I find that I keep needing to repeat these points:
Here’s another email question I received. (By the way, I LOVE receiving them — it ensures that I blog about real-world topics of interest to at least ONE person!!):
Things seemed to have shifted since you wrote Managing the Professional Service Firm.
In that book, you described a world where it was the partner who was tasked with developing business. Today, in many professional firms, including the Big-4 accounting firms, it is dedicated Business Development Managers(BDM) who work hand-in-hand with the partners. I am curious to better understand how such a relationship works.
I currently work at a large IT manufacturer which, over the years, developed a services arm. Dedicated business development people (and even departments) are a lot more common in my industry, but over the years, a lot of people who came up through our services area have found their way into this type of positions at the Big 4 (and seem to have succeeded well.)
My current role at the IT firm services group involves developing and maintaining key relationships with six major accounts and setting the strategy or direction in how we work with them. While there are various sales representatives and specialists across the country working with various contacts, it my responsibility to see we all march in one direction and that we are providing solutions to these customers in a uniform or consistent fashion. The interesting, and sometimes challenging, aspect is that none of these folks report to me, but instead to the local company operations.
Are things now similar in Big-4 accounting firms?
In most professions, things have changed significantly since I wrote my 1993 book. Many professions (not just large accounting firms) have made significant transitions in getting organized for marketing, selling and business development, with marketing departments being established with significant roles, responsibilities and budgets. The teaming you describe is now a lot more common than it was in 1993.
However, I must report that it really is firm-specific, and can easily wax and wane. When the Big-4 accounting firms had large consulting practices, they successfully made a big transition to hiring dedicated salespeople who worked, as you say, hand-in-hand with the partners. In addition to people hired for sales activities, there was a sensible investment in marketing support, so that the firm could efficiently keep the partners informed (in real time) on industry trends affecting their clients. This teaming made it easier for partners to research their clients, prepare sensible proposals when needed, keep up to date, and allowed for wise allocation of tasks between specialists.
This teaming could and did work in some firms. However, when the regulatory environment changed (post Enron) and many firms sold off their consulting businesses, their commitment to marketing and sales teaming between the remaining audit and tax professionals and the marketing professionals sometimes was weakened. Some firms cut back their commitment to marketing and the use of marketing professionals.
The situation has also been “muddied” in the current climate. Many large accounting firms in the post-Sarbanes-Oxley environment have more demand for their services than they can handle. Marketing is now less about looking for new clients than it is about ensuring that key major clients are happy. This is EXACTLY the role you say you are now performing in your IT firm: co-ordinating activities for major accounts without having “formal” powers.
By the way, the same should be true in other professions like law firms, although there is still the common mistake that marketing professionals are more often used to hunt for new clients, rather than help in nurturing existing relationships. What you say you do in your current It firm is very sensible and important, but it is less common in some other professions.
You will obviously know that the role you currently play can be either very fulfilling or a nightmare: it depends on whether the firm you join is serious about (a) cross boundary coordination; (b) investing in client relationships and (c) teaming between partners and marketing professionals. As always, culture and seriousness of intent is crucial.
My advice is to tread cautiously. Some firms are serious about all three of these things (cross-boundary coordination, investing in relationships and teaming with marketing professionals.) When they are serious, it’s working very well. However, some other firms are only pretending. And guess who wins when the firm is only pretending? It isn’t the marketing professional.
I received this extensive case study from “NexLevel†who would really like our help to save him from bankruptcy. Please offer your ideas.
Your article, “The One-Firm Firm” addresses my current situation. I own a salon and spa in Texas. I acquired the business 18 months ago and have faced resistance to new strategies almost from day one. As you may know, most stylist / technicians wield power by threatening to leave and take clients with them. They are the rainmakers. Therefore, most salons are what you call “warlords†shops.
I fear I do not have much time in order to implement an employee development program. Attracting other rainmakers is difficult even though we offer full “back office” support. We provide assistants, front desk, bookkeeping, etc. They do not even sweep the hair clippings as we have a housekeeper on staff. With all of the above services, the stylists still want full commission (55%). Industry analysts show that salons cannot be profitable with payroll / commissions over 45 – 50%.
Clients are very loyal to stylists and very vocal in giving their opinions, likes and dislikes. I need to terminate one of the rainmakers for insubordination, but it will hurt cashflow so much that I would have to close.
The staffing model of the salon since the early 70’s has been to have a hair-stylist up front servicing clients at full commission. Support people were hired to work in the back, shampooing and applying color and perms, washing towels, sweeping hair, cleaning the bathrooms, etc. for hourly min wage + tips. In most salons, these tasks would be a part of the job.
The irony is that the stylist received full commission but do not have do all the work and resist contributing to the overhead cost of the assistants. They know it, the clients know it too. Until 6 yrs ago none of the stylists made a great deal of money. As others retired, they took on the clients of the retirees. Now they are making money, but have no loyalty to me.
