August 13, 2024 • 37 mins
Part of the remit of an ops leader is to ensure they’ve got the right people, in the right place.
In many agencies, account managers handle sales, client relationships, AND project management. However, this hybrid role often leads to trade-offs.
Everyone’s got their own strengths and preferences – and these responsibilities seemingly require very different personality types.
A great sales person might struggle with rigorous project management, resulting in issues like over-servicing. While an exceptional project manager might struggle with developing a sales pipeline, leading to stress, missed targets, and a shallow pipeline.
So, should these roles be separated?
We'll explore this with our guest, Jenny Plant. With over 20 years of experience in agency account management, Jenny founded her consultancy, Account Management Skills, to share sales training skills with account managers.
Jenny will share:
- The pros and cons of separating account and project managers
- What value agencies seek in their account managers
- How sales training can improve client relationships, retention and business growth
Jenny's website: https://accountmanagementskills.com/
Jenny's podcast: https://accountmanagementskills.com/podcast
Follow Jenny on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jennyplant/
Follow Harv on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/harvnagra/
Stay up to date with regular ops insights. Subscribe to The Handbook: The Operations Newsletter.
This podcast is brought to you by Scoro, where you can manage your projects, resources and finances in a single system.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Harv (00:31):
Hi all, welcome back to the show.
Ops people, we have to beunicorns, masters of all trades.
But should others in our teamsbe expected to be as well?
In the agency space, it's quitecommon to have account managers,
which you expect to be greatsalespeople, great client
relationship managers, andexpect them to be excellent
project managers.
(00:53):
In my experience, this hybridrole often comes with a trade
off.
People in that role mightgravitate towards aspects of the
role that they're mostcomfortable in, whether that's
project management or managingthe client relationship and
developing sales.
This can lead to disappointmenton the part of the operations
leader that the individualsmight either not be as rigorous
around project control as they'dlike, leading to issues such as
(01:16):
over servicing, or they might begreat at project management, but
be less comfortable discussingnew opportunities with the
client and actively developingtheir sales pipeline, causing
stress for the management team,including the MD, finance, and
operations.
As Ops people, we have a say ininforming how our agencies are
structured and staffed.
(01:37):
So is it reasonable to expectone person to be able to do all
of the above, manage projectswell, and develop business and
client relationships, or shouldthese roles be separated?
And regardless of whether weseparate these roles, account
managers in agencies don't oftencome from a formal sales
background.
So how can we ever expect themto deliver on that side of their
(01:58):
role?
How can they develop thoseskills?
That's the topic of today'sepisode.
Our guest today is Jenny Plant.
If that name sounds familiar,it's because you may have heard
or seen something about herpodcast online, or you might
already be a fan.
She's the host of the brilliantCreative Agency Account Manager
podcast, which she's beenhosting for nearly two years.
(02:18):
Jenny has over 20 years ofexperience in agency account
management, but she tells me itwas when she took on a role at a
global healthcare comms agencythat she had her aha moment.
There, she had the formal salestraining where she learned
everything she felt she shouldhave known for her first account
executive role.
It's then become her mission toshare that knowledge and that
(02:40):
led to her setting up her ownconsultancy Account Management
Skills.
Through her company, Jennyprovides training on account
management skills for creativeagencies.
Her goal is to support clientretention and help agencies grow
existing client relationships.
I had the pleasure of chattingwith Jenny previously and
listening to her podcast.
So I'm really excited for you tojoin this conversation and hear
(03:02):
what she has to say.
Let's get into it.
Jenny, it's a pleasure to haveyou here today.
I have to admit I'm a bitnervous talking to a
professional podcaster who'sbeen doing it over two years.
I've been doing it two months,so I've been kind of sweating it
the past hour being like, Ibetter not screw this up.
Jenny Plant (03:19):
Please be, be assured.
I am, no way.
I do not think I'm professionalat all.
I still cringe when I listen tomyself.
So gosh, please.
No gosh, please.
But thank you anyway.
That was kind.
Harv (03:30):
Thank you so much.
So first question, we're goingto quickly start with
terminology.
I know everyone can have adifferent point of view, but I
wanted to start with yours.
In the agency world, do you seethe job titles, client
relationship manager, clientservices managers, and account
managers, are they all kind ofcut from the same cloth or do
they have different nuances?
(03:51):
What's your point of view onthat?
Jenny Plant (03:52):
No, they don't at all.
I think it's a bit like the wildwest.
All of our agencies do somethingslightly different and therefore
we all call these key points ofclient contact, something
completely different.
So anything from account managerto relationship manager there
was, there's an internal commsagency in the US who call their
account people strategistsbecause they lead the strategy
(04:14):
as well as the clientrelationship.
So
Harv (04:17):
Right.
Jenny Plant (04:17):
it's across the board.
And also there's kind ofdifferent levels as well.
So you have these multitudewhere agencies have different.
You know, they can start withaccount exec, account manager,
senior account manager, accountdirector.
I mean, it's just bonkersreally.
Harv (04:31):
Right.
Right.
A lot of job titles, all roughlyin the same ballpark of what the
responsibilities are.
So it comes to kind of internal,whatever they've decided to call
those roles.
Jenny Plant (04:40):
Exactly.
Yep.
Harv (04:42):
Okay.
So what we're going to betalking today about is the role
of the account manager andparticularly in agencies where
the role covers both sales andcustomer relationship and the
project management side ofthings.
First of all, how common is itto have this kind of hybrid
role?
Jenny Plant (04:57):
Very common.
I, I see it.
I work with different countries,mostly English speaking
countries.
So I do a lot of business withthe U S, some with Australia,
and Europe, but definitely it'snot uncommon, it's across the
board really, you do find it inevery country.
Harv (05:13):
Any thoughts on why you think this is so common to have
this hybrid role?
Jenny Plant (05:18):
I think it's partly traditional because that's how
we used to do it 20 years ago.
Harv (05:23):
Hmm.
Jenny Plant (05:24):
I think it was about 20 years ago with the
advent of digital agencies, thatthere was a requirement for a
more specialized skillset inmanaging the type of projects
that we were doing.
I'm old enough to have seen thatshift.
So you saw the rise of moreseparation of the two roles, I'd
say at the beginning of 20 yearsago, and it's
Harv (05:46):
Hmm.
Jenny Plant (05:46):
it's just grown and grown and grown as more agencies
are now digital.
But having said that there arestill, as we said, still hybrid
account manager roles.
you know, PR is a, an agencyindustry that's specifically,
you can find a lot of hybrid.
Medical communications agenciesare the same, a lot of hybrid.
(06:07):
But I think more consultancybased companies tend to have the
hybrid role.
Harv (06:16):
Yeah.
I've seen that, you know, mypast agency, we did everything
from strategy to brandingthrough to digital.
And it was only the digital thathad the dedicated producer
roles, whereas everything elseon the project management side
was covered by hybrid accountmanagers as well.
So as a prelude to thediscussion, can I ask where you
stand on this debate?
(06:36):
What's your point of view?
Jenny Plant (06:38):
I feel quite strongly that if your current
business model is working foryou,
Harv (06:43):
Yeah.
Jenny Plant (06:43):
Then carry on.
Harv (06:45):
Okay.
Jenny Plant (06:45):
There's no need and there's no one size fits all
because every agency is slightlydifferent.
Every agency operates slightlydifferently.
Harv (06:53):
Yeah.
Jenny Plant (06:53):
The
Harv (06:54):
Yeah.
Jenny Plant (06:54):
key question to ask yourself, if you are the owner
of an agency and you're thinkingabout, you know, how do I
structure my team?
I think one of the key things,is for me, is I spend all this
time and money getting a client.
And when we have the client, arewe retaining it and growing it,
most importantly, are wecapitalizing on that
(07:17):
relationship?
Because we all know thestatistics.
The Harvard Business Review saidit's 5 to 25 times more
expensive to get a new clientthan it is to grow an existing.
So there'so much potentialwithin your current client base
to expand.
So it could be cross sellingupselling, you know, adding more
(07:37):
value, coming up with moreideas, getting referrals,
getting introduced to otherparts of their organization, to
their network, there's all ofthat potential.
And I think that's the keyquestion for me.
If it's not broken, don't tryand fix it with a new business
model.
Whatever's working, go with it.
So I, I, I feel like that.
I know a lot of people aredifferent.
They're, they're quite black andwhite, but I've, I've, worked
(08:00):
with so many different agencies.
Some agencies don't have anaccount management function at
all, you know?
So that's my, that's my stanceon it.
