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BD Coaching that drives revenue growth - James Bacon
319 Plays1 month ago
In this episode of Shortlisted, BD coach James Bacon shares his insights on how coaching can positively drive business growth and elevate personal and group BD strategies. He shares tools and tips for delivering high-impact coaching sessions.
Together, they unpack how to build trust with seasoned professionals, the frameworks that drive meaningful coaching, and how to turn data, technology, and AI into coaching allies. James also reveals how leaders can embed a coaching mindset into their culture and reignite motivation when teams lose momentum.
If you’re a leader or business developer looking to sharpen your coaching skills and inspire performance, this episode delivers practical wisdom and powerful takeaways.
Credits: Music by Grand_Project from Pixabay
Produced by Kwame Slusher Audio
Recommended
Transcript
The Role of Coaching in Professional Services
00:00:01
Speaker
Every single one of us has the ability to get better. You should not be stopping. And yet professional services just seems to miss that a little bit and just goes, I'm a partner at this firm. I'm doing really, really well.
00:00:12
Speaker
I'm good technically. I'm not great at PD, but it's okay. And I think... I would love people just to go, coaching is good. Coaching is not a remedial class.
00:00:22
Speaker
Everyone can get better. Let's just have one or two sessions to think about. if there's one or two things that you could just move the needle on slightly that could have a bit of an impact, what would that be?
00:00:34
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.
00:00:46
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.
00:01:03
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.
00:01:16
Speaker
So if you're in a leadership role focused on growth, then Shortlisted is your go-to resource for actionable insights and inspiring stories.
Sales and Coaching Insights from James Bacon
00:01:25
Speaker
We're delighted to be joined by James Bacon, co-founder of Australian consulting firm, Monterosa, and more recently Trailblazer, which helps UK startups achieve greater sales certainty.
00:01:36
Speaker
His background in sales and sales coaching offers a rare combination of professional services rigour and high growth tech agility. Having held internal roles with three leading consulting firms and consulted for major engineering, legal and big four firms, he has an intimate understanding of the professional services challenge.
00:01:56
Speaker
Crucially, though, he also advises fast moving giants like Google and TikTok, enabling him to translate the most effective modern sales practices from the tech world directly back into a professional services environment.
00:02:10
Speaker
Welcome to the podcast, James. Hi, James. Hello, Katie. Hey, Graham. Great to be here. Thank you for having me, actually. Super excited. um I do love listening to a podcast, so ah let's hope I enjoy being on one at just as much.
00:02:23
Speaker
I'm sure you will. I'm sure our listeners are going be really interested to get really under the hood of what it's like to be a great coach. And that's my first question, actually. What distinguishes in your mind a great sales coach from a great salesperson?
00:02:38
Speaker
Well, I think a great salesperson is quite self-focused is probably what I'd say. you know They're focused on achieving their numbers, their revenue target, et cetera. Whereas I think a sales coach is much more focused on helping others ah achieve their potential, unlock their potential, ah you know be the best that they they can be really. In my experience, I think the best yeah the best sellers are not necessarily...
00:03:04
Speaker
the best coaches. And I think you see that. I do a lot of work, obviously, in corporates as well as professional services. But you often see in corporate world a lot of brilliant salespeople being promoted to sales managers who are then asked to coach and lead the team. And and they really struggle, one, because they probably don't enjoy it as much.
00:03:22
Speaker
And so I think, yeah, I think some people have that inane ability to want to help others as opposed to just be successful themselves. And I think that's what probably defines a sales coach. you know When I look at the best sort of BD coaches, and I know you obviously you focus really in professional services, let's try and make this more professional services focus.
00:03:41
Speaker
The best yeah sort of coaches, I think actually have some sales experience or some BD experience. And I think that's a bit of a challenge which I'll come to in in the world of professional services.
00:03:53
Speaker
So I think you to be a great BD coach, I think you have to be, or it helps to have been at the coalface, to have experience of winning work, to be in the market, having conversations, to be trying to get meetings. so Because I think that's what people really value. It's that experience that that you can bring to the table.
00:04:10
Speaker
But you don't have to have been the best salesperson to be a great sales coach. And I think you'll probably hear me rattle on about all analogies around sports, et cetera, because i do love I do love sport in
Parallels Between Sports and Business Coaching
00:04:21
Speaker
general. But I think there are some great parallels and similarities between what happens in professional sort of sporting arenas and how we can sort learn from that in business and sort of professional service as well.
00:04:32
Speaker
And i often think ah i grew up in Manchester in the UK and, you know, it's consequently supported Man United. and But Alex Ferguson, you know, you he was a good footballer.
00:04:43
Speaker
yeah But he definitely wasn't on the top of the list. And yet, I think if if you ask most people who's the top three best managers or best football coaches in the world, I think he would be on lot of people's top three lists. And yeah know I think having that experience enables you to be a brilliant coach, but you don't have to have been the best salesperson.
00:05:02
Speaker
It's just about how do you unlock the best of other people? I think that's a real challenge in in your world. of internal BD teams and BD leaders becoming BD coaches in there in their first.
00:05:17
Speaker
And you know i think it's the the challenge is that a lot of those teams have been in internal roles most of their careers.
Challenges for Internal BD Teams
00:05:26
Speaker
And you know I think that' that that creates a problem. I always remember a number of years back, was a very ah very strong-minded, but very super capable ah senior manager in the BD team. And I remember i got engaged to come in and work with some of the partners there.
00:05:44
Speaker
And she made it very clear from the outset. She said, look, I can do exactly what you do, but the difference is you are external and I am internal. And I have no doubt. I mean, she was brilliant. There's no doubt she would have done a great job, probably even that maybe a better job than than I would have done. But it is that perception or credibility perception that I think yeah sometimes the partners are looking for when when sort of listening. So yeah, it's it's one of the biggest challenges. I think the challenge isn't because of the The BD's team feeling that challenge, I think is actually that the the partners or the fee earners you know actually expecting that or or challenging that lack of credibility. Well, why should I listen to you? You haven't been in the market. You haven't done this. You haven't led that conversation. You haven't had to write that email.
