Date of 2010 PM Forum confernce announced -
Wednesday 22 September
PM Forum Global Conference 2009
Relationships
Kim Tasso reports on the PM Forum’s Annual Conference 2009.
Kim Tasso
Hamish Munro, chief executive at
Guildhall Chambers, started
proceedings with a brisk run
through of the findings of the
annual survey into “Where should
marketers add value?”.
No surprises that the
legacy of the recession appears to be a
focus on new business development and
encouraging referrals but it was good to see
some indication that input on pricing is now
finally expected.
Technology panel
The first panel session comprised an
academic (CRM/KAM from Cranfield) and
three technology suppliers talking about
leveraging and monetising your business
relationships – although there appeared to
be some debate about whether monetising
was a valid proposition. Lee Bryant of
Headshift (personally my favourite speaker
at last year’s workshops) was strident in his
views about the death of broadcast
marketing, the need to de-bureaucratise and
reduce internal marketing cost structures,
the IT fantasies of CRM and Sharepoint and
lawyers as “information nerds”. I would have
liked to hear more from him on “augmented
intelligence”.
I couldn’t help thinking that whilst the
cutting edge technology solutions they
mentioned almost take your breath away
(eg. automatic data mining), the underlying
problems remain the same. But it is interesting
to contemplate a world where IT and
marketing were able to harvest all the client
information from day to day operations
automatically and then offer fee-earners
what they always wanted – a comprehensive
and easy to use database already populated
with accurate information.
One particularly interesting idea for the
health sector was from Andy Honess at Qlik
Tech who described a system where the
time spent with each patient was analysed
to enable patient level costing and
consultant effectiveness analysis – another
factoid was that thoracic surgeons were
30% more productive when their performance
data was made public – imagine if
these tools were applied to lawyers,
accountants and surveyors!
Sales coaching masterclass
For the first breakout, I joined a select group
of marketing leaders to hear what Max
Landsberg (writer of The Tao of Coaching)
had to say in the sales coaching masterclass
which he titled ‘Creating heroes’. We spent
half an hour going around the room learning
about the particular sales challenges of all
the delegates which were duly noted realtime
by his assistant. He then started the
run through of the seven stage project at
Heidrick & Struggles search consultancy. We
all loved the cartoon with a tortoise being
encouraged to go through a burning hoop
and most delegates reported afterwards
that they found the four stage framework
for relationship building helpful. I also liked
the hastily drawn flipchart diagram showing
the results of their study of the propensity
of clients to use the firm again when the
two factors of understanding of the business
and execution of the assignment was
considered.
Over lunch we enjoyed delicious bowls of
rice with stir fry vegetables, salmon and
lamb – and some went on to enjoy cheesecake
too (but others were pleased that they
left space for the ice cream that arrived with
afternoon tea!) and chatted to the various
sponsors representing a range of vital
suppliers – Kelso (PR), Concep (resource
email marketing), Mytton Williams (brand
consultants), Hubbard One and Pivotal
(CRM) and Andy Bounds (training). I also
asked which of the workshops had proved
most interesting – there was considerable
enthusiasm for the tips and hints picked up
at the pitching session run by Allen & Overy
and PwC and many liked the insights
provided by the Eversheds team on classifying
client service and value by rocket
science, core and routine.
The Mind Gym – Becoming indispensable
Looking and sounding amazingly like a
young-version Pierce Brosnan, the charismatic
Octavius Black exploded onto the
stage after lunch fired up no doubt by his
recent coverage in the Sunday Telegraph.
With such a short slot he made maximum
impact by selecting a few key ideas – trust,
value creation and measurement and energy
– and communicating with vivid stories,
interesting anecdotes (interestingly using
Malcolm Gladwell as a key source) and
various audience participation exercises. I
particularly liked his suggestion to get
people to describe the value they bring to
an organisation in terms of a newspaper
article and the HR example he provided
“27-year-old opens Dutch hotel”.
Power and influence
I again joined the marketing leaders group –
some of the same faces from the morning
but a smaller group – to hear Roger Delves,
a former mainstream advertising man
turned academic from Ashridge, talk about
power and influence and how to be a player.
