Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
Sector Strategy & Collaboration in Professional Services
224 Plays16 days ago
In this episode of Shortlisted, Dr Heidi Gardner and David Harvey explore how professional services firms can use collaboration and sector strategy to drive real growth. Drawing on their research and hands-on experience, they reveal what makes a sector-led approach succeed and how firms can avoid turning it into a branding exercise.
They unpack the cultural shifts that enable smart collaboration, the practical steps BD and marketing teams can take to turn strategy into daily behaviour, and how leaders can judge whether investment in sector programs will deliver meaningful returns. Heidi and David also discuss the leadership styles, governance structures, and partner engagement required to build momentum and overcome internal resistance.
Credits: Music by Grand_Project from Pixabay
Produced by Kwame Slusher Audio
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction to the Shortlisted Podcast
00:00:00
Speaker
Sorry, at the risk of sounding a little judgmental. I think it's a terrible, rotten idea. I mean, that's just not going to work if the partners don't have full ownership of this. And if they're not willing to change their behaviors to deeply embed this kind of advisory relationship, ah where are you going to? i mean, you're you're your you' marketing people who are then going to do what exactly?
00:00:23
Speaker
You're listening to Shortlisted, a podcast from Seldon Rosser, the leading executive search firm that connects professional services firms to the best leadership candidates in business development, sales, marketing, and communications.
00:00:36
Speaker
This podcast is dedicated to helping ambitious leaders in professional services build high-performing, market-leading firms. I'm Graeme Seldon. And I'm Katie Rosser. And in each episode, we bring you candid conversations with leaders who are driving growth and innovation in their fields.
00:00:52
Speaker
Be it leadership and strategy to talent management, client development, marketing communications, or cutting edge technologies, including AI. We explore the key areas that contribute success in today's competitive landscape. So if you're in a leadership role focused on growth, then Shortlisted is your go-to resource for actionable insights and inspiring stories.
Aligning Culture and Business Strategy
00:01:15
Speaker
Welcome to today's episode. We're joined by two leading thinkers and practitioners in professional services strategy and collaboration, Dr. Heidi Gardner and David Harvey, joining us from the US.
00:01:28
Speaker
We're exploring how firms can align culture and business development strategy to truly win work and grow. And our springboard is their co-authored Harvard Law School case study on Hogan-Lobbles' strategic shift to a sector-led marketing and client service approach.
00:01:44
Speaker
But we'll also broaden the discussion to what these lessons mean for professional services leaders right now in a world of increasing complexity, client expectation, and cross-sector opportunity.
00:01:57
Speaker
So our guests are Dr. Heidi Gardner, who's a distinguished fellow at Harvard Law School Center on the Legal Profession and previously a professor at Harvard Business School. She co-founded the research and advisory firm Gardner & Co.
00:02:11
Speaker
and is the author of more than a hundred books, chapters, case studies and articles, including the Washington Post bestseller, Smart Collaboration and its sequel, Smarter Collaboration.
00:02:23
Speaker
Having lived and worked across four continents, she brings deep empirical insight into how professional services firms succeed by breaking down silos and building collaborative advantage.
00:02:35
Speaker
We also have David Harvey with us today, who is the principal and founder of Harvey Global Consulting, bringing more than two decades of experience in legal marketing and business development for leading law firms.
00:02:49
Speaker
His focus is helping firms build sector programs, strengthen BD discipline and translate strategy into measurable growth. David also regularly hosts BD forums for CMOs and BD leaders globally, bringing current insights into what drives success in today's competitive professional services market.
00:03:10
Speaker
So great that you're joining us. Welcome to the podcast, Dr. Heidi Gardner and David Harvey. Thank you. Great to be with you. so nice to have you with us. Now, just want to set the scene. You've collaborated together on articles and conferences, and and it'd be really great just to hear how you met and when you decided to work together.
00:03:29
Speaker
Oh, wow, Dave,
Sector-Led Marketing Approaches
00:03:30
Speaker
you're going have to take that one. I'm afraid I don't even know. Sure, I do remember we were working together when I was with OREC. So i was I was in charge of one of the sector programs at OREC, and that is a pretty well-known US West Coast oriented firm, really good in tech.
00:03:50
Speaker
And the the managing partner there decided that he wanted to have a very focused sector program. So they actually only have three sectors that they focus in on.
00:04:01
Speaker
And so I was introduced to Heidi by our CMO at that time, and we started working together. And one thing led to another, which led to a Harvard case study, which led to then the Hogan Lovells case study.
00:04:17
Speaker
And we've been collaborating ever since. Yeah, it's been great fun. I mean, yeah, thanks for that reminder, Dave. i couldn't I couldn't pinpoint where it all started because it feels like we've been working together for ages and we've done client work and writing and research and ah your CMO roundtables, which have been a massive success. And so it's been so much fun to to to work together in all of these different ways.
00:04:40
Speaker
It's great that you're both here to talk to us about specifically about the case study around Hogan-Levels. We're going to start there, but we will broaden out from there. But let's let's look at that case study. So that the Hogan-Levels case study showed how a firm can re-engineer the way it goes to market around sectors.
00:04:57
Speaker
And what
Importance of Industry Language and Thought Leadership
00:04:58
Speaker
do you see, what do you both see as the core principle of a truly sector-led approach? And do you consider sector strategy to be critical success marker for professional services firms today?
00:05:10
Speaker
This was a Harvard Law School case study that we published, and we were drawn to writing the Hogan-Levels case study because it exemplifies so many of the principles that we just think are so core.
00:05:23
Speaker
I mean, to begin with, it's entirely client-focused. The best sector programs, Start with the understanding that clients increasingly see themselves as consumers of sector or industry intelligence and trend information and so forth. And i think the best law firms really dive into a sector program because they understand that they can add so much more value to the clients.