Harv (08:10):
If it ain't broke, don't fix it.
And if you do start recognizingsome of the pains that might
lead to somebody thinking thatthey need to distinguish that.
Before we get into that, Jenny,I wanted to ask what kind of
qualities are good qualities tohave in an account manager?
Jenny Plant (08:24):
I think, if you, if we're talking about.
Are we talking about a hybrid ora pure standalone
Harv (08:29):
Let's say standalone so that we can distinguish these
functions.
Jenny Plant (08:33):
The standalone has a natural ability to lead a
client relationship.
They're able to manage theclient relationship without
ruffling feathers.
They're very good at readingsocial signals and pre empting
disasters.
They're kind of emotionallyattuned to what's happening.
They rally their colleagues andtheir behaviors include an
(08:56):
ability to sell ideas, protectprofits, to Commercial curiosity
and to understand the client'sbusiness, their market, their
customer.
So it's quite an entrepreneurialmindset because you are
responsible for your book ofbusiness, your key accounts, and
you're responsible for nurturingit, nurturing them.
(09:17):
You have a forecast target.
Your goal is to make sure thatyou are building trust, building
the relationship, looking forgrowth opportunities.
And, and I think typically,again, it's coming back to the
pure account manager role, aswell as that generally speaking,
they tend to be quiteenthusiastic, optimistic, and
very at ease with meeting newpeople.
(09:39):
They're more akin to salespeoplethan perhaps the pure play
project manager is.
Harv (09:46):
Mm hmm.
And that was going to be my nextquestion.
How is that distinct from whatyou see as a great project
manager?
Jenny Plant (09:53):
For me, a great project manager has a really
good attention to detail.
They are process driven.
They're super efficient.
They are the engine room of thebusiness.
hmm.
They are able to problem solve,they have a very thorough
approach.
They're highly respected and youjust, you know, there's someone
(10:13):
that you can rely on.
That's not going to let anythingfall through the cracks.
And conversely, the accountmanagers, they might be kind of
big picture, but not so good atthe detail.
Harv (10:24):
When I hear those strengths or qualities in a good
account manager versus projectmanager it almost sounds to me
like those could be verydifferent personalities, the
introvert versus the extrovert,you know, attention to detail
versus really liking buildingrelationships and keeping the
client happy.
So you can see where thattension can come in with the
(10:46):
hybrid role
Jenny Plant (10:47):
Absolutely, Harv.
I mean, interestingly I've beenworking with um, David Baker, in
the US and many agency peopleare aware of David cause he's
very well known.
He's done DISC profiling.
He's got over 28, 000 DISCprofiles, having looked at all
of the agency roles over time.
Harv (11:05):
hmm,
Jenny Plant (11:06):
And he's actually found that typical account
managers and project managershave a different DISC profile as
well.
Harv (11:13):
right,
Jenny Plant (11:13):
you're right to observe that what makes you a
great account manager isn'tnecessarily what makes you a
great project manager.
And I have personal testament tothat because I, in my career was
a hybrid account manager
Harv (11:26):
right,
Jenny Plant (11:26):
and I loved, loved, love the meeting of new people.
If you put me in the room of anetworking event, by the end of
the night I'd have spoken tomany people,
Harv (11:37):
right,
Jenny Plant (11:37):
exchanging business cards and loved that;
presentations.
But when you put me in a roombehind a big spreadsheet and I
had to do a scope of work, Ijust felt tired and overwhelmed.
And I did it, because I had todo it, but it wasn't my flow.
Harv (11:54):
I've seen that as well, Jenny, from my experience, it's
very similar to what you'redescribing there is that, people
kind of gravitate towards theskillset that they're more
comfortable in based on theirpersonality and their
experience.
Right.
So when you get that kind of avery outgoing kind of bubbly
personality to try to focus onthe details of really rigorous
(12:15):
project management, you mightget things like the over
servicing and, scope creep beingallowed because it's really hard
to put your foot down in frontof the client.
And then on the other end ofthings, when somebody is just
much more comfortable notspeaking to people and being
focused on the work and makingsure that's being done really
efficiently, you know, they,they can struggle with the
(12:35):
client handling because thingscan be a little bit too strict.
so if that's the case and westill have hybrids, is it still
possible to have this kind ofunicorn role or is that just the
reality of it, that you'realways going to have this kind
of tension and people are goingto be better at one thing or
Jenny Plant (12:53):
I don't see the hybrid role going away partly
because it's more usual when youstart an agency, you would
probably have a hybrid rolethere because everyone's wearing
multiple hats.
Harv (13:05):
hmm.
Jenny Plant (13:06):
I think it's just a decision as you grow the
business, what makes more sensefor you and the type of work
you're working on, the type ofbusiness, how you sell as well,
Harv (13:16):
Right.
Jenny Plant (13:17):
becoming, I'm seeing a trend with a lot of
agencies, productizing what theydo.
Harv (13:22):
Mm.
Jenny Plant (13:22):
Offering products and programs rather than
bespoke, pricing based onspecific projects.
And I think we're going to seemore and more of that.
Harv (13:32):
Mm.
Jenny Plant (13:33):
so yeah, we're, we're changing, I think the
business model is changing.
And I think like everything, ifyou're a business owner or
leader, you have to evolve withthe changes that are happening.
Harv (13:43):
Do you think even at larger agencies, it's
sustainable to keep the hybridrole or is that kind of one of
the triggers maybe that sizegets to a certain point, and
then it becomes much morenecessary to have very distinct
roles and responsibilities?
Jenny Plant (13:57):
I think it's a good question.
I think there's probablydifferent, definitely different
scenarios.
Either you get to a tippingpoint and it makes more sense
for you to split them out.
So you're early in your progressand it's easier at that stage.
Rather than, you're fullyestablished and then you decide
to split the roles.
(14:17):
I've worked with agencies thatare on that journey and it seems
a bit of a trend.
How you do that is as importantas what you do, because part of
it is looking at your team andit's a combination of what the
business needs and what theindividual wants to do.
You were talking Harv about youknow, your natural propensity to
(14:40):
do one thing or the other.
I think it's all about gettingpeople sitting in the right
seats.
So that they can flourish and bein flow.
The last thing you want is tohave someone with more of a
project management leaning,being given a forecast target to
achieve.
And being told to walk theproverbial halls of the
(15:01):
organization, look at what theclient's market is doing and
look at the commercialopportunities of where you could
grow the account.
It's just not, maybe it's notinteresting, you know, they much
prefer the satisfaction ofcompletion of projects.
You know, that flow where yousee everything coming together
(15:22):
and that's what you're good at.
Harv (15:24):
Absolutely.
So Jenny, I wanted to talk abouthow these roles operate
together.
Let's say somebody does decidethat, up until now, they've had
this kind of hybrid role, butthey've started to recognize
some of the pains and they thinkthat they're at a certain size,
or, whatever's triggering themto lead to this kind of process.
How do you think these rolesoperate together?
What's the handoff point betweenthe account manager and the
(15:46):
project manager if you do decideto separate these?
Jenny Plant (15:50):
I think the first thing to say, if you are
thinking about doing this, youhave to kind of treat it like a
change management program.
Cuz it is upsetting the applecart.
What we're effectively talkingabout is re-engineering job
descriptions to be quitedifferent to what perhaps they
were before.
And I think everything needs tobe thought about in that way and
(16:11):
to bring people on the journeywith you.
To talk first of all, about thewhy you're doing it and give
everybody enough time to kind ofget used to that idea, then look
at the might have an idea of whowould maybe have a natural
propensity to do one role or theother.
The ideal scenario is everyonesays, well, I would prefer to do
(16:32):
the account manager.
I would prefer to do the projectmanager and they all fall in
their natural buckets.
So, you know, I probably coulddraw on the experience working
with a couple of agencies thathave separated the role in terms
of working together.
I think having a RACI model.
You're very familiar with RACI,I'm sure.
For those listening, you there'sfour elements to that, who's
(16:56):
responsible, who's accountable,who's consulted and who's
informed and then looking atyour client journey and plotting
out who is going to do what rolefor each stage of the journey.
and I mean, just to give you anidea of, internal communications
agency working in the U S whohave a account manager that acts
(17:17):
like a strategist and a separateproject management team.
The account manager that theycall a strategist works with the
project manager throughout thejourney for every single
project, regardless of size.
Harv (17:29):
Hmm
Jenny Plant (17:30):
Conversely, I've been working with an award
winning UK digital marketingagency that's worked in the
separation, the AM and PM teamfor years, and they work
slightly differently.
