by Robin Dicks | May 27, 2020 | Robin's Blog
A couple of weeks ago our car – probably like many others in the last few weeks – had a flat battery. The thing about modern cars is it’s a lot more complicated than it used to be, you can’t just stick jump leads on any more. In the end it necessitated two different people from two different organisations coming out. I’ve no idea which one was more technically adept, as I struggle to tell the difference between a spark plug and an exhaust pipe. But one guy coughed into open air, and kept rubbing this nose, and was pretty blasé about social distancing. The other had gloves, had clearly sanitised stuff, was respectful of distance, and had clearly thought how to communicate and show me how to do stuff, again at a distance. Who do you think I’d use again? It’s a blunt example, but enabling customers to feel safe and secure in dealing with you is going to be a big deal for a...
by Robin Dicks | May 14, 2020 | Robin's Blog, Uncategorized
I’m not going to say “this is a challenging time”. There’s no need to replay all that. You already know. What’s more important is that some of the unknowns may derail your competitive ability to retain work and clients over the next few months. I’ve written about this at more length elsewhere (see here) But some of the key bits are ensuring that not only do you know what your clients want, but you understand how emotionally capable staff – and their line managers – are to deliver it. That requires finding out, in a sensitive, and risk-free way. You can’t be resilient if you don’t know what you need to do to create that...
by Robin Dicks | Jan 20, 2020 | Robin's Blog
At the end of 2019 we completed a research programme for a major law firm into the future of in-house legal teams, what they would look like in 2025, and the challenges faced. The results were fascinating and it struck me that they might well also be true for many ‘intellect’ based professions and indeed in-house marketing, BD, HR and other functions within professional services firms. The key behaviours and skills which respondents said they needed to develop included a deeper understanding of the business and the wider sector, stakeholder management, influencing and the ability to understand technology. Soft skills and processes were a higher priority than technical functional skills, and a core challenge was balancing day to day demands with the ability to get ready for future challenges. While some people saw technology as a “magic bullet” most recognised that while it could help, there were many other aspects needed to get a team fit for the future. One of the key results that sticks in my mind was that the success stories we heard about, often were based on creating a team with shared goals, and real clarity of purpose that guided their behaviour, actions, and relationships with colleagues. That seems to me to be very true for marketers and BD people within professional services firms...
by Robin Dicks | Mar 8, 2018 | Robin's Blog
I’ve recently been looking at getting new car. So I make appointments for test drives etc. All good fun. At one car brand/dealer, once I’d made the appointment, I got an email reminder the day before, then on the morning, and subsequently I’ve had about 3 mails, apparently from the head of customer sales (though clearly automatically generated) advising me of the risk of letting the car I really want go by. All very fine, if a bit irritating and intrusive. But the real problem is that the salesperson didn’t turn up to the appointment I’d booked and I left after 30 minutes of wasted time. It turns out the receptionist didn’t pass the message on properly, the salesperson didn’t check. The closest I got to an apology was a voicemail saying ‘sorry I missed you’. I wonder how much effort has got into the automated message system and how much has gone into staff training and behaviour. The former has no impact on my purchase decision, the latter has quite a bit. I won’t be buying a car from...
by Robin Dicks | Sep 16, 2016 | Robin's Blog
Brexit means uncertainty. Should leaders, marketers and other heads try and ignore it, in the hope that it will go away? Should they plan on the basis of an outcome they hope will happen? Or should they give in to the uncertainty and not plan at all? Should they promote hard, or accept reduced budgets? Or should they rethink where they can really add value – click here for some thoughts on how leaders can really respond positively to the challenge and help build the firm’s performance. I’ll talk about the role of scenario planning also in a future...