00:05:51
Speaker
and And that's really the hallmark is when it starts with the client. It doesn't start with what can we sell more of. It starts with how do we serve our clients better? And and that's, I think, the most important thing.
00:06:03
Speaker
Yes. And I would add, I think it's part of a larger trend for attorneys to be trusted advisors as opposed to just reactive, which was sort of the old style.
00:06:15
Speaker
So that means, you know, really getting deep into the industry expertise of those clients that they're working with. And that means having industry language fluency is what we call it.
00:06:27
Speaker
So that if you
Benefits of Smart Collaboration
00:06:28
Speaker
know the industry, you can speak their language. Right. And theyre the clients are looking for that. It also means from a thought leadership side, um getting ahead of the clients.
00:06:40
Speaker
in terms of having a strong point of view and helping to lead them to see around the corners. Some of the other things you know that we see are really strong commitment to being structured in the right way to support the effort and also actively managing client relationships in that sector, in those particular sectors.
00:07:03
Speaker
Great. And Heidi, your research into smart collaboration has shown how culture determines whether strategy succeeds. So what cultural shifts are essential before a firm can genuinely operate in a set-to-led way?
00:07:18
Speaker
Absolutely. I mean, our our research is really clear that when firms or groups like sector groups engage in smarter collaboration, in other words, they bring together the right experts at the right time, no more, no less, um in order to tackle complex problems, that it results in a host of advantages.
00:07:38
Speaker
you know, we've measured profitability and revenue increases. We've read we've measured customer loyalty, client satisfaction. We've measured um a whole host of talent-related outcomes, like the ability to attract and retain ah the top talent.
00:07:55
Speaker
And so
Building on Sector Strengths
00:07:56
Speaker
we know that smarter collaboration, working across the traditional silos in an organization, is absolutely essential. you know When it comes to the sector approach, that is really the nexus of where practice groups need to collaborate.
00:08:13
Speaker
right you know It's funny, Dave and I have seen examples in a range of different kinds of of professional firms where ah the firm will claim that we have you know a transportation sector, but it's really one guy in one, you know, legal domain or consulting domain who serves, you know, a few airlines.
00:08:34
Speaker
That's not a transportation sector, right? and And so the the the the hallmark of a truly well-functioning sector program is the ability to work ah across these different practice groups to do what Dave was talking about, you know, create a strong point of view, a well-rounded um perspective that doesn't just solve today's problems, but has a strong future focus to it as well.
00:09:01
Speaker
Yeah, I would just add that from the cultural standpoint, it helps if there's already some of this bubbling up within the firm already. So, for example, with Hogan Lovells, what we saw going back 10, 15 years is that there was a core group focused on the automotive industry.
00:09:20
Speaker
and they were in Munich, and they were meeting regularly, and they were starting to talk about those issues. So that ended up being sort of an and exemplar for what happened as Hogan-Levels took on other types of industry efforts.
00:09:37
Speaker
um So if your firm already has some of that happening, um if you're already known for a particular industry, then that's a great place to start and a good way to help transform the firm more broadly in terms of taking that ah sector and industry approach.
00:09:55
Speaker
Absolutely. One
Integrating Sector Knowledge in Law Firms
00:09:56
Speaker
of the things that we find about a sector approach is that for many people, it's what they're passionate about, right? So, I mean, there are some people who just love tax law, right? But there are other people who are really passionate about a sector.
00:10:11
Speaker
You know, for my first book, Smart Collaboration, I remember interviewing a partner and he worked in the fast-moving consumer goods, specifically coffee. And he, you know, right?
00:10:22
Speaker
He woke up. What did he say? I wake up every day and smell the coffee. Right. And he he you know took his family to visit coffee plantations around the world. I mean, he was like full on into this.
00:10:34
Speaker
And we found so many people in writing different case studies or doing our our work with clients. you you know One woman jumps out at me. She said, you know I became a lawyer because I'm a gearhead.
00:10:44
Speaker
you know All I wanted to do was to buy more cars and you know get deeply immersed in the automotive industry. And she ended up as, i think, co-head of their automotive practice, their ah their automotive sector, rather.
00:10:58
Speaker
And you know this is where passion comes in. People are excited about an industry, they have, you know, a hard time if somebody asks them, oh, and you know, the reading material on your desk, is it for for work or for fun? And they say yes, because they're so into the the sector. And I think culturally that really comes through when people have that kind of you know, beyond interest, the real passion for the sector.
00:11:25
Speaker
It's really interesting what you're talking about, because you're talking about the sort of fear and ah the lawyer side of that the passion coming from the lawyers themselves. What we've seen on our side as marketing and BD recruiters is that often a firm goes to market and says, right, we now need to go on a sector strategy.
00:11:43
Speaker
We need to start bringing people from sector to come into the law firm and do business development. So let's hire somebody from automotive. Let's hire somebody from pharmaceutical. Let's hire somebody from tele telco.
00:11:55
Speaker
But often, i would say in more than 50% of the cases, it doesn't work because there is this real cultural ah mismatch between people coming from ah sector like automotive and going into ah highly political matrix-based organization like a law firm. So it would be really interesting see.
00:12:16
Speaker
given that you specialize in collaboration, you specialize in that sort of, you know, cultural dynamic, how have you seen it work and why does it not work? Yeah, I mean, yeah I was at McKinsey for a number of years, mostly London and a year in Johannesburg and some other places as well. And we had a lot of industry experts on staff with us.
00:12:41
Speaker
And the big difference, I think, is that we didn't have nearly the class divide that you see in a lot of law firms, right? um There was you know no perception that the automotive or telco industry expert was a second-class citizen.
00:12:59
Speaker
They were client-facing. They had enormous respect. They could... you know face off with any partner or other you know fee earner in the organization with as much credibility as the rest of us.
