Tony Reiss

Why Partners Continue to Underdelegate

Posted on 15 October 2013 by tonyreiss

The benefits of delegating are clear. Some of the main ones are that there is:

Learning, career progression and enhanced motivation for the juniors
Potentially lower costs to clients (or higher margins for firms)
Freeing up of partner time to do more business development or contribute other added value activities

But delegation is not happening to the extent that it should be. Just ask yourself what proportion of work currently done by partners could be done by more junior lawyers? It’s quite a high figure isn’t it?

Here is a typical list of what partners say when I ask them about why they don’t delegate more:

I don’t have anybody to delegate to – they’re not experienced enough
It’s quicker to do it myself
I prefer to do the work myself than spend my time supervising others
The client wants me to do their work

Here’s a list of what they usually don’t say, but I think are the underlying reasons for poor delegation:

I’d rather stay in my comfort zone and spend time working on matters (eg drafting etc)
I want my recorded hours to be impressive, because I’m concerned about my job security
It’s threatening to my ego to know that more junior lawyers can do what I do

So what can firms do to address this problem?

Change what you measure and how you reward partners. One firm introduced measures of matter profitability and circulated the partner league tables. It wasn’t the big billers who came top – it was the partners managing the bigger teams and delegating more of their work. At the same time, reduce the emphasis on chargeable hours as the main measure of performance
Introduce 180 feedback. So partners get upwards feedback on their management performance. This can be anonymised to encourage an openness of communication. The feedback can be delivered by a neutral person.
Provide delegation and supervision training. There’s an art to briefing somebody properly. Many of us, particularly if we’re somewhat stressed, miss out some key aspects of the briefing. We’ve found that it can be useful to ask the person being briefed what they’ve heard and what they’re going to do. This helps the person briefing spot any messages that need to be clarified or reinforced.
Introduce checklists/processes to act as guides for junior lawyers. If there are any anxieties about junior lawyers making any slips, why not provide them with more guidelines. It could be a very good use of any non-chargeable time to produce such checklists.

Many commentators believe there’s been a paradigm shift in the legal market. Clients will continue to be more assertive in the relationship. The smart firms are looking for ways of doing better work and offering better value. Getting better at delegating is part of the answer.

Posted in Leadership and Management, Managing Change | Tagged chargeable hours, comfort zone, delegation, fear, matter profitability, measure and reward, profitability, supervising, training | Leave a comment

It’s Different Selling to Women

Posted on 11 October 2013 by tonyreiss

Male and female brains are wired differently.

I’ve long had a sense that, to sell to a woman, it helped if I had a female colleague in the selling team. But I’d never analysed why. Deloitte has! The firm carried out some important research in B2B selling, which all suppliers of professional services should take note of. See HBR September 2013.

The key finding is that women buyers tend to see the occasions when presentations of proposals are given as opportunities to explore possibilities – while men tend to narrow down options and close in on a decision.

Insights from brain research show that the composition of men’s and women’s brains are different:

Men have 6.5 times more grey matter (better for processing information)
Women have 10 times more white matter (better for assimilating and integrating information)
The cord connecting the left and right lobes is 10% thicker in women

Other important findings:

Women are more sensitive to any gender bias – so anything that smacks of a patronising style (eg ‘don’t worry – we’ll take care of it’) doesn’t go down well.
Men like their buyer-power status to be acknowledged. Women don’t.
Women tend to consider the rights of others more.
Women prefer a cooperative, consultative approach to decision-making.
Women prefer to sit opposite so they can have face-to-face discussions. A man might prefer sitting alongside to confer about something.

Deloitte has introduced a training programme which includes helping their staff become more aware of gender issues when selling. They use actors trained to provide opportunities to practise building rapport (just as Sherwood does). If the female client comments on your tie, how should you respond?

I think this is useful research. It feels right.

With more women taking on more senior buyer roles, surely men need to get better at selling to women.

For more on the art of selling see https://tonyreiss.com/2013/09/12/pitch-perfect-a-new-book-to-help-lawyers-win-more-pitches/

Posted in Business Development and Selling, Coaching and Training | Tagged Deloitte, gender issues, rapport, research, sales training, Selling, training, women buyers | Leave a comment

Are Your Partners Business Savvy Enough?

Posted on 7 October 2013 by tonyreiss

Most firms recognise that they are too focused on transactions and not focused enough on long-term relationships. This blog article explores the issue using the Service-Value matrix.

The comfortable place for many firms is to be in the middle of the service-value matrix and that might be exactly the wrong place to be! This might mean that either the service is too ‘wishy washy’ from the client perspective or that you’re wasting money doing things the client doesn’t need!

