ProfServ Traction Podcast

Episode Run Time: 8:43

Welcome to the ProfServ Traction Podcast, dedicated to exploring how professional services and technology businesses break through the ceiling.

In this episode, Steve Preda breaks down the key aspects that make professional services companies different from other businesses, and the unique difficulties involved in the leadership and management that these kinds of businesses must overcome in order to break through to the next level. 

Time Stamps

[00:15] Introduction: How managed professional service firms are different from other businesses   

[00:47] Why managing a professional services business is much harder than other businesses 

[00:59] Reason 1: Highly skilled and trained people require compelling leadership 

[01:09] Reason 2: Career structure hierarchies within professional services firms

[02:00] Difficulties in leading and managing a team with expectations of traditional business hierarchies

[02:16] Reason 3: The focus on billability of people in a professional services firm 

[02:55] Identifying disincentives for people who want to become leaders and how to open the door towards  creating the leaders a company needs 

[04:01] Reason 4: The firm is a collection of solopreneurs

[04:25] Managing and overcoming challenges when leading a team that sees themselves as solopreneurs/entrepreneurs 

[04:53] Reason 5: Dispersed ownership 

[05:00] Examples of dispersed ownership structures and their complexity

[05:40] Reason 6: Challenges in decision making and leadership

[06:55] The first steps involved in starting a professional services firm’s EOS journey.

[07:10]  Examples of identifying some of the major functions of a business. 

[08:00] Strategic questions business leaders can answer through EOS in order to  take a company forward to that next level. 

Conclusion

What are the major functions of your business and who in your organization really “gets” it? Does your company have unique leadership challenges that you may not have considered or adapted to? The Entrepreneurial Operating System will give your services or technology business a whole new perspective on empowering those within the organization to function on a whole new level! 

Headline Quote:

06:40 – 7:07

“And whenever we started professional services firms on the Entrepreneurial Operating System, EOS Traction and one of the first things that we do and focus there on the first few sessions together is to figure out what the major functions of that business are and who are the people who get it, who want it and who have the capacity to execute on those major functions. And what are the major roles of those functions.”