Rereading the notes from one of our several hundred interviews with rainmakers, I came across this story about Edwin Heft, an accountant and partner at Touche before it began its long series of mergers with other firms: 

A senior partner, Edwin Heft, decided that there had to be a way to get the more junior members of the firm out in the market learning how to develop business.  He decided that this should be done by establishing a practice development committee composed of senior managers, managers and staff accountants.  A senior manager was to be chair and Heft served as an advisor. 

The committee was given a small budget to allocate as it wished on business development. Heft understood that in the early stages it was important to reward efforts rather than results.  You can sell professional services by a shot gun or rifle approach.  With a shot gun approach, you make many contacts and get the message out to all, but the net you throw is wide and it may not pay off for a long time.  He realized that if you want to encourage young professionals to get out in the market place, you must reward the effort, because the young person otherwise is doing it strictly on faith, and that faith is sorely tested.

Becoming a rainmaker is ego-deflating.  There is a lot of rejection, or what looks like rejection to the inexperienced.  To boost morale, committee members were rewarded with a small bonus.  They set goals, but didn’t evaluate themselves; Heft did that. 

It was a small effort for four or five years, and it worked.  Heft had been savvy about who he picked for the program and insightful about how to make it go.  The experiment was highly successful.  Three of the four senior managers became great business-getters.  One later became chairman of Touche.

Edwin Heft was one of the rare rainmakers who knew how to help others learn to sell.  Almost fifty years later, we at Harding & Company had to reinvent through hard practice what he got so right the first time he tried.  I just wish I knew more about this singular effort to create rainmakers.

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Order your copy of Ford Harding’s new and revised edition of Rain Making, called ”…an essential guide for anyone responsible for business development in the professional services industry…” - Mark Mactas, Chairman and CEO Towers Perrin

Inexperienced at selling, some professionals struggle to find the words to use to introduce a colleague. Of course, given enough time they could, but the opportunity usually comes unexpectedly, offering no chance to prepare. Once it passes, the professional forgets the need to prepare in the frenzy of client work, until, too late, the client springs another opportunity on him.Here is some language you can adapt to your needs. Once you have revised them to better fit your circumstances, practice them five or six times over the next two days. Then review them once a month until the opportunity to use them with a client welds them to your memory:

Sample Language #1

I sense this is important and urgent. Could I make a suggestion? Two of our partners are extremely knowledgeable on this subject, having helped such companies as A, B and C. You’ve been a good client, and I would like to arrange a meeting with one or both of them to share with you some of the experiences other companies have had and what they learned about dealing with it. Of course, they would very much like to work with you on this matter, but both take the long view about marketing and would want you to come away from the meeting feeling glad you spent the time, regardless of whether you chose to work with them or not.

Sample Language #2

On this matter we can do a better job for you if I bring in Richard Sanchez from our XYZ Practice. He is extremely knowledgeable in this area and, I think, would fit well with your people. I will bring him with me next week, if that’s okay with you.

Sample Language #3

Part of my job is to share with you things that we see in the marketplace that it might benefit you to hear about or about which we can bring a different point of view. Kathy Kelly of our XYZ practice has developed some fascinating insights into the recent movement towards ABC. Would you be interested in hearing what she has to say?.

Is there any language that you have heard or that you use that works well and that you would like to share?

For 20 years I have heard the complaint that cross selling, the selling of multiple services to the same client, doesn’t work.  There are a number of reasons why cross selling doesn’t live up to expectations.  A principal cause was pointed out by David Maister in his book, True Professionalism: people try to do it when there is no apparent extra value to the client from using the same firm for two services.  Clients are usually good at figuring this out. 

Here I focus on another reason: people treat cross markets as if they are an easier channel to sell through than others.  They aren’t. 

This false expectation manifests itself in several ways.  First, people who don’t know how to sell externally think that, for some reason, they should be able to cross sell.  They are the ones who look for an easy way to get business.  They may be able to close a deal if a client comes to them, but they don’t know how to go out in the market place and find one.  Account teams made up of such people meet monthly to talk about how they will cross sell to a specific client.  They then do little to further the cause, meeting again a month later to talk some more. 

The misconception that cross selling is easy is also manifested in how people talk about it.  Poor cross sellers are quick to tell others what they should be doing, as in “You should be able to get me in there.”  They overestimate what colleagues are able to do, as in “You control the client; you should be able to get me an introduction.”

Good cross sellers are good sellers.  A good cross seller treats the cross market like any other market.  She works hard to service the colleagues she hopes will introduce her to a client.  She talks with them often, building trust over time, helping them learn what words to use when introducing her and her service.  She finds ways to help them sell their own services, too.  She patiently earns their trust and respect.  Of all the people she can sell through, she picks out those who know how to sell and are willing to introduce her, not wasting time on those who can’t or won’t.  She leaves out should statements, relying on firm and practice management to create an environment that she can cross sell in.  In short, she treats the cross market pretty much like she treats any other.

One of the best cross sellers I know, Peter Blatman, who is now with Deloitte Consulting, won over the sales force of the firm he was with at the time.  First, he first demonstrated the power of cross selling by bringing in a huge engagement that required many of the firm’s services.  He then encouraged his consulting team to earn the respect and interest of the sales force.  He got agreement from his team to respond to all calls from members of sales force within 24 hours.  Over three years, revenues of his practice from work originating with the sales force shot up from almost nothing to 70 percent.  In other words, he put as much effort into the cross market as he would any other he hoped to get business from.  And it paid of.

In that respect, cross markets are not so different from any other market.