How to manage client relationships during departure and successions

With employees spending many hours and years forging strong relationships with clients, a suitable successor is going to be crucial to manage key relationships successfully during transition and into the future. So, wouldn’t it be ideal to know who, within the firm, would be the best candidate you should transition this client relationship to for seamless service?

You could be forgiven for thinking that ‘hindsight is a wonderful thing’. However, strategic visibility of communication can help you identify the perfect successor and this can be achieved by implementing a data-driven solution. Here we take a closer look at how you can manage key relationships effectively during departure and successions through data insights.

Managing staff changes

With remote working now the norm for many employees of professional services firms, understanding and managing staff changes is vital for client retention.

When people depart a firm, this will always impact client and referrer relationships. So being able to understand the frequency and recency of communication between your firm and key relationships would give you a huge advantage over your competitors.

This is where real-time and accurate communication data allows you and your senior management team to identify and assess the relationships held by any given staff member.

Having access to this relationship intelligence is invaluable. Knowing whether a key staff member is leaving your firm, has already left your firm or a key contact is leaving a client’s organisation can help protect your revenue. Your firm’s data can help you identify whether your influence at your client’s firm is declining and which external relationships will most likely be impacted because of departures from the firm. You can obtain information in advance or post-departure.

Using a solution such as our Client Sense software will allow you to easily view and assess:

• Client, contact, referrer relationships held by a staff member
• Who best to communicate the change to the client
• Who, within the firm, you should transition the client relationship to
• That contact has been made by the new relationship owner

This insight allows you to put successor planning measures swiftly in place so that there is little or no impact on the client or your bottom line.

Relationship intelligence for accountants and lawyers

With 360-degree relationship intelligence mapping, you can ensure that your firm performs much more strategically to increase and maintain revenue.

This data-driven visibility will improve client retention as you can track staff relationships while intelligently managing client relationships during departure and successions.

Watch our video to find out more about how our Client Sense technology can manage transition to support key relationships and improve client retention.

Book a consultation with us to discuss a consultation or Client Sense deployment.

At Symphony - APS we specialise in offering products and services for professional services firms that drive growth. Read about other solutions in our comprehensive product library including: accountancy Practice Management, CRM for accountants, and Marketing Automation.