00:06:30
Speaker
And I think that's probably one of the biggest challenges so in the world of BD coaching for internal BD teams. Does that make sense? Absolutely. We come across that a lot, don't we, win there in our
Building Trust in Professional Relationships
00:06:41
Speaker
recruitment world? And I suppose, do you have any tips for people in that scenario on how they do build trust and credibility from that starting point? 20-something years ago, um i actually joined Ernst & Young. And the the day that I joined on my desk was this book called The Trusted Advisor by a guy called David Meister, who was ex-Deloitte and Charlie Green and and and another ah author.
00:07:04
Speaker
I don't if either of you read it. Oh, years ago. Years ago, yeah. And it's been written years ago, but it's still actually really hard to get. um We had, I was working with another client who we were trying to get, yeah they said, what's the one book that you think we should get all of our directors to read and like get the trusted advisor?
00:07:23
Speaker
But there was like a three or four month wait on it. So it's obviously still being a bestseller out there. But... The reason I mentioned that, 20 years ago, you know i read this book and it is probably my most referenced book still to date from ah from a business perspective.
00:07:38
Speaker
And in the book, they talked about a model for understanding trust. And Katie, this sort of comes to your so your question. I think it really highlights four attributes that you need to focus on to build trust with, whether it's your coachee, whether it's your client, whether it's your friends, et cetera.
00:07:58
Speaker
I think it works across all all dimensions. So that the four attributes are credibility, In essence, you know do you have the credibility that makes you know that i means that I should listen to what you have to say?
00:08:10
Speaker
Second thing is reliability. you know Do you actually deliver on what you promised? Do you turn up for meetings on time or early when you yeah you say you're going to send me some information? Do you do that? So do you deliver on on what you promise?
00:08:21
Speaker
ah The third one is intimacy, which is how well do you know the individual, both at a personal and a professional level? So you know do you spend a bit of time building rapport knowing whether they have family, where they go on holidays, those sort of things?
00:08:34
Speaker
But also, how well do you understand their, if you're talking to a partner at law firm, engineering firm, it doesn't really matter, do you understand what their current context is, where they're currently at, what are some of the challenges they're facing, where they're trying to get to, what are their aspirations, et cetera?
00:08:48
Speaker
How well do you understand their world? And then the last one. So you sort of look at those three things and it is an equation. So you can actually walk away with a score if you wanted to. But then those things are divisible by your level of perceived self-interest, which is yeah how much am i trying to how much of this focus is about me and me making money out of this as opposed to helping the coach coachee be ultimately successful?
00:09:15
Speaker
And I think that's where it got down to the start, Graham, where you said, what's the definition or what what separates ah you a good coach from a salesperson? It's the the focus on helping others be as successful as they as they can be. And I think that's the the self-orientation piece or self-interest piece.
00:09:31
Speaker
you know Of course, I'm going to get paid for doing a coaching session, but ultimately my goal is to, how do I help this person be walk out of here with a better plan or better equipped to be able to have that conversation or to to you so unlock this client opportunity, et cetera.
00:09:47
Speaker
and and so When you come back to it, Katie, and you said, how do I build trust with people? I just look at that framework all the time and I go, okay, how do I demonstrate a bit of credibility? Well, in my 50s now, so I've got a lot of track record in this, so I've got a bit of credibility, but the reliability, the intimacy, how do I ensure that the the self-orientation or self-interest is is right actually goes, in my mind, is the framework that I would use to try and build build trust with people. So you know it's Someone in the internal BD team, I think you have credibility. You might not have credibility in the same way that I have credibility, but you have some of that credibility. And maybe that's the area you need to build on a little bit more.
00:10:26
Speaker
But yeah don't underestimate the power of the other three things as opposed to just trying to focus on the credibility piece. One of the things that we get asked a lot by people who are in internal BD coaching roles is that, for instance, if they're in ah in a law firm, they might have a pocket of the partnership who ah really technically strong, what they do, they're the best in the market.
Addressing Confidence and Emotional Intelligence
00:10:48
Speaker
They lack emotional intelligence. They're not great in front of clients. They're not confident about selling. How do you coach someone like that who's technically strong, but maybe lacks emotional intelligence and confidence?
00:11:04
Speaker
I think generally, if there is appetite from those particular partners, and I think that's the thing about coaching, it's very hard and it's very frustrating to coach someone who doesn't really want to be in the room or doesn't see the value of it or doesn't want to be there.
00:11:20
Speaker
And I think that's I think that's part of the challenge in a way in that a lot of the time, and and I'd love your perspective because you're you're close to lots of firms around this, that those people who are in coaching programs, let's just say, it is a couple of things. One, they're aspiring partners so that the firm goes, let's put some support around them.
00:11:40
Speaker
Let's help them build a business case for partnership. Let's help them get off to a fast start. Let's give them some external sort of support or coaching support. ah Then you've got your new partners yeah just yeah just being promoted. And it's like, let's get them support. Let's make them, let's invest in them and to ensure that they are successful.
00:11:57
Speaker
ah Then we skip a whole bunch of other partners. And then we end up with those partners who are not performing, not meeting revenue target, really struggling at the moment. And it's like, well, let's give them some coaching just to see if we can turn it around. And I think that's often the the perception. if yeah If you think about partnerships, there are very few in the sparring or the new partners. And there's a whole category of people in the existing partnerships.
00:12:24
Speaker
And I think a key challenge, people look at coaching going, why why do I need this? Or I'm in this group now because I'm not achieving my numbers. And that becomes, I said, it becomes really hard to work with people who don't really want to want to be there.
00:12:39
Speaker
So, I mean, my my goal would be, I'd love more people to be open to coaching. um And again, I look at you know drawing on the sporting world. I'm a big tennis fan. And it was interesting. i was i was watching thenior i was watching Alcaraz play Sinner the other day in the sixth lounge, I think it was.
00:12:57
Speaker
And you know there was a lot of commentary about Yannick Sinner in the last 12 months has completely changed his s serve. Now, the service action out of all the things you could change is the hardest thing to change.
