Sales Speak: Making It Rain

“Motivation and inspiration energize people,” says Harvard Business School professor and authority on leadership and change, John P. Kotter. “Satisfying the need for achievement, sense of belonging, recognition, self-esteem, a feeling of control over one's life and the ability to live up to one's ideals, elicit a powerful response,” he says.

Creativity Is the New Paradigm

In 2010, IBM conducted one-on-one interviews with more than 1,500 CEOs, corporate heads and public sector leaders across 60 nations and 33 industries. Sixty percent of those interviewed ranked creativity first now and for the next five years. By its nature, creative leadership is the antithesis of the status quo. In an economy where it seems that very little is working to turn things around, a dose of creative thinking may be the cure.

Get Close to the Client

The IBM survey also revealed that 88% of the CEOs and 95% of the standout leaders polled believe that getting closer to the customer is the top business strategy over the next five years.

Revived Business Development

Revived business development results start with a willingness to change and have written goals. And small changes can yield a big return.

“Written goals cannot be emphasized enough,” says Michael Hollingsworth, managing partner of Nelson Mullins Riley & Scarborough's Atlanta office, and co-head of the firm's mergers and acquisitions group. “Without goals, you are hoping for a good year. Goals give you motivation every day and, if you do what needs to be done every day, you will have an excellent year.”

As a leader, taking time to plan sets an example.

“Generally speaking, I find that targeted activities are more likely to produce results with the most efficient use of your time,” says Jill Pryor, partner and chair of the Marketing Committee at Bondurant, Mixson & Elmore, LLP. “Statistically, you are far more likely to get another legal matter from a client you already know than from a stranger you meet at a cocktail party. In every interaction with existing clients you have an opportunity to improve your service and value to that client. Similarly, you know that former clients for whom you don't currently have a matter ' unless the relationship ended badly ' trust you and would hire you in the right circumstance.”

Thirty minutes is all it takes to build a doable business development plan.

Here are 10 tips for building a personal plan that has proven very successful in restoring OMPs to a world-class rainmaker and for inspiring the rest of the team to follow their lead.

Building a Personal Plan

1. Set Clear Targets

Planning starts with making a Top 10 list of specific target clients, then drilling that list down to just the top three. It is not enough to say, “Any Fortune 100 company in the XYZ market.” Which specific company? To stay in action and add urgency, reduce reliance on core clients by lowering the percentage of those revenues typically factored in.

“Every prospect is not an ideal client,” says John Yates, chair of the technology practice at Morris, Manning & Martin, LLP and co-author of “Super Rainmaking: Ten Secrets to Raising the Bar in Your Professional Practice.” “The reality is, and this is very hard to do, you have to turn down a lot more than you decide to pursue. One of the keys is to build a qualified target prospect list and then be very selective about how you spend your time, and more importantly, your money to pursue the targets. There are a lot of prospective clients in the world, but you have to sit back and ask yourself, 'Who is that ideal client, and where should I be spending my resources?'”

2. Commit to Researching the Top Three Target Clients By a Specific Date

Knowledge fuels the plan. Research should be focused on uncovering the three most important needs of the company or individual target. It is a great exercise for team members to get involved in the business development process, which stimulates creative thinking.

3. Conduct a Set Number of Client Interviews

Set an agenda and arrange to meet with a set number of prospective or existing clients within a specific time period. Prepare a list of questions to advance the relationship. Ask team members to contribute to the list to reflect knowledge of the client and their practice specialty.

4. Offer to Make Strategic Introductions

Offer to make strategic introductions, and then ask that client to do the same so that existing client contacts can be expanded. Show team members how to think bigger about their contacts by suggesting they add this tactic to their business development toolbox.

5. Schedule at Least One Business Development Activity Every Day

Devote some time to marketing and business development each day over the next 12 weeks and diligently keep track of the time invested. Activities could include meeting with prospective clients, making sure to plan how the time will be used and the questions that will be asked.

6. Establish an Accountability Partner

Agree to meet on a regular basis in person, or otherwise, to discuss commitments and results. Consider setting up a buddy system for team members to support their business development goals.

7. Build a Visibility Plan

Identify publications, industry organizations and events that attract client targets and build a plan to become visible there. Show team members how to build and implement their own visibility plan and how to use the opportunities they generate to move their business development goals forward.