The Company at one point was a $2.8 mil dollar business and could easily afford the overhead costs. Today, I can’t. With overhead payroll and commission, total payroll is 67% of revenues. We are in a high profile strip center and rent is $8400/mth for 3600 sf. We do $800,000 yr, but there too much going out the door.
Raising prices on the existing client base would be greatly help. However, the stylist will most likely resist as they did before. That battle started the riff leading to 2 employees leaving. We retained 100% of the clients, so we have a feather in our decision making management cap. All dissenters were proved wrong.
Stylists who are afraid that they will lose clients by raising prices do not understand supply and demand or their value to the market. They only want to work harder for the lower prices. And they do this because of the assistants that perform the time-consuming tasks that they do not pay a whole lot for.
This fear becomes arrogance if the stylist has sufficient clientele to support them going independent. They will then have to accept losing clients or work more hours because they are working all alone without assistants. If they pay an assistant they are in my boat and will not make the money they want.
Among the solutions I have considered are to budget and implement regular advertising and measure results to improve, implement aggressive recruiting and training program. With a regular flow of new clients and home grown employees, I, as the owner could always have foundation and build a firm, not just a collection of independent warlords. By the time the existing stylists begin to resist policy and process changes, I will have more stability and can manage the any insubordination or non-collaboration head on.
What advice do you have for “NexLevel?”
Marshall Goldsmith is a famous executive coach, who has worked with more than 80 CEO’s in the world’s top corporations. He has a fabulous new book out called What Got You Here Won’t Get You There. Actually, the title is not very descriptive, but the subtitle says it all: 20 workplace habits you need to break. It’s a content-rich, well-written book.
While Goldsmith warns against self-diagnosis, I found the list incredibly helpful (even though I am not and never will be a CEO.) The practical, real world advice he provides for conquering these bad habits is immensely useful. Here’s his list of bad habits:
Read the book. You’ll learn a lot about yourself, and how to improve (slowly.)
As a way to get our discussion going on this blog, let me ask all of you two questions about your bosses (not about you, but your bosses.)
(a)
Which of Goldsmith’s 20 bad habits would you say is the most damaging?
(b)
Which do you think are the most common?
Managing the boss is a critical skill that everyone needs to learn early in our careers, but most professionals neglect — to their regret. Once you master the art of managing your boss, you can enjoy your job more, experience less stress and ambiguity about your assignments, and increase your career success.
My latest podcast episode, entitled Managing Your Boss, explores specific suggestions to help you take more initiative and excel at your assignments to improve your work relationship with your boss.
In this episode, I am also pleased to include several excellent tips on managing your boss that were sent in by readers of this blog. I would like to offer a special thanks for their contributions to Arnoud Martens, James Cherkoff, Ken Hedberg, Liz Zitzow, Shawn Callahan, Brendan Connelly, and Kathleen DeFilippo.
Timeline
00:31 — Learning to receive assignments well
01:42 — 11-point checklist to clarify your assignments
06:21 — Tips from David’s readers’ on how to manage your boss
07:00 — ArnoudMartens: show respect
07:38 — Theimportance of taking initiative
09:19 — James Cherkoff: how to make your boss’s job easier
12:04 — KenHedberg: 4 tips on managing up
13:45 — Liz Zitzow: make your boss lookgood
14:50 — Shawn Callahan: match your boss’s communication style
15:30 — Brendan Connelly: commit to weekly status reports
16:03 — Kathleen DeFilippo: take responsibility
16:48 — A taking initiative success story
You can download Managing Your Boss or sign up to receive new Business Masterclass seminars automatically with iTunes or other podcast players. (Click here for step-by-step instructions on how to subscribe.) My seminars are always available for download at no cost.
I was just sorting through my paperwork and found this.
Last September, I gave a speech at a conference of professors from across central and eastern european business schools. One of my themes was about the importance of managers actually being interested in the people they manage. At the end of my presentation, one of the audience members handed me a note with the following Islamic saying:
Very often, we are concerned about our own welfare and the souls of others. It would be better if we would be more concerned about our own souls and the welfare of others.
I’m delighted to announce that in the 7th annual webcast award competition, my wife’s videocast blog startcooking.com, has been nominated as one of the five finalists for a “bloggie” in the category of best food blog.
Yesterday’s blogpost was about the politics one encounters as a consultant or internal advisor.
However, the truth may be that you can never get away from office politics, no matter where you work.
There are many people who tell you that you need to be careful what you say, who you say it to, and how your message might be perceived (or misperceived).
The advice they would give is to act on a first presumption of suspicion or distrust — that it’s the only realistic way to behave. Unless you’ve built a strong, trustworthy relationship with a person, you should assume (they say) that whatever you say will be rebroadcast (and potentially misbroadcast) to a wide variety of people.
Naturally, this would also mean that you should be very careful with emails and voice mails — you never know who some people will forward your message to, or blind copy.
They would advise you to “strategize†what you say at meetings and when.
How do you out there feel about this? I’m torn. On the one hand, I think it terrible to be this paranoid.
