My Must-Read List

Must-Read for Firm Leaders

“The Win Without Pitching Manifesto” - This is a must-read for anyone that leads a professional services firm. It will make you re-think how you position your firm, how you negotiate with your prospects, and even how you think about proposals and agreements. Warning: The author’s exclusive use of male pronouns throughout the book can be challenging for some readers.

Must-Read for Firm Leaders

“The Business of Expertise” - David C. Baker is often considered ‘The Expert’ when it comes to professional services firms. Obviously ‘selling’ expertise is different from selling shoes, or coffee, and building a business around that expertise is different as well. This is another must-read for leaders of professional services firms.

You should be ‘winning’ more pitches

“Pitch Anything” - If you make presentations, whether to win work, to get work approved, or to win a case, Oren Klaff’s neuroscience-based methodology is a must-read. You weren’t taught to present like this. You’ve never thought about your relationship with your ‘audience’ like this. You need to understand how their brain really sees and hears what you’re saying.

You won’t like this book… but you need it

“Fanatical Prospecting” - There are a lot of people in professional services that will hate this book. That’s exactly why you need to read it. You may not like to ‘sell.’ You may not like the idea of ‘sales.’ You may not even like the word ‘sales.’ But you have to be able to win work and fill your pipeline if you want to stay in business. Jeb Blount lays out the system and reveals the discipline that you need to develop.

Here’s proof

“Grow” - This book is definitely for branding and marketing wonks, but if you ever needed proof of the benefit of building your firm based on a ‘purpose,’ it’s here. Jim Stengel teamed up with a group of researchers to track and study purpose-driven brands around the world, across markets, and versus their competitors and found an exponential advantage to building a purpose-driven brand.

Everything is a negotiation

“Never Split The Difference” - Are your clients negotiating your fees down? Do you give in too easily? How much are you leaving on the table? Chris Voss translates his experience as the FBI’s head hostage negotiator into lessons for negotiating anything in any situation. Need to negotiate a fee, a purchase price, a salary? Read this book. You’ll become a better negotiator and you’ll enjoy Chris’ stories on the way.

Need sales training?

”The Challenger Sale” - Maybe you’ve had sales training in your past. Whether you’ve gone through Sandler Sales Training or something else, this research project turned modern sales methodology is the only sales training developed for our modern reality. It’s the only system developed since your clients started researching everything via the internet BEFORE they call you. Even if you think you know business development and sales, you need this book.

If you’re struggling with marketing…

“Building A Story Brand” - Learn how to stop wasting time and resources on marketing and business development, by communicating your message (via email, website, video, verbal presentation) in a clear way that moves your prospect towards hiring you. This is Donald Miller’s first ‘marketing’ book. His follow-up book with Dr. J.J. Peterson, “Marketing Made Simple” is also on my list.

Be intentionally profitable

“Profit First” - One of the things that I love about Mike Michalowicz is his ability to distill problems down to their essence and build simple systems to solve those problems. ‘Profit First’ doesn’t mean putting money before everything, but it does mean building your firm to be intentionally profitable… and tells you how to do it.

Get them to trust your idea like it was theirs

“Flip The Script” - In his follow-up to “Pitch Anything,” Oren Klaff delves deeper into how to present ideas that your prospects, selection committee, or jury want to hear. Based on the neuroscience of communication and decision making, Oren goes beyond persuasion, to teaching you how to get to a point of agreeing on ideas that your audience thinks of as their own.

People will pay you more for WHY you do it

“Start With Why” - You’ve probably watched Simon Sinek’s TedTalk, but have you read the book? He says “People don’t buy what you do, they buy WHY you do it.” If you’re in professional services, I have a different version: People buy what you do. That’s why you’re still in business, but they’ll pay you more for WHY you do it. Read “Start With Why” and flesh out everything from the TedTalk and more. It’s worth the read.

It’s not just for marketing

“It’s Not What You Sell, It’s What You Stand For” - Similar to Jim Stengel’s “Grow,” Roy Spence presents case study after case study of how organizations across the spectrum benefited from focusing not on a mission, not on a vision, but on a purpose. Once you read this, you’ll start thinking about purpose and you may stop thinking about purpose as an idea or a statement, and more of purpose as an operating system for your firm.

This will impact you every day

“The One Thing” - What's the one thing you can do such that by doing it everything else will be easier or unnecessary? Lack of focus and prioritization is one of the biggest threats that all of our businesses face on a yearly, quarterly, monthly, and daily basis. At first, Gary Keller’s concept may seem too simple or too good to be true, but once you embrace it you’ll find that it’s not simple, but it is powerful.

Go from order-taker to trusted advisor

“The Challenger Customer” - Is the follow up to “The Challenger Sale” and I think it’s critically important for anyone in business development for professional services to read and understand. If you’ve wondered why your clients see you as a service provider or, worse, an order-taker, read this book. You’ll learn how to go from service provider to expert and order-taker to trusted advisor. This is one of the most important expertise establishing books you can read.

If you need a marketing system…

“Marketing Made Simple” - His follow-up to “Building a Story Brand,” is a team from Donald Miller and Dr. J.J. Peterson to create a step-by-step guide to growing your business. This is one of those actionable books that I love because if you simply follow the steps, you’ll make progress and change the course of your business. I’d read “Building A Story Brand” first, but either way… Do the work!

How to ‘fix’ what’s wrong in your firm

“Fix This Next” - In Mike Michalowicz’s follow-up to “Profit First” he covers every aspect of your business. If you’re struggling in multiple areas or don’t know why you’re struggling, start here. You go back to “Profit First” once you dig into the financial side of your firm. On a related note, Mike has written 8 books and they’re all worth the read.

A system to win the work you want

“Book Yourself Solid” - This is one of those books that will ‘force’ you to learn how to win more of the work you want because Michael Port presents a 100% actionable, step-by-step process that you don’t currently have. I love books like this for professional services firms because they’re about the systems and processes that most firms lack. Do the work!

The future of your business is at stake

“The Infinite Game” - In true Simon Sinek fashion, this book is packed with well-researched examples that may open your eyes to why some businesses survive and even thrive for generations, why some don’t, and why some start strong and suddenly nosedive. You can choose whether you have a finite or infinite mindset, but you need to understand that business is an infinite game. This book can be a game-changer.

The Entrepreneur Operating System

“Traction” - This is another must-read for anyone that leads a professional services firm and another book that I love because it’s 100% actionable. Not only does Gino Wickman introduce his Entrepreneur Operating System (EOS), but he walks you through it, and gives you the templates for everything from meeting agendas to marketing plans. Again, read this book, put it into action, and see your firm improve.

Atomic Habits

“Atomic Habits” - As a habit-driven person, James Clear’s story and new methodology for building (or breaking) habits was life-changing. From mindsets to action, once you understand the system you can start to change every aspect of your life and business. James shares his life’s journey, starting from being hit in the face with a baseball bat, but if you need the scientific research to back it all up, it’s in here too.

Repeat clients and referrals

“Fanocracy” - From the outset, this book by David Meerman Scott and Reiko Scott with examples from The Greatful Dead and a surfboard company, may seem outside the box for professional services firms, but in an industry that depends so heavily on repeat clients and referrals, providing a client experience that builds a ‘Fanocracy’ can be exactly the gamechanger you’ve been looking for. What would it be like if your firm had a loyal following of fans?