Whilst the style of this session was more of
a lecture than the day’s other events – the
exploration and discussion of the role of
politics within organisations was fascinating
and we were all soon talking about dark
knights and white knights. We observed that
so often in professional firms results win
over adherence to values and that mavericks
were tolerated because of their significant
financial contribution.
He argued that the need for influencing
skills was increased in matrix organisations
and reminded us of leadership guru John
Adair’s analysis that senior people spent too
much time on the task to the detriment of
the team and the individuals. He also
encouraged senior people to look at how
much discretionary time they had and how
they used it. The underlying theme of much
of the lively discussion was the need to align
individual and organisational interests.
Client relationships in practice panel
Last year, I found this the most valuable
session and I was not disappointed this year.
It was an impressive line up and the panellists
spoke candidly about their experiences
of being the client of a professional service
provider.
What is value?
Ian Sears, from the Office of Government
Commerce, is responsible for the
programme to save £1bn from the £26.2bn
budget for professional services. He
described the components of value as
follows:
- A sharp injection of extra resource and a
quick exit
- Effective transfer of knowledge
- Measurable and tangible benefits
- Fresh ideas
- Advising me when I am wrong or when
project aims are not achievable.
Neville Eisenberg, of Berwin Leighton
Paisner, wants advisers to avoid preconceptions,
do research and listen carefully so that
they can align themselves with his firm’s
objectives and help in selling the project
benefits to his partners. Paul Edwards, of
DLA Piper, who spends £2m on professional
services, indicated that quality is a
given and that the critical issues are to
understand his business and to guide him
through a pre-defined process. David
Illingworth, of the Nuclear Decommissioning
Authority, wants honesty so that advisers tell
it as it is, good chemistry between people
and to be understandable – to speak the
language of those who are not experts.
Sir Paul Judge, who in addition to being
the President of the Chartered Institute of
Marketing is a director on several major
institutions and companies, started by
defining a professional: a) Using an academic
framework in a practical way; b) Interacting
with clients appropriately; c) Adhering to a
code of ethics; and d) Keeping yourself and
your clients up to date with continuing
education.
Main dislikes about professional advisers?
Sir Paul indicated that what he most dislikes
about professional advisers (apart from the
bill) is arrogance, inflexibility and being
ejected when a conflict arises. David advised
against overtly selling the next project, not
listening, committing and not delivering and
failing to assess your risk appetite. Ian
mentioned his irritation with those who did
business development at his cost and
learning on the job and where there is a
lack of ownership abandoning his organisation
with poor outcomes.
In what felt like a therapy session, Neville
went on to mention his irritation when
something is needed fast but doesn’t come
in quickly and when advisers are over confident
and self-serving. Paul agreed that slow
delivery was a major bug-bear, stressed the
need for consistent quality (particularly
across international offices) and could not
understand why he was still sometimes
surprised at bills when a quick advance
phone call would prepare him.
There were questions from the floor
relating to price, commoditisation and the
merits and dangers of e-auctions. The role of
the marketers in helping professionals identify
and articulate the value added was
noted by the panellists who also felt that it
was possible for them to engage with clients
at a senior level. Paul elaborated on this
point by mentioning that a key challenge for
marketers was to win the trust of the partners
whilst David reminded us of the need
for clients to speak to technical specialists so
marketers should be accompanied.
Sir Paul pleaded for web sites to become
less bland and more specific. He also
suggested that we may learn from the role
of the account director in an advertising
agency – managing the relationship and
process and bringing in experts in research,
creative and media as required.Towards the
end there was a request for marketers to
move away from “confetti marketing”, to
take time to develop their knowledge of
clients and transactions, to work with IT to
support information sharing and allocate
time for more strategic thinking on
improving client relationships and adding
value.
Hamish brought things to a rapid close
with a fast summary. One of the themes to
emerge from the day was that of trust –
with dimensions such as inter-firm and interpersonal
trust as well as sensible (rational)
and sensitive (emotional) trust.
Kim Tasso is an independent strategy and
marketing consultant and a freelance journalist.
Visit www.kimtasso.com