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ave you ever wondered why a company fails to engage a
lawyer (any lawyer) to fix a problem for which they clearly need a solution?
Or, why a company doesn’t follow through on an easy opportunity you’ve
presented to them? Have you wondered why you win some engagements quickly while
others take forever to get signed? Have you ever suspected that there are
politics at work going on inside the company that is keeping you from getting
the engagement?
If you’ve been active in business development in the corporate
legal industry, you’ve had these questions and experiences.
Selling is hard.
Brutally hard. Caring, nice, smart, experienced, business savvy lawyers who
proactively reach out to well qualified prospects with proven solutions still fail
to close new engagements nine times out of ten. The questions above point to the
frustration of selling. But they also provide a clue to an overlooked part of
the legal business development process, the legal services buying process.
Legal services buyers have their own unique internal
dynamics that must be addressed before they are ready to begin the legal
services buying process. In some cases, and with certain practice areas, the
process that a company goes through to be ready to buy a solution to an issue,
problem or opportunity (IPO) occurs quickly. But in numerous other situations
and legal subject areas, the process occurs slowly, in fits and starts, or forces
company decision makers through a great deal of internal wrangling and politicking.
Businesses make decisions to hire outside counsel in ways
that are unique to each individual business. A company's decisions can
change course, stop suddenly, speed up or switch to new partners without
warning. We assume that companies who are seeking help with their legal problems
are ready to engage the lawyer when they find one that suits their needs and
can solve their problems. But for a lot of selling situations, that’s simply
not the case. Buyers sometimes use these sales discussions to gather
information, think through their own internal challenges and gauge risk and
opportunity.
As outside counsel, we don’t have a clear view of this internal
company decision-making process. But if we did, it would explain why some
engagements are signed quickly while others drag on unsigned; why some work comes
from people we hardly know; why you only get small scraps of work and not the big
deals; why a company doesn’t respond to genuine offers of assistance or why
companies don’t seem to understand what the company actually needs in terms of
legal assistance. Most importantly, a view inside the company would expose the
myriad of political calculations, business decisions, and historical learnings
that shapes a company’s readiness to engage outside counsel.
Not all legal work comes with the same set of motivations and
objectives. Some legal work is non-discretionary. That is, the company has few
options but to engage outside counsel to assist with the matter. Examples of
these situations include ‘bet-the-company’ litigation, corporate filings,
regulatory work or investigations. The impetus for this work comes from forces
bearing on the company which gives the company little choice in how it will
proceed. And in these cases, it must typically act quickly.
On the other hand, some work is discretionary. Sometimes
even optional. That is, the project must be prioritized and assigned resources
in the context of the business’ other pressing needs and opportunities. Outside
counsel’s ability to understand these internal priorities and strategies are
limited and often distorted.
Because of this, legal business development training does
not address the earliest phase of the sale funnel, the phase which occurs
inside the company before it has decided to engage outside counsel. Conventional
training ignores the company’s buying decision process. In doing so, several
important opportunities are missed and questions left unanswered which, not
only makes us less effective, but inhibits our ability to learn and improve selling
methods.
THE BUYING DECISION PROCESS
The complexity of decisions drives the speed in which a
company can make a decision. Companies facing complex choices must decide on the
strategic importance to the company of the problem or opportunity and tease out
the breadth and complexity of the implications any potential solution will have
on the company, its operations, customers, partners and resources. As an
example, an offer to revise clauses in a technical contract may appear
necessary, even simple. But the consequences (or unintended consequences) of
revising those clauses can have far reaching affects on the company. Both the
lawyer and company stakeholders must carefully consider those implications before
they can engage someone to revise those clauses.
When lawyers call on their business contacts, they don’t typically
consider the internal dynamics and criteria that must align to be ready to find
and vet solutions and providers. Without this internal alignment, even the most
rational and simple decisions can languish in company politics, analysis or budgeting
delays. The saying ‘paralysis by analysis’ speaks to this very problem as it describes
the competing interests inside the company trying to negotiate consensus and
direction.