They choose which projects theywill put the team on and which
projects they will put just aproject manager on to lead.
(17:52):
there's that complexity as well.
It's thinking, is this for allclients?
and this UK one, they would puta team onto retainers.
Harv (18:03):
Okay.
Mm-Hmm.
Jenny Plant (18:04):
one would put, put every, every team gets, every
project gets to.
But the first point is toinvolve your account manager in
the closing of the business.
So maybe it's in the kind of thefinal pitch stage of the
business.
So the client has familiarityand then both the PM and the AM
would then work on the pitchproposal to turn it into a scope
(18:28):
of work.
So the account manager will belooking through the lens of
commerciality.
So Right, how are we going todevelop the relationship?
What is the strategy aroundwhere we see the growth
potential and the opportunityand the project managers looking
at it through milestones,timelines, costs, and how we're
going to manage it physically.
Harv (18:49):
Right,
Jenny Plant (18:49):
And then you go to contract stage.
And again, both are involved inthat stage to make sure that
they fully understand, all ofthe terms on both sides.
Harv (18:58):
mm hmm,
Jenny Plant (18:59):
Then you would have an internal kickoff stage where
the project manager would leadwith the account manager
supporting, and then an externalkickoff with the client, where
the account manager would leadwith the project manager
supporting.
So I think they operate as ateam, but where it makes more
sense for the account manager tolead, then they do.
(19:20):
And the project manager supportsand vice versa.
Harv (19:22):
right,
Jenny Plant (19:23):
So rule of thumb, and this isn't always the case
again, it could be projectdependent is the account manager
would be driving the keyrelationships and, and in
particular running quarterlybusiness reviews, end of year
reviews with clients, at thebeginning of their fiscal year,
sitting with perhaps astrategist to look ahead to what
(19:46):
the scope of work is going to beplanned for the year, but
anything to do with making ithappen, nothing gets, you know,
they work very closely together.
Harv (19:56):
mm,
Jenny Plant (19:57):
internal sign off as well.
Harv (19:59):
right
Jenny Plant (19:59):
But the project manager, as I said before, is
the engine room to make sureeverything happens.
So resourcing, scoping, how, youknow, which project management
system we're going to using, allof that from start to finish.
Harv (20:13):
You know, we're talking about kind of differing skill
sets and one thing I've noticed,whether somebody decides that
these roles, they want tooperate them separately, or in
this hybrid.
I don't know if you'd agree withthis, but I, I've seen that
often people that have theseaccount management roles in
agencies don't necessarily comefrom a sales background.
You know, they might've startedas an account exec executive at
(20:33):
the agency and kind of grownthrough that process.
So, so it's quite likely thatthey don't have that kind of
formal sales experience orskillset, beyond perhaps
hopefully being really goodrelationship builders, if that's
the kind of angle of theirskillset versus the project
management side, do you tend tofind the same?
Jenny Plant (20:51):
Absolutely.
It's, it's very, very normal.
I think sometimes when anaccount exec in that hybrid role
gets promoted to AM and thenmaybe A ccount Director Some
agencies, AD AD stage, that'swhere they expect them to grow
accounts.
Whereas if you're AM, theexpectation isn't that you will
(21:12):
be sales.
Harv (21:13):
Right.
Jenny Plant (21:14):
there's that scenario, but conversely,
there's also people that reachan account director role and has
effectively been a very, verygood project manager.
Harv (21:27):
Mm hmm.
Jenny Plant (21:28):
They go into another agency that's always
operated with separate roles.
And all of a sudden they'refaced with a forecast sheet and
targets and, you know, clientdevelopment plans, and the
expectation is that you can dothis.
So it's often the type of agencythat you've been brought up in
Harv (21:49):
Hmm.
Jenny Plant (21:49):
and how the management has led the team.
Harv (21:55):
That's a really good point.
When we were chatting in ourprevious call, you, you brought
up an interesting story, youknow, we're going to talk about
that you've set up your ownconsultancy and that's been
going for a number of years, butyou were telling me why this was
kind of a trigger for you to setup.
It would be fantastic if youcould tell us about that.
Jenny Plant (22:10):
Yeah.
I mean, I'm a dinosaur.
I started in the early ninetiesin a Hatton Garden, London,
independent agency, about 90strong.
Harv (22:18):
Okay.
Jenny Plant (22:18):
It was what was called a through the line.
So we were doing above the lineand below the line.
So
Harv (22:23):
Right.
Jenny Plant (22:23):
above the line was the ads, and below the line was
kind of brochures, direct mail,stuff like that.
I was the hybrid accountmanager.
Harv (22:31):
Okay.
Mm-Hmm
Jenny Plant (22:33):
Mostly in my career, Harv, until I reached
general manager of Publicis LifeBrands, I've worked mostly
agency side.
I've also worked client side.
So as a marketing manager for anairline, I worked for a
pharmaceutical company.
So I have had both sides, butmostly agency side.
And it wasn't until I wasgeneral manager that I was given
(22:53):
sales training and it was like ahuge light bulb had gone off.
All of a sudden I was seeingeverything through, through a
commercial lens, which wasn'tafforded to me when I was in my
first agency.
Harv (23:07):
Yeah.
Jenny Plant (23:07):
And it was like, I thought if only someone had
given me this sales trainingwhen I was starting off as an
Account Exec I would have mademore money for the agency I work
for.
I would have given so much morerelevant value to the clients.
I would have had betterconversations with my clients
because I understood more aboutwhat they were looking for,
(23:28):
know, because clients wantoutcomes.
They don't necessarily wantprocess.
I think there's, there's kind offour four levels of value.
The first level is servicedelivery, you know, delivering
that project on time, on budget.
You've got the next level, whichis not only do you do level one,
but you also give the client afantastic experience.
Harv (23:47):
Right.
Jenny Plant (23:47):
You're a great relator.
You understand what their needsare, their KPIs, and you're
really good at developingrelationships.
So that's level one and leveltwo.
Then level 3 for a client is notonly you do one and two, but you
also give a return oninvestment.
You are delivering an outcomebased on the investment they're
making.
And at that level, you know,account managers need to be a
(24:07):
lot more commercial.
They need to be challenging.
They need to understand theclient's business.
I mean, no one really gave methe remit to, do some research
on the client's business.
It was very much about theagency project.
It wasn't about the clientbusiness.
Harv (24:24):
Right.
Jenny Plant (24:24):
And then the fourth level is not only do you do one
to three, but you also are afuturist.
You bring the future to clients.
You're situationally aware, youunderstand the marketplace, the
trends, and you're bringingthose ideas in advance.
So, you know, what opportunitiescould you be bringing to the
client that they're missing outon?
(24:45):
You know, we've had several bigalgorithm changes or the cookies
have disappeared.
If you were at the forefront ofyour industry, you could be
weaving that into clientconversations.
You could also be capitalizingon what's working with other
clients and sharing it withthem.
You know, there, there was astudy by Relationship Audits and
Management, which is an auditingcompany for relationships.
(25:08):
And they did a study and theyasked, they, they basically
audit the relationship.
They questioned the clients andthe question was, do you want
your Agency to leverage theunderstanding they have with
other clients and share it withyou?
You know, without naming names.
(25:29):
Do you know what percentage ofclients said that they wanted
the agency to do that?
Harv (25:34):
Was it all of them?
Jenny Plant (25:35):
Yeah, a hundred percent.
And yet, I mean, that's such an,a normal kind of thing, but how
often do we do it?
And the account manager, the onethat knows the client best is
perfectly placed to do that.
Harv (25:48):
hmm.
Very, very good point.
On that futurist thing, that's agreat idea and great suggestion.
Is that just a regular phonecall and a lunch that you would
go and share some, drop somenuggets of wisdom or what you've
seen?
Or have you seen this workreally well with emails or
creating a more formalpresentation or something like
that?
What, what works well?
Jenny Plant (26:08):
I think you have to create business relevant
contexts.
So if you're having thatconversation in a day to day
status call, that's kind ofokay, but the client might not
be expecting it.
They just want you to get onwith the project.
You know, why are youdistracting me asking me
questions about my businesschallenges, just focus on the
job at hand.
(26:28):
So I think where you do havethose contextual moments, and by
that, I mean, you know, yearlyplanning sessions, quarterly
business reviews, quarterlystrategy sessions, innovation
sessions.
You could even, you know, havemasterclasses or strategic
workshops.
It's in my experience, muchbetter to have a dedicated
(26:51):
moment, rather than to squeezeit in.
You can have lunches.