00:13:15
Speaker
And I think that that is um absolutely essential to be able to help people not just find their footing, but be able to contribute to their fullest. And I think to your point, Graham, it's true that it is a different type of organization when you're working within a law firm.
00:13:33
Speaker
And it is incumbent on the marketing professionals to show the value that they can add. Sometimes that's at the strategy level. That's great if you're involved at that very high level.
00:13:46
Speaker
But you also have to be deep into the execution. And so where I've seen marketing professionals, especially add value, is not so much with the sexy stuff, the the strategy, right?
00:13:59
Speaker
um But in the day to day execution, driving that, making sure that there's a plan for that particular industry. rubbing shoulders with the attorneys who are the ones that are the leaders for that group, but also reminding them of you know what they said they were going to do and making sure that the trains are running on time. It's as simple as sometimes making sure that you have regular industry meetings scheduled, that they take place, that you've helped with the agenda or helped drive that agenda.
00:14:33
Speaker
All of those things can really help the marketing professionals prove their worth and also drive that execution around industry efforts. And David, building on your experience working with law firms, it would be great to hear from you a little bit about turning theory into practice. And do you have any advice, particularly for firms who might be considering a sector strategy for the first time about how to turn all this into practice so it just doesn't sit on a page?
00:15:07
Speaker
yeah that's that's a really interesting question and i think it goes back a little bit to what i was saying about our lesson from hogan levels which is you look for those organic efforts that are already taking place and help to grow those efforts from a gardening perspective look for the seedlings and shoots right and try to help those along.
00:15:31
Speaker
That can mean providing the structure around it, making sure that there is a plan, um and making sure that those groups are meeting regularly.
00:15:42
Speaker
I think you do want to start with the coalition of the willing. you know i think you look, and a lot of firms do try to pilot this with those industries that they think are ripe and have good leadership, which I know Heidi will talk about in some detail.
00:15:59
Speaker
But that's where a lot of firms get started is look for the strengths within the firm, look for good leadership and start with just a couple of industries. Don't try to boil the ocean, just be very focused on where you start that effort.
00:16:15
Speaker
It's a lot of investment, isn't it, in in marketing BD infrastructure. And so I wonder when a firm decides to go on this path, What's the timing? Like when can they start to see, do you think a return on investment? How long does it take?
00:16:32
Speaker
and I mean, the answer is really clear. It depends. But I mean, so that's the only answer you can give to how long it takes. But let me give you a quick example from some research we did. We had the opportunity to research a law firm that had about 12 months earlier kicked off there their sector program.
00:16:52
Speaker
And they actually did it with far too many sectors, to Dave's point. um that They weren't selective and focused enough. They had about a dozen that they kicked off initially, mostly because of politics, and they didn't want to have to say no to anyone who had their pet sector.
00:17:08
Speaker
um And so they kicked off 12 of them. what When we started studying them, what we observed is that there was a group of them, about a third, maybe four who four four firms who four sector groups, who started to pull apart from the pack.
00:17:24
Speaker
And over time, we could begin to measure across a whole range of metrics how well they were doing. And this was everything from early indicators, we know what we call leading indicators, you know things like how often were they you know getting called for you know, by the press, how often were they getting mentioned in you know, various articles, when they were they getting invited to conferences, et cetera, what were they publishing, you know, and and ultimately it really paid out in terms of of revenue and more sophisticated, complex client mandates as well.
00:17:58
Speaker
And so we were interested in understanding what they did differently And they made a really important pivot. And so from you know all of them, from the first time out of the gates, they were focused on some of the stuff Dave was talking about, getting themselves organized.
00:18:19
Speaker
making lists of clients and figuring out which partners were already serving them and so forth. So that was all important work to do. What we found though, is that about the nine to 12 month mark, the really successful ones made a pivot.
00:18:34
Speaker
And they stopped focusing their time and their meetings and their conversations internally and began to get out into the market. um They probably did it even earlier than that, but they were running full force by this nine to 12 month mark.
00:18:48
Speaker
And that pivot from internal to external made an enormous difference in the ah ROI. um And so 18, 24 month mark their success in financial terms was massive compared to the half dozen or even eight um sector groups that were still kind of wallowing in internal navel gazing.
00:19:10
Speaker
And being willing to get outside one's comfort zone to ah establish a point of view, to go on stage and talk about this industry sector, to hobnob with the the executives there. Those are all ah slightly risky actions to take, and they're absolutely essential. You can't wait until you've got everything buttoned down 100% because you're going to miss the opportunity.
00:19:39
Speaker
And you're going to get people really disenfranchised and um demotivated. Nobody wants to show up to the sixth meeting to talk about what they're going to talk about. Is there evidence that that sector-led firms are more profitable than, say, practice-led firms?
00:19:54
Speaker
Yeah, I've crunched the numbers, right? um And one of the things that we see in research like that is you've got to get your definitions straight. So what does it mean to have a sector effort?
00:20:06
Speaker
We had some pretty strict definitions around that. It cannot be that you have on your webpage, we have 15 sectors that we serve. Again, that goes back to, you know it's it's ah it's a man and his dog serving one airline that doesn't make a transportation sector, right? So when we put parameters on qualifying what it meant to truly have a sector approach to serving clients um and looked at who was organized that way, who had the right leadership. Did they have um a sponsor or champion at executive level, you know, XCO level?
00:20:39
Speaker
We put a lot of those um parameters on. and when we examined the correlation between firms that truly had a sector program functioning well um and profitability and a whole host of other kinds of metrics, the correlation's really high.
00:20:57
Speaker
Do you think now it's now that so many firms have done the sector strategy, is there an expectation from clients that firms should have a sector strategy? Like, is there a is a ah is there a client group that might think to themselves, well, if you're coming to me and you're not actually coming to me as experts in my sector, when I've got another law firm that is going to come to me with experts in that sector, I mean, are you seeing that now it's just becoming the norm?