I also believe that starting with a lack of trust is likely to breed mistrust. Playing office politics may only serve to worsen office politics. And if you’re not very skilled at it, it might be a disaster to try.
On the other hand, CAN you be a non-participant? I’d readily confess that some of my worst career events came from not being very attuned to (or skilled) at office politics. (I wish I picked up on unsaid things faster!)
Tell me, please, is it it really this bad out there? Is office politics a key part of everyone’s life (not just the advisor’s)? If so, where do you go to get better at it? Is there a reading list?
In my consulting career, it is often the case that I quickly realize that I have been hired for more than just the purpose I’d been told. As a consultant, my clients often tell me they want help in developing strategies and systems to move the company forward on its declared goals. But what isn’t said is that, all too often, different groups within this company are at odds with each other and I am a tactic or a weapon in this battle (or worse, a war.)
In many, if not most consulting assignments (even many speaking assignments) it is apparent that, as a person who has an extensive written history, it is known that I already have many views on common issues. This means I am a threat to at least one group within my client firm, possibly to all sides. Since I’m already “on the record” on many issues, it’s hard for me to come off as impartial.
It used to surprise me, but I now accept that all business problems have “sides†or “positions.†Each department (marketing, operations, procurement) wants you to adopt their point of view and help them prevail. It works vertically, too. Management wants you to explain to “them†(the workforce) why they should go along with the corporate policies, while the juniors want you to help management understand why they (the juniors) are close to burnout.
The polarization doesn’t have to be between formal groups. In a majority of my consulting assignments, the battle is between individuals who just have different operating philosophies (hunters and farmers, for example) and who want my help in figuring out a way for them to coexist. (Sometimes they can and should, sometimes they cannot and shouldn’t)
All this real-world complexity must be addressed. I suspect that there is no such thing as a politically-insulated position for a consultant to be in. It’s ALWAYS about politics, and like it or not, you’re involved. (This is just as true for internal staff like HR and marketing. We like to think what we offer is our intellect, but really we’re all marriage guidance counselors — helping people live together.)
Even though I have decades of exposure to the realities of corporate politics and gamesmanship, I find it astoundingly hard to navigate my way through it. It requires muscles and skills in which I was not schooled. I never had a course in mediating, politicking, bargaining, shuttle diplomacy, representing people to each other. And I’m not sure I want the job of arbitrating other people’s lives together.
I’m not saying this is avoidable. It isn’t. It’s the normal human interplay of egos, diffrences in preferences and turf. It’s not often about logic, rationality, analytics, experience, frameworks and all the other things that consultants like to think are their stock in trade.
As I think Ben Franklin once said, you don’t persuade by appealing to people’s sense of reason, but to their interests.
As an advisor, I really have to ask myself what am I bringing to the table if I am working with smart people who are divided not by a lack of understanding (they are not missing facts, logic or conceptual frameworks.) What they are missing is agreement about how to run their joint (firm) affairs. And that disagreement is not driven by a lack of clarity, but a real difference of vested interests.
Take, as a relatively pure example, a fight over the design of a compensation system in a professional firm. Everyone can PRETEND it’s about it’s about the logic of which systems best promote the long-run health of the firm. However, the truth, 99 times out of 100, is that when a firm goes outside to get an advisor, they are looking either for a diplomatic mediator who can bring opposing sides to agreement, or (on occasion) one side is trying to hire a consultant who already agrees with them so that the internal battle can be fought.
All this raises some very interesting question for those of us who earn our living as advisors.
Do you HAVE to be a skilled mediator to be a good advisor?
What do you do if you’re not?
Is it OK to accept an engagement when you know you are being used as political weapon?
Is it ethical to accept an assignment if you think your work will lead to the break-up of that firm by proving to people that they shouldn’t be living together?
Is there ever a way to not be politically involved?
Is there ever a way to not have a political impact?
Update: this discussion is continued in a new post entitled Politics Part II.
Many people who say they want the benefits of romance still act in ways that suggest that what they are really interested in is a one-night stand — but it is clear that those who have a talent for building real relationships get more from the world. Building mutually-beneficial, mutually-supportive relationships is as important to your career as it is to your personal life.
My latest podcast episode, entitled Relationships and Romance, explores how to improve your personal and professional relationships with the Six Rules of Romance
Timeline
00:31 — Understanding Relationships
02:02 — Relationships vs One-Night Stands
06:18 — The Six Rules of Romance
06:37 — Romance Rule #1: Go First
09:01 — Romance Rule #2: Express Appreciation
10:35 — Romance Rule #3: Listen (for what’s different)
12:32 — Romance Rule #4: Keep Asking
14:36 — Romance Rule #5: When You Need Help, Ask For It
17:26 — Romance Rule #6: Show an Interest in the Person
19:46 — An Exercise for Improving Your Relationships
You can download Relationships and Romance or sign up to receive new Business Masterclass seminars automatically with iTunes or other podcast players. (Click here for step-by-step instructions on how to subscribe.) My seminars are always available for download at no cost.