I'm not saying you can't.
Yeah, of course.
But contextually, it might notbe expected.
Well, I think lunch is yes, butstatus calls, monthly reporting,
however your agency currentlyworks, think about the touch
points you currently have andconverting them into more
(27:13):
business led conversations.
Harv (27:15):
hmm.
I like the idea of creating moreof a moment though.
Then people start expecting thatof you and your agency and they
start valuing that and you standout from everyone else who's not
doing that and is maybe onlyrelying on the lunchtime catch
ups now and then every sixmonths or whatever.
Jenny, I was scribbling downthose pillars you had mentioned,
you know, service delivery,great experience, ROI, and being
(27:39):
a futurist.
We're going to talk about kindof the training that you offer,
but that sounds like a reallystrong foundation.
Is that what your trainingprograms are built around?
Jenny Plant (27:46):
Yeah, that's one of my models.
Harv (27:48):
Okay.
Jenny Plant (27:49):
That we talk about when we talk about raising your
value.
And then we go into how you dothat.
I've been doing this since 2016full time, teaching account
managers how to grow existingbusiness.
And through that time, I've seeneverything, I mean, every reason
that you wouldn't want to do it,every excuse, not for it to
happen.
(28:09):
And what I've realized is theskills themselves is just the
tip of the iceberg.
What people really want fromaccount managers is, they want
the business outcome they wantis more predictable revenue from
existing accounts.
So they want to know that thatforecast is on point.
(28:29):
You know, you're going to retainthat and grow that client.
You also want the accountmanager's skills to be
repeatable.
So you want that repeatableperformance
Harv (28:39):
Right.
Jenny Plant (28:40):
Not just for all those skills of growth to sit
with one person.
So you want a process and,thirdly, you want a competitive
advantage.
You know you see the opportunitythat all of this profitable
business just needs unlockingrather than chasing the new
business.
So it's those three things.
(29:01):
And when, when I do my program,skills is just one part of it.
Harv (29:05):
Right.
Jenny Plant (29:06):
We talk about the strategy, you know, to have that
commercial clarity.
Which clients are growth worthy,which ones aren't, what's our
plan?
You know, there's multipledifferent ways to do it.
And looking at relationship riskand then the skills is the
second one, which is all aboutbeing consultative.
How to ask questions, how topropose ideas, you know, it's
(29:27):
all the hows, how to ask forreferrals.
And then the third part is thecultural continuity.
So it's the processes.
How do we embed a process?
Just as you have a projectmanagement process, we could
have an account growth process.
Harv (29:42):
I love that.
I love that.
It just sounds so impactful tome, just recognizing that a lot
of people on this path have justkind of graduated in it and
haven't had the opportunity tolearn those kind of, Well, just
experiences or have somebodyreally frame that in an
actionable way.
So I think that's fantastic.
So do you offer multipletraining types as well?
(30:05):
Can you tell us about that?
Jenny Plant (30:06):
Yeah.
I mean, I, I sit down with theclient and decide where they're
at currently and what
Harv (30:12):
Okay.
Jenny Plant (30:12):
So if there's a proper sort of diagnosis, there,
there are three core programsthat I offer,
Harv (30:18):
Okay.
Jenny Plant (30:19):
Which is my account accelerator, which is working
with me for a year.
Harv (30:23):
Okay.
Jenny Plant (30:24):
I found that that they are for senior account
manager above.
Basically people who come andwork with me in those three
areas and take back thelearnings to their business and
implement them so that thebusiness benefits.
So I've got lots of clientservices directors, account
directors, senior accountmanagers who are charged with
(30:45):
the forecast and they areresponsible for implementing
those processes.
I have short courses, so AccountBooster is a three day training
for a group, and that's run by acouple of colleagues of mine.
I also have an online program,Account Kickstarter, which I've
just updated, so it's fresh andit's got all my new stuff.
So, that's quite exciting.
(31:06):
So if you don't want to be in atraining environment, you want
to self learn, you know, in selfdirected learning, then there's
that.
But there's other ways that Ican work.
I mean, I do a webinar where youmight want, working with a very
quite not famous, but brilliantagency.
That's got lots of high profileaccounts.
(31:28):
They don't have a dedicatedaccount management team, but
they want all of their frontfacing client people, regardless
of what their title is to becommercial and to be looking for
growth opportunities.
Harv (31:40):
Right.
Jenny Plant (31:41):
So I offer like a webinar where I can give you all
the principles, and then somefollow up consultancy so that
everyone's levels of awarenessare raised around, you know,
what could we do differently?
Harv (31:55):
That that's really valuable as well.
Cause everyone has thatopportunity, if you're
communicating with the client tokind of upsell, cross sell and
that kind of thing.
Is there any kind of triggerthat you think people have when
they're reaching out to you?
In fact, you know, is, is there,is there something that's
happened internally or do youthink it's just, just being
aware that you offer theseprograms and that light bulb
(32:16):
moment happens?
Jenny Plant (32:18):
I think it's either a challenge or an opportunity.
So the challenge might be, youknow, we are not, it might be a
skill set thing.
You know, they're observingtheir behaviors of their account
managers and
Harv (32:30):
Mm hmm.
Jenny Plant (32:31):
we could be doing this better.
Harv (32:32):
Yeah.
Jenny Plant (32:33):
Or it could be, we're just not growing the
accounts.
We've got these fantasticrelationships, but we're, we're
kind of trying to fill ourpipeline at the moment.
Harv (32:41):
Mm hmm.
Jenny Plant (32:41):
We're recording this in, you know, mid 2024, a
lot of pipelines have stalledbecause
Harv (32:47):
Yeah.
Jenny Plant (32:48):
taking longer to approve.
So a lot of agency owners areturning their attention to
existing clients and thinking,you know, how can we add more
value?
How can we do more things forthese clients and help them
more?
they're looking at that.
So that's another reason that myaccount growth training appeals
to them.
But it's, it's probably
Harv (33:06):
Excellent.
Jenny Plant (33:06):
one of those couple of scenarios.
Harv (33:09):
Mm hmm.
Okay.
Jenny, if anybody wants to learnmore about you and your
programs, where can they golook?
Jenny Plant (33:15):
Yeah, they can contact me on LinkedIn, Jenny
Plant,
Harv (33:18):
Okay.
Jenny Plant (33:18):
And just send me a message or
accountmanagementskills.com.
Harv (33:22):
Excellent.
And your podcast as well.
Lots of great interviews thereand lots of learning
opportunities.
Jenny Plant (33:29):
Yeah.
Creative Agency Account ManagerPodcast, it's the podcast that I
wish I'd had when I was anaccount exec.
So I try to get a range ofguests like you talking on
different aspects of the agencybusiness
Harv (33:42):
Mm hmm.
Jenny Plant (33:43):
To improve and to upskill the account management
community.
Harv (33:46):
Amazing.
Excellent.
Jenny, thank you so much forbeing here.
Hopefully at some point we canhave you back and go into more
detail, into maybe one aspect ofyour training programs or
something like that where we canexplore that in a little bit
more detail.
But that's fantastic advice fortoday.
So thank you so much.
Jenny Plant (34:03):
Harv, thank you so much for inviting me.
This has been fun.
Harv (34:06):
I hope you agree that was a great conversation.
It's an interesting conundrum.
The hybrid account manager issuper common.
The role is not going away.
And it's not easy to dismantleif that's the way you've staffed
and structured your agency untilnow.
Yet we can clearly see that theskills and the characteristics
required for each side of thatrole are so very different.
(34:28):
Like Jenny said, first andforemost, if it's working well,
then there's no point intinkering.
But what do we do forrecognizing some of the issues
with this kind of hybrid role inour agencies?
Well, we've got a few options.
Starting with the mostdifficult, you could engage your
HR team or your HR supplier anddiscuss how this kind of
transition can be attempted.
(34:49):
It's tricky.
You're changing people's jobdescriptions and their job
titles, so people might not bevery happy.
That being said, it's notimpossible.
It just needs to be donesensitively.
Another option, you couldconsider starting to hire in
more distinct roles goingforward so that over time you're
starting to create that newstructure organically.
For example, starting to hirePMs or producers that support
(35:12):
that account managers.
Or another great option, andit's the one that Jenny and I
spent the most time talkingabout.
Spending time thinking abouteach of your hybrid account
managers, and understandingwhich skills they're stronger
in.
The sales and relationship, orthe project management side of
things.
Based on that, invest in yourteam and in your business by
(35:32):
engaging someone like Jenny toreally skill up your team
members that are lacking in thecommercial aspect.