8. Build a Professional Development Plan to Enhance Client Value

If getting closer to the customer is the client's most important goal, then that must also be the OMP's strategy. For example, would learning more about capital funding in the biotech field better serve the needs of environmental clients? Would becoming more proficient with technology and/or online resources like LinkedIn and Google+ make researching new business targets faster and easier?

9. Share the Formula

Share the 30-minute business development plan formula with partners and team leaders. Good results are worth talking about.

10. Consider an Outside Expert

If rainmaking is still at the bottom of the to-do list, consider bringing in an outside expert. When all else fails, spending money on an expert is one sure way to kick urgency up a notch. “At Loeb & Loeb, we are exploring engaging coaches to help our lawyers move beyond marketing and to embrace the sales process,” says Mr. Schaefer.

Final Thoughts

Move business development forward even when everything else is falling apart. For some, daily business development activities will be an unfulfilled wish as one attention-grabbing issue after another eats up the best of intentions. In those situations, making a list at the beginning of the month containing at least three items that can be worked on no matter what else is going on, keeps business development moving forward.

Business management and productivity. A written business development plan will reenergize and refocus business development efforts. Improving management skills will make more time for doing what matters most. Assessing priorities, increasing efficiency and enrolling the administrative staff in the OMP's success will go a long way toward achieving balance, that elusive equilibrium that gets left at the door on the first day of law school.

Look beyond what can be seen today. Marc Taylor, whose firm, Taylor English Duma LLP, has grown from four attorneys in 2005 to more than 125 today, knows Rome was not built in a day. “It is important to remember,” he says, “that business development is a long-term process of building trust. No does not mean Never.”

Robin Hensley, a business development coach, is president of Raising the Bar, a company that specializes in coaching managing partners. Contact Hensley at 404-815-4110 or via e-mail at [email protected].

Editor's Note: This article first appeared in the New York Law Journal's Law Firm Management Special Pullout Section on Oct. 17, 2011. It has been shortened for this publication.

While rainmaking is probably one of many good reasons an individual is moved into an Office Managing Partner leadership role, the more distance from the day-to-day requirements for rainmaking, the more inevitable is the erosion of those skills. Business development is often the last thing on an Office Managing Partner's (OMP's) to-do list and the first thing that gets thrown overboard when priorities conflict. In spite of numerous and daunting challenges, OMPs are waking up to a new reality: adapt or die. “Firms can't just rely on reputation and referrals, anymore. They have to make business development a priority and help their team hone client development and management skills,” says David Schaefer, New York Office Managing Partner at Loeb & Loeb LLP. The good news is that it is never too late to get back in the game. OMPs can overcome this list of challenges by understanding the new environment and tackling it head on with new strategies that encompass some well-known leadership principles together with proven business development tactics. This article presents a plan for doing both.

Motivation and Inspiration

“Motivation and inspiration energize people,” says Harvard Business School professor and authority on leadership and change, John P. Kotter. “Satisfying the need for achievement, sense of belonging, recognition, self-esteem, a feeling of control over one's life and the ability to live up to one's ideals, elicit a powerful response,” he says.

Creativity Is the New Paradigm

In 2010, IBM conducted one-on-one interviews with more than 1,500 CEOs, corporate heads and public sector leaders across 60 nations and 33 industries. Sixty percent of those interviewed ranked creativity first now and for the next five years. By its nature, creative leadership is the antithesis of the status quo. In an economy where it seems that very little is working to turn things around, a dose of creative thinking may be the cure.

Get Close to the Client

The IBM survey also revealed that 88% of the CEOs and 95% of the standout leaders polled believe that getting closer to the customer is the top business strategy over the next five years.

Revived Business Development

Revived business development results start with a willingness to change and have written goals. And small changes can yield a big return.

“Written goals cannot be emphasized enough,” says Michael Hollingsworth, managing partner of Nelson Mullins Riley & Scarborough's Atlanta office, and co-head of the firm's mergers and acquisitions group. “Without goals, you are hoping for a good year. Goals give you motivation every day and, if you do what needs to be done every day, you will have an excellent year.”

As a leader, taking time to plan sets an example.

“Generally speaking, I find that targeted activities are more likely to produce results with the most efficient use of your time,” says Jill Pryor, partner and chair of the Marketing Committee at Bondurant, Mixson & Elmore, LLP. “Statistically, you are far more likely to get another legal matter from a client you already know than from a stranger you meet at a cocktail party. In every interaction with existing clients you have an opportunity to improve your service and value to that client. Similarly, you know that former clients for whom you don't currently have a matter ' unless the relationship ended badly ' trust you and would hire you in the right circumstance.”

