Book Review: The Integration Imperative

Review by Patrick D. Kelly, Esq., Member, Steptoe & Johnson PLLC in Charleston, WV. He currently serves as the Managing Member of the firm’s Charleston office and is co-leader of the Long Term Care Team. Patrick can be reached at 304.353.8119 and pat.kelly@steptoe-johnson.com.

Suzanne C. Lowe’s book, The Integration Imperative, provides a comprehensive and analytical view of a common problem found in professional service firms – a disconnect between marketing and business development. Do your accounting department, IT department, revenue generators, and human resources department work well with your marketing and business development departments? If not, they should. Lowe drives home the point that marketing and sales are part of everyone’s job.

Firms that want to grow market share, increase revenues and provide greater value to their clients must harness their personnel to work collectively toward a common goal. Too often, “silos” develop within organizations, each with its own purpose and its own perceived mandates. When this occurs, all available resources are not being brought together for the greater good of the organization. Lowe provides high-level concepts for tearing down the silos and offers templates that can be used as a guide for self analysis, as well as a starting point for changing your firm’s organizational framework or cultural paradigm. The book also stresses the importance of talent development, skill development, and the awareness of best practices in your field.

One unique aspect of the book is its layout. It contains three distinct parts that are offered in an “a la carte” fashion. The reader can peruse each part separately and in one’s order of preference.

Part I – A Solvable Problem – provides an overview of the marketing and business development disconnects which often exist in firms. If you believe that an integration problem exists in your firm, this chapter will assist you in making the case. Lowe offers observations from her extensive consulting experience and statistics to support her position. Part I will also provide you with initiatives that firms have undertaken to addresses the cultural factors that have contributed to the disconnect.

Part II – Introducing the Integration Imperative – outlines organizational frameworks and cultural paradigms that can be employed to embed marketing and business development into everyone’s job. The “Integration Imperative” encompasses three separate imperatives that merit consideration by every organization.

• The Process Imperative proposes that the function of marketing and business development is to segment the market, target the “right” clients, determine which clients to pursue or avoid, and then to determine pricing.
• The Skills Imperative advocates the creation of “competency pathways” for everyone in the firm, including both revenue-generating and nonrevenue-generating professionals. According to Lowe, a successful competency pathway model should outline each person’s responsibility and the type of contribution each person must make to successfully implement the firm’s marketing, selling and client services processes. Shared accountability for success and failure is key.
• The Support Imperative challenges managers to recast their administrative functions to encourage more active collaboration, the sharing of responsibilities and the institution of co-leadership on marketing and business development activities. These functions, when combined, enable enhanced contributions to the firm’s growth goals.

Part III – The Integration Imperative Can and Does Work! - features stories describing the challenges and successes of real firms that have worked toward greater functional collaboration, shared accountabilities and individual competencies, utilizing the three Integration Imperatives outlined in Part II. The examples are not limited to large law firms or small accounting firm. They vary by sector (engineering, law, real estate, consulting), size (mid-size and large), and marketplace (regional, national and global).

Marketing and business development professionals will initially be drawn to this book and will greatly benefit from it. But many others in a firm should read it. The a la carte structure of the book facilitates its use to a broader audience. Often it is difficult to convince revenue producers to sit down and read 250 pages of a marketing / business development book. Although the best of intentions may exist, unless a block of free time suddenly appears, it is unlikely to happen. Savvy marketers and business developers who know their colleagues well (learning styles, right brain/left brain) can target and recommend the Part of the book that suits each individual. As a lawyer accustomed to case studies, the stories in Part III of the book were well suited for me.

The Integration Imperative identifies problems that exist in every organization -- even the best managed organizations -- and it offers great ideas for structural and cultural solutions. The ultimate goal of the book is to help firms deliver a better value proposition to their clients. A goal that we should all strive to achieve!