00:21:23
Speaker
Yeah, I think so. I also want to just add that I think in terms of other metrics, you should look beyond financial metrics when you look at the success of a sector program.
00:21:35
Speaker
And there are a number of different ways to do that. So, for instance, with Hogan Lovells, Thomson Reuters was doing an annual interview of in-house counsel.
00:21:46
Speaker
And they were asking about which firms do they see ah really understanding their industry. And so in that metric, you saw Hogan Lovells basically double the number of in-house counsel who mentioned that Hogan Lovells is one of the firms that really understood their industry.
00:22:06
Speaker
That comes through also in third party rankings, you know, things like chambers and other types of organizations that that interview and look for um which attorneys are best in different areas.
00:22:22
Speaker
um So from a marketing standpoint, I think you don't want to just look at the financial side. That's important, obviously. But other things like partner engagement, ah when Hogan Lovell's put together their annual partner meeting, they started one that was just based around industry.
00:22:42
Speaker
And that was really revolutionary for them to get everyone together from across the world to see the what they could bring to bear um on various types of industries.
00:22:55
Speaker
So if people are participating in those kinds of activities, whether it's an annual retreat or whether it's regular um industry calls, that's also an internal indicator of how well the industry program is going and whether you have you know enthusiasm for what you're doing.
00:23:17
Speaker
think also on the business development side, if you're seeing an increase in win rates, for those areas that you're focused on in a particular industry. That's really important.
00:23:29
Speaker
And another good indicator that your sector focus is working.
00:23:35
Speaker
So if I come and I totally agree with all of that, Dave, I think, and that well-rounded approach is really vital. um You know, I'll touch on this idea of scorecards. um Dave and I have helped a whole range of different law firms create scorecards at the sector group level, you know, for the leaders and then cascading that down to partners who are operating within that sector.
00:23:57
Speaker
And The process of creating that scorecard and really you know twisting people's arm to come up with a focused set indicators that are really critical for success is it's a it's a really important process for people to go through. What does the sector program stand for and what how do we define success?
00:24:21
Speaker
And how are we holding people accountable for it? So, you know, that's that's essential. Heidi, you mentioned before that there was a firm that went to market with 11, 12 sectors, which was too many.
00:24:34
Speaker
How important is it that the leadership get on board of this very early on and sort of combat the politics around that so that rather than go to market for 12, you say, realistically, we only need to go to market for four and that's what the firm is doing and that's what we're putting our efforts behind. And if you know if you don't like it, it's tough, we're getting on the journey.
00:24:54
Speaker
How important is that leadership style? So leadership is everything. When a firm is launching, they have to be 100% convinced that leaders are on board with this.
00:25:05
Speaker
And we're big advocates of a firm starting a sector program if they're really launching it from scratch, doing it as a pilot. and calling it a pilot. It helps take a lot of the heat away from, oh we've only got four to start with.
00:25:20
Speaker
They may choose never to expand beyond those initial four. um and some of the desire to become a formal sector group or a formal sector leader actually disappears when partners understand, my God, that's what it takes. Like, this is real work. I don't just get a you know another line on my business card.
00:25:42
Speaker
um And so we strongly advocate going in with a ah pilot approach and picking, you know, three, four, maximum five to start with so that you can get the focus behind it. But leadership is absolutely everything. You need to have a ah champion and a sponsor right up in Exco.
00:25:58
Speaker
And we think one of the interesting points um that came out when we were writing the the Harvard case study about um Hogan Lovells is that they ended up creating a kind of you know super leader across who sat across sectors and that person sat on Exco.
00:26:15
Speaker
And, you know, it really helps to even out some of those power dynamics. um You know, when you think about what a leader needs to advocate for, you know, whether it's resources and you know a whole range of different things, it is crucial that the the sectors understand that they've got a voice at Exco who's going to be working on their behalf.
00:26:40
Speaker
and And Hogan Levels did a really smart thing in um figuring out how to not only have somebody in XCO for that power play, but also as a span breaker, because then that person was responsible for, you know, helping to to coach and monitor the sector groups across the firm.
00:27:00
Speaker
Yeah, and just to pick up on that point too, the person who was on executive committee was also um providing input into the annual partner reviews for everyone who was involved in the sector program.
00:27:14
Speaker
So that's the carrot or sometimes the stick that you need for someone at the top to be able so that the partners know that they are going to be evaluated on how they contribute to the industry program.
00:27:29
Speaker
I think the other thing I would say is from a managing partner standpoint, there are going to be people who just aren't going to buy into sector industry approach.
00:27:41
Speaker
You're going to have, even at Hogan levels, I think the percentage was 25% that said they were sector agnostic. You know, so you have to um deal with that. And that's, again, to Heidi's point where you need strong leadership at the top that's going to say, that's OK.
00:27:59
Speaker
We don't need to have 100 percent participation, but we do need where we want to be known for a particular industry, the right leadership in place. David, I'm interested to, given that you you you came from a law firm, CMO background, and ah managing teams and looking at team structures, et cetera.
00:28:21
Speaker
When you're advising firms on a sector-led strategy, um often it then translates into recruitment of BD people who've had sector exp experience.
00:28:34
Speaker
How much of an investment do you think firms need to be aware of when they're going to market? it It's not just a case of them saying we're going to align our partners to a sector strategy. They also have to align their business services and their BD resources. So do you often see that a sector strategy results in an increase in hires for professionals with BD experience in sector?
00:28:56
Speaker
You know, I think it certainly can, and it it depends on the firm, right? So I think that in the very large firms, there's a lot more specialization that's similar to, for instance, like the big four accounting firms.
00:29:12
Speaker
However, you know when you get to a mid-size firm or you get to 300 lawyers or fewer, you have a lot of people who have sort of jack-of-all-trades responsibility, right?