Thirty minutes is all it takes to build a doable business development plan.

Here are 10 tips for building a personal plan that has proven very successful in restoring OMPs to a world-class rainmaker and for inspiring the rest of the team to follow their lead.

Building a Personal Plan

1. Set Clear Targets

Planning starts with making a Top 10 list of specific target clients, then drilling that list down to just the top three. It is not enough to say, “Any Fortune 100 company in the XYZ market.” Which specific company? To stay in action and add urgency, reduce reliance on core clients by lowering the percentage of those revenues typically factored in.

“Every prospect is not an ideal client,” says John Yates, chair of the technology practice at Morris, Manning & Martin, LLP and co-author of “Super Rainmaking: Ten Secrets to Raising the Bar in Your Professional Practice.” “The reality is, and this is very hard to do, you have to turn down a lot more than you decide to pursue. One of the keys is to build a qualified target prospect list and then be very selective about how you spend your time, and more importantly, your money to pursue the targets. There are a lot of prospective clients in the world, but you have to sit back and ask yourself, 'Who is that ideal client, and where should I be spending my resources?'”

2. Commit to Researching the Top Three Target Clients By a Specific Date

Knowledge fuels the plan. Research should be focused on uncovering the three most important needs of the company or individual target. It is a great exercise for team members to get involved in the business development process, which stimulates creative thinking.

3. Conduct a Set Number of Client Interviews

Set an agenda and arrange to meet with a set number of prospective or existing clients within a specific time period. Prepare a list of questions to advance the relationship. Ask team members to contribute to the list to reflect knowledge of the client and their practice specialty.

4. Offer to Make Strategic Introductions

Offer to make strategic introductions, and then ask that client to do the same so that existing client contacts can be expanded. Show team members how to think bigger about their contacts by suggesting they add this tactic to their business development toolbox.

5. Schedule at Least One Business Development Activity Every Day

Devote some time to marketing and business development each day over the next 12 weeks and diligently keep track of the time invested. Activities could include meeting with prospective clients, making sure to plan how the time will be used and the questions that will be asked.

6. Establish an Accountability Partner

Agree to meet on a regular basis in person, or otherwise, to discuss commitments and results. Consider setting up a buddy system for team members to support their business development goals.

7. Build a Visibility Plan

Identify publications, industry organizations and events that attract client targets and build a plan to become visible there. Show team members how to build and implement their own visibility plan and how to use the opportunities they generate to move their business development goals forward.

8. Build a Professional Development Plan to Enhance Client Value

If getting closer to the customer is the client's most important goal, then that must also be the OMP's strategy. For example, would learning more about capital funding in the biotech field better serve the needs of environmental clients? Would becoming more proficient with technology and/or online resources like LinkedIn and Google+ make researching new business targets faster and easier?

9. Share the Formula

Share the 30-minute business development plan formula with partners and team leaders. Good results are worth talking about.

10. Consider an Outside Expert

If rainmaking is still at the bottom of the to-do list, consider bringing in an outside expert. When all else fails, spending money on an expert is one sure way to kick urgency up a notch. “At Loeb & Loeb, we are exploring engaging coaches to help our lawyers move beyond marketing and to embrace the sales process,” says Mr. Schaefer.

Final Thoughts

Move business development forward even when everything else is falling apart. For some, daily business development activities will be an unfulfilled wish as one attention-grabbing issue after another eats up the best of intentions. In those situations, making a list at the beginning of the month containing at least three items that can be worked on no matter what else is going on, keeps business development moving forward.

Business management and productivity. A written business development plan will reenergize and refocus business development efforts. Improving management skills will make more time for doing what matters most. Assessing priorities, increasing efficiency and enrolling the administrative staff in the OMP's success will go a long way toward achieving balance, that elusive equilibrium that gets left at the door on the first day of law school.

Look beyond what can be seen today. Marc Taylor, whose firm, Taylor English Duma LLP, has grown from four attorneys in 2005 to more than 125 today, knows Rome was not built in a day. “It is important to remember,” he says, “that business development is a long-term process of building trust. No does not mean Never.”

Robin Hensley, a business development coach, is president of Raising the Bar, a company that specializes in coaching managing partners. Contact Hensley at 404-815-4110 or via e-mail at [email protected].