Tag: Business Development

Are Alternative Fee Arrangements (AFAs) the New Standard for Law Firms?

From the National Law Review’s Business of Law guest blogger, Meredith L. Williams of Baker Donelson Bearman Caldwell & Berkowitz, PC discusses the current legal marketing ‘it’ topic – alternative fee arrangements or AFAs.  Meredith provides a great historical perspective on this topic and goes into nice detail on how law firms should address this new hot issue.  Read on: 

The Supreme Court of the United States answered this question when they released the opinion for Perdue v. Kenny A. In this case, the Supreme Court rejected the statement “departures from the hourly billing are becoming more common.” In addition, the court noted “if hourly billing becomes unusual, an alternative to the lodestar method [hours worked times billing rate] may have to be found. However, neither the respondents nor their amici contend that that day has arrived.”

Are AFAs new?

Although the U.S. Supreme Court stated hourly billing is the usual practice, alternative fee arrangements remain a growing trend in law firms. From 2008-2010 law firms have seen an increase in AFAs from 4-16% (Source: CounselLink). However, the question remains are AFAs new or are they a natural evolution?

Alternative fee arrangements have existed for decades in many law firms. Examples include blended rates, contingency fees, fixed fees, capped fees, collared arrangements, etc. Although the concept of AFAs is not new, the push to offer more alternative arrangements has never been more prevalent in law firms as it is today. Key drivers of this shift are the economy, the ACC Value Challenge and the clients demand of more risk sharing and consistent, transparent, value-based project pricing.

The ACC’s Value Challenge is based on the concept that law firms can improve the value of delivering legal services without increasing the cost. For law firms, this concept alters and increases the focus on efficiency in the delivery of those legal services. This new focus on efficiency creates a demand to price legal services, manage the legal work process, manage the right talent and form a strategic alliance with clients to improve the service delivery. Clients are now looking for transparency and true cost control. AFAs are the new way of delivering on these demands.

Ultimately, alternative fee arrangements are about risk sharing. With the economic and global shift, clients and companies are now in the driver’s seat. They are attempting to shift more risk of legal service delivery to law firms. However, law firms are only agreeing to this risk transfer as long as the arrangements are still profitable.

What do law firms do now?

As AFAs become more common, how can a law firm compete in this area? Law firms must understand the different sides to alternative fees – estimation and management – and align their firm strategies to these areas.

First, firms need to learn to estimate the cost of legal services. Estimates and budgets must now be based on cost rather than billable rates. Firms are beginning down this path of price estimation with many different budget and estimation tools that are new to the market. A standard starting point is data mining previous matters of similar nature of suit. This process provides an accurate view of prior costs for a type of service. However, using historical data can also show the inefficiencies in those former processes. Finally, the data mining of former data can be incredibly difficult if law firms have not previously used phase and task billing codes in their time entry system.

Next, firms must learn to manage the alternative fee arrangements effectively in order to remain profitable. Budgeting tools, case management tools/ strategies and process analysis are key pieces to this phase. As stated above, there are many new budgeting tools to the market that now help law firms manage budgets and control expenses. However, most tools rely on the use of phase and task billing. In addition, law firms are now considering strategies to aid their attorneys and staff in the understanding of legal project management. This is a difficult task to accomplish because lawyers are not project managers by nature and the norm is not to look at legal work in phases or tasks. Finally, firms are looking at any and all tools that exist within their firm our outside their firm that can aid in efficiency. Things such a document assembly, form production, expertise databases, case/deal management software and extranet collaboration with clients are just a few tools that firms are considering. When an alternative fee arrangement is used, without management of the budget, deal/case and processes, the risk of profitability loss now falls to the law firm instead of the client.

What will change?

The largest change seen by law firms is that billable rates are no longer the driver of profitability. Firms have previously been raising rates at a 6-8% increase with each passing year. With the economy, the practice of raising rates had to change. We now live in a buyers-market for legal services. Clients no longer stand for the standard rate increases but instead now look for a strategic partner. Additionally, the entire law firm model on compensation and partner track are called into question with the change from billable hour and rates. Firms that move to alternative fee arrangements need to look to alternative metrics and measures for compensation, partner track, staffing and bonuses. Some firms are turning to metrics such as overall performance, expense management, practice management, client development, and leadership skills instead of the maximum billable hours.

Conclusion

In conclusion, alternative fee arrangements are not the new standard for law firms in 2010. Currently, AFAs only make up 10-16% of business. However, just as we saw this percentage increase from 2008 to 2010, we expect a further increase over the coming years. In order to stay competitive, law firms must determine their stance and strategy with AFAs and learn to remain profitable in this changing time.