00:29:26
Speaker
And you have to figure out how to manage either with the team that you have or look for outside resources. I think that's where it's really interesting with with AI, um being able to do some of the things that we weren't able to do quickly in the past um is is really helping to revolutionize that.
00:29:47
Speaker
So for instance, keeping track of industry trends, right, and putting together um profiles on different companies, those are all things that we're now able to do in minutes that might have taken weeks before.
00:30:05
Speaker
um So I think that those are areas where even smaller medium-sized firms can be more nimble and rely on better tools and better technology.
00:30:16
Speaker
that we're seeing um come to the fore. um So I don't think it's it's necessary to have you know an outside industry expert hired in to the marketing department.
00:30:27
Speaker
And to your earlier point, Graham, that a lot of times doesn't work because of the the cultural changes. So I think um you need to be creative in thinking about how you bring that knowledge in, but it may not be by hiring another person.
00:30:46
Speaker
As we're having this conversation, I'm thinking about some of the ah management teams, managing partners I've met in, say, more traditional law firms who may not be doing this. And I can imagine them saying, this sounds fantastic, but it's not something we need to do. It's not for us because insert barrier.
00:31:06
Speaker
In your view, is there ever a law firm that doesn't need a set to strategy? You know, is there a type of firm that this doesn't apply to? And if so, what would that firm look like? I think every lawyer needs sector expertise.
00:31:22
Speaker
And um I think there might be firms that are boutiques that almost by definition are already sector focused.
00:31:34
Speaker
And so they might not need the same kind of apparatus that you would if you were you know a full service firm and needing to create this matrix where you've got um practice groups and sectors. Yeah.
00:31:48
Speaker
Right. But um I think there are far too many lawyers out there who say, I'm sector agnostic. You know, I'm a litigator and a courtroom's a courtroom.
00:32:00
Speaker
Really? Because, you know, when I'm talking to the GCs, they actually find it and incredibly valuable to have an advisor. I'm picking up on Dave's word earlier. you know, he talked about a a trusted advisor And GCs want somebody who knows their industry inside and out and can help advise on litigation strategy and what their competitors are doing.
00:32:22
Speaker
And so, you know, yeah, you can be a good litigator. You can probably be a great litigator. But can you be the trusted advisor that the GC and maybe even the board is going to turn to when it all hits the fan?
00:32:37
Speaker
I don't know. That's a whole lot harder if you don't know this industry inside and out. And so, you know, when somebody tells me, and and we hear this from, you know, a whole range of different people. I'm picking on litigators right now, but, you know, we we hear this kind of excuse from, you know, all sorts of people. I'm in tax. I don't need this.
00:32:54
Speaker
But, you know, I was just, I spent a lot of time with in-house lawyers. I was with 150 general counsel on Friday for a program. And, When I asked them at the start of the program, what are the most VUCA, the volatile and certain complex ambiguous problems that they are facing and that their board cares about?
00:33:15
Speaker
They were adamant that you know those challenges, whether they related to AI or regulation, macroeconomic and and and geopolitical forces, all of those complex issues had a very, very strong sector bent to them.
00:33:32
Speaker
And they were all really clear that somebody who's going to truly advise them to be able to be good um strategic advisors, you know, get a seat at the strategy table in their company, they had to have people from the outside helping them understand market intel and sector strategies.
00:33:51
Speaker
And, you know, I think that's so important for for lawyers to understand is, you know, to to to develop a true, lasting, valuable client relationship.
00:34:02
Speaker
You know, not just the sort of transactional, you hire me when you need me and you never see me when you don't. to you know To get past that that vendor mentality, people really have to have much deeper expertise. The demands are way higher than they've been.
00:34:19
Speaker
Yeah, i would I would agree with everything Heidi just said and just add that if I were talking to a managing partner, i would also say, take a look at what's going on with your competition.
00:34:30
Speaker
And we would have many examples of where firms that you might think are happy to just pick up business from wherever it comes from are much more focused. And like I said, this is really a secular trend.
00:34:44
Speaker
You know, that um clients are expecting their advisors to know their industry. So if you're making a conscious decision to say, i don't really care about that, you're putting yourself at a competitive disadvantage.
00:34:59
Speaker
And I think um you're you're going to be swimming upstream. ah so why not go with the flow and go with ah where the industry is going, which is towards much more specialization, including by industry.
00:35:14
Speaker
Yeah. I mean, if I go back to the client perspective, you know think about the GC. They are aiming, if they're worth their salt, they're aiming to become more and more strategic in their own company.
00:35:27
Speaker
and And we see great examples of of general counsel who are elevating the status of their legal team throughout their organization. But their counterparts, CFOs,
00:35:39
Speaker
you know, and everyone, I don't have to run through the list, but virtually every other chief has a set of outside advisors who are equipping them with this knowledge, right? You know, when I was at McKinsey, my job was to, you know, face off with the CEO, and the chief strategy officer and similar, and make sure they knew exactly what was, you know, happening in their industry.
00:36:03
Speaker
you know and in adjacent industries where trends were gonna start to hop over the fence. but And so if if the GC does not have their outside counsel playing that role, they're at a massive diff disadvantage. They walk into the you know the the ex-co meeting, the board meeting, and they're ill-equipped.
00:36:22
Speaker
And no law firm partner should leave their client kind of swinging in the wind without that kind of knowledge. You've been really great at talking to us about sort of the pitfalls as well as the strategies throughout. And a couple of things that and I picked up on is the essential need of the scorecard and being adjusted and the incentivization being correct, as well as going from internal to external quickly rather than navel gazing, I think was your phrase.
00:36:50
Speaker
Are there any other things that you would change that you see as common pitfalls when firms try and do this that you observe? Well, I can jump in there. On the marketing side, what I see is that responsibilities for industry are often added on top of everything that the marketing professionals are already doing.