00:13:09
Speaker
He was world number one or world number two 12 months ago, winning majors and and the grand slams, and yet decided that he could be better if he decided to tweak and change his serve, the hardest thing to do.
00:13:24
Speaker
But he he went and did that. Irina Savalenka, world number one by a clear margin at the moment in the women's game. I recently heard that she brought on ah new attacking coach, let's call it, called Max Murney. He was a double specialist.
00:13:39
Speaker
And she brought him on and engaged him now because he was brilliant at moving forward and coming to the net and volleying. Now, she only plays less than 5% of her shots in that context. But she said, could I get better at the...
00:13:54
Speaker
three, four, 5% of the shots that I play in that space. And you know engage someone, pay for someone to actually improve this. And i thought I love that mindset of we can all get better.
Mindset Shift Towards Continuous Improvement
00:14:04
Speaker
Every single one of us has the ability to get better. You should not be stopping. And yet professional services just seems to miss that a little bit and just goes, I'm a partner at this firm. I'm doing really, really well.
00:14:15
Speaker
I'm good technically. I'm not great at PD, but it's okay. And I think I would love people just to go coaching is good. Coaching is not a remedial class.
00:14:25
Speaker
Everyone can get better. Let's just have one or two sessions to think about. If there's one or two things that you could just move the needle on slightly that could have a bit of an impact, what would that be? Yeah, that that's where I'd love everyone to get to. And I think if we got to that point, you would probably end up with, again, less people being yeah resistant to it.
00:14:43
Speaker
So yeah, I mean, sorry to come back to your question of you know dealing with people who don't have the Yeah, the EQ for some of this. um I often just try and get them to be the client or I get them to say, well, how would you approach this?
00:14:58
Speaker
And then say, well, okay, how do you think if you were the client in that context, how would you respond to this? Would would you respond favorably? Would you not? and And sometimes just putting them in the shoes of the other party, the client, most of the time.
00:15:10
Speaker
They just go, oh my gosh, yes, I realize that isn't necessarily the the rights of approach. So sometimes you actually have to just not make them fail, but do you you often you know want them to realize that what they're doing isn't necessarily the best thing that they could be doing. And that creates more openness to learning or to changing things.
00:15:29
Speaker
And so once you've brought all these structures and frameworks and you've worked on potential resistance and you've got really engaged people to coach, how do you make sure that you're keeping the sessions focused on getting an outcome? And how do you measure those outcomes so that they're not just coming away feeling good?
00:15:48
Speaker
It's not just a routine check-in, but there is the real impact that you want to deliver. A lot of the time, it is easy to have a nice, pleasant conversation that doesn't really move the needle.
00:15:59
Speaker
And again, it's a it can be a bit of a tick the box textile. It's brilliant. and I had my coaching sessions with James. That was great. But yeah in in reality, not a lot sort of happened. um And don't get me wrong. I mean, yeah I think I'm still learning in this. I have that sort of view of, yeah I think we can all get better.
00:16:17
Speaker
And there will be meetings I come out of going, my gosh, that didn't necessarily work or we didn't get the outcome we wanted. What stopped us sort of getting there? So I'm definitely not standing here going, I'm an absolute guru and master about this.
00:16:29
Speaker
yeah Katie, I think the key is the more you can make it around a specific opportunity or a specific meeting or a you know ah specific client that you're wanting to unlock or you know try and win over or expand the relationship of. I think as soon as you get into something that is more tactical, it's much better.
00:16:50
Speaker
And I think then you can make it much more sort of outcome focused, which is how do I run that specific meeting? And you can get them into, well, how are you thinking about running that meeting? Okay, here's my thoughts on it. Or what do you see as the downsides there? So i think you can I think doing it that way works well. you know How am I going to get the meeting? Well, talk me through specifically what your email is going to be. What are you going to say in the email? What's going to make...
00:17:14
Speaker
a general counsel or a CFO turn around and go, oh my gosh, I use another firm, but this is really interesting. I should give up 45 minutes of my time to meet with you. i think making it very tactical ensures that you can then measure some of the outcomes associated with it, um as opposed to sitting there and going, talk to me about your practice and where you wanted to get to. And you can have this nice conversation.
00:17:39
Speaker
but it doesn't actually walk away with that. Well, it doesn't necessarily end with them walking away with, right, here are my three things that I've got to do. And when we catch up again next time, we're going to report on whether I've done these sort of three things. So I think that's the way to do it.
00:17:52
Speaker
Katie is focusing around some of those outcomes. Yeah, I sometimes even get people to send me the email they're about to
Aligning Coaching with Goals
00:18:00
Speaker
send to the client before they send it and and I critique it and send it back. And then it's like checking in with them. How did it go? Did you get the meeting?
00:18:07
Speaker
cetera. I think if you can make it more like that, people will walk away with more, i guess, skills that they can then use and reapply for other situations that will be similar going forward.
00:18:20
Speaker
Listening to you here, I can just picture you being really motivating and energizing in those sessions, but it requires some motivation of the person you're coaching as well. So how much are you able to coach motivation versus it has to come from that person and come from within?
00:18:39
Speaker
I do have to manage my style sometimes because not everyone, don't know, and I'm not picking on tax, but you know an introverted tax partner or something doesn't necessarily want me bouncing in the room like Tigger going, right, let's go, what are we going do? And yeah that's that's not really right. So I think you do have to balance.
00:18:55
Speaker
I have to sometimes slow down or adapt my style to the to the other person a lot more because otherwise you just lose a bit of that sort of intimacy from the trust perspective because you this you're lacking a bit of that sort of commonality.
00:19:08
Speaker
yeah i think you do need a level of intrinsic motivation. So it has to come a bit from from within. ah yeah I think it's one thing for the firm to say, you need to improve your numbers or you need to do this. And if you don't do this, this is the downside.
00:19:22
Speaker
Or if you do do this, here's the upside of bonus. I think yeah some of those in extrinsic motivators aren't as powerful as the intrinsic side. So I think really it's a key of...
