We need structures that don't squash flexibility and creativity but minimize inefficiency and confusion.
We don’t want people to be interested in us as a means to an end, as a destination for their own purposes. We want people to be interested in us as fellow-voyagers, people who care about us enough to...
Warlord firms succeed when management keeps the big hitters happy and productive. The past and the future are not often items high on the agenda. Consequently, over time, the performance of extreme wa...
WHAT IS IT?The one-firm firm approach is not simply a loose term to describe a culture. It refers to a set of concrete management practices consciously chosen to maximize the trust and loyalty that me...
The solution for an individual firm must always address three perspectives in any organizational review: structure (how we are formally organized); processes (how different types of decisions are to b...
The firm exists to help its people succeed, not the other way round.
The attitude of exclusive professionalism (which restricts the label of professionalism to the advisor) manifests itself in a number of dysfunctional ways. It reinforces a misleading belief that the a...
Speak with expression, not monotonically. Use body language, eye contact, and vocal range. Show the client you have energy around the subject at hand. 5.
Make sure you’ve done absolutely all your homework on the client company, the client marketplace, and the client individual, and that it’s absolutely up to the minute. Even if you know them and their...
It is ironic that a business in which the serving of clients depends so heavily on interpersonal psychology should be peopled with those who believe in the exclusive power of technical mastery. And
I was amazed at how many fools I ran into until I noticed the common denominator in all those interactions: me. Why
Are there any topics I should avoid because they are too delicate to discuss in a large forum? • Are there any topics on which the views of your colleagues are significantly divided? •
A new $100,000 engagement can be very profitable, or be one that loses the firm a lot of money. Yet many firms reward partners for the volume of fees (top-line) that they bring in, not whether or not...
Success, no matter how you define it, is attainable only by persuading another person-a boss, a client, a colleague, a subordinate, a friend or loved one-to give you what you want.
Sincerity, the way we usually mean it, has to do with intentions; we assume it comes from within. But our clients have no way to observe sincerity except through external behaviors. From certain behav...
Profitability will not come from managing hygiene factors alone: Future profitability depends on health as well—and firms’ methods of measuring, reporting, and managing need to reflect both.
We try to elevate the empowerment of our people over the organizational niceties of structure and process except to the extent that those structural and process features work to empower our people
Make specific commitments to your client around small things: getting that article by tomorrow, placing the call, writing the draft by Monday, looking up a reference. And then deliver on them, quietly...
Less formally, we consider the time it takes someone to return a phone call, whether meetings are canceled or kept, and whether to-do lists are completed. Reliability