You and the firm's leadership team should have brainstormed a plan of action. Now is the time to organize to put that plan of action into action.
Focus on a bottom-up strategy, meaning get the junior folks involved and contributing ideas. You've got to have everyone involved in the effort and give people the opportunity to be a part of the plan.
Make sure your industry teams are functioning properly. Who is paying attention to the different service lines? Do people feel responsible for revenue? If not, organize it such that they do.
At Mercer Capital, we have four service groups which are charged with driving revenue for their service line. We have industry teams charged with creating opportunities for the firm in those industry niches. All of our financial analysts are involved. We're all attempting to pull in the same direction.
Admittedly, these efforts are firm-wide efforts. That's okay. Face-to-face business development is part of the strategy and we'll talk about that in a future post. Yet, the firm as a whole has to be ready to move.
How does this organization start? I would suggest that you, as the marketing director, need to work with the managing partner to make it happen. If the managing partner isn't moving, find a champion on the leadership team and win him/her to your side. Sometimes the managing partner isn't moving because they are afraid. See Part 1 of this series. Remember that action creates momentum. Momentum creates opportunity. Opportunity offers the chance for success. When faced with this dilemma in 2001, I was the one who first took action and our leadership team responded. I say that not to toot my own horn but to tell you that it can be done because I've done it.
Begin today to get everyone involved. Organize to act. Then act!
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