And for those that have thatdown, but struggle more with
delivering projects on budget,perhaps engaging someone to
provide training on businessfinances, like Alfie, who we
spoke to in a previous episode,so that they really understand
how the over servicing has anegative impact on the business
(35:54):
and support them in developingtheir PM skills.
Better yet, get everyone that'sin this kind of role better
trained on both sides of therole so that they're both more
commercially aware but also muchmore sensitive to the way a
project should be deliveredprofitably.
That's it for today's episode.
Quick question, if you'reenjoying the podcast, have you
(36:15):
shared it with a friend orcolleague?
If not, this is your cue, pleasedo so.
And, have you subscribed to theHandbook Newsletter?
This is written by myself and itgoes out every other week, and I
talk about my own experiencewith the most recent topic
covered in the podcast, andshare the key takeaways from the
guest interview, so It's easyfor you to remember what was
(36:35):
discussed in case you want toaction and implement any of
those ideas at your own agency.
You can sign up for thenewsletter at scoro.com/podcast,
scroll down on that page andyou'll see the newsletter signup
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And don't forget to share yourfeedback or suggestions with me
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(36:58):
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That's it for me.
I'll see you in the nextepisode.
Thanks very much.
Hi all, welcome back to the show.
Ops people, we have to beunicorns, masters of all trades.
But should others in our teamsbe expected to be as well?
In the agency space, it's quitecommon to have account managers,
which you expect to be greatsalespeople, great client
relationship managers, andexpect them to be excellent
project managers.
(00:53):
In my experience, this hybridrole often comes with a trade
off.
People in that role mightgravitate towards aspects of the
role that they're mostcomfortable in, whether that's
project management or managingthe client relationship and
developing sales.
This can lead to disappointmenton the part of the operations
leader that the individualsmight either not be as rigorous
around project control as they'dlike, leading to issues such as
(01:16):
over servicing, or they might begreat at project management, but
be less comfortable discussingnew opportunities with the
client and actively developingtheir sales pipeline, causing
stress for the management team,including the MD, finance, and
operations.
As Ops people, we have a say ininforming how our agencies are
structured and staffed.
(01:37):
So is it reasonable to expectone person to be able to do all
of the above, manage projectswell, and develop business and
client relationships, or shouldthese roles be separated?
And regardless of whether weseparate these roles, account
managers in agencies don't oftencome from a formal sales
background.
So how can we ever expect themto deliver on that side of their
(01:58):
role?
How can they develop thoseskills?
That's the topic of today'sepisode.
Our guest today is Jenny Plant.
If that name sounds familiar,it's because you may have heard
or seen something about herpodcast online, or you might
already be a fan.
She's the host of the brilliantCreative Agency Account Manager
podcast, which she's beenhosting for nearly two years.
(02:18):
Jenny has over 20 years ofexperience in agency account
management, but she tells me itwas when she took on a role at a
global healthcare comms agencythat she had her aha moment.
There, she had the formal salestraining where she learned
everything she felt she shouldhave known for her first account
executive role.
It's then become her mission toshare that knowledge and that
(02:40):
led to her setting up her ownconsultancy Account Management
Skills.
Through her company, Jennyprovides training on account
management skills for creativeagencies.
Her goal is to support clientretention and help agencies grow
existing client relationships.
I had the pleasure of chattingwith Jenny previously and
listening to her podcast.
So I'm really excited for you tojoin this conversation and hear
(03:02):
what she has to say.
Let's get into it.
Jenny, it's a pleasure to haveyou here today.
I have to admit I'm a bitnervous talking to a
professional podcaster who'sbeen doing it over two years.
I've been doing it two months,so I've been kind of sweating it
the past hour being like, Ibetter not screw this up.
Jenny Plant (03:19):
Please be, be assured.
I am, no way.
I do not think I'm professionalat all.
I still cringe when I listen tomyself.
So gosh, please.
No gosh, please.
But thank you anyway.
That was kind.
Harv (03:30):
Thank you so much.
So first question, we're goingto quickly start with
terminology.
I know everyone can have adifferent point of view, but I
wanted to start with yours.
In the agency world, do you seethe job titles, client
relationship manager, clientservices managers, and account
managers, are they all kind ofcut from the same cloth or do
they have different nuances?
(03:51):
What's your point of view onthat?
Jenny Plant (03:52):
No, they don't at all.
I think it's a bit like the wildwest.
All of our agencies do somethingslightly different and therefore
we all call these key points ofclient contact, something
completely different.
So anything from account managerto relationship manager there
was, there's an internal commsagency in the US who call their
account people strategistsbecause they lead the strategy
(04:14):
as well as the clientrelationship.
So
Harv (04:17):
Right.
Jenny Plant (04:17):
it's across the board.
And also there's kind ofdifferent levels as well.
So you have these multitudewhere agencies have different.
You know, they can start withaccount exec, account manager,
senior account manager, accountdirector.
I mean, it's just bonkersreally.
Harv (04:31):
Right.
Right.
A lot of job titles, all roughlyin the same ballpark of what the
responsibilities are.
So it comes to kind of internal,whatever they've decided to call
those roles.
Jenny Plant (04:40):
Exactly.
Yep.
Harv (04:42):
Okay.
So what we're going to betalking today about is the role
of the account manager andparticularly in agencies where
the role covers both sales andcustomer relationship and the
project management side ofthings.
First of all, how common is itto have this kind of hybrid
role?
Jenny Plant (04:57):
Very common.
I, I see it.
I work with different countries,mostly English speaking
countries.
So I do a lot of business withthe U S, some with Australia,
and Europe, but definitely it'snot uncommon, it's across the
board really, you do find it inevery country.
Harv (05:13):
Any thoughts on why you think this is so common to have
this hybrid role?
Jenny Plant (05:18):
I think it's partly traditional because that's how
we used to do it 20 years ago.
Harv (05:23):
Hmm.
Jenny Plant (05:24):
I think it was about 20 years ago with the
advent of digital agencies, thatthere was a requirement for a
more specialized skillset inmanaging the type of projects
that we were doing.
I'm old enough to have seen thatshift.
So you saw the rise of moreseparation of the two roles, I'd
say at the beginning of 20 yearsago, and it's
Harv (05:46):
Hmm.
Jenny Plant (05:46):
it's just grown and grown and grown as more agencies
are now digital.
But having said that there arestill, as we said, still hybrid
account manager roles.
you know, PR is a, an agencyindustry that's specifically,
you can find a lot of hybrid.
Medical communications agenciesare the same, a lot of hybrid.
(06:07):
But I think more consultancybased companies tend to have the
hybrid role.
Harv (06:16):
Yeah.
I've seen that, you know, mypast agency, we did everything
from strategy to brandingthrough to digital.
And it was only the digital thathad the dedicated producer
roles, whereas everything elseon the project management side
was covered by hybrid accountmanagers as well.
So as a prelude to thediscussion, can I ask where you
stand on this debate?
(06:36):
What's your point of view?
Jenny Plant (06:38):
I feel quite strongly that if your current
business model is working foryou,
Harv (06:43):
Yeah.
Jenny Plant (06:43):
Then carry on.
Harv (06:45):
Okay.
Jenny Plant (06:45):
There's no need and there's no one size fits all
because every agency is slightlydifferent.
Every agency operates slightlydifferently.
Harv (06:53):
Yeah.
Jenny Plant (06:53):
The
Harv (06:54):
Yeah.
Jenny Plant (06:54):
key question to ask yourself, if you are the owner
of an agency and you're thinkingabout, you know, how do I
structure my team?
I think one of the key things,is for me, is I spend all this
time and money getting a client.
And when we have the client, arewe retaining it and growing it,
most importantly, are wecapitalizing on that
(07:17):
relationship?
Because we all know thestatistics.
The Harvard Business Review saidit's 5 to 25 times more
expensive to get a new clientthan it is to grow an existing.
So there'so much potentialwithin your current client base
to expand.
So it could be cross sellingupselling, you know, adding more
(07:37):
value, coming up with moreideas, getting referrals,
getting introduced to otherparts of their organization, to
their network, there's all ofthat potential.
And I think that's the keyquestion for me.
If it's not broken, don't tryand fix it with a new business
model.
Whatever's working, go with it.
So I, I, I feel like that.
I know a lot of people aredifferent.
They're, they're quite black andwhite, but I've, I've, worked
(08:00):
with so many different agencies.
Some agencies don't have anaccount management function at
all, you know?
So that's my, that's my stanceon it.
