What’s Next for Professional Services

The demands and expectations of clients are changing. Due to a number of factors, such as the digital revolution, increased market competition and the recent pandemic crisis, clients want more value for their investment; there is a new focus on efficiency, speed, quality and cost.

Delivering a piece of work is no longer enough. Professional service firms must consider how they nurture the relationship with the client and in what ways they can improve their services. Much of this will come down to technology. However, people and knowledge sharing will always remain at the center of the industry.

Increased focus on the client experience

The professional service firm must be able to communicate and advise the client on any and all of their needs. Rather than generalists, the industry must move towards market specialties with the staff aware of the challenges and opportunities facing their clients. For some, this may require strategic partnerships.

New ways of working

Last year, professional service firms focused their attention on the immediate need of a smooth transition to remote working. Now, however, they must consider the long-term sustainability of remote and flexible working and how it can be truly embedded into the organization.

Not only must they think logistically about their internal processes and communications, but how they can continue to deliver high-quality services to their clients. Critical to this is resource management and work allocation systems. Going forward, professional service firms will look to ways of choosing the right person to do a piece of work based on their capacity to take on new projects, skillset, career objectives and ambitions as well as previous performance.

This not only ensures the team is working to full capacity and efficiency, benefitting both the client and the firm, but also considers the work-life balance of the employees.