual and firm performance, is essential to maximum effectiveness.

Duffy offered this:

• It all starts with the firm culture. Instill, encourage and reward behavior that digs in deep and creates a culture of client-centricity.
• Learn from your efforts. Learning from the firm’s overall efforts, which includes the wins and the losses, is an essential piece to constant course correction.
• “One firm” — clients don’t think of the numerous segments or practices that form a firm. Nor should they. When speaking to and asking questions of a client, it has to be a one-firm approach.

And I’ll add this for the marketers who are less experienced than Bowers and Duffy:
Whatever approach or practice resonates with you and your current environment, you can always rely on certain questions to help shift an attorney’s or accountant’s mindset to refocus on client-centricity. Help your attorneys and accountants with these ideas:

• Become more knowledgeable about your client’s business plan. Get them to share this with you and get your key professionals in the room when they are having strategic sessions on this plan.
• Facilitate issue-spotting and problem-solving. Asking open-ended questions without knowing the answer creates uncertainty: You may not know the answer or be able to solve the dilemma. But that is not the point of this task. The point is you are learning about their business and its challenges.
• Know who your client’s top business advisers are. And this can involve introducing other professionals to your client so they have business solutions providers from a range of services.

​
Being a business solutions provider is the next frontier. You, as professional services marketers, are perfectly positioned to help your attorneys and accountants reach this client status.

On June 28, 2018 I had the pleasure of discussing professional development for business developers and marketers as part of the Legal Marketing Association's regular Podcast. This Podcast was done in conjunction with the May/June 2018 issue of the LMA's Strategies magazine.

In this Podcast, I discuss everything from what firms want from their business developers and marketers to today's current trends and unique challenges legal marketers face with this task. I also contrast this to professional services business developers and marketers in both the accounting and A/E/C sector.

​To listen: http://blog.legalmarketing.org/podcast-episode-32