©2010 Baker, Donelson, Bearman, Caldwell & Berkowitz, PC. All Rights Reserved.

About the Author:

Meredith L. Williams is Baker Donelson’s Director of Knowledge Management.  Although trained as a lawyer, she is not actively engaged in the practice of law.  Instead, she oversees BakerNet, the Firm’s industry-leading intranet, and coordinates strategic growth on behalf of the Firm in knowledge management, competitive intelligence and technology.  Ms. Williams is widely recognized as a leading authority in knowledge management issues for the legal field, and is a frequent presenter and author on knowledge management and competitive intelligence. 901-577-2353 /www.BakerDonelson.com

Is Your Email Service Provider the Best?

This week’s Business of Law Guest Bloggers at the National Law Review are from Duo Consulting.  Sonny Cohen of Duo provides some good specifics on what to look for in an emailing service.

We recently received this question from a law firm marketer. I’ve edited it slightly for brevity and anonymity:

“Our email service is earning a big #fail at this point. We’ve used (Name Brand provider) with great success for small jobs and I’m talking with them about an enterprise solution. Do you have a provider you love (or a crappy one I should be warned away from)? What are the pros and cons of the systems you’ve used?”

The question, submitted to a listserv, engendered responses of affiliation with one ESP or another because they liked them, had no problems, or other good indications of service. But email delivery is more complex than you might first imagine and one size does not fit all. It is not (yet) a commodity. Personal recommendations of quality service or indications of being satisfied are a good start of an evaluation but an insufficient qualifier for engaging an email service provider. Like the acquisition of almost any service (legal or technical) it is important to understand requirements.

This is not intended to be comprehensive but merely to illustrate my point. Get this part and you might get there is more to the story. So let’s take a look at these simple factors:

  • What does your email subscriber base look like? gmail.com? or bigcompanyname.com?
  • How big a mailing would you execute at one time?
  • What is your mailing frequency?

If you send a lot of email frequently to corporate email addresses, the email reputation is critical to getting into the inbox of your subscriber. The better email service providers (ESPs) do 2 things. First, they manage the reputation of the email addresses from which they send the email (their IP addresses). The best ESPs offer you the opportunity to set up your own email address on their system. This will look something like email.lawfirm.com and email will come from something like sonny@email.lawfirm.com So while it still looks like your business, it is isolated from your domain (lawfirm.com) and from the email sending behavior or misbehavior of other clients of this ESP. Are you with me?

What happens if you send an email to a lot of people at the same domain such asxxxx@client.com where xxxx is lots of different people? When all these emails show up @client.com at one time, they look like spam. It may even look like an attack on the email server. The corporate email server receives these emails so you probably see these emails as being delivered. But they never make it into the inbox of the individual email recipients.

The better ESPs offer the capability to throttle the sending of emails so that they don’t look like a spam attack on an email server. It more closely resembles natural email commerce. Good commercial ESPs can afford to throttle the send of their emails. Spammers cannot because they’ve got way too much email to send. Are we getting esoteric yet?

ESPs are commercial companies and not a part of any website development company’s core competency. We have our favorites but we are not linked at the hip. Email services built into CRM systems such as Interaction, Salesforce, etc. are bulk mailers and do not have these deliverability features and a deliverability desk (personnel) focused on managing IP reputation. This doesn’t make them bad by any stretch. But it does affect deliverability performance.

Finally, the best ESPs are becoming messaging companies capable of delivering text messages and voice messages. If your communication strategy is to be first to market with targeted information, you may find that a text message alert system is a client service you haven’t yet considered. It is unlikely that your “economy” bulk email guy who is “friendly to deal with”  offers these extended and diversified contact capabilities. And maybe you don’t need it and never will.

Being able to track email performance is a common feature but it is not the test of a quality system. And these tools may not even provide accurate or complete information regarding the effectiveness of your email marketing campaigns. Even the best (i.e. more costly) ESPs come only close to precise. Third party firms like Return Path and Pivotal Veracity might provide this higher level of email evaluation and deliverability improvement.

Price is not always a guarantee that you will get better delivery services like what I’ve identified above. But a low price pretty much guarantees that you will not. For my part, I think reaching targeted contacts for a few pennies is a pretty good deal. If you are driven to cut that penny in half, you should at least know what you are getting and what you aren’t.

