managers are top performers and are respected and liked by the staff. The human resources group can help the firm track attrition by manager to determine whether there are any problems with a particular manager, principal, or partner.

Opportunities for training: Investment in training is a major driver of employee satisfaction.

Satisfaction with team and coworkers: Dysfunctional teams and coworkers drive out employees quickly. High-performing, cohesive teams can be a source of immense job satisfaction and are an important source of employee and client satisfaction.

Opportunities for career growth: The firm must provide the professional staff members with challenges to satisfy their demand for learning.

Compensation: Compensation, while the most obvious (and often cited) variable, is not the number one factor in the career decisions of professional services professionals, as long as the compensation is within 10 percent of the market rate. If an employees compensation is far below market, he or she will, however, seek alternative employment (or possibly reduce his or her efforts).

Opportunities for promotion: Most professional staff have ambitious interest in career advancement. The firm must ensure that there is a clear promotion ladder to satisfy these goals. The firm should also ask individuals to perform at the level of skills the promotion requires before receiving the promotion. This procedure ensures that staff who are promoted do not fail because they could not handle the rise in skill level required.

While compensation often receives the most attention as a determinant of staff satisfaction, simply increasing salaries is rarely the right answer. The preceding inventory of satisfaction determinants indicates that a well-planned career track for professional staff, as well as other noncompensation-related factors, is equally important. This chapter, along with Chapters 9 and 11, addresses these issues.

Career Tracks

A critical tool for managing professional and administrative staff in a services firm is a well-defined career path. A given firm will have a variety of titles and roles assigned to various professionals. An important distinction should be made between two major categories of employees in a professional services firm. First, professional staff are those who are directly responsible for the delivery of the services and overall management of the firm (attorneys in a law firm, doctors in a medical practice, agents in a real estate firm,

consultants in a consultancy, and so on). The second category, administrative staff, is composed of those who are charged with supporting roles within the professional services firm. These employees are usually working on administrative duties (secretaries, assistants, receptionists, paralegals, or coordinators) or functional areas (human resources, finance, marketing, or information technology).

This distinction is made because there are usually important differences in firm compensation, career path, recruiting, roles, and responsibilities between the two types. Professional staff members are expected to focus their attention on building and executing the business of the firm, with an eventual path to management and perhaps equity participation. Because the majority of the employees in a given professional services firm are professional staff, this chapter focuses on career tracks and policies for those employees. The promotion path of administrative staff is usually determined by the firm on a case-by-case basis and follows the traditional patterns for these professionals.

The legal profession characterizes three key roles played by individuals in professional services firms as finders, minders, and grinders. This assessment is a fairly accurate description, particularly for consulting and legal services. Finders are charged with identifying new clients, identifying needs at existing clients, and selling new engagements based on existing or new service offerings. Minders, usually mid-level managers, are charged with ensuring that the execution of the projects or assignments is proceeding smoothly. Grinders, usually analysts, consultants, or entry-level professional staff, execute the work and perform much of the analysis or heavy lifting during a project.

The specific titles for these roles varies from firm to firm and industry to industry. A list of the typical titles for each role follows:

Finders: Partner, director, managing director or managing partner, vice-president, senior vice-president

Minders: Senior associate, principal, director, manager, senior manager

Grinders: Analyst, associate, senior associate, consultant, senior consultant

As would be expected, the ratio of finders to minders and grinders is a critical component of firm profitability and varies depending on the type of firm, specific services offered by the firm (type of work), and profit goals of the firm. David H. Maister, a leading thinker in the field of management consulting and author of numerous books on the topic of professional services firm management, provides an excellent overview of leverage approach in Chapter 1 of his book Managing the Professional Services Firm (see Resources section). An overview of leverage ratio benchmarks can be found in the benchmarking chapter of this book as well.

The leveraged professional services model creates a pyramid organization structure, as shown in Exhibit 10.1. Chapter 9 covers the potential ways in which a professional services firm may structure itself in more detail.

Elements of a Career Track

The critical components of a career track include well-defined levels, roles and responsibilities at each level, promotion criteria, and compensation plans for each level.

Levels. Each level within the firm (associate, senior associate, principal, partner) should carry a specific and clear title. As a firm grows, particularly across multiple geographies, it is helpful when a manager has the same set of expectations and responsibilities across offices and practices. Many firms, particularly those that grow through acquisition, have a wide range of titles assigned for a given role. A manager in one area group may be a senior associate in another and a technical lead in yet another. Setting the titles clearly and consistently is a critical element in bringing order to career tracks.

Roles and Responsibilities. For each level, the typical roles and responsibilities should be clearly documented, including client delivery work, as well as internal firm administrative duties, operations work, and business development efforts. This means inventorying the skills, experience, education

Typical points of entry for new professional staff

Exhibit 10.1 Representative Professional Services Firm Structure