According to David Maister, the Harvard guru, the three levels of value to clients are as follows:

Expertise – Major ‘you-bet-your-ranch’ legal work (eg serious litigation or major acquisition etc) where you need the best and the client is prepared to pay for it.
Experience – Some important aspects to get right and the client needs a firm with a good reputation, but also wants good value.
Efficiency – The client needs lawyers (begrudgingly) but it’s all relatively straightforward and wants the cheapest price and good service.

Looking at this from the firm’s perspective and the service type they can offer, I think there are three distinct offerings:

Partnership – the firm has close working relationships with the senior executives and is involved in strategic issues. The client might be treated as a ‘Diamond’ key account.
Advisory – the firm has a good working relationship with the client on specific matters, but is less well known in the boardroom.
Execution – the firms may be on a panel providing a low cost service on several relatively low value matters. Secondments of relatively junior personnel might be included in this category.

You might take a moment to consider where your firm is on this matrix. Most firms offer a range of service levels. You might offer defence legal work to insurers (Execution) and have a Corporate partner sit in on board meetings (Partnership). This is fine, though you create management and culture challenges when offering such a combination.

The art is to match the service to the value that the client is seeking.

Many firms would like to enhance the value of what they are providing. To do this, partners need to get better at being more business savvy. They need to earn the right to be at the top table and contribute value at a more strategic and business level.

So, how can this happen? Here are some suggestions:

Upgrade your research/knowhow/BD team to provide partners with the bullets they’ll need to fire. I advocate that partners need five topics of conversation with senior executives. Many of these will be based on sector issues (competition, legislation, tax etc) but some might just relate to the company itself. You’ll be unlucky if one of these doesn’t strike a chord and get you building a relationship with the C-suite executives.
Pick five – ten clients to have on a key account programme and draw up a plan with the client to develop a mutually advantageous relationship. Most firms write a client plan in isolation and best practice (based on a study I’ve done in other sectors) is to write a plan jointly with the client – after all, you’re looking for a win-win! Pick partners to run these key accounts who have the core skills for relationship building.
Train your partners in the art of facilitating discussions with senior people. It’s less about presenting and more about asking great questions, listening really well (not just to the words, but the meaning behind the words) and building consensus to take issues forward.

These initiatives should help you move into the highest value ‘partnership’ role in the top right-hand corner of the matrix.

This all presupposes that the client wants to be in a partnership with you – but that’s another article!

Posted in Business Development and Selling, Leadership and Management, Managing Change | Tagged 3E's, Advisory, Effectiveness, efficiency, Execution, Expertise, Maister, Partnership, Service, value, Value-Service Matrix | Leave a comment

Could Lawyers Run Meetings Better?

Posted on 2 October 2013 by tonyreiss

Otherwise entitled Meetings, Bl***y Meetings!

Some meetings are relatively straightforward to manage, for example those between just you and your client. Many other meetings are much more difficult to run, for example where you have you, your client, the other side and their lawyers all present. They’re even more complicated if the bank or other third parties are represented!

Chairing such meetings involves more than just managing getting through the agenda. The Chair needs to manage three strands of activity if the meeting is to be a success.

Content/Tasks

This strand consists of the ‘what’ of the meeting – all the data, facts and opinions about the subject in hand. Information will need to be exchanged. Budgets and timings have to be agreed. Documents need to be signed etc.

Method/Processes

This stream of activity is concerned with ‘how’ the meeting is conducted. For example:

How will the agenda be agreed?
Are the key points summarised and checked out before moving on?
How will disagreements be settled?
What are the ways in which decisions will be made?

In my experience not enough emphasis is given to these processes. By choosing the right ones, they can make getting the tasks so much more efficient and even enjoyable!

People/Feelings

This stream of activity is primarily concerned with the people in the meeting and the way they are dealt with. The trouble with people is they can have feelings! For example, about:

The other people in the meeting and the hierarchy
What has happened before the meeting or about the content of the meeting
The way the meeting is being conducted and about the role of the Chair.

The biggest danger, it seems to me, is that meetings involving lawyers can seem Chair-less. If it seems difficult to appoint a single Chair, it might help to appreciate that the role can alternate – be reallocated as you move through the agenda. But somebody should take responsibility for the smooth running of the meeting.

Having appointed one, the Chair must be careful not to be subsumed into the details of the tasks at hand. Otherwise the process and people aspects can easily go out the window! Then there’s the risk of meetings with lawyers being too long, boring and frustrating!