Whew! Hope this is helpful. Oh yeah, who do we use? ExactTarget. But remember. One size does not fit all. Think about your requirements.

Email open rate is only one indicator of email success

© 1999-2010 Duo Consulting

About the Author:

Sonny works closely with Duo’s clients to develop their online business and marketing strategy. His tactical responsiblities include: Implementing and managing paid search engine campaigns;  Consulting on and implementing permission-based email; Providing strategic online marketing consultation to law firms and others using web analytics to help drive website and business performance and Conceputalizing and implementing social media marketing.

312-529-3003 / www.duoconsulting.com

The Insider’s Guide to Event Organizers: 10 Questions You Can’t Afford Not to Ask Yourself

The Business of Law Guest Blogger this week at the National Law Review is Wendy Tyler of American Conference Institute who provides some valuable insight on what to look for in an Event / Conference Organizer:  

A traditional component of business to business marketing strategy is utilizing conferencing and trade show solutions. Ever an increasingly competitive business, the conferencing and trade show industry has witnessed significant market shifts as demand from attendees, exhibitors, speakers and sponsors have changed with the business climate. Marketing budgets remain closely scrutinized as decision makers need to justify their investments to a higher standard than ever before, which means the pre‐qualification process for an event is more vital than ever.

At any given moment, no less than two dozen event organizers simultaneously compete for your business.  With this volume it’s not uncommon to find yourself unable to fully vet each and every event opportunity that comes your way, and in return, it’s possible that valuable opportunities are being overlooked while poor opportunities may inadvertently be selected.

Evaluating an event opportunity starts with asking the right questions.  There are ten essential questions that every event purchaser should ask every conference or trade show organizer when reviewing an opportunity to participate at any level.   Each of these questions acts as a guidepost in effective qualification.   Naturally, the list of questions you might want to ask doesn’t end at ten; but these ten will help you narrow your event search and potential involvement.  Once you have these answers, any good event account manager should be able to guide you through your additional questions clearly and concisely discussing the marketing capabilities, overall event strategy, and brand development opportunities that may be available to you.

1.  How many total attendees do your events average?

This question will help you evaluate the size of the event so you can determine if the opportunity presented is for support of a conference or trade show. Due to the cyclical nature of live events, attendance does vary so it’s important that you ask what the high/low range of attendance has been so you can better assess the risk of an underperforming event.

2.  How many events do you produce a year?

This question will give you a good sense of the event organizer’s market penetration. The fewer events produced per year generally indicates that the organizer does not consider conferencing a major part of their business. For some purchasers this may not make a difference in their buying strategies but for others, there is a high degree of comfort knowing you are investing in a business whose primary business function is the delivery of the service you’ve procured.

3.  How many of your total attendees are fee‐paying delegates?

Quite often, event organizers lump all participants as “attendees” – this can include speakers, sponsors, exhibitors, guests, exhibit floor walkers and press. Paying delegates are the highest value prospects because they are investing money in the information presented at an event. Consequently, the greater number of paying attendees will lead to a greater quality of a pre-qualified audience for your needs – even at the sacrifice of quantity – and provide your organization with a better chance of meeting the right decision makers. The old adage “you get what you pay for” is never more apparent than here.

4.  When can you show me a list of attendees?

An event organizer should be able to show you a list of attending companies no less than two days prior to an event in order to substantiate the quality of the attendees. In some cases, and with certain levels of sponsorship, you may have the opportunity to receive an update on registered attendees several weeks prior to the event. The bottom line is that two days prior to a conference, any organizer that doesn’t release some information on the confirmed attendees may not have confidence in their event thus placing your investment in jeopardy.

5.  Does this list include speakers, guests, sponsors, etc.?

Similar to any purchase of significant value, it is important to carefully review what it is you will be investing your dollars in. A sample attendee list, even one from a related event is a great way to get a feel for the expected audience. As the event nears and you receive an attendee list, be sure to find out whom exactly is included. While speakers, guests and even other sponsors can represent strong business development opportunities for your organization, it is important to know where the attendees are coming from so you can plan accordingly, manage internal expectations and have better metrics for measuring your return on investment.

6.  Would you let me speak to a former speaker or attendee?

Similar to a “word of mouth” campaign, a great way to pre‐qualify a conference organizer is to speak with a former or current speaker, attendee or sponsor. This will provide your organization with an opportunity to get a first‐hand account of the event; and the organization you’re about to allocate marketing budget to.

