• by Kendall Allen , June 14, 2010

In what I consider a pretty lush and varied business life, I had one of those weeks that makes me thankful for how things have played out in my working world. I spent it immersed with clients, students -- and in conversation after conversation with many people I admire and trust. Former chiefs, insightful global execs, ascending peers, and a gaggle of smarty-pants colored the week start to finish.

This week's column simply celebrates a single thought I heard at the very end of the week that instantly resonated. From the point of view of one super-duper global honcho: "We are supremely client-facing, with zero self-awareness."

Having spent most of my career doing what we in the business call facing the client -- usually passively applying the proper deference whenever we say this -- I smiled from the inside out. We all strive for excellence. The honest among us know that we often fail and succeed  in equal parts. It's a cumulative history and body of work, this client services thing. So, even among the best in the business, there are fine lines around executing on good intentions.

When client service is your life's work, it is in several make-or-break areas that you develop a knack, a certain je ne sais quoi. And then, even when you fail, you always know what time it is. If you don't develop in these areas, you may look back one day and not really understand your own experience, through all the haze. The client service professionals who I have seen garner the most admiration and sustained business relationships have a sense for these things:

Client Services, with a capital CS, does not mean the client is always right. The disproportionately dutiful version of "account service" weighted heavily on obsequious order-taking gets the client relationship nowhere real. It creates a false sense of performance that is incredibly short-lived. And, in the process, as you lead teams under this somewhat bogus imperative, you may just sap the soul of the agency. Then it's often hard to recover from that kind of deficit. Additionally, the overly dutiful often paralyze themselves with fear of mistakes and never get in touch with their own penchant for creative risk-taking, which can take client business to new levels.

Be wary the wanton use of the p-word: partnership. If we are using this in the context of a client relationship, we should know what it means and live it more often than we say it. Begin with delving into and committing to total understanding of your client's business context, tensions and opportunities. As you flesh out strategy and formulate plans, measurement and analysis framework -- keep it real. Charming the client with strategy-speak at the expense of good tactics will show its own wear soon enough. Tactics -- good, good tactics -- matter.

Siloed discipline expertise -- if not encouraged to breathe -- is a problem. We have seen incredibly skilled, fairly senior single-discipline media people attempt to transition to robust client services or founding agency principal roles without taking the time to expand their horizons. This expansion would entail getting outside of known comfort zones on client business scenarios; gaining more-sophisticated marketing strategy development tools; learning new disciplines within the mix; tackling technology knowledge thresholds on par with today's market; and embracing agency collaboration and workflow best-practices around cross-discipline work. Avoiding these expansions, you persist not knowing what you don't know, until something very painful happens that illuminates a dangerous lack of business exposure. A more diversified exposure breeds wherewithal. Lack of wherewithal may lead to one's own exit from the scene.

It is often said that that self-awareness is the most underappreciated asset in business. I don't totally agree. Those who know how very much it matters,  appreciate it without even trying to measure it. See, that's the thing about je ne sais quoi. You can't put your finger on it, but time after time, it makes the difference .