One assumption of conventional business development training
is that lawyers have little influence on the buying-decision process. Instead, they focus on the buying process
itself, assume all legal needs require solutions and have buy in, and apply a selling
framework without regard to where the company is in their internal negotiations
about a solution. That’s a mistake. But take heart. It is a mistake made across
numerous industries which sell their dynamic solutions into highly matrixed corporations.
Decisions whether or not
to address an issue, fix a problem or seize an opportunity must be balanced
against the available resources, the risks and priorities of the company. From
the company’s perspective, those that see little risk in a situation or
who find the implications of an issue narrow in scope may not be motivated to
act. Conversely, problems which have strategic or existential importance for
the company and narrow, well understood implications are more likely to be
dealt with quickly. Issues or matters which are both strategically important
and which have complex and wide-ranging implications for the company will
require careful study and consideration. Conventional sales programs don’t
start with this understanding and instead apply the same sales formula
regardless of how the company may view the problem, issue or opportunity relative
to its goals and strategies.
It may seem obvious that companies require each legal need to
achieve an ROI or make a ‘business case’ in order to move forward on the project.
It is not so obvious that lawyers can help in this process. But they can. And
in doing so, they can significantly increase their closing ratios and reduce
the number of other lawyers they compete with for that work.
A new selling method
offers these and other benefits for professional selling situations and is
especially relevant for corporate or transactional lawyers. Decision-Strategy Selling™ is a
complement to selling skills training programs and helps attorneys better
understand, facilitate and navigate the prospect’s engagement decision and
selection process thereby improving the attorney’s selling process.
It gives lawyers a framework to better adjust their sales pursuit strategies to
accommodate the unique buying experience of their practice area and of their
target company prospect. And it teaches lawyers how to stay 'tuned in' to the
company's engagement decision process showing them how to shift roles from decision coaching, consultative selling or
contractor negotiation roles to move engagements to signature. In most
cases, Decision-Strategy Selling™ does
not replace the need for consultative selling skills training. It guides
lawyers in ow to refine their pursuits in real time to maximize their selling
effectiveness and close engagements faster. However, the method is frequently
effective in winning engagements without the need to advance to a consultative
selling role because, in coaching company representatives through their
internal decision process, they become trusted advisers with unequaled
knowledge of the unique cultural hallmarks and operational needs of the company.
In this sense, it is a form of selling that doesn’t require ‘selling’.
Lawyers who learn Decision-Strategy Selling™
techniques earn trusted adviser more quickly because they learn how to
facilitate decisions and avoid using consultative persuasion techniques until
it is appropriate. They learn decision coaching techniques that reveal more
about the company’s operations, internal relationships and strategic priorities
than lawyers who only use consultative selling skills or research tools. And
they gain the insights required to formulate pitches that closely align with company
needs and priorities, often times eliminating the company’s need for
competitive bids. Most importantly, lawyers learn to avoid creating ‘sales pressure’
that leads to adversarial rather than authentic relationships.
Law firms are not known for their business development
savviness, let alone their ability to innovate sales methods. But Decision-Strategy
Selling™ provides a methodology that is a natural extension of a lawyer’s innate
capabilities such as questioning and discovery skills. And creates a new awareness
of the phases of selling and the best techniques to navigate the sales process.
Conventional selling skills training suggests building
authentic relationships as a condition for sales opportunities. But the
byproduct of ‘selling’ is sales pressure which is destructive to authentic and trusted
relationships. Decision-Strategy Selling™ eliminates the sales pressure that
forms in consultative selling situations because it focuses the lawyer on
coaching skills, skills that enhance relationships rather than challenging the
relationship.
Decision-Strategy Selling™ provides a simple methodology for quickly evaluating the complexity of a legal services selling situation and enables lawyers to fine tune their business development strategies. It explains the buying decision process and teaches lawyers new skills and questioning techniques that will enable them to move through the three main phases of a legal selling situation more effectively. Lastly, lawyers who use the method will gain greater confidence in business development abilities through a heightened awareness of company buying decision process and their role in sales conversations and the pitch process.