7. How would you define your organization’s reputation?

It is important to determine how an organization defines its reputation. It is especially important to see if their self‐definition matches the definition offered by previous attendees, sponsors & speakers. An organizer should know how it is perceived in the marketplace, for better or for worse and be able to convey this to any potential client honestly and transparently.

8. What is your competitive advantage?

Similar to reputation, a company’s competitive advantage will help an event purchaser clearly define what they can expect from the organizer. This answer will also provide a purchaser with a benchmark for evaluation after the event concludes. For example, if an event organizer is known for attracting press, you will be able to judge your return on investment based on how much press your organization received.

9. How can you help my company with your go to market strategy?

As an event purchaser, it is important to challenge the organizer to provide a comprehensive solution to your business objectives as opposed to having them simply provide a “one size fits all” product. We live in agile times and most solution providers should provide custom solutions tailored to meet your specific needs. The exception to this rule is if you are working with a trade show organizer because the volume of sponsors and exhibitors sometimes prohibit high degrees of customization.

10. Can you explain your process of program development and speaker recruitment?

Program development and speaker recruitment are to an event organizer what research and development is to a pharmaceutical company. The process is as important as the product. Through greater understanding of where content is derived and speakers are recruited from, an event purchaser is provided the opportunity to evaluate the product in its entirety. With greater content and speakers comes a higher quality of attendee. Understand the source of the content and speakers and an event purchaser will be able to better judge the chances of meeting the right audience.

The questions provided above are intended to serve as guidelines for those evaluating event sponsorship and exhibition opportunities. The answers you receive are contingent upon a number of factors including the type of event, the product intelligence of the sales executive and the corporate culture of the organizer. As with the nature of live events, the ability to accurately predict a successful event experience is more art than science however; armed with these ten basic questions, you will be given every possible advantage in making the best decision for your company.

© 2010 AMERICAN CONFERENCE INSTITUTE, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

About the Author:

Ms. Tyler has been with American Conference Institute (ACI) since May 2005. Her responsibilities include managing the U.S. sales team, forging strategic alliances and identifying emerging growth sectors and topics. www.AmericanConference.com / 212-352-3220

Twitter Do’s & Twitter Don’ts

As included in the Business of Law Section of the National Law Review Tom Ciesielka of TC Public Relations provides some solid Do’s & Don’ts for Twitter:  

With millions of unique visitors each month, Twitter is still at the top of the social media game. Some people still use Twitter to catalog boring details of the day. However, savvy and smart users realize Twitter’s usefulness as a concise way of marketing and reaching out to consumers and media.  Read the following do’s & don’ts to continue being one of the savvy and smart users.

  • Do make quality friends. Capturing an audience on Twitter is important, but don’t start following 857 people in one day. Start with a few friends, some movers and shakers of your industry, some legal reporters—listen to their tweets, and offer relevant replies. Then continue to follow a few new people week by week. Don’t just follow to follow, but actually think about why you want to connect with a certain person – think “strategic following.” Then contribute meaningful posts each day that others might find interesting as a way to build your own following.
  • Do protect your reputation. Twitter can be used to solidify your brand image, and it is an indispensable medium when crisis hits. Maintaining a Twitter account can help your firm when a damaging story hits cyberspace because a response on Twitter is often the fastest way to acknowledge the problem or issue. Failing to address any breaking news that involves your company makes you look at best, incompetent and at worst, guilty. Confidentiality laws may render tweeting a bad idea, but you should always pay attention to what’s happening and be prepared to do damage control when necessary.
  • Do be efficient. Building relationships on Twitter can facilitate communication about your legal specialties and expertise. However, using Twitter effectively and appropriately can be a time-consuming job, so try and implement applications that will help you be more efficient like TwitterFeed, TweetDeck and ÜberTwitter. It is also more efficient to partake in niche topic conversations about your practice areas instead of tweeting about the world of law in general. Specificity trumps generality.
  • Don’t be boring or narcissistic. Stick to tweeting about pertinent topics and find ways to express your personality through the links you post, rather than tweeting about how many briefs you’ve written that day or what color tie you’re wearing. Share links to legal headlines or comment on stories related to your expertise. Participate in discussion, reply to other users’ tweets, re-tweet their tweets—Twitter is not a one-person game, so don’t try to be the center of the universe.
  • Don’t turn off your censor. In cyberspace, a record of your most inappropriate tweet will live on in infamy long after you’ve cooled down. Never forget that what you say on Twitter can come back to haunt you, so rude or tasteless comments can come back to haunt you. Play it cool and don’t tweet anything you wouldn’t say in public; after all, Twitter is incredibly public.

