Can you make a silk purse from a sow's ear? In other words, can you make sales and business development champions out of attorneys, accountants, bankers and financial advisors?
In 1921 the renown management and R&D consulting firm of Arthur D. Little, Inc., of Cambridge, Massachusetts made a silk purse out of a sow's ear. They proved that something said to be impossible was.......more
Today, Zoka Institute makes sales and business development champions out of attorneys, accountants, bankers and financial advisors and......more
Surviving and growing in a commoditized service marketplace.......more
In 1921 the management of Arthur D. Little, Inc., of Cambridge, Mass., issued a small report describing the methods employed by the firm's chemists to create "silk" from pork byproducts. The idea behind this surprising and not very practical experiment was to prove that something said to be impossible is, with sufficient effort and ingenuity, attainable. As the report notes, the old adage "you can't make a silk purse of a sow's ear" had been used for years to discourage inventiveness and enterprise. "We resolved...to prove that it was false, and we have done so. We have made a silk purse of a sow's ear."
Editors Note: I saw the silk purse proudly displayed in its glass case numerous times during my time working at ADL.
Surviving and growing in a commoditized service marketplace. In the commoditized and highly competitive legal, accounting, banking and financial services marketplace the important attribute that distinguishes one service firm from another and one professional from another is the persona of the person representing the entity. A successful business development/sales training program for ongoing and lasting results must focus on recognizing and developing one's personal assets and presentation skills along with sales techniques and process. Ongoing group training and one-on-one personalized coaching are critical for sustainable change. There are no quick fixes.
Accomplished business development and sales professionals with a sole focus on business development and sales thoroughly train for at least a year and reenforce that training annually (at a minimum) with refresher training. Yet, companies/firms expect attorneys, accountants, bankers and
financial advisors to be successful rainmakers with minimum or no training.
Today, the Zoka Institute makes business development and sales champions out of attorneys, accountants, bankers and financial advisors and anyone else who wants to be a champion. Like Arthur D. Little, Zoka Leadership and Sales Training also proves that something said to be impossible is, with sufficient effort and ingenuity, attainable. There are no quick fixes, again it requires sufficient effort and ingenuity to change one's limiting habit energy.
Zoka Training is designed to provide non-sales professionals with the skills and techniques to develop their individual capabilities in new business development to increase billings.
There are two necessary approaches to new business development critical for any professional service firm – the farmer and the hunter.
First, and most important, is strengthening client relationships for the purposes of developing existing clients as a strong and ongoing referral source for new business as well as cross-selling and up-selling existing clients for additional services within the firm - The Farmer.
Second, is developing new business relationships - outside of existing clients - through active sourcing, networking and marketing. The Hunter.
Most professionals will fit into one of the preceding two categories. A rare few can be successful focused on both arenas.
Zoka Training is fully customized to capitalize on and enhance the different styles and personalities of the participants in order to achieve each professional's personal objective in concert with the firm's defined strategic goals for new business development.
It is designed to develop reasonable and realistic individual metrics to achieve the firm's goals for increased billings.
It is designed to overcome limiting habit energy and typical anti-sales attitudes and turn them into creative business development energy.
Value
-Annual increase in firm-wide billings
-Formal business development structure, process and metrics
-Firm-wide business development culture
-Improved client relations and services
-More referrals and higher quality referrals
-More rainmakers
To learn how to turn attorneys, accountants, bankers, and financial advisors into rainmakers please email me at lblumsack@zokainstitute.com.
Click here to go to the website.
Regards,
Larry
617-489-1933