00:19:33
Speaker
Well, the goal of what I try and do is tap into finding some of those and then trying to create a bit of a bridge between what our sessions are going to focus on with what they're trying to achieve or get out of it. So I think if you start with asking,
00:19:50
Speaker
enough questions around you know what what are you trying to do and and what does great look like and what where are you trying to be a year, two years, three years for now? And if you could wave your magic wand five years from now, what would your practice look like?
00:20:02
Speaker
ah Where would you be from a brand perspective in the marketplace? What would be your profile? The more you can get people, and whether they love the BD or hate the BD, I think most senior sort of fee earners have got a view of, um I'd like our practice to look a bit like this. I'd like to be at this sort of level. I'd like to have a profile that people just keep going, yes, I'm in Chanders and I get 15 calls a month yeah with inbound leads or something.
00:20:28
Speaker
And I think if you can understand where they're trying to get to, then I think it's up to you to then sort of align the these sessions with helping them achieve that.
00:20:39
Speaker
And even if the firm have slightly different views of, I need you to come in and coach this person on this topic, you're better off focusing around some of the things that align with the individual and then trying to weave in some of the firm's directives, I guess, into those into some of those sort of conversations.
00:20:56
Speaker
There's a great framework for anyone listening called the WIN Framework, and and that stands for What's Important Now. It's a three-letter acronym there. It's by a lady called Liz Wiseman.
00:21:08
Speaker
So if you just literally Google Liz Wiseman WIN Framework, it comes up with some really interesting stuff. But it it talks about finding out and identifying what's important now. And then how do you, in my case, as the coach, try and get in on the win, if that makes sense? Because if it's not a priority, so this is all about aligning what we're trying to do with what they are focused on at this moment in time. So if I'm asking them to do a bunch of stuff, but this really isn't a priority right now, their focus is around five other things, then they're probably not going to do and be as engaged and give the time and effort to
00:21:44
Speaker
for for our conversation compared to other things. they're definitely not going to probably fulfill on the outcomes or the action items walking out of it. So um yeah, the the framework works really well. You understand what's important to the the firm.
00:21:57
Speaker
You understand what's important to say the partner. You find the overlap in there. And then the question is, how do i align what I'm trying to do? How do I get in on the win? um So again, I love a framework. I think these things really help coaches be more effective.
00:22:12
Speaker
And that's a good one for me in terms of trying to find that motivation and align the motivation. I'm interested to know, I mean, it's great that you're sharing that framework. I'm going to put you on the spot and ask you what is important now? I mean, the the the financial markets have never been more dynamic, both positively and negatively, if we think about Australia.
00:22:33
Speaker
So thinking about the clients that are working with you right now, the requests that you're getting for coaching right now, what is important now in the market? I think that will vary from from firm to firm. So I think you know if you look at it, as a simple it's a simple Venn diagram with with three sort of circles there. And yeah the first circle is what's important to the firm.
00:22:56
Speaker
So if you're dealing with a particular firm, it's like, well, what are the key priorities or strategic objectives for the firm over the next six to 18 months? And there'll be and know a number of strategic priorities that they're focused on or ambitions that they have.
00:23:10
Speaker
Then the second circle is yeah what's important to that professional that I'm talking to. If they're a senior associate, it might be different than if they're or a director versus a partner or something.
00:23:22
Speaker
So they will have that. And then the question is, well, how does that align with the firm's aspirations? And there surely should be some form of overlap. um Otherwise, there's a bit a bit of a problem. And then the question is, there how do i how does this session support you and the firm achieve those combined, what's important now. So I think, Graham, it's less about just the market conditions and what's some happening there. It's more individual in terms of firm goals, partner goals, and then how does this session help drive both of those things?
00:23:55
Speaker
And if you can align with the firm goals, the partner goals, then this session suddenly has more but priority, more likely to have accountability from the partner to actually action on it, et cetera, going forward.
00:24:06
Speaker
Do you think it's a more competitive market than it's been before in your experience? Like, do you think that the need for strategic sales coaching is more pronounced
Strategic Coaching in Economic Pressures
00:24:18
Speaker
now? Yeah, I i do. and Yeah, I think it is.
00:24:21
Speaker
It is tough. I think it's I mean, I think it's not quite as tough here. as it is in the UK, for example, and the UK and some other markets ah are really sort of struggling as just from an economical economic perspective.
00:24:38
Speaker
But I think, yeah, it is tough. And I think if there's less opportunities around, and and I don't know whether you've got visibility, the number of M&A transactions, for example, is it up or down on to the last year, et cetera. But if there's less typical work around, it means that firms they need to increase their win rate.
00:24:56
Speaker
um Because if my win rate was 25% and yeah it was okay, we were chasing 20 deals and we're winning four five of those deals. But now there's only 10 deals around, suddenly I've got to win half of those.
00:25:09
Speaker
And I think the best way to increase the win rate is to yeah engage an internal coach to really focus and on driving that, an external sort of expert to come in and and help the team sort of support support that. So, yeah, I mean, I think it's it's been a good industry to be in during the GFC, um during COVID, because, you know, it doesn't really matter what is sort of happening. There's there's a constant need for winning work around this. There's only so much cost cutting you can do. So you just got to increase the increase activity, increase win rate um in this difficult market.
00:25:46
Speaker
And on the flip side, I've got a client that is doing amazingly well at the moment. I mean, an absolute bumper year, the last couple of years, um and they're they're going brilliantly.
00:25:57
Speaker
But yeah I think you know don't don't just sit there and at the top of the mountain and going brilliant because they know that and they've they've been smart enough to recognize these market conditions for them.
00:26:08
Speaker
aren't going to last forever. So how do we use the time while we're at the top of the mountain to actually build stronger relationships, put in place better BD practices, et cetera, so that when the market starts cooling off, we are still at the forefront. We've still got lots of opportunities. We're winning more than we should be winning, et cetera.
00:26:29
Speaker
And I think that's great. I love working with firms that don't necessarily have a burning problem, as in we are really struggling. They're suddenly going, we're doing brilliantly, but we know this isn't going to last. How do we try and equip partners and equip the firm more broadly to you know keep the momentum even when the market slows down a bit?