Harv (08:10):
If it ain't broke, don't fix it.
And if you do start recognizingsome of the pains that might
lead to somebody thinking thatthey need to distinguish that.
Before we get into that, Jenny,I wanted to ask what kind of
qualities are good qualities tohave in an account manager?
Jenny Plant (08:24):
I think, if you, if we're talking about.
Are we talking about a hybrid ora pure standalone
Harv (08:29):
Let's say standalone so that we can distinguish these
functions.
Jenny Plant (08:33):
The standalone has a natural ability to lead a
client relationship.
They're able to manage theclient relationship without
ruffling feathers.
They're very good at readingsocial signals and pre empting
disasters.
They're kind of emotionallyattuned to what's happening.
They rally their colleagues andtheir behaviors include an
(08:56):
ability to sell ideas, protectprofits, to Commercial curiosity
and to understand the client'sbusiness, their market, their
customer.
So it's quite an entrepreneurialmindset because you are
responsible for your book ofbusiness, your key accounts, and
you're responsible for nurturingit, nurturing them.
(09:17):
You have a forecast target.
Your goal is to make sure thatyou are building trust, building
the relationship, looking forgrowth opportunities.
And, and I think typically,again, it's coming back to the
pure account manager role, aswell as that generally speaking,
they tend to be quiteenthusiastic, optimistic, and
very at ease with meeting newpeople.
(09:39):
They're more akin to salespeoplethan perhaps the pure play
project manager is.
Harv (09:46):
Mm hmm.
And that was going to be my nextquestion.
How is that distinct from whatyou see as a great project
manager?
Jenny Plant (09:53):
For me, a great project manager has a really
good attention to detail.
They are process driven.
They're super efficient.
They are the engine room of thebusiness.
hmm.
They are able to problem solve,they have a very thorough
approach.
They're highly respected and youjust, you know, there's someone
(10:13):
that you can rely on.
That's not going to let anythingfall through the cracks.
And conversely, the accountmanagers, they might be kind of
big picture, but not so good atthe detail.
Harv (10:24):
When I hear those strengths or qualities in a good
account manager versus projectmanager it almost sounds to me
like those could be verydifferent personalities, the
introvert versus the extrovert,you know, attention to detail
versus really liking buildingrelationships and keeping the
client happy.
So you can see where thattension can come in with the
(10:46):
hybrid role
Jenny Plant (10:47):
Absolutely, Harv.
I mean, interestingly I've beenworking with um, David Baker, in
the US and many agency peopleare aware of David cause he's
very well known.
He's done DISC profiling.
He's got over 28, 000 DISCprofiles, having looked at all
of the agency roles over time.
Harv (11:05):
hmm,
Jenny Plant (11:06):
And he's actually found that typical account
managers and project managershave a different DISC profile as
well.
Harv (11:13):
right,
Jenny Plant (11:13):
you're right to observe that what makes you a
great account manager isn'tnecessarily what makes you a
great project manager.
And I have personal testament tothat because I, in my career was
a hybrid account manager
Harv (11:26):
right,
Jenny Plant (11:26):
and I loved, loved, love the meeting of new people.
If you put me in the room of anetworking event, by the end of
the night I'd have spoken tomany people,
Harv (11:37):
right,
Jenny Plant (11:37):
exchanging business cards and loved that;
presentations.
But when you put me in a roombehind a big spreadsheet and I
had to do a scope of work, Ijust felt tired and overwhelmed.
And I did it, because I had todo it, but it wasn't my flow.
Harv (11:54):
I've seen that as well, Jenny, from my experience, it's
very similar to what you'redescribing there is that, people
kind of gravitate towards theskillset that they're more
comfortable in based on theirpersonality and their
experience.
Right.
So when you get that kind of avery outgoing kind of bubbly
personality to try to focus onthe details of really rigorous
(12:15):
project management, you mightget things like the over
servicing and, scope creep beingallowed because it's really hard
to put your foot down in frontof the client.
And then on the other end ofthings, when somebody is just
much more comfortable notspeaking to people and being
focused on the work and makingsure that's being done really
efficiently, you know, they,they can struggle with the
(12:35):
client handling because thingscan be a little bit too strict.
so if that's the case and westill have hybrids, is it still
possible to have this kind ofunicorn role or is that just the
reality of it, that you'realways going to have this kind
of tension and people are goingto be better at one thing or
Jenny Plant (12:53):
I don't see the hybrid role going away partly
because it's more usual when youstart an agency, you would
probably have a hybrid rolethere because everyone's wearing
multiple hats.
Harv (13:05):
hmm.
Jenny Plant (13:06):
I think it's just a decision as you grow the
business, what makes more sensefor you and the type of work
you're working on, the type ofbusiness, how you sell as well,
Harv (13:16):
Right.
Jenny Plant (13:17):
becoming, I'm seeing a trend with a lot of
agencies, productizing what theydo.
Harv (13:22):
Mm.
Jenny Plant (13:22):
Offering products and programs rather than
bespoke, pricing based onspecific projects.
And I think we're going to seemore and more of that.
Harv (13:32):
Mm.
Jenny Plant (13:33):
so yeah, we're, we're changing, I think the
business model is changing.
And I think like everything, ifyou're a business owner or
leader, you have to evolve withthe changes that are happening.
Harv (13:43):
Do you think even at larger agencies, it's
sustainable to keep the hybridrole or is that kind of one of
the triggers maybe that sizegets to a certain point, and
then it becomes much morenecessary to have very distinct
roles and responsibilities?
Jenny Plant (13:57):
I think it's a good question.
I think there's probablydifferent, definitely different
scenarios.
Either you get to a tippingpoint and it makes more sense
for you to split them out.
So you're early in your progressand it's easier at that stage.
Rather than, you're fullyestablished and then you decide
to split the roles.
(14:17):
I've worked with agencies thatare on that journey and it seems
a bit of a trend.
How you do that is as importantas what you do, because part of
it is looking at your team andit's a combination of what the
business needs and what theindividual wants to do.
You were talking Harv about youknow, your natural propensity to
(14:40):
do one thing or the other.
I think it's all about gettingpeople sitting in the right
seats.
So that they can flourish and bein flow.
The last thing you want is tohave someone with more of a
project management leaning,being given a forecast target to
achieve.
And being told to walk theproverbial halls of the
(15:01):
organization, look at what theclient's market is doing and
look at the commercialopportunities of where you could
grow the account.
It's just not, maybe it's notinteresting, you know, they much
prefer the satisfaction ofcompletion of projects.
You know, that flow where yousee everything coming together
(15:22):
and that's what you're good at.
Harv (15:24):
Absolutely.
So Jenny, I wanted to talk abouthow these roles operate
together.
Let's say somebody does decidethat, up until now, they've had
this kind of hybrid role, butthey've started to recognize
some of the pains and they thinkthat they're at a certain size,
or, whatever's triggering themto lead to this kind of process.
How do you think these rolesoperate together?
What's the handoff point betweenthe account manager and the
(15:46):
project manager if you do decideto separate these?
Jenny Plant (15:50):
I think the first thing to say, if you are
thinking about doing this, youhave to kind of treat it like a
change management program.
Cuz it is upsetting the applecart.
What we're effectively talkingabout is re-engineering job
descriptions to be quitedifferent to what perhaps they
were before.
And I think everything needs tobe thought about in that way and
(16:11):
to bring people on the journeywith you.
To talk first of all, about thewhy you're doing it and give
everybody enough time to kind ofget used to that idea, then look
at the might have an idea of whowould maybe have a natural
propensity to do one role or theother.
The ideal scenario is everyonesays, well, I would prefer to do
(16:32):
the account manager.
I would prefer to do the projectmanager and they all fall in
their natural buckets.
So, you know, I probably coulddraw on the experience working
with a couple of agencies thathave separated the role in terms
of working together.
I think having a RACI model.
You're very familiar with RACI,I'm sure.
For those listening, you there'sfour elements to that, who's
(16:56):
responsible, who's accountable,who's consulted and who's
informed and then looking atyour client journey and plotting
out who is going to do what rolefor each stage of the journey.
and I mean, just to give you anidea of, internal communications
agency working in the U S whohave a account manager that acts
(17:17):
like a strategist and a separateproject management team.
The account manager that theycall a strategist works with the
project manager throughout thejourney for every single
project, regardless of size.
Harv (17:29):
Hmm
Jenny Plant (17:30):
Conversely, I've been working with an award
winning UK digital marketingagency that's worked in the
separation, the AM and PM teamfor years, and they work
slightly differently.
