Sebastian Hartmann

Your Future Workforce won’t fit into Your Firm!

Your Future Workforce won’t fit into Your Firm!

For most professional and B2B services firms, human capital constitutes the largest single cost driver of business activities. The current pace of change across consulting, legal, accounting services, and other professions is driving massive shifts in human capital requirements, skill transformation needs, and talent shortages. At the same time, top-tier talent is increasingly harder to recruit, develop and retain. Professional services firms are recognizing that they are not immune to the Great Resignation.

That’s why more and more firms are beginning to leverage a mix of employees and contingent workers to meet their clients’ needs, deliver competitive services and solutions and transform themselves. An extended workforce approach helps firms reduce fixed costs, leverage specialized skillsets for varying periods, increase capacity and individual flexibility or even innovate and grow in new markets. Building management capabilities for an extended workforce that combines internal and external resources will define the success of many professional services firms in the coming years. This article outlines some fundamental building blocks for designing a workforce ecosystem strategy and management capability.

Procurement’s Awakening in Professional Services

Procurement’s Awakening in Professional Services

An unlikely new key player within ProfessionalServiceFirms is slowly crawling into the spotlight: Procurement.
This often immature function and role, which until today has mostly dwelled in the back-office, administrative shadows of knowledge-based firms, is evolving as cornerstone of strategy execution for lawfirms, consulting, accounting, or marketing service providers. Why? Well, read my article on this emerging topic.

Can Old Dogs still learn New Tricks? Towards the Next Gen Playbook for Managing Professional Services

Can Old Dogs still learn New Tricks? Towards the Next Gen Playbook for Managing Professional Services

The inherited recipes for growth and profitability are eroding as the input-oriented models of traditionally fuzzy knowledge-based services are being replaced by throughput- or output-based compensation for much more client focused and increasingly digital solutions. Leaders and managers in charge of professional service firms need to adjust their management playbook in order to remain relevant in the next generation of professional services. But where to begin?