00:26:52
Speaker
And one of the things that and we know you do as well as coaching the fee earners is coaching the coaches, coaching BD and salespeople within these firms and and possibly even more of that as we see firms invest in this area for all those reasons
Coaching the Coaches Effectively
00:27:07
Speaker
you've mentioned. So what do you do differently or how do you approach it differently when you're coaching the coaches?
00:27:15
Speaker
I think if you're sitting down with a fee owner, you're sitting down and you're talking about where where do they want their practice to be? you know Talk me through the current practice, current client base. Talk me through where you want it to be.
00:27:26
Speaker
um i think partners and fee owners probably get bored of me saying, you know don't yeah build the practice that you want as opposed to the practice that you get. And what I mean by that is you know not just not just sitting down and going, oh, here's an opportunity that's come my way.
00:27:43
Speaker
I've got it. And suddenly you start inheriting all these different clients and opportunities. I'd love people to be a bit more purposeful around, yeah if I could wave my magic wand in five years from now, what clients do I want to be working for?
00:27:56
Speaker
And you know i did that number of years back. I went, I'd love to work with Disney. And then it took me like two and a half years to find the right opportunity and find the right person before I actually actually started working with Disney. But it it took...
00:28:08
Speaker
it took a bit of focus around that. And if I hadn't done that, I would never have had the opportunity to work with Disney because it just wouldn't have landed in my lap. I had to be super sort of proactive ah around it. And yeah, I mean, one of the best partners that I've come across um in the M&A field, you know, did that. It's not by luck that I'm working with the clients that I'm working with. It's because I was intentional 15 years ago around these are the clients that I want to work with. And now,
00:28:35
Speaker
I'm working with them. So, you know, those are the conversations that you're having with the fee earners. And then the question is, okay, how do you, now you've got a plow, how do you try and implement the plow? And then how do you try and get in front of these people? And what was that first meeting, second meeting, third meeting, et cetera, so look like, how do you differentiate yourself?
00:28:51
Speaker
I think as soon as you were working with the coaches, the conversations are ah different because the focus with the a coach or a sales manager who's got responsibility for coaching in the corporate world, you know it's around you know it's a different thing.
00:29:08
Speaker
So for them, i really focus on probably three or four things. I focus on who they should be investing their time with because they probably don't have enough time and they but I wouldn't advise that they spread themselves thinly across the 20 people, you're going to get better return from their time by focusing on four or five, doing a brilliant job, word of mouth will spread before you know it, more and more partners are receptive to this.
00:29:36
Speaker
So I typically focus on who who should you be prioritizing your time with? And I look at that around, i sort of categorize partners or or the yeah the people that they're working with around current revenue. What are you currently getting in? That will tell you your level of performance, whether you're high performer or struggling, and then their level of potential.
00:29:55
Speaker
So how would you rate this person's potential to be doing more? And I typically say to start with, I'd focus on those people with higher potential. So that could be your superstar rainmaker in the professional services context or your sort of underachievers. We think you could be doing better. You should be doing better. Let's just work out how we can support you be better around that. So I think the who to coach is is really important. That's what I focus on with them.
00:30:20
Speaker
And then the how to coach, because you know I think, again, we shouldn't assume that all coaches approach things the same sort of way. So there'll be a number of frameworks that I might mention or bring in there. TGRO is a simple, well-known one for how do you structure a coaching conversation.
00:30:36
Speaker
um i do the There's a coaching spectrum, which is all about, you know at some point in the conversation, you should be asking ah lots of questions and getting the other persons to be reflecting on what they could be doing differently. But at some point in the conversation, you need to be probably your the partners or others who wanting advice.
00:30:53
Speaker
So how do you know where to play on the spectrum from being giving advice and guidance versus asking questions and helping them work it out for themselves? And then the last one is more about winter when to coach versus say, when when to sell. So, I mean, for example, I'm working with a ah sales leader in Toronto at the moment of of all places, but you know I'm like, well, when do you when do you step out of that coaching role or the ah observation role or et cetera and actually into the actual sales role and getting them to realize that these things are really important. So you don't want to coach on big opportunities. You want to actually play a role in actually winning the big opportunities. So those are some of the things that I would focus on, the who to coach, the how to coach, the when to coach. um
00:31:38
Speaker
And yeah, I mean, that's that's probably a a good starting point, Kating. You've used that analogy of sports a lot, you know, and sports professionals having individual coaching around specific things that they want to improve in.
Building a BD Culture
00:31:52
Speaker
and But when we're dealing with professional services firms, you might have hundreds of individual fee earners who might need different levels of coaching around different things, etc, etc, etc.
00:32:03
Speaker
um How do you embed BD culture into a firm? How do you actually get a business who wants to grow and has aspirations to grow to understand that self-improvement around business development should be a cultural norm in the organization? How do you go about doing that?
00:32:21
Speaker
Yeah, I often look at things around um through the lens of what I call the three C's. And this is something I actually did with the that the chap I was sort of working with in Toronto. He's in a world of chaos. There is so much stuff going on.
00:32:33
Speaker
And I said, hold on, let's just look at things across three C's. First C, clarity. Does everyone have in your team have clarity on what their expectations are, what their revenue goals are, what's expected of them, et cetera, et cetera? How often they're going to update the pipeline or the CRM, all that sort of stuff. Does everyone have absolute clarity around it?
00:32:52
Speaker
Second thing, capability. Does everyone have the capability that they need to be able to execute around that, et cetera? And then the third one is around conditions. you know Have we created or are we creating the optimal conditions for which um from which our fee earners or our people can actually thrive in and and be sort of super successful? So I would have thought if you look come back to the sort of the culture piece and how do you put this in there, I think the starting point for me would be around clarity.
00:33:21
Speaker
which is, does everyone have clarity, not just the executive team around what are we trying to do? What are our aspirations in the market? Are we trying to move from number five to number three?
00:33:34
Speaker
Or are we trying to grow revenue from A to B? um does and Does everyone have clarity on what is expected of them? around that. That would be my starting point from a a culture perspective. Then the next thing is wrapping your arms around them in terms of, we know there are some capability gaps because we're asking you to do things differently than what we've previously been doing.