They choose which projects theywill put the team on and which
projects they will put just aproject manager on to lead.
(17:52):
there's that complexity as well.
It's thinking, is this for allclients?
and this UK one, they would puta team onto retainers.
Harv (18:03):
Okay.
Mm-Hmm.
Jenny Plant (18:04):
one would put, put every, every team gets, every
project gets to.
But the first point is toinvolve your account manager in
the closing of the business.
So maybe it's in the kind of thefinal pitch stage of the
business.
So the client has familiarityand then both the PM and the AM
would then work on the pitchproposal to turn it into a scope
(18:28):
of work.
So the account manager will belooking through the lens of
commerciality.
So Right, how are we going todevelop the relationship?
What is the strategy aroundwhere we see the growth
potential and the opportunityand the project managers looking
at it through milestones,timelines, costs, and how we're
going to manage it physically.
Harv (18:49):
Right,
Jenny Plant (18:49):
And then you go to contract stage.
And again, both are involved inthat stage to make sure that
they fully understand, all ofthe terms on both sides.
Harv (18:58):
mm hmm,
Jenny Plant (18:59):
Then you would have an internal kickoff stage where
the project manager would leadwith the account manager
supporting, and then an externalkickoff with the client, where
the account manager would leadwith the project manager
supporting.
So I think they operate as ateam, but where it makes more
sense for the account manager tolead, then they do.
(19:20):
And the project manager supportsand vice versa.
Harv (19:22):
right,
Jenny Plant (19:23):
So rule of thumb, and this isn't always the case
again, it could be projectdependent is the account manager
would be driving the keyrelationships and, and in
particular running quarterlybusiness reviews, end of year
reviews with clients, at thebeginning of their fiscal year,
sitting with perhaps astrategist to look ahead to what
(19:46):
the scope of work is going to beplanned for the year, but
anything to do with making ithappen, nothing gets, you know,
they work very closely together.
Harv (19:56):
mm,
Jenny Plant (19:57):
internal sign off as well.
Harv (19:59):
right
Jenny Plant (19:59):
But the project manager, as I said before, is
the engine room to make sureeverything happens.
So resourcing, scoping, how, youknow, which project management
system we're going to using, allof that from start to finish.
Harv (20:13):
You know, we're talking about kind of differing skill
sets and one thing I've noticed,whether somebody decides that
these roles, they want tooperate them separately, or in
this hybrid.
I don't know if you'd agree withthis, but I, I've seen that
often people that have theseaccount management roles in
agencies don't necessarily comefrom a sales background.
You know, they might've startedas an account exec executive at
(20:33):
the agency and kind of grownthrough that process.
So, so it's quite likely thatthey don't have that kind of
formal sales experience orskillset, beyond perhaps
hopefully being really goodrelationship builders, if that's
the kind of angle of theirskillset versus the project
management side, do you tend tofind the same?
Jenny Plant (20:51):
Absolutely.
It's, it's very, very normal.
I think sometimes when anaccount exec in that hybrid role
gets promoted to AM and thenmaybe A ccount Director Some
agencies, AD AD stage, that'swhere they expect them to grow
accounts.
Whereas if you're AM, theexpectation isn't that you will
(21:12):
be sales.
Harv (21:13):
Right.
Jenny Plant (21:14):
there's that scenario, but conversely,
there's also people that reachan account director role and has
effectively been a very, verygood project manager.
Harv (21:27):
Mm hmm.
Jenny Plant (21:28):
They go into another agency that's always
operated with separate roles.
And all of a sudden they'refaced with a forecast sheet and
targets and, you know, clientdevelopment plans, and the
expectation is that you can dothis.
So it's often the type of agencythat you've been brought up in
Harv (21:49):
Hmm.
Jenny Plant (21:49):
and how the management has led the team.
Harv (21:55):
That's a really good point.
When we were chatting in ourprevious call, you, you brought
up an interesting story, youknow, we're going to talk about
that you've set up your ownconsultancy and that's been
going for a number of years, butyou were telling me why this was
kind of a trigger for you to setup.
It would be fantastic if youcould tell us about that.
Jenny Plant (22:10):
Yeah.
I mean, I'm a dinosaur.
I started in the early ninetiesin a Hatton Garden, London,
independent agency, about 90strong.
Harv (22:18):
Okay.
Jenny Plant (22:18):
It was what was called a through the line.
So we were doing above the lineand below the line.
So
Harv (22:23):
Right.
Jenny Plant (22:23):
above the line was the ads, and below the line was
kind of brochures, direct mail,stuff like that.
I was the hybrid accountmanager.
Harv (22:31):
Okay.
Mm-Hmm
Jenny Plant (22:33):
Mostly in my career, Harv, until I reached
general manager of Publicis LifeBrands, I've worked mostly
agency side.
I've also worked client side.
So as a marketing manager for anairline, I worked for a
pharmaceutical company.
So I have had both sides, butmostly agency side.
And it wasn't until I wasgeneral manager that I was given
(22:53):
sales training and it was like ahuge light bulb had gone off.
All of a sudden I was seeingeverything through, through a
commercial lens, which wasn'tafforded to me when I was in my
first agency.
Harv (23:07):
Yeah.
Jenny Plant (23:07):
And it was like, I thought if only someone had
given me this sales trainingwhen I was starting off as an
Account Exec I would have mademore money for the agency I work
for.
I would have given so much morerelevant value to the clients.
I would have had betterconversations with my clients
because I understood more aboutwhat they were looking for,
(23:28):
know, because clients wantoutcomes.
They don't necessarily wantprocess.
I think there's, there's kind offour four levels of value.
The first level is servicedelivery, you know, delivering
that project on time, on budget.
You've got the next level, whichis not only do you do level one,
but you also give the client afantastic experience.
Harv (23:47):
Right.
Jenny Plant (23:47):
You're a great relator.
You understand what their needsare, their KPIs, and you're
really good at developingrelationships.
So that's level one and leveltwo.
Then level 3 for a client is notonly you do one and two, but you
also give a return oninvestment.
You are delivering an outcomebased on the investment they're
making.
And at that level, you know,account managers need to be a
(24:07):
lot more commercial.
They need to be challenging.
They need to understand theclient's business.
I mean, no one really gave methe remit to, do some research
on the client's business.
It was very much about theagency project.
It wasn't about the clientbusiness.
Harv (24:24):
Right.
Jenny Plant (24:24):
And then the fourth level is not only do you do one
to three, but you also are afuturist.
You bring the future to clients.
You're situationally aware, youunderstand the marketplace, the
trends, and you're bringingthose ideas in advance.
So, you know, what opportunitiescould you be bringing to the
client that they're missing outon?
(24:45):
You know, we've had several bigalgorithm changes or the cookies
have disappeared.
If you were at the forefront ofyour industry, you could be
weaving that into clientconversations.
You could also be capitalizingon what's working with other
clients and sharing it withthem.
You know, there, there was astudy by Relationship Audits and
Management, which is an auditingcompany for relationships.
(25:08):
And they did a study and theyasked, they, they basically
audit the relationship.
They questioned the clients andthe question was, do you want
your Agency to leverage theunderstanding they have with
other clients and share it withyou?
You know, without naming names.
(25:29):
Do you know what percentage ofclients said that they wanted
the agency to do that?
Harv (25:34):
Was it all of them?
Jenny Plant (25:35):
Yeah, a hundred percent.
And yet, I mean, that's such an,a normal kind of thing, but how
often do we do it?
And the account manager, the onethat knows the client best is
perfectly placed to do that.
Harv (25:48):
hmm.
Very, very good point.
On that futurist thing, that's agreat idea and great suggestion.
Is that just a regular phonecall and a lunch that you would
go and share some, drop somenuggets of wisdom or what you've
seen?
Or have you seen this workreally well with emails or
creating a more formalpresentation or something like
that?
What, what works well?
Jenny Plant (26:08):
I think you have to create business relevant
contexts.
So if you're having thatconversation in a day to day
status call, that's kind ofokay, but the client might not
be expecting it.
They just want you to get onwith the project.
You know, why are youdistracting me asking me
questions about my businesschallenges, just focus on the
job at hand.
(26:28):
So I think where you do havethose contextual moments, and by
that, I mean, you know, yearlyplanning sessions, quarterly
business reviews, quarterlystrategy sessions, innovation
sessions.
You could even, you know, havemasterclasses or strategic
workshops.
It's in my experience, muchbetter to have a dedicated
(26:51):
moment, rather than to squeezeit in.
You can have lunches.
I'm not saying you can't.
Yeah, of course.
But contextually, it might notbe expected.
Well, I think lunch is yes, butstatus calls, monthly reporting,
however your agency currentlyworks, think about the touch
points you currently have andconverting them into more
(27:13):
business led conversations.
Harv (27:15):
hmm.
I like the idea of creating moreof a moment though.
Then people start expecting thatof you and your agency and they
start valuing that and you standout from everyone else who's not
doing that and is maybe onlyrelying on the lunchtime catch
ups now and then every sixmonths or whatever.
Jenny, I was scribbling downthose pillars you had mentioned,
you know, service delivery,great experience, ROI, and being
(27:39):
a futurist.
We're going to talk about kindof the training that you offer,
but that sounds like a reallystrong foundation.
Is that what your trainingprograms are built around?
Jenny Plant (27:46):
Yeah, that's one of my models.
Harv (27:48):
Okay.
Jenny Plant (27:49):
That we talk about when we talk about raising your
value.
And then we go into how you dothat.
I've been doing this since 2016full time, teaching account
managers how to grow existingbusiness.
And through that time, I've seeneverything, I mean, every reason
that you wouldn't want to do it,every excuse, not for it to
happen.
(28:09):
And what I've realized is theskills themselves is just the
tip of the iceberg.
What people really want fromaccount managers is, they want
the business outcome they wantis more predictable revenue from
existing accounts.
So they want to know that thatforecast is on point.
(28:29):
You know, you're going to retainthat and grow that client.
You also want the accountmanager's skills to be
repeatable.
So you want that repeatableperformance
Harv (28:39):
Right.
Jenny Plant (28:40):
Not just for all those skills of growth to sit
with one person.
So you want a process and,thirdly, you want a competitive
advantage.
You know you see the opportunitythat all of this profitable
business just needs unlockingrather than chasing the new
business.
So it's those three things.
(29:01):
And when, when I do my program,skills is just one part of it.
Harv (29:05):
Right.
Jenny Plant (29:06):
We talk about the strategy, you know, to have that
commercial clarity.
Which clients are growth worthy,which ones aren't, what's our
plan?
You know, there's multipledifferent ways to do it.
And looking at relationship riskand then the skills is the
second one, which is all aboutbeing consultative.
How to ask questions, how topropose ideas, you know, it's
(29:27):
all the hows, how to ask forreferrals.
And then the third part is thecultural continuity.
So it's the processes.
How do we embed a process?
Just as you have a projectmanagement process, we could
have an account growth process.
Harv (29:42):
I love that.
I love that.
It just sounds so impactful tome, just recognizing that a lot
of people on this path have justkind of graduated in it and
haven't had the opportunity tolearn those kind of, Well, just
experiences or have somebodyreally frame that in an
actionable way.
So I think that's fantastic.
So do you offer multipletraining types as well?
(30:05):
Can you tell us about that?
Jenny Plant (30:06):
Yeah.
I mean, I, I sit down with theclient and decide where they're
at currently and what
Harv (30:12):
Okay.
Jenny Plant (30:12):
So if there's a proper sort of diagnosis, there,
there are three core programsthat I offer,
Harv (30:18):
Okay.
Jenny Plant (30:19):
Which is my account accelerator, which is working
with me for a year.
Harv (30:23):
Okay.
Jenny Plant (30:24):
I found that that they are for senior account
manager above.
Basically people who come andwork with me in those three
areas and take back thelearnings to their business and
implement them so that thebusiness benefits.
So I've got lots of clientservices directors, account
directors, senior accountmanagers who are charged with
(30:45):
the forecast and they areresponsible for implementing
those processes.
I have short courses, so AccountBooster is a three day training
for a group, and that's run by acouple of colleagues of mine.
I also have an online program,Account Kickstarter, which I've
just updated, so it's fresh andit's got all my new stuff.
So, that's quite exciting.
(31:06):
So if you don't want to be in atraining environment, you want
to self learn, you know, in selfdirected learning, then there's
that.
But there's other ways that Ican work.
I mean, I do a webinar where youmight want, working with a very
quite not famous, but brilliantagency.
That's got lots of high profileaccounts.
(31:28):
They don't have a dedicatedaccount management team, but
they want all of their frontfacing client people, regardless
of what their title is to becommercial and to be looking for
growth opportunities.
Harv (31:40):
Right.
Jenny Plant (31:41):
So I offer like a webinar where I can give you all
the principles, and then somefollow up consultancy so that
everyone's levels of awarenessare raised around, you know,
what could we do differently?
Harv (31:55):
That that's really valuable as well.
Cause everyone has thatopportunity, if you're
communicating with the client tokind of upsell, cross sell and
that kind of thing.
Is there any kind of triggerthat you think people have when
they're reaching out to you?
In fact, you know, is, is there,is there something that's
happened internally or do youthink it's just, just being
aware that you offer theseprograms and that light bulb
(32:16):
moment happens?
Jenny Plant (32:18):
I think it's either a challenge or an opportunity.
So the challenge might be, youknow, we are not, it might be a
skill set thing.
You know, they're observingtheir behaviors of their account
managers and
Harv (32:30):
Mm hmm.
Jenny Plant (32:31):
we could be doing this better.
Harv (32:32):
Yeah.
Jenny Plant (32:33):
Or it could be, we're just not growing the
accounts.
We've got these fantasticrelationships, but we're, we're
kind of trying to fill ourpipeline at the moment.
Harv (32:41):
Mm hmm.
Jenny Plant (32:41):
We're recording this in, you know, mid 2024, a
lot of pipelines have stalledbecause
Harv (32:47):
Yeah.
Jenny Plant (32:48):
taking longer to approve.
So a lot of agency owners areturning their attention to
existing clients and thinking,you know, how can we add more
value?
How can we do more things forthese clients and help them
more?
they're looking at that.
So that's another reason that myaccount growth training appeals
to them.
But it's, it's probably
Harv (33:06):
Excellent.
Jenny Plant (33:06):
one of those couple of scenarios.
Harv (33:09):
Mm hmm.
Okay.
Jenny, if anybody wants to learnmore about you and your
programs, where can they golook?
Jenny Plant (33:15):
Yeah, they can contact me on LinkedIn, Jenny
Plant,
Harv (33:18):
Okay.
Jenny Plant (33:18):
And just send me a message or
accountmanagementskills.com.
Harv (33:22):
Excellent.
And your podcast as well.
Lots of great interviews thereand lots of learning
opportunities.
Jenny Plant (33:29):
Yeah.
Creative Agency Account ManagerPodcast, it's the podcast that I
wish I'd had when I was anaccount exec.
So I try to get a range ofguests like you talking on
different aspects of the agencybusiness
Harv (33:42):
Mm hmm.
Jenny Plant (33:43):
To improve and to upskill the account management
community.
Harv (33:46):
Amazing.
Excellent.
Jenny, thank you so much forbeing here.
Hopefully at some point we canhave you back and go into more
detail, into maybe one aspect ofyour training programs or
something like that where we canexplore that in a little bit
more detail.
But that's fantastic advice fortoday.
So thank you so much.
Jenny Plant (34:03):
Harv, thank you so much for inviting me.
This has been fun.
Harv (34:06):
I hope you agree that was a great conversation.
It's an interesting conundrum.
The hybrid account manager issuper common.
The role is not going away.
And it's not easy to dismantleif that's the way you've staffed
and structured your agency untilnow.
Yet we can clearly see that theskills and the characteristics
required for each side of thatrole are so very different.
(34:28):
Like Jenny said, first andforemost, if it's working well,
then there's no point intinkering.
But what do we do forrecognizing some of the issues
with this kind of hybrid role inour agencies?
Well, we've got a few options.
Starting with the mostdifficult, you could engage your
HR team or your HR supplier anddiscuss how this kind of
transition can be attempted.
(34:49):
It's tricky.
You're changing people's jobdescriptions and their job
titles, so people might not bevery happy.
That being said, it's notimpossible.
It just needs to be donesensitively.
Another option, you couldconsider starting to hire in
more distinct roles goingforward so that over time you're
starting to create that newstructure organically.
For example, starting to hirePMs or producers that support
(35:12):
that account managers.
Or another great option, andit's the one that Jenny and I
spent the most time talkingabout.
Spending time thinking abouteach of your hybrid account
managers, and understandingwhich skills they're stronger
in.
The sales and relationship, orthe project management side of
things.
Based on that, invest in yourteam and in your business by
(35:32):
engaging someone like Jenny toreally skill up your team
members that are lