Developing Knowledge-Based Client Relationships. (Second Edition) [Kindle Edition]

Ross Dawson has recently produced the second edition to his successful Developing Knowledge-Based Client Relationships. Opening sentences set the tone: "Knowledge and relationships are where all value resides in today's economy...Moreover, knowledge itself is all about relationships." This resonates well with my experience. In this book, Ross looks at this issue in the context of professional service firms, a market in which I spent over 20 years of service. In this case, a client is not simply purchasing the services of the smart individual assigned to them, but the collective knowledge of the entire firm. That is where the unique value lies. Otherwise a simple placement service at much lower rates would be sufficient.

This is the second edition of a book which first appeared in 2000. One of the major upgrades came from an understanding that if you clients do not recognize the value you create for them through more knowledge-based relationships and services, it does not help you or your clients. This new edition addresses this issue by proving material on how to lead your clients through knowledge based relations and understand the value they bring. Ross provides a useful model for obtaining a deep partnership with your client. The four stages are engaging, aligning, deepening, and partnering. While there are many such models, I have found them useful focal points for activities. For example, we used a somewhat similar model to design our internal marketing efforts at Ryder. It helps to ensure that you are laying the right foundation for a deep relationship and not getting ahead of the process. You do not what to conduct aligning activities until you are engaged, etc. Sounds simple, but this point is often overlooked in practice without a model to check against.

There is a good section on the current and future status of professional service firms and a multi-chapter section on how these firms can add value by promoting knowledge-based relationships with their clients. Being very practical I was especially interested in the final section on implementation. How can you practically do this stuff? As Ross wrote, the real value is making these things happen. I was not disappointed here. He gives a robust framework of the five key domains: strategies, structures, process, skills, and culture. But, more importantly, fills this framework in with specific suggestions.

Next, follows a review of the growing communication channels available to connect with clients and their strengths and limitations. There is a tradeoff between efficiency and relationship strength. But the high payoff activities come from the high relationship initiatives. Ross extends this approach to offer ways to expand client contact beyond the initial relationships that brought you into the firm. This expanded contact requires greater guidance and leadership to ensure consistency and alignment with your objectives for the client and this leadership is the subject of the next chapter. Here he makes use of the four stage model introduced earlier, engaging, aligning, deepening, and partnering, and applies it to a variety of communication channels. I have found that a key to success in most consulting relationships is active involvement by the client. The best initiatives, the ground breaking ones, came from a partnering with some smart client people. The worst were ones were we were forced to do it for them. Ross develops this theme in the next chapter on co-creation with some excellent examples such as the successful London ad agency, Mother.

Ross concludes with an appendix on the nature of mental models drawing on cognitive science. This was my academic field so I read this piece with great interest. He covers the two main types of mental representations, analogical or sensory based like images, and propositional which are abstract in nature and best represented by language and math. These two forms can complement each other but their qualities need to recognized and taken advantage of in communication. The goal of this review of the basic concepts of cognitive science is to provide a grounding in ways to more effectively transfer knowledge. To transfer knowledge we must understand how people acquire this knowledge.

I certainly recommend this book to anyone who wants to develop deeper client relations, create more impactful initiatives and enable their clients to appreciate the significance of this work.

Well written and organized text on client relationships and the issues of dealing effectively with knowledge sharing and transfer in business. This book is a practitioner's manual that discusses key foundations of this topic, and then later examines some of the primary approaches used, with a majority of the book covering implementation of these ideas. Dawson begins the text by indicating that "even if you are brilliant at engaging in knowledge-based relationships with your clients, that does not help you if your clients do not recognize the value you can create for them through this deeper level of engagement. Professionals must lead their clients into knowledge-based relationships by demonstrating the value of collaboration. On every front, the future success of professional services firms will depend absolutely on the leadership capabilities within the firm." The author furthers this line of thought by discussing recent growth of the U.S. economy, which was driven by information, ideas, services, and knowledge. But while value is in knowledge, the most powerful trend in business right now is commoditization: "Without a relationship you become a commodity. With a relationship, everything is possible. You can create far greater value for your clients than your competitors can, and as a result lock your clients into longstanding, mutually profitable, collaboration."

Dawson discusses the guilds of yesteryear, the predecessors of today's professions, the purpose of which in part was to protect the commercial privileges of those who held valuable skills and knowledge. But this philosophy cannot continue in a world where vast amounts of information flow freely. The author contrasts delivering professional services in such a manner, by which a client receives an outcome, but does not see the process involved, and is not wiser as a result of the engagement, as the "black box" approach. Continued pursuit of such an approach is detrimental to the professional services firm. "These black box services are opaque to the client. Since the only reference point the client has is the result, it is relatively easy for other firms to replicate that result and then compete primarily on price. In other words, they are commoditizing the service." With a knowledge based approach, however, "the outcome is that clients are more knowledgeable, are able to make better decisions, and have enhanced capabilities. In short, the client is different as a result of the engagement. Professional firms and clients are pooling their capabilities to create results they could not achieve individually. This makes it impossible for competitors to replicate these outcomes. The entire engagement is based on rich interaction, meaning there are many opportunities to develop a valuable and lasting relationship."

One of the best segments in this text is entitled "Why should I teach my clients to do what I do?", where the author notes that "the great fear of professionals is that if they make their clients more knowledgeable they are giving away their key productive asset from which they make money. In many cases this is a misunderstanding of the nature of knowledge-based relationships. This is often not about teaching your clients to do what you do but making them better at what they do, which is very far from doing yourself out of a job. In other cases, it is true that knowledge-based relationships result in clients becoming more self-sufficient. In some cases, it is true that knowledge-based relationships result in clients becoming more self-sufficient. In some situations it is possible that this means they will rely less on you in the future. More often their increased self-sufficiency will allow you to move to higher value and more profitable types of engagements. Either way, refusing to engage in knowledge-based relationships with clients is an unsustainable position. In professional services, the far greater risk is that competitors will offer more value to your clients than you do, so that you will lose all their business."

Another favorite of this reviewer is the 10-page segment "Models of relationship management", where Dawson explains that different models can be created by using diverse approaches to how the four primary knowledge relationship roles (senior representative, relationship coordinator, knowledge specialist, and knowledge customizer) combine and relate. With the guru model, most of the high-level client contact is concentrated on an individual or small number of individuals. Contact begins to expand beyond this key contact at the professional services firm with the expansion model. The mirror model is a bit different, because people communicate directly with their peers as opposed to through a formal relationship manager. And the integration model is the stage at which the boundaries between the firm and the client blur beyond recognition. As the author notes, these four models coincide with each of the stages of relationship development: the engaging, aligning, deepening, and partnering stages. Quite simply, this 350-page text is well thought out throughout, and is well recommended for independent consultants, consultants in professional services firms, and clients who are engaged or are considering engagement with such entities.

An excellent treatment of information and knowledge. More importantly, how you can use that structure for improving your client engagements to help them - and you - be more successful.