00:33:52
Speaker
And we need more of our, don't know, senior associates, special counsels, others actually in the market doing things. We can't just rely on our partners to be bringing in the revenue. We need others to do this.
00:34:03
Speaker
And we're going to put that support around you, both in the form maybe some training, both in the forms of linking you up with the internal BD team for follow-up coaching, those sorts things. i think that's how I would be going about doing it. And then lastly, looking at the conditions for success. you know matt does everyone Is everyone operating in the optimal sort of conditions that's actually going to drive the right motivation that people are going to be recognized, rewarded the right way for asking them to cross-sell? Well,
00:34:32
Speaker
Maybe put some KPIs associated with cross-selling in there rather than just hoping that they're going to do the right thing. You mentioned Disney and Google throughout the conversation. And I just wonder, the coaching that you do in corporate versus prof services, how different is it? is Is professional services as different as everybody likes to think?
00:34:53
Speaker
yeah I think there are lots of things that are highly transferable. Whether you're trying to win work or... but Yeah, if you're i know if you're a Google and you're trying to you know grow market share or share of wallets, share of marketing spend with you know a big organization, it is no different than if you are one of the big law firms trying to grow your share of wallet from a legal spend sort of perspective.
00:35:17
Speaker
um I think there are obviously nuances in that the people in the corporates are often full-time sales, yeah know BD people. And yet we know that yeah a lot of the time, yeah partners and others are probably, what, 10%, 15%, if you're lucky, 20% focused around around business development. So you've you've got to adapt to that world. They're not going to have the same amount of time and the same amount of rigor to actually implement some of the things. so Yeah, um my mantra of of late has been focused on just doing the basics brilliantly.
00:35:50
Speaker
And if you do the basics brilliantly, things will actually work out for you. don't And I think that's the challenge in professional services, because you're dealing with some super smart, highly intellectual people.
00:36:02
Speaker
who, when you say we could do the basics brilliantly, they're like, that doesn't excite me. I'm a super skilled, highly intellectual person. Show me the mastery class and I'll turn up. um and And we always have that problem, yeah turning around and going, we're going to run a you know training session on questioning and listening skills. And partners would just go, I'm not turning up to that because I know how to do that.
00:36:22
Speaker
They're not necessarily particularly good at it, but you're going to have to dress it up as something different to sort of get them there. um So, yeah, I think the basics brilliantly, I think is is a good thing. i was listening to something the other day, high performance podcast. I don't know if you listen to that at all. It's it's out of the UK, but they bring in a lot of ah business leaders. They bring a lot of sports people, a lot of people who are coaching some senior sports people.
00:36:48
Speaker
And there was a great quote. Someone that was working with Kobe Bryant said, yeah, that what is it? I wrote it down. The best never get bored with doing the basics. And I think that that would be something I'd love.
00:37:01
Speaker
firms doing brightness, you know if you can get them focused on on doing the basics, that can sort of work well.
Enhancing Coaching with AI
00:37:07
Speaker
Let's talk about technology because data is everywhere, you know, dashboards, CRMs, performance trackers, and now, of course, AI.
00:37:16
Speaker
Our first episode, that we interviewed a chap called Lee Curtis, who has developed an AI agent to sit on the team structures of BD and teams in professional services firms.
00:37:29
Speaker
I'm interested to hear your viewpoint on how technology has changed the coaching dynamic. And then specifically, do you see a world where AI agents can do your job?
00:37:42
Speaker
I'm a big fan of ah AI technology. i think it is yeah i think the winners are going to be the people who adopt it, but don't look at it as necessarily replacing technology.
00:37:53
Speaker
certain things. So I think it it makes those people who are really open to it and know how to use it you way more efficient, way more effective, more impactful, et cetera, just saves them yeah huge amounts of sort of time.
00:38:05
Speaker
yeah having Having said that in terms of replacing me, there are some amazing tools out there. i don't know if you're familiar with one called Udly. I-O-O-D-L-I.
00:38:15
Speaker
It was actually, I came across it because it was created by an ex-Google person in the US who used to be like chief of staff to the original founders ah of of Google.
00:38:26
Speaker
And yeah, and and I think... And Google are now using it. So actually tomorrow, I'm actually going to be the first the guinea pig that actually is the first external provider to use this tool as part of, a not an in-person, but as as part of ah um a virtual training session. So most of the time, people use these training yeah these these AI sort of yeah tools, tech tech tools as pre-work or post-work. Go and do this, then yeah do the training, then go and have a go at doing it and you'll get some feedback.
00:39:00
Speaker
But we're actually doing it, using it as part of the the the training, just because I think psychological safety is one of the big things that people come back to us with going, you put me into a breakout room and I had to role play this. And I'm with my manager, had to be in the room or someone else in the room. I didn't feel really comfortable.
00:39:16
Speaker
well like Well, here's a great tool that you can use you know for this. So this is a it's like they call it a speech presentation tool. But in a way, I think it is it would be brilliant for firms to offer this, especially maybe you wouldn't get partners doing it so much, but certainly you would get more sort of junior mid-level people embracing it, I think.
00:39:35
Speaker
And you're actually able to go in there and go, right, I want to rehearse an agenda for this upcoming meeting. And you you go through that. And at the end of it, the feedback is amazing. I mean, I've been using it you know brief recently and having a go. I've set myself some scenarios or I'm setting the group scenarios. and I've had a go at practicing it.
00:39:52
Speaker
It will give you feedback on how quickly you talk. It will give you feedback on eye contact into the screen. If you're doing virtual meetings, it will give you feedback on Did you pause enough?
00:40:04
Speaker
It will give you feedback on filler words. It will give you feedback on, you know, what word did you use to start each sentence and the repetition of of certain words. it's It's amazing. And then it will give you specific feedback on what you said.
00:40:17
Speaker
So said this resonated, this didn't. Have you thought about doing this? I think tools like that, they definitely have a place. I think what's interesting about that, we spoke, we spoke to Luke S about this is that it takes the emotion and the, and the, um, out of it in terms of, you't you don't take it personally when it's coming from AI, you take it as instruction, you take it as advice, but when there's a real person in front of you saying you talk too fast or you could have used this, but there isn't, there is an opportunity to get defensive around that, isn't it? So yeah in a way that that's a, that's a huge improvement in terms of the,
00:40:52
Speaker
the coaching process if you're taking the emotion out of it, I would imagine. 100%. Generally, I think yeah less subjected. so It's less about me sitting there going, yeah but but Katie, I think this. and You're going, well, I disagree.