For more thoughts about improving the effectiveness of meetings, see:

Posted in Business Development and Selling, Leadership and Management | Tagged 3 strands, chair, feelings, meetings, people, process, task | 1 Comment

A Diagnostic to Assess Where Your Firm Really is on Quality

Posted on 1 October 2013 by tonyreiss

I was really proud when my old firm, Cameron Markby Hewitt (now part of CMS Cameron McKenna), became the first City firm to be accredited as an Investor in People (IiP). The standard helped us improve so many practices, particularly planning and investments in business development and training.

Lexcel has come along for law firms and the results are impressive with these benefits typically cited by users:

Better client care
Better procedures for risk management
Lower insurance premiums

Quality standards are taking off globally. A quarter of all ISO 9001 global certifications in 2010 were in China. Clearly many firms have benefited from working to quality standards.

So why my opening question? My belief is that the biggest danger when looking at quality standards is complacency. And I’ve been thinking about how to avoid it. Here’s one suggestion…

Ask your partners, associates and business support teams how well your firm performs typically, day to day, on a number of fronts. For example:

How well are teams briefed on new matters?
Are matters well planned and managed efficiently?
How well do teams work across practice groups and offices?

The answers can be pooled and thereby anonymised and management can get a clear view as to where their focus of attention should be.

Here’s a questionnaire to help you diagnose the weak areas and minimise the risks of complacency.

Posted in Business Development and Selling, Leadership and Management, Managing Change | Tagged complacency, diagnosis, quality, questionnaires | Leave a comment

Managing Matters for Profit

Posted on 30 September 2013 by tonyreiss

As clients are increasingly asking for fixed fees and driving these fees down, lawyers need to find more efficient ways of delivering legal services to ensure protecting their margins.

How can you do this?

I have recorded a webinar (available through MBL Seminars) in which I review the factors that affect the profitability of legal work. I explore:

What determines how much you can charge
What the costs are for delivering the service
The principles of effective matter management
What gets in the way of some lawyers being effective at matter management and what can be done about this

What You Will Learn

This webinar covers the following:

Matter Profitability – the Drivers and Influencers
- The factors that affect the profitability of legal work
- What determines how much you can charge and what the costs are for delivering the service?
- The elements that you have control over
The Principles of Effective Matter Management
- The benefits of good matter management
A Matter Management Checklist
- Whose job is it to manage the matter?
- What about when nobody has clear responsibility for tasks?
- What are the three areas that matter managers need to focus on?
- The key issues that matter managers need to keep an eye on

For signing up, see http://www.mblseminars.com/outline.aspx?progid=4461&Key=

For further useful blog articles on this subject, see

https://tonyreiss.com/2013/09/10/improving-profitability-using-a-simple-diagnostic-tool/

https://tonyreiss.com/2013/03/12/matter-profitability-plugging-that-leaking-sieve/

Posted in Leadership and Management, Strategy | Tagged fee pressure, improved profitability, matter management, pricing, webinar | Leave a comment

Quality – Does Your Firm Always Deliver?

Posted on 17 September 2013 by tonyreiss

I was really proud when my old firm, Cameron Markby Hewitt, became the first City firm to be accredited as an Investor in People (IiP). The standard helped us improve so many practices, particularly business planning and investments in training.

Lexcel has come along for law firms and the results are impressive with these benefits typically cited by users:

Better client care
Better procedures for risk management
Lower insurance premiums

Quality standards are taking off globally. A quarter of all ISO 9001 global certifications in 2010 were in China. Clearly many firms have benefited from working to quality standards.

So why my opening question? My belief is that the biggest danger when looking at quality standards is complacency. And I’ve been thinking about how to avoid it. Here’s one suggestion…

Ask your partners, associates and business support teams how well your firm performs typically, day to day, on a number of fronts.

How well are teams briefed on new matters?
Are matters well planned and managed efficiently?
How well do teams work across practice groups and offices?

The answers can be pooled and thereby anonymised and management can get a clear view as to where their focus of attention should be.

Download the questionnaire below to help you diagnose the weak areas and minimise the risks of complacency.

Posted in Business Development and Selling | Leave a comment

Ten Big & Easy Tips to Win More Pitches

Posted on 16 September 2013 by tonyreiss

PITCH PERFECT is a new book designed to help professionals win more pitches. These tips come from the world of selling and have been adapted for professionals such as lawyers, accountants, surveyors etc.

Don’t wait to be asked to pitch – instead, agree which clients you want and go about the process of meeting them. Impress them with your insights into their sector, their company and their strategic issues. Ask lots of intelligent questions.
Find out who’s responsible for selecting advisors. Sometimes we rely too much on just one individual who we hit it off with. There are usually others in the frame who will be important. You’ll need to meet them and impress them as well. Often there are still other people who may be influencers of the decision.
Find out what’s important to this client. What are their needs? There are different types of needs:
- Needs for the company (eg rigour/quality, timeliness, value for money)
- Needs for the key individuals (eg making their life easier, helping them look good)

The best way to flush these needs out is, again, to ask good questions.

