Most professional service providers -- accountants, attorneys, finance and investment specialists -- claim to serve as such. Few truly do. Yet more than ever, clients demand that their high-priced counselors and senior managers not just be "technicians," but rather broad-based, forward-thinking confidantes who can help them better manage and grow their business.

Any professional who strives to be a true business advisor faces a challenge. It is in understanding what specific skills define the role, and then working continually to cultivate the capabilities that are needed to maximize client satisfaction and development.

 

So what does it take to be a bonafide business advisor? The answer lies in the increasingly systematized professional discipline and art of executive leadership.

 

Being an effective advisor requires understanding the strategic, operational and human resource challenges that corporate leaders struggle with daily. The problems facing CEOs, CFOs and COOs are leadership problems. Therefore, to advise a C-level leader you have to think like a C-level leader. What’s more, you have to focus acutely on the problems that -- as they say -- keep those executives up at night.

 

Herein lies a key insight for professionals who want to enhance their business advisory skills: By embracing leadership thinking, professionals can better anticipate and act upon the accounting- and finance-related imperatives that support their clients’ efforts to achieve growth and profitability.

 

Let’s consider the concept of leadership for a moment. First off, are leaders born or made? This is the age-old question that’s been answered quite decisively in recent years. By all accounts, the people who we view today as great leaders developed the skills that make them such.

The fact is, everyone is born with the intrinsic ability to cultivate leadership skills. But only the people who actively hone those traits can actualize their potential to become genuine leaders.

 

Why is all this important for accounting and finance professionals? It’s because that, by developing leadership skills -- and hence, leadership thinking -- you can improve your ability to deliver valuable advisory insights from the perspective that is your particular area of functional expertise. Leadership thinking becomes an analytical orientation -- a new frame of reference for evaluating recurring business challenges.

 

Executive leadership encompasses a broad range of skill sets and personal characteristics. But the analytical lens that is leadership thinking emphasizes these four areas:

Some may pose the question: "I work with controllers and CFOs. Why would I have to worry about such non-financial things ... ‘soft issues’ that my clients would only tangentially consider in their daily business activities?"

 

Such is the query of a technician, not of a business advisor.

 

Serving as a strategically oriented counselor requires considering the financial ramifications of clients’ non-financial initiatives. For instance, a company may be seeking to expand in overseas markets. Or open a new production facility. Or geographically re-deploy a significant portion of their employee base. None of these are financial issues per se. But they all have distinct fiscal ramifications. Thus, it’s necessary to look at broad strategic and organizational issues, then explore the accounting- and finance-specific critical success factors relative to those issues.

 

Clearly, many audit and financial professionals do indeed "think beyond the numbers" while never losing sight of them. But to provide true added value as advisors, it’s necessary to continually consider the essential inter-relationship of seemingly "soft issues" that have "hard-dollar" consequences.

 

This is a multifaceted subject. Next month we'll focus on the aforementioned components of leadership thinking. We’ll look at how to address the core business issues in each area to help advise on common organizational and strategic problems. And, for public accountants and consultants, we'll address using leadership thinking to better identify client needs and cross-sell services.

 

Editor’s Note: This is the first article of a new monthly column that focuses on personal-development issues and ideas. Growing Concerns will address topics designed to help you enhance your skills in the areas of communication, client-service, sales and leadership.

 

MARK N. CLEMENTE provides personal coaching in leadership, sales, and career management to professional clients nationwide. A former director of marketing and communications for Coopers & Lybrand, he is the author of four books and dozens of journal articles on management development and corporate growth. His clients have included professionals from Big Five and middle-market accounting and management consultancies, as well as Fortune 500 companies. Mark speaks worldwide before professional and academic groups, and holds a masters degree in strategic communication and leadership. He can be reached at mark@clementeonline.com or by calling 201-444-9830. Visit his Web site at www.clementeonline.com