00:41:07
Speaker
yeah it it takes that away. it actually becomes much more data-driven feedback that you are that you are getting. so i like that. i mean yeah i don't think you're yeah I don't think any professional service firms necessarily recording calls you know or things like that at the moment, which is what you're getting in in corporate world. you know They're recording the calls. There's now technology that is analyzing those calls.
Mentorship and Continuous Learning in Coaching
00:41:31
Speaker
It is giving you feedback on how many ty how many questions are you asking versus... um you know giving statements or or pitching sort of product. What's the ratio around this? How much talk time are you doing? So how much are you talking versus the customer talking?
00:41:47
Speaker
It's giving you some brilliant feedback that goes, oh my gosh, I had no idea around that. um And I think that's coming back to to sport. you know Sometimes people say to me, you need to change your golf swing. You need to do more of this or less of that. I'm like, really? I think I'm doing okay.
00:42:01
Speaker
And yet if they videoed me and I look back on the video at the driving range, I'm like, oh my gosh, you're right. I do i do this completely. It becomes the first sense of I need to change.
00:42:12
Speaker
and And I think that's where the the if the technology or even AI in this world um Yeah, it can play a great role in doing that. So, yeah, I'm a big, big fan.
00:42:23
Speaker
i would love people to give it a go embrace it. um You can learn on your own time. You're not reliant on engaging people like me. It's a really easy way to scale coaching across an organization.
00:42:36
Speaker
Yeah. And look, when you were developing your own coaching style, there wasn't Udly or AI to give you any tips. So who or what, but helped you develop your style to who you are today?
00:42:50
Speaker
and a good mentor of mine. He's been a mentor for, I met him actually when I was at EY and then ah at Capgemino. And we've become very, very good friends um since. He's now godparents to my kids.
00:43:03
Speaker
And I think he's acted as my soundboard, my coach. He is amazing at not giving advice, but just asking questions. And I typically jump into a lot of it It's probably too much advice giving versus him. But I mean, he's he's amazing at asking the right questions of me. And yeah, I mean, there's certain things that he's... I remember one year I had a... When I was setting up on my own, he said, oh, you've had a great year, haven't you? And I said, yeah, I have.
00:43:29
Speaker
And he goes, you know what the goal is? The goal is never to have just a great year. It's about having a great decade. and And that sort of stuck with me going, oh my God, yeah. You think you just reached the top of the mountain. It's like, hold on, I've just... The clouds are just...
00:43:41
Speaker
parted and it's like, oh my gosh, there' there's a summit three levels up. And I think that's the that's the art. that's that yeah So he's someone that I've definitely sort of looked at. um But even just in my interactions with yeah clients and people like that, you know often you just, don't know, if you have this openness to learn, you'll always be picking up going, gosh, that's a really great thing. Why didn't I ask that question? Or why didn't I do this? Well, that was a great bit. I should incorporate that into my sort of coaching. So Yeah, I mean, I think through through the likes of Kevin, through the likes of sort of firms bringing me in to do this you know, you're just sort of learning in a way as as you're sort of going.
00:44:19
Speaker
I read a lot of books. I listen to now lots of podcasts and things like that. So I'm i'm constantly trying to tweak and iterate what I do. Is there a particular coaching moment or story that stands out for you about where you saw somebody really transform either themselves or in their practice?
Transformative Frameworks and Tools
00:44:39
Speaker
I mean, I'd like to think have been lots of instances where people have walked away going, that was hugely valuable and that sort of changed how I think about things. And again, I come back to the basics brilliantly, simple little tools, simple frameworks, even just how they map their practice and think about their client base and where they need to spend more time or less time yeah on those.
00:45:00
Speaker
um Yeah, I think those are eye-openers that people just go, oh my gosh, that is so, so useful. And and now it's sort of part of their BAU or DNA to an extent.
00:45:12
Speaker
So then there's been lots of individual sort of scenarios. But I think I got recently, was it last year, got asked to 150... do a hundred and fifty coaching sessions for a client over a three-week period.
00:45:25
Speaker
So they opened it up to the the wider audience and just said, first come, first served, you get thirty minute a 30-minute coaching session. Contrary to what people think of coaching, yeah often people go pure coaching is me just sitting there going, well, Graham, what do you think you could do differently? Or what do you think you could be doing in this instance?
00:45:43
Speaker
Yeah, I think but the client said to me, we want you to probably spend the five minutes understanding the challenge that these people are facing and then give them some advice around it. So it was slightly different um perspective. But that was that was amazing. We were doing 10 sessions a day for three weeks on America time. then and yeah so starting at 5 a.m.
00:46:05
Speaker
or 4 a.m. m or something um for for five hours, back to back, no breaks, unless someone was late. And then we replicated that across EMEA and into into sort of APAC. But yeah there were some amazing...
00:46:19
Speaker
I'd say there were just some quick wins. It's amazing what you can do when you just got 30 minutes. That was all you had. 30 minutes and you've got to try and solve someone's problem, either helping them solve it or giving them advice around it.
00:46:30
Speaker
I'd probably look back at that and go, that was that was an amazing project that probably won't happen again necessarily. But um yeah, I think we we got some huge impact on that.
00:46:41
Speaker
I think we should share the idea. i think that everybody who's in a BD coaching role in a professional services firm should think to themselves, I'm going to 150 coaching conversations or 100 or whatever it might be every three week period. You've got half an hour.
00:46:55
Speaker
ah love it. Well, a friend of mine who works at one of the big four, I mean, she's just going through a coaching accreditation um sort of program. And yeah I think part of that, having done the course, in order to get accredited, she has to log 100 hours of coaching.
