By Ford Harding & Mimi Spangler

Over the years we have seen the leadership of many professional service firms frustrated by key account programs that don't work. There are, of course, many reasons that this happens, but one stands out: firms almost always start with too many key accounts.

A key account is one having such value or offering such potential to a firm that it warrants special attention. Attention translates quickly into time devoted to the account by account team members, usually partners from a variety of practices and geographies. The more key accounts a firm has, the more teams a partner is likely to serve on.

There's the rub. Partners at professionals must sell work, deliver services and administer the firm. They are always stretched for time. The more they are given to do, the more fractured their efforts become. Assigned to too many accounts, they rationally devote their attentions to the one they are in charge of or the one or two where they see the greatest potential for their practices and ignore the rest. As a result, many account teams lack the attention of key team members, so key relationships go undeveloped, opportunities to cross sell are missed and the account team falters. Also, there is often a lot of finger pointing at those who let down a team that can cause lasting ill will, when the real problem is structural.

We believe firms fall into this trap, because management lacks the fortitude to tell a partner that his best client will not be designated a key account or to limit partners to membership on two account teams. They pay for this weakness.

When Cortez landed on the coast of Mexico, he famously burned his ships before marching inland, focusing all attentions of his followers on the need to succeed. Partners will always want to go after any account where they can make quick and easy sales. Letting them do so, is akin to what Cortez would have done had he left his ships unburned, preserving retreat as an option. If you want to focus time and attention on a client by making it a key account, you mustn't make retreating from it too easy.