4. Don’t just pitch by telling the client how good your firm is. Express the description of your firm’s offering in terms of benefits. If you want more clarity on this, consider the statement ‘We have an office in Brussels’. This is a feature of your firm’s offering. The client could easily think ‘So what?’. The best firms at pitching will explain why having an office in Brussels is a benefit to the client.

5. Don’t just explain the benefits – provide evidence. This makes your pitch come alive. This transforms your pitch from just words to helping the client touch it and feel it. This technique allows the client to know it’s true.

6. Have a project plan for producing the pitch. Too many firms end up rushing the preparation and have to have a back-of-the-taxi conversation before presenting. You’re unlikely to be at your best if you do that.

7. Show you really understand the clients’ needs in your proposal. And put this up front in the document. Again too many firms start off with ‘we have this…’ and ‘we’ve done that…’. This approach doesn’t build any rapport.

8. Be impressive and engaging. Know your stuff. This helps generate confidence in the mind of the client. Be engaging by listening really well to the client and showing that you’ve listened and understood what they’ve said.

9. Rehearse, rehearse, rehearse. Not just your inputs but the answers to their tricky questions. Take along your juniors who’ll be doing a lot of the day-to-day work. Clients will be reassured to meet them.

10. Be open about fees and give options. Many firms suffer from a disease that I call ‘price-itis’. The key symptoms are that they fear they’ll have to be the cheapest to win the work. Very few services in the professional services sector are bought just on price. Value is the key thing to focus on. Sell your services first and negotiate on price afterwards.

These tips and dozens of others are available in The BD Handbook for Lawyers – PITCH PERFECT, available on Amazon and directly from the publishers at http://www.troubador.co.uk/book_info.asp?bookid=2212

PITCH PERFECT – a new book to help lawyers win more pitches

Posted on 12 September 2013 by tonyreiss

I’m delighted to announce the arrival of my new book, written for lawyers to help you win more pitches. I thought you might like to see an excerpt.

I wrote the book because the smart firms are deciding not to wait for clients to invite them to pitch for work – they’re going out to present their credentials. Not only can this speed up the process of winning instructions, but it can also cut out competitors as well as save the firm the time costs of going through a potentially more rigorous formal pitch.

But pitching is not always succeeding as firms would like. Indeed the majority of pitches by law firms are failing. Many partners also find the process difficult. It can smack so easily of what some might see as aggressive selling.

Our analysis of pitch documents and presentations shows that many firms are not going about their pitches in the most appropriate way. In particular, firms are not tailoring their messages appropriately to each prospective client. Too much ‘we, we, we’ and too much ‘boiler plate’ content is frankly not very persuasive.

Whilst there cannot be a ‘McDonald’s formula’ where the same approach is sure to make the perfect hamburger every time, Sherwood PSF Consulting has developed a process and can provide some tips that can make your pitches less speculative. The five step Pitch Perfect process is summarised here. I also provide some examples of some successful techniques used by law firms.

The book is available on Amazon and directly from the publishers at http://www.troubador.co.uk/book_info.asp?bookid=2212

Meanwhile, here are ten useful tips to get you going…https://tonyreiss.com/2013/09/16/ten-big-easy-tips-to-win-more-pitches/

Posted in Business Development and Selling | 1 Comment

The Essence of Strategy is Choosing What NOT to Do

Posted on 11 September 2013 by tonyreiss

English: GFP expressing pyramydal cell in mous...

Use Start/Stop if no more neurons.

These wise words came from the great strategist Michael E Porter.

Look at it this way:

Can you spend even more hours in the office?
Are you only operating at 70% brainpower, with some spare neurons you can call on?
Have you got loads more energy available to give to work issues?

I’m guessing that for most people the answers are ‘no, no – though I accept there might be a few neurons tucked away on the creative side, no again’.

So this suggests to me that, to have the time and energy to start a new initiative, you’ll need to stop doing something else.

Easier to say than do perhaps. But surely a conversation with the boss is worthwhile along the lines of ‘In order for me to get buy-in to this initiative and see it through properly to completion, I’m going to need time and resources. Which of these other projects on my list can I put on hold?’

Start using the Start/Stop rule! It’s better to do a few things well than juggling lots of half thought-out projects!

For more on strategy from Michael Porter in HBR see http://www.ipocongress.ru/download/guide/article/what_is_strategy.pdf

Posted in Leadership and Management, Managing Change | Tagged buy-in, change, change management, energy, Michael E Porter, neurons, projects, start/stop | Leave a comment