00:37:14
Speaker
So they might already have you know a very full load, are working you know crazy hours. And then um someone comes along and said says, now, on top of that, we want you to cover these five industries.
00:37:29
Speaker
you know And they're ready to say, um I think i'll I'll look for another opportunity somewhere else. but But no, I think, so it has to be done carefully. And this is where CMOs can play a really important role in resource allocation.
00:37:47
Speaker
And I think it goes back to are you trying to be the best in 13 industries or are you gonna focus on three, right? And so at Oric we focused on three and that does allow you starting with like the website,
00:38:02
Speaker
to show that these are the three that we're focused on. um That's still relatively unusual for the big law firms that we work with. And so, you know, Heidi and i sometimes will come in and if they're working with 15 different industries take time to look at what are the fastest growing and biggest opportunities among those 15 industries. There's lots of ways of looking at that.
00:38:30
Speaker
um But for instance, when you're talking about tech, things like AI or autonomous vehicles, you know, we know those are fast growing areas within the tech sector and they're emerging areas.
00:38:43
Speaker
So OREC, those were some areas that we started focusing on very early. um And there are corollaries, you know, with other with other industries. So you're looking at things like growth rate, but then you're also looking hard at what leadership you have right now.
00:38:59
Speaker
And that's where Heidi and team do such a great job of doing like a skill will assessment to figure out um if you do have the right ah horses in place or if you need to be trading a couple of them out.
00:39:14
Speaker
Yeah, I think at the risk of of sounding like a broken record, leadership is absolutely essential. right um One of the pitfalls that we see is that firms assume that because somebody is extremely well known, has a real reputation as the guru in sector X, that they are the logical leader of the sector group.
00:39:35
Speaker
And those are incredibly different skill sets. They also have very different motivational profiles behind them, right? So somebody who loves being out in front and and being seen as the guru may have very, very little interest in doing all of the blocking and tackling that Dave described, right? All of the organization and the influence that it requires.
00:40:01
Speaker
And so I think that's a huge pitfall is putting the wrong leaders in place. I think another um pitfall we've observed is having too many leaders. So Dave, I'm thinking about one client we worked with that had nominally seven leaders of one sector group. I mean, it was basically, every you know, anyone who showed up to three meetings in a row got ah a sector leader title or something. I'm not sure how they did it, but it was, sorry, I'm being a bit facetious here, but, you know, it was um really, you know,
00:40:30
Speaker
it unworkable, kind of when everybody's in charge, nobody's in charge. And so, you know, having too many leaders, again, i think it arises from a political problem. They didn't want to say no to anybody. They didn't want to demotivate people.
00:40:45
Speaker
But, you know, that's, I think, is hugely problematic. If you're not going to genuinely equip people to to play a true leadership role, not a manager role, but a leader role, then they shouldn't be appointed.
00:41:00
Speaker
Yeah, and that brings up another good point, Heidi, which I think you also have to set expectations for what it means to be a sector or industry leader. And we've seen that all over the board, right?
00:41:13
Speaker
But one of the things that's really helpful is that If you can have some training at the beginning or like Heidi does a fabulous master class series that we get all of the new leaders in the room.
00:41:26
Speaker
We talk about things like this case study and that helps get people understanding like what does a best practice look like for a sector leader? What are the responsibilities?
00:41:38
Speaker
How am I going to juggle this with my practice? responsibilities too. you know, there's a lot to work out and you see them, the light bulbs start to come on, but it takes a while, you know, for for those lawyers who are already very busy to understand and recognize what they're going to need to do to make this industry effort successful.
00:42:03
Speaker
What's interesting when hearing at hearing just that that piece there is that we often see firms want to develop a sexist strategy and then they think that the best way of doing that is to hire a BD person to go in market and speak to clients.
00:42:16
Speaker
And in a way, it's a little bit like delegating the responsibility. What's your view on on that? Terrible. Yeah. honestly Honestly, like, sorry, at the risk of sounding a little judgmental, I think it's a terrible, rotten idea.
00:42:32
Speaker
I mean, that's just not going to work if the partners don't have full ownership of this. And if they're not willing to change their behaviors to deeply embed this kind of advisory relationship, ah where are you going to, i mean, you're you're your're marketing people who are then going to do what exactly?
00:42:49
Speaker
Exactly. Right. So i think um starting with ah with the marketing people is is putting the cart before the horse. And, you know, I believe that you've got to have fully a full fledged group of people who.
00:43:07
Speaker
Dave talked about the coalition of the willing people who are basically already operating like this. And you're putting formal structure and resourcing to make them even better at at what they already do.
00:43:18
Speaker
And then it begins to naturally and organically start to spread through the organization. Success breeds success. And and people get a bit of FOMO. you know They really want to be doing this and they they do start to join up.
00:43:30
Speaker
But um I think it absolutely has to start with deep, deep, deep sense of ownership by the partners. Yeah, now i do think I do think, Graham, there is a role for the marketing folks to play in terms of certainly staying up to speed on the industry.
00:43:48
Speaker
And that can be in a number of different ways. So if you're talking about, for instance, sending your high-level marketing person to an industry conference along with the partners?
00:44:01
Speaker
Yes, by all means. And they can pick up on what the trends are. And they can also help opportunity spot. So there are people who do that well in certain markets where they're going to a lot of these industry conferences and they're helping to pick up opportunities.
00:44:19
Speaker
potential leads and clients. But the reality is that then you still need that attorney to to close the deal. And to do that, you've got to have a really good handoff, you know, between the marketing professional and the lawyer.
00:44:36
Speaker
And that's not not an easy thing to do. Generally, you know, like it's good for a marketing person to be out there as a wingman, but not the one who's trying to actually close the deal.
