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The client should be able to determine from a sentence or two whether our expertise is likely to meet his needs.
The narrower our claim of expertise, the more integrity we earn.
No is the second best answer we can hear.
demonstrate the selectivity and efficiency of the expert and march headlong into these conversations in pursuit of no.
Instead of waiting to hear, “You seem expensive,” we might say, “I’m a little concerned about the ability an organization of your size has to afford us.”
The target is not the market. We take precise aim at the smaller target and are happy to hit the wider market.
Our claim of expertise should be a lot narrower than the sum of our capabilities.
walk away from those opportunities where he is not viewed as the expert.
commit to the idea that continuous learning is mandatory.
We commit to deepening our expertise, rapidly and forever, so that we can find out just how good we can become.
the very act of focus is likely to build depth.
We need not be smarter or more creative than our competition, only more focused.
skills we must possess or acquire in order to succeed in a differentiated creative enterprise are: consulting first, writing second, artistry third.
Repeated observation and problem solving is bound to improve our quality and efficiency.
If we want to build deep expertise we must take pains to document how we work, to define how we will work in the future and to continuously refine and improve our approach.
build a culture of continuous learning by hiring for skill, by developing it through training, by empowering our people to form their own professional development plans that we will approve and fund, by holding them accountable to these plans, and, most importantly, by leading with our own example.
Our thinking is our highest value product;
we must remember that he is not fully committed until he has parted with his money.
rule of money: Those who cannot talk about it, do not make it.
Stress is caused by the things we do not do. The root of this money stress is not in the conversations themselves, but in not having them when we know we should.
“Before I say no, let me ask you a few questions.”
“Can and will the client afford us?” is vital information that we must resolve to uncover as soon as possible.
Discussing money early is an easily formed habit that, once acquired, helps us better make the decisions that shape the future of our practice.
We know that profit margin, like power, only diminishes with time.
if we are not losing business on price occasionally, then we are not charging enough.
our most profitable clients get our best service. It does not happen the other way around. Superior service does not improve profit; profit improves service.
Firms like ours are not fired over the large invoices for strategic work; they are fired over the small invoices for tactical work.
When we employ commodity pricing we invite commodity comparisons,
The defining characteristic of a commodity is an inability to support any price premium.
our pricing for these services has little to do with the hours it takes to deliver them.
When our clients buy our thinking, however, they need to understand they are not buying it in units of time.
Premium Pricing Improves Commitment
We are not meeting our full obligations to our clients when we make recommendations that they find easy to ignore.
The corporations that we most admire are the ones that invest in research and development. We must follow their path.
we will use some of our greater profit margins to better ourselves and put greater distance between our competition and us.
We will seek respect above money, for only when we are respected as experts will we be paid the money we seek.
Selectivity is Power When we express our resentment for the client who does not value us, we are really expressing our self-loathing for not being able to walk away from him.
In following the twelve proclamations we will leave the poor clients to our competitors,
Profit is the proof of the worth of our enterprise.
The Gift We Might Give We possess something that most others do not. We see what others cannot. We can conceive what does not yet exist. At our very best, we have it within us to lay out the future and lead people to it.
We will do great work for those who respect us and pay us our worth.
From our rewards we will use our gifts to lift our families, inspire our communities and influence all of humankind.