Copyright © 2010 TC Public Relations

This posting is republished with permission from the Chicago Lawyer Magazine Blog “Around the Watercooler” located at:  http://h20cooler.wordpress.com/2010/

About the Author:

Tom Ciesielka, President of TC Public Relations, has worked in public relations, marketing and business development for more than 25 years and has enjoyed working with clients ranging from law firms to distinguished authors to national and local companies. He feels privileged to have established trusting working relationships with these clients and values every opportunity he gets to help businesses grow.  He is also a former board member of the Legal Marketing Association in Chicago and has spoken at Chicago Bar Associations CLE programs.  312-422-1333 / www.tcpr.net

Top 10 Rainmaker Best Practices to Win in 2010 – Part 3

In the final installment of her three-part Business of Law guest blog posting at the National Law Review, Deborah Knupp of Akina Corporation details the final four steps to help focus and streamline legal business development.  

This week’s posts are identifying the Top 10 Rainmaker Best Practices, that when focused on with discipline and intention, distinguish you and your firm and help you gain a competitive sales advantage.  Our previous posts Part 1 and Part 2 focused on the first six Rainmaker Best Practices.  Today’s article focuses on the last set of four Best Practices and discusses WHAT works in any market and HOW to implement the best practices to impact your business with increased revenue, increased leverage of time and resources and improved accuracy and predictability in your sales pipeline.

7) Networking and Working a Room

Networking effectiveness has less to do with personality and more to do with readiness.  Simple answers to questions like, “What is my goal or objective for the event?”  “How many people do I want to meet at the event?”  “How might I follow-up after the event if I make a connection?” turn networking situations into productive treasure hunts.  Networking basics include having your Quick Pitch ready, having business cards accessible and managing your time to meet your objectives.  When possible, ask for the attendee list in advance and peruse the day’s headlines (news, sports, current events) to have small talk ready to break the ice.

8) Campaign Thinking

The ethos of Campaign Thinking is any single act of marketing or business development should be leveraged minimally for a 3:1 payback.   3:1 leverage could be turning an article into a speech and a webinar.  3:1 leverage could be turning a single event into a 3-part communication plan: pre-event communication, during the event conversation and post event follow-up communication. 3:1 leverage can also be geography based by utilizing travel as the authentic reason to connect, i.e. one meeting in NYC turns into three meetings in the Northeast Corridor.

9) The 6 Silver Bullets for Closing and Managing the Red Zone

Unfortunately, there is no magic phrase or silver bullet to close business.  There are however, six qualifiers that can be like silver bullets to understand when business should close.  Business will generally close if there is:

1)     A legitimate problem

2)     A good fit solution

3)     A sense of urgency attached to the timeline to make decisions.

4)     Access to the decision makers and their decision-making criteria

5)     Expectations that are in alignment regarding the level of effort it will take to initiate a relationship and work successfully with you

6)     Budget that fits with your fee structure

When your prospect’s interests align with your six qualifiers, business has a way of closing itself.  If you aren’t sure if your prospect’s interests align against a specific qualifier, asking additional Discovery Questions will provide clarity and a sense of what the appropriate next steps might be.

When business does close, it is understandable that when a prospective client gives you a verbal “yes,” it is tempting to celebrate and step back from your selling efforts.  However, managing the Red Zone means that you recognize that when you get the “yes”, the incumbent has gotten the “no,” which can often lead to desperate decisions and measures to retain the client.  Business is not truly closed until work has started.  Therefore, when you receive word that you have been hired you are on the 20-yard line.  You will want to continue to stay connected, step-up communication and set clear definitive next steps as you ready for the actual work.

10) Create SuperFans through Client Experience

Many professionals assume that if they do good work, clients will continue to hire them for more work. However, reality tells us that just doing good work is not enough.  The competitive market tells us that we need to continuously manage the client relationship to inspire client loyalty while simultaneously looking for additional problems to solve for the client. Recognizing that loyalty is usually a result of an accumulation of good experiences rather than one outstanding moment, we can create SuperFans by finding ways to deepen value within the client experience in seven areas of innovation:

1)     Client feedback

2)     Client intake process

3)     Communication and expectation management

4)     Client appreciation

5)     Knowing a client’s business

6)     Non-legal client project participation and facilitation

7)     Alternative fee arrangements

Summary

Whether you are new to business development or a seasoned veteran, the Top 10 Rainmaker Best Practices are designed to give you greater focus, greater control and greater results with more predictability.  When you remember to focus first on building authentic relationships and solving the problems that should be solved, you will have greater joy during the journey and greater impact in the communities in which you serve.

