Rate Your Practice

Rate your practice for the new era.

Today we live in a business world dominated by the financial crisis. However as I travel around and meet people in all walks of business I find that there is a general frustration with the negativity of tough times. If anything, business people and professionals, in particular, simply want to get on with the future.

Now for some, that future is an ideal retirement. They are ready to sell or hand the baton over to a younger group within their organisation. They have had enough and the current crisis has brought forward their decision.

So strong has that demand been that Summit is now helping a number of practices with a transition of ownership or management. Allied with this is the recognition that there is a rationalisation process amongst professional practices which will be accelerated by the current business environment. And again Summit is being asked to assist with mergers and acquisitions for those exact reasons.

However, if you are of a mind to develop and grow from within current practice - then now is the time to examine the key factors that will ensure success in the future.
The important point to remember is that for most owners rating their organisation’s performance in these key areas – there will be a need for change. I believe that changing a practice is often more comfortable for the person managing the change than perhaps the employee who is being asked to change the habits of a lifetime or move out of their security zones.

On the other hand much of the change required after the evaluation will fall on the shoulders of the owners of the business. In other words the change will need to be at the top. For instance, I believe that the future will require acceptance of multi-disciplined practices. For many that will mean a great change in attitude. It will also require updating of systems and computer programs – not just to meet competition but to maintain young and talented professionals who don’t want to be left behind.

So let’s take a close look at the key indicators or criteria for future growth. Many of you who have read this column in the past or attended a seminar at which Summit have presented – will have seen a number of these factors before. All that is required is an honest appraisal of where you are now.

A Good Team
Attracting and retaining good people is a critical success factor for professional service practices. The old fashioned view ‘that we are paying them enough’ is not enough in today’s environment. Young people particularly will not endure a boring work environment. Successful firms celebrate successes (new clients, birthdays, major achievements) have sound training, career plans & feedback, job variety and recognition.
Use this criteria to rate your firm in attracting developing and retaining good team.

Poor Average Good
-5 0 5
Production Culture
A second department to be developed is what our team does produce – particularly, quality and timely work for clients.
Bringing the team together in a culture of ‘continuous improvement’ is one huge success ingredient in growing firms that also contributes to efficiency and effectiveness (i.e. control of costs & earners).

Successful firms have solid work scheduling systems whilst looking at capacity and technology capabilities with reduced time write offs and few job complaints about quality & delivery times.
How do you rate?

Poor Average Good
-5 0 5

Value Added Services
We’ve found clients want more and more a ‘one stop shop’ approach to related services e.g. for a surveying firm consider; engineering design, town planning, project management, architectural design etc without diminishing the core skill – in this case, surveying.
Unfortunately, as professionals, it is easy to stay with your core professional skill and not entertain cross selling.

Clients certainly don’t expect you to be the master of all these professions – rather be the controller of quality filtered alliance partners i.e. other professional firms.
How do you currently rate with this opportunity?

Poor Average Good
-5 0 5

Key Clients and Alliances Program
Most professional firms get clogged with the 20% ‘c’ clients creating 80% of problems, bad debts, write offs and loss in employee morale. At the same time relationships with client referrers (e.g. architects, engineering firms, lawyers etc) are generally poor.

Successful firms have a client and alliance partner review process which filters out unworthy clients and alliances and highlights the 20% A, B clients and alliance partners who give 80% of the revenue, profit, referrals and job satisfaction for the team.
So how do you rate in existing low value clients and alliances, attracting new clients & up selling and cross selling with new value add services & having regular meetings to review progress.

Poor Average Good
-5 0 5

Leadership
Using a corporate approach to different roles & responsibilities (e.g. shareholder, director, CEO), leadership is then the key factor in the way forward for professional service firms.

An owner or CEO needs to be leading the organisation towards a bigger future. That requires a number of hours not dedicated to servicing clients but rather servicing the business.
Which is better for the firm? – Producing currently 1200 chargeable hours or introducing 2400 new chargeable hours from new clients?

Thus developing roles for partners & managers (CEO, Business Development, Human Resources, Operations and Financial roles) to take on specific responsibilities is clear forward thinking on a tried & proven model.

So imagine a firm with compound growth of 20% with better quality clients, a high producing team, selling value added services with value billing (fixed fees).
Understanding this how good is the leadership at leading change, relationship building, keeping a strong focus on results, solid professional skills and commitment?

Poor Average Good
-5 0 5

Next Step
So after reviewing all the above - the next step is the where analysis. Where do I want this business to be strong in and what are the strategies I have to focus on to get there. The above model gives you a good guide for this. It is about setting your objectives for change. A year from now how do you want to rate yourself.