I once interviewed the managing partner of a large office of an international professional service firm. I had been told that, without changing personnel or investing extra funds, he had converted a number of the firm’s declining and demoralized branch offices into flourishing practices. I was eager to learn the secret of his success. Would it be strategic planning? Tight cost control? Marketing training for the professional staff?

“The key thing that I do,” he told me, “is to call each person into my office and ask a single question: ‘What do you want to be famous for?” He reported that a very high percentage of partners have no answer to the question. “The typical professional,” he continued, “is a highly trained, intelligent person, usually ambitious, who wants to feel special and to feel that the firm that he belongs to is special. But it is remarkable how few people are focused. My job as managing partner is to engage, encourage, focus, and channel the partners’ energies and ambitions.”

Excerpted from ‘Managing the Professional Service Firm’ by David Maister, pages 209 to 210