00:44:48
Speaker
So, but that can work well. While we're talking about the marketing BD leaders, actually, David, I'm thinking about the really interesting perspective that you have from the forums that you run for these individuals.
00:45:01
Speaker
And so I'm wondering what particular strategies, pain points, um hot topics you're hearing come come to the table most often in these forums, and actually if that's different globally.
00:45:15
Speaker
Yeah, you know, that's an interesting question because I have done these forums in North America, UK, and now I'll be starting in Australia. And I see that a lot of the issues are similar across the board, um starting with leadership. um What I've seen among the very sophisticated law firms is a lot of start and stop on these kinds of programs.
00:45:43
Speaker
So they maybe had, you know, a great industry program going for a couple of years, um then sort of went cold for a bit. And now they have to come back and decide how they're going to reinvigorate the program.
00:45:58
Speaker
And Heidi and I have certainly, that's that's some of the ways that we come in to work with firms when they're trying to do that, trying to reinvigorate their program. um I think also,
00:46:10
Speaker
being able to manage clients from a global standpoint is even more complex um and difficult and of course across time zones. um And so that comes into play a little bit more, I would say, in my UK forum than in the US because you do have a lot of firms based here that are just focused on the US market. It's such a large market and they don't think about going outside of the US.
00:46:39
Speaker
um But I think for for firms based in Australia or or based in the UK, they're thinking more globally and also a lot of times thinking about the US market because it is such a large one.
00:46:54
Speaker
And Heidi, you have a ah global perspective coming at it from the angle of collaboration and culture and leadership. What are your reflections to add for that as some of the trends you see globally?
00:47:08
Speaker
So let me echo what Dave said. I don't see ah tremendous amount of regional differences, which I think tends to surprise people. And you know what we see across the board is this growing sophistication in terms of understanding what it takes to truly add value to clients.
00:47:28
Speaker
like not extract value from clients, but add value to them. And i think the the very best firms now are finally getting rid of the ridiculous term cross-sell.
00:47:42
Speaker
I mean, cross-sell is anti-client. no you know ah As I said, I work with you know hundreds of GCs every year and never has one said to me, i really love being cross-sold at.
00:47:55
Speaker
I mean, like, but that's you know, that is just not client-centric. And so, you know, firms that are are more with it understand that this idea of collaboration, and what we call smarter collaboration,
00:48:11
Speaker
it It is not the and pure introduction. I know somebody who needs what you offer and I'm just going to throw that you know over the wall to you. Now, good luck, run with it.
00:48:22
Speaker
um you know It's not that and it's not the sort of crass, I'm going to cram as many people onto the file as I can and hope nobody notices. ah Rather, it is starting with the the deep down business advisory conversation, not, you know, technical legal expertise, but genuinely what's going on in your business. And that's where the sector expertise matters so much, right? People come across as far more credible opening up that conversation with a perspective on how trend X is affecting the competition and being able to dig into that.
00:49:01
Speaker
And it naturally, incredibly naturally unearths the opportunity to for a client to reveal some sort of challenge or opportunity that they'd like to grasp.
00:49:12
Speaker
And that lawyer to say, you know, i think we've actually helped a different client with that. Do you want to talk to? and then it opens up the relationship. And we're seeing far more sophistication across geographies with firms that recognize that that's what it takes to really differentiate themselves. Yeah.
00:49:33
Speaker
Yeah, and I just want to add to that that I think it's so important for the firms to have a really good client feedback or client listening program. um And it's surprising that in my roundtables you were asking about, Katie, that there are still a fair percentage of really big, sophisticated firms that don't have a well-developed client feedback program or client listening program.
00:49:58
Speaker
And that still shocks me in 2025 that that there are firms that don't do that, um because if they are, if they do have a program in place, if they are going out there regularly and listening to their clients, then that's going to naturally be brought back and identify opportunities for cross serving.
00:50:21
Speaker
which I think is the term that we prefer a lot more than cross-selling, right? Because it's coming from, they've said that they want this. the um the client has said that they want to hear more about this particular practice or or industry or area.
00:50:39
Speaker
And so it's an invitation for the firm to come back and say, well, hey, here's what we've got. And we'd love to talk to you about that. um So I think to Heidi's point, you know, you've got to have your ear to the ground with the client and marketing can play a role in that.
00:50:59
Speaker
So I am. I was going to um jump in with a ah quick data point here. i was um My team and I were working with an Australian law firm not long ago um and just had a quick ah check back with them.
00:51:14
Speaker
And their stat is that um when the managing partner has a client listening conversation um with a general counsel or someone.
00:51:26
Speaker
um Anybody want to guess what proportion of those meetings lead to additional work?
00:51:37
Speaker
it's it's it's it's over 90%, right? and I mean, it's absolutely incredible. And so you have the managing partner walking in there with no agenda whatsoever, except to say, you know, how is it going? What's on your mind, et cetera.
00:51:51
Speaker
But, In this case, you know, the the managing partner is a man. So he walks in and he's been making the rounds. So he understands the market incredibly well. um He's got some of these tidbits to drop in.
00:52:05
Speaker
And all of a sudden they're having a business conversation, not a legal conversation. And the the opportunities just flourish from there. the David, you mentioned earlier that you're coming to Australia, which we're very excited about. So you're going in Sydney in February, I believe, February 26th.
00:52:23
Speaker
Yes. The hosts are one of your forums. We call them forums in Australia because when you say roundtable, for us, a roundtable is literally an hour sitting around having a sandwich. um But your your roundtable forums, they're a day and a half, I think, aren't they? So what can delegates expect?
00:52:41
Speaker
Yes, and and thank you, Graham, for umm helping educate me on the difference between a roundtable and a forum. um Very helpful. Yes, it is a day and a half ah very intensive education. And I do like to keep it intimate. So no more than typically 15 people from across the country, really the top marketing leaders getting together.
00:53:06
Speaker
We do it in under Chatham House rules so that people feel free to share. And there is a lot of great sharing that takes place. um I mix that part of the program with bringing in terrific outside speakers like Heidi Gardner, who really add to ah the discussion and get us thinking more broadly and just generating some terrific discussion.
00:53:33
Speaker
I'm really excited to be doing it um at Ashurst where I understand they have a new beautiful Sydney office. So very excited about that and um already have a number of people from some of the really top firms in Australia who've decided they want to be a part of this.
00:53:51
Speaker
So very excited about it. Fantastic. Well, you both shared so much to today. We are so grateful to you for coming onto the podcast and giving so much honest information, but also information that people can do something with.
00:54:07
Speaker
You're both highly practical and it's just been fantastic. So we're really, really happy that you were able to come and join us today. Thank you so much for having us. Thank you.
00:54:23
Speaker
So what did you think of that? Oh, wasn't it a fascinating conversation? I feel so privileged that we've had them on the podcast. And it was really fantastic to have a really focused conversation on sector.
00:54:36
Speaker
But it did come back to this bigger topic that no matter what we're seeking to do in business development, it has to start with leadership and it has to start with commitment from partners.
00:54:47
Speaker
And I just found it so fascinating on the set to piece that we were talking about. Well, it starts from the passion of the partners um and it starts from the way that they're incentivized and the scorecard. In fact, to use Dr. Heidi Gardner's words, that's essential to success.
00:55:04
Speaker
So often in our chair, Graham, we see that this responsibility completely delegated to BD and with partners almost seemingly almost washing their hands of it now, but it just doesn't work that way. It's not a marketing strategy.
00:55:19
Speaker
What came out from the conversation, what was really clear from both of them is that marketing is there to assist people. But the strategy itself and the driver has to come from the fear.
00:55:32
Speaker
And I thought it was really interesting when she when she described actually that when she talks about who gets appointed to be the sector leader, sometimes it's not the most likely person who's the most famous person in the business for that.
00:55:47
Speaker
Because sometimes they don't have the temperament to want to be out in the market, going to the conferences, networking, doing all the thought leadership, et cetera, which is required. And I thought it was really interesting that she, you know, she painted a picture of the fact that having a sector strategy doesn't just mean having this marketing strategy overlay to everything else that you're doing.
00:56:06
Speaker
It's actually a change of the way in which you run your practice, you run your business. And I don't think a lot of... um lawyers when they think about or law firms when they think about having a sector strategy ah don't think they've understood that it's it's essentially cultural shift and a real business development shift as opposed to just oh well let's just put a glossy brochure out I thought it was hilarious when she talked about you know one one partner with a few airline clients does not an aviation sector make like it was just you know because we've seen it haven't we you know
00:56:43
Speaker
We've seen managing partners come to us and say, we're thinking that what we might want to do is hire somebody to come in as our BD director and bring us sector strategies. And, you know, we've been thinking that we've got all these sectors and actually you've probably only got three. So, um yeah, that was brilliant.
00:57:01
Speaker
and And the focus on it comes from the client first, you know, will be so obvious to some people and revolutionary to others. But she she really positioned that along with David in a great way, which was imagine all the peers of the general counsels. And the advice they're getting about their business, their sector, trends relevant to them in their roles. And if the general counsel isn't getting that in the same way as the CFO, the CAO from their lawyer, where are they getting it from?
00:57:33
Speaker
Yeah, and when I asked the question, you know, do we, do oh no, you asked the question, do do you think that every law firm should have a sector strategy and her response was every lawyer should have a sector. And David who was so also so great at being able to give us the insight from being in the CMO position to now advising CMOs about what's on their plate and all the rest of it. And I thought it was really good when he said this, often these sector strategy just become another thing on the desk of i already overworked marketing and business to development professional. So, you know, the big takeaway from all of this is if you're thinking of having a sector strategy or if indeed you have a sector strategy, have you asked the question, is it coming from the lawyer?
00:58:15
Speaker
You know, is it really a sector strategy? i mean, the biggest takeaway for me, much like one of the takeaways from last month's coaching podcast, is if you want real change, you have to incentivize real change, which means none of these shifts are going to work unless the partners are incentivized, collaborating, behaving, and passionately desiring um the outcome.
00:58:43
Speaker
um It cannot be driven uphill from BD alone. No. And in actual fact, if you think about the podcast we we did with James Bacon on on coaching and the podcast before that with Emma Zadda around boards, you know, really all this points to it has to come from the top, has to come from the managing partner down.
00:59:05
Speaker
And if they're not across all of this, these strategies are not going to work.
00:59:11
Speaker
A question for you, Graham. This was very much focused on law firms. What takeaways might there be for our clients in other professional services sectors?
00:59:24
Speaker
I think it's highly transferable. i mean, and we know that the big four have gone to market on sectors for a long time. um But, you know, do architecture firms go to market on sectors? Some of them do. Some of them go to market on, you know, the education sector or the health sector or whatever it might be.
00:59:40
Speaker
But I think genuinely what what they were talking about was it's just a very obvious way of thinking about your consulting practice. If you're an engineer, architect, lawyer, accountant, it's just a really good way. A recruitment consultant is a really good way of thinking about What practice do we have deep knowledge of and how can we educate or how can we share? How can we inform the clients that we're working with? So the takeaways for all of us, um including you and I. Absolutely. Well, another great podcast. Look forward to at the next one.
01:00:14
Speaker
Well, the next one will be 2026. series coming back in 2026. We've got some great people lined up for that. Some COOs, some managing partners. It's going to be fantastic. So you're looking looking forward to that.
01:00:26
Speaker
You've been listening to a Seldom Rossa production. You can find Shortlisted wherever you find your podcasts.