To see Part I of Top 10 Rainmaker Best Practices to Win in 2010 click here.

To see Part II of Top 10 Rainmaker Best Practices to Win in 2010 click here.

COPYRIGHT © 2010 AKINA CORPORATION

About the Author:

Deborah Knupp has worked globally with CEOs, executives, managing partners and attorneys as a coach and business executive for over 20 years. She has helped these leaders align their people systems and business objectives to create cultures based on the principles of accountability, integrity and authentic relationship building. Her work has focused on making the work environment a place where employees “want” to be; where clients “want” to buy; and, where leaders “want” to serve a bigger purpose in their communities and families.www.akina.biz /312-235-0144

Top 10 Rainmaker Best Practices to Win in 2010 – Part II

This week’s National Law Review Business of Law Guest Blogger is Deborah Knupp of  Akina Corporation . Deb authored a very helpful three part series on specific steps that attorney’s can take to increase business!  The following is part two: 

This week’s posts are identifying the Top 10 Rainmaker Best Practices, that when focused on with discipline and intention, distinguish you and your firm and help you gain a competitive sales advantage.  Our previous post focused on the first three Rainmaker Best Practices.  Today’s article focuses on the next set of three Best Practices and discusses WHAT works in any market and HOW to implement the best practices to impact your business with increased revenue, increased leverage of time and resources and improved accuracy and predictability in your sales pipeline.

4) Operate by the Platinum Rule through Discovery Questions

At Akina, we often speak about operating out of the Platinum Rule, which says “do unto others as they would be done unto,” or in more basic terms seek to serve another’s interest first, understanding that your own interests will be satisfied over time.  By operating from the Platinum Rule, we take on a posture of service over self-interest.  One of the best ways to evidence the Platinum Rule is through Discovery Questions.  “Discovery” implies that we are interested and care about others.  We often demonstrate more credibility by the types of questions we ask because our questions reveal our character.  Discovery Questions ultimately get others talking about the thing that they know best… themselves.  If new business is the natural outcome of solving problems, then the only way to understand what problems should be solved is to ask.

Getting into the habit of asking good Discovery Questions also enables us to find the most authentic way to stay connected over time.  When we ask good questions, it often becomes obvious how we can be most helpful to someone else, either through our introductions, information (knowledge) or invitations (access to events or opportunities).

Finally, good Discovery Questions help orient us as to where a prospective buyer might be in their decision-making process.  We don’t have to worry about “hard closing” if we’re paying attention to a buyer’s readiness to close.  Discovery Questions give us access and insight into a prospect’s perspective so that we can respond appropriately and adequately.

5) Time-Boxed Follow-up

Which brings us to the next best practice…great rainmakers call out Definitive Next Steps as they go.  Time-boxed follow-up is the opportunity to set next steps in the moment.  It’s saying “I’ll call you next Friday to set up lunch” or “I’ll reach back out to you in six months if we don’t connect again before then” versus leaving next steps open-ended or saying “we should do this again some time.”  Time-boxed follow-up concretely identifies what actions will be taken and by when.  Definitive Next Steps give us the chance to demonstrate that we are our word, that we are responsive, and that we care.

6) Prep/Plan/Strategy

At a high level, effective preparation demonstrates that you honor another’s time by caring enough to have a game plan designed to get to a clear destination. Tactically, effective preparation helps you control the variables you can in an uncertain market place.

At a minimum, they key elements of preparation include identifying: 

  • Your objective for why you want to meet
  • Your distinct key messages to convey interest and value
  • The discovery questions you will ask to deepen understanding and relationships
  • Anticipated scenarios and outcomes with potential definitive next steps, typically from a best case, likely case and worst case scenario

When done well, effective preparation, planning and strategy is done more than 24 hours before a meeting and is not conducted in a parking lot, elevator or car while driving.  Look for the final Rainmaker Best Practices in the following days!

To see Part I of Top 10 Rainmaker Best Practices to Win in 2010 click here.

COPYRIGHT © 2010 AKINA CORPORATION

About the Author:

Deborah Knupp has worked globally with CEOs, executives, managing partners and attorneys as a coach and business executive for over 20 years. She has helped these leaders align their people systems and business objectives to create cultures based on the principles of accountability, integrity and authentic relationship building. Her work has focused on making the work environment a place where employees “want” to be; where clients “want” to buy; and, where leaders “want” to serve a bigger purpose in their communities and families. www.akina.biz /312-235-0144