00:47:10
Speaker
So it's not the 10,000 hour rule, ah but it's 100 hours ah of sort of coaching. And I said to you know we're running this program um here. Why don't you offer this instead of just doing other coaching with the rest of the firm? Why don't you offer this as part of the BD program?
00:47:24
Speaker
program and just go, everyone anyone can yeah schedule a 30 minute or an hour conversation with me around BD and what you're doing. i think that's a great way for anyone in BD teams that is wanting to do more coaching.
00:47:38
Speaker
yeah It's the best way to build credibility. Open it up. Those people who are wanting to sign up will sign up. You'll get some track record. You'll hopefully get some great quick wins along the way. And then more and more people in the firm will become open to yeah the the coaching from the internal teams.
00:47:54
Speaker
That was great. Let's get coaching. Let's get coaching. I've been exhausted by the end of it. I'm just thinking you'd be running on adrenaline. Oh, by the end of the by the end of week three, I was absolutely shattered. I had no idea it was going to be as as exhausting as it was because every conversation is is fresh and you're meeting 150 new people all with different problems.
00:48:16
Speaker
And you've got to be on the ball. You've got to have ideally some answers that they don't want to hear. Sorry, I don't think I can help you. So you've got to have, you know, you you yeah you really have to be yeah have to be sort of switched on.
00:48:28
Speaker
I don't think you'd ever be sure of an answer. and but um It's been fantastic interviewing you. We've really, really enjoyed it. And you've given so much for our listeners. I mean, there is so much in there. When we listen back, we'll just we'll be so we'll be writing furiously notes about all these different frameworks and things that people can do in their business. Thank you so much for coming. We really appreciated talking to you.
00:48:56
Speaker
Well, Casey, I'm i'm exhausted. i mean, like he is got he's got so much energy and you can see why he's so successful at what he does, right?
Sustaining a Culture of BD Improvement
00:49:05
Speaker
I think it'd be really good to remind ourselves why we invited him onto the podcast in the first place.
00:49:10
Speaker
um And that really is because we're getting so much more requests now from our clients to look at ways in which they can upskill the people in the business around business development and coaching and client development, et cetera.
00:49:26
Speaker
And there is a real sense, I think, that that skillset is not available in-house in the way that it is available externally. And here's a really good example of what you get if you bring somebody into the business who's got years of expertise, just focus on coaching, but also that real sort of diverse background of clients that he's worked with and sales that he's worked with. Because at the end of the day, it all boils down to simple formulas and the basics.
00:49:56
Speaker
And do you know what? You feel exhausted. I feel energized. It's my age. It's my age. One of the things I love about it, and I may paraphrase incorrectly, but when he was talking about just being the best at the basics and getting and you know being really inspirational about always aspiring to be better,
00:50:17
Speaker
And all know this, but without a coach consistently nudging us to do this, then it's easy to fall away from that. And it's easier for partners who are good enough, successful enough, profitable enough in the middle almost, you know, not the rainmakers, not the people who are struggling with their numbers overtly being referred almost immediately.
00:50:40
Speaker
with this sense of remedial action whereby there's so much untapped potential. And so I really liked that he talked about the importance of this across a whole firm. And I think this is the reason why several of the director briefs we've we've worked on in the last 12 months have really focused on coaching as as a core part as well. And I think when we look at recruitment and think about this with a recruitment lens, it was really interesting when James touched on that tension, when we do want to source this internally, between the fact that you're a better coach if you've been a salesperson yourself at some point in your career,
00:51:22
Speaker
But many BD people in prof services who are purists to the career path have been quite internally focused. So I think the you know if we reference AI, the mundane will go away. Some of this will correct itself with people being pushed more external and being coached on coaching and sales methodologies earlier in their careers.
00:51:43
Speaker
Some of it, dare I say, as a recruiter might be more expensive views to recruitment and where coaching talent might come from in the future as well. Yeah, yeah. I mean, I think he there were two things I took away from him around about the market. One was, you know, the client that was doing brilliantly and is still investing in coaching because they understand. But what I thought about that afterwards was actually that doesn't surprise me because if you've got a BD culture in your business, it goes to culture.
00:52:13
Speaker
if you have a culture of continuous improvement professional development not just around the the technical skills of being an engineer or being a lawyer being an accountant but actually the business skills and the client skills if you've got a culture that actually says you need to be really really good with clients and you need to be really really good at winning work then it embeds itself and of course you continue having coaching in the same way like the tennis player continues to have coaching they're at the top of their game But then it made me think about all of those clients that come to it too late.
00:52:46
Speaker
They come to it as a as a rescue. you know we're losing we're We're losing ground. We're losing clients. We're losing profit. but We need BD. We need BD. it's In a way, it's too late because because it takes years to build this sort of culture.
00:53:01
Speaker
And so, you know, I think the message to any managing partner, CEO out there who's looking at the balance sheet thinking we've got this, you know, we need to win more work. there the The amount of win rate, that the win rate needs to be higher because the amount of opportunities is lower. He referenced that.
00:53:16
Speaker
Get yourself into the BD mindset. Bring in coaches. It's the best investment you can probably make. And when it is cultural, it's multi-pronged. It's not just let's do this quick fix, this one tick. A multi-pronged we often see is external coaches mixed with hiring people with strong coaching skills internally, mixed with technology. And by the way, how fascinating was James's example there.
00:53:43
Speaker
So it's multi-pronged, it's consistent because it's not just six months and we're done because then you fall back into the same complacency. and complacency doesn't win in this market or in the future.
00:53:56
Speaker
So who are we interviewing next, Graeme?
Upcoming Episode Preview
00:53:59
Speaker
Well, it's exciting because direct from the USA, we have Dr. Heidi Gardner, author of Smarter Collaboration,
00:54:07
Speaker
And also David Harvey, who is a really impressive consultant who specializes in working with top-tier law firms in the US. um And who also runs a series of very high-level conferences for CMOs in the US.
00:54:22
Speaker
And they're both coming on together specifically to talk to us about sector development, sector marketing, sector BD in the legal profession. So that is going to be one that a lot of people are going to be very interested in.
00:54:38
Speaker
Really looking forward to it. This has been Selden Rossa production. Find our episodes wherever you get your podcasts.