Farone Advisors LLC

What makes a strategic plan for a practice group or firm work? Today's edition of The American Lawyer has Dan Packel touching on several essential points that make strategic plans effective, with valuable insights from Patrick J. McKenna and Michael Rynowecer. Law firms and their sisters, professional service firms, are unique partnerships. Having seen plans that work, and learned from hearing about (many) others that fail, here are four essentials that firms can take to ensure success in the plan and process. 💡 1. Involve the partnership at various stages of the plan, and offer all partners the chance to contribute. No, that doesn't mean your consultant of whomever is preparing the plan must spend hours with all of the partners, rather provide ways for partners to provide feedback through roundtables or online surveys. Those that want to speak up but may not be part of the core of the plan, need to have a voice. 💡2. When creating the plan, share highlights of the results and process with the partnership throughout the plan. Nothing is worse than a partnership where the mystery of the plan brews into uncertainty as to the firm's leadership and future plans. 💡3. Make sure you have a mechanism to keep the plan on track. Once the plan is approved, be sure to set SMART goals (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-Bound) and have actionable timelines, metrics (KPIs), responsibilities and check-in points. 💡4. Involve your CMO and senior marketing people at every stage of the process. They will bring intelligence and experience when it comes to strategy and go-to-market planning. Asking them to be involved once the significant decisions have been made is far too late to truly gain the benefit of their expertise. Having a strategic plan that succeeds means being strategic about how you create the plan in the first place. #strategicplan #strategy #CMOs

Is there an idyllic law firm, one with the perfect culture? It’s the firm that has an effortless time attracting and retaining the finest lawyers and other professionals. It’s also the firm that turns out the very best work due to the lack of silos between practice areas and rainmakers.  While I don’t think the perfect firm exists, there are a few things I’ve seen several of my clients’ firms do to create a strong positive culture. While taken together they may not create a version of a Seurat painting, these steps may be helpful in getting at least a sketch from which to start. 🎨 1. Create a compensation system for lawyers and all other professionals that rewards collaboration in client service, new business generation and working on a cross-functional basis. 🎨2. Consistently remind those in the firm and vendors who work with the firm of the firm’s cultural foundation, purpose and goals. Communicate, communicate, communicate. 🎨3. Don’t allow bad behavior by anyone, particularly by partners. If you see something, say something. By allowing partners to remain at the firm who mistreat one another, staff, or vendors, you are sending a message to the rest of the firm (and frankly, to the outside world) that this behavior is acceptable.  Get them help or get them out. 🎨4. Reward those who do an exemplary job of demonstrating the firm’s values. They are the benchmark. Retain them by showing them respect. If this is a topic of interest, join us on May 8 at Duane Morris LLP in New York for the Legal Marketing Association program, A High-Trust Law Firm Culture – How Legal Marketers Can Move the Needle. Hear from leaders in the area including David Robert of Loeb Leadership, Michael (Ellenhorn) of Decipher Investigative Intelligence and Allan Schoenberg of Vinson & Elkins, as I moderate a panel on the very best practices in this area. https://lnkd.in/ez56XpVg

"What holds lawyers back from creating plans for themselves or their own pratices?" Often it's the fear of not getting it right, or not knowing the steps that are involved. Most of the lawyers I know are perfectionists, but sometimes they don’t know where to start. Other times, they just don’t want to fail.  I get it. Some mysteries we need to wait to unravel, but others we can solve ourselves. To have a go-to-market strategy and business plan, several things need to be in place. Here are clues to some of the most commonly missed elements. 🔍 Very clear objectives. Are you trying to grow your practice or maintain what you have in place? If you are trying to grow, how will you do that? First focus on existing clients (always the best idea), but if so, which ones and for what? Ask yourself, how you can provide them with even better service, or develop new ways to help them. The next steps may be to garner new clients within a growth industry, geography or other sector of the business world. Determining what you want to achieve is essential to create the proper roadmap. 🔍 Buy-in from the partners who the plan touches. We’ve all heard about the importance of giving people the background and “the why.” Participative management in these types of plans is essential. Use your planning process to garner input and insights into what the practice's lawyers want to see in the plan, or use an outside resource/consultant to interview the partners and help you customize the right plan. 🔍 Ensure your marketing leadership is involved from the onset. CMO, CBDO, Chief Marketing Director, Practice Strategist... whatever title they may have, your business development and strategy professionals within the firm should be involved from the start. They are entrenched in the day-to-day marketing of the firm, and they’ll have a good handle on the marketplace. They’ll know what strategy and tactics have worked for others in the past and should also have cutting edge ideas. What better source to tap into and locate new opportunities? 🔍 Have real deadlines and know who you will hold responsible. Knowing what needs to be done and doing it are two different things. Set priorities and agree on timelines and goals for execution. Next, agree upon clear-cut articulated tactics to ensure who will accomplish which ones. 🔍 Put it in an accessible plan. Create plans to use as a roadmap and update them as you go along in the rest of the year. Practice plans should not sit on a shelf or file cabinet gathering dust. I love talking about the planning process for individuals, practices, and firms. You can find a strategic planning success checklist on my website for additional ideas. #praticeplans #individualplan #strategy #presentations #lawfirm

In a competitive landscape where diversity drives innovation, BD coaching tailored for women is essential. Join us on Episode 137 of the CMO Series Podcast as Will Eke sits down with Deborah Brightman Farone, Founder of Farone Advisors LLC, to delve into why specialized BD coaching is crucial for women navigating today's business environment. From success stories to actionable recommendations, the conversation highlights invaluable insights into enhancing BD skills and fostering diversity within law firms. Listen in full via the link in the comments. #CMOSeries #LegalMarketing #lmamkt

So I botched up, but I had fun doing it.  I attempted to use Shutterstock’s AI image generator to create an online holiday message that would use my own aspirational “aesthetic.” A clean background, some classical architectural features, and an organized desk. What I didn’t expect was the apple logo that resembles a rotund person with a tiny head or the graphic of green spores that look to be multiplying behind my holiday message. I am a just learning how to structure my queries and modify these results. (I am not very good at it.) Still, it was fun to experiment and try to use an AI tool to generate something creative, even if it is a bit…wonky. (Some of the earlier renditions can be spotted along the bottom of the graphic. Yikes.) Merriam-Webster’s word of the year is “authentic,” and while this image is anything but, I hope my admission at being a total novice at this technology fits the definition. I hope that for each of us on LinkedIn, 2024 turns out to be a happy, healthy and peaceful year. I also hope that each of us can grab some of the newer technologies that are coming our way, have fun and play with them, even if we end up with green spores. #newyear2024 #innovation #marketing #strategy

Bonjour Paris! The International Bar Association could not have chosen a more spectacular venue for their annual meeting. If you are here tomorrow, I hope you will join us at 2:30 pm for an incredible session. We’ll update you on what’s new and important in social media, and how to make it part of your firm’s strategy. I’ll be giving a brief show and tell, and then open up the session into a game show (with music and flashing lights) starring our brilliant contestants Paul Marmor, Helen Burness, Sneha Ashtikar Roy and Olga V. Mack!

Last week, first- and second-year associates in our Washington, D.C., office participated in an interactive workshop, “Successful Rainmakers and What You Can Learn from Their Success,” as part of our 2023 Best Practices in Client Service Training series. Thanks to Deborah Brightman Farone, author of “Best Practices in Law Firm Business Development and Marketing,” for leading the workshop! 📚