| If you assessed the available books on the topic of managing professional service firms, you probably arrived at the same conclusion we did about a year ago. You can find over a hundred books on the topic. Ninety-five percent of these books are written for the independent consultant who wants to learn how to incorporate, how to develop a proposal, how to sell themselves, and how to individually deliver a project to a client. The other 5 percent of the published books target the executives of large, national consultancies with thousands of consultants/employees. There were no books available to help the professional service firm with anywhere from 2 to 1,000 professionals. Yet, almost 75 percent of all professional services companies are in this group. In the books for independent consultants, you learn the basics (e.g., how to act on the client site, what the start-up costs are). In the books for large consultancies, you learn how to expand internationally or about developing philosophies. In this book, you learn how to grow an existing firm. You learn at what points you need to make decisions such as adding administrative support, opening another office, building another service line. You learn how to determine what is the best sales organization structure for your firm. You learn what information systems you need to build and when. This book is for the growing consulting company and its associates and management.
The bulk of our consulting experience has been in the technology consulting and management consulting fields. We have had interesting consulting problems involving 50,000-, 2,000-, and 500-person consulting organizations. Significant input in this book has come from lawyers, accountants, doctors, and many other professionals. The contributing authors have varied and successful professional services backgrounds. This book consolidates the best practices for the mid-size consulting company. We have observed consistent patterns of success and failure in consulting and have been fortunate enough to survive them. The main goal of any professional services company is to add enough value to your clients that they will pay you enough to cover your costs and make a decent profit. We have captured the lessons learned and the tools, techniques, and practices that can help a professional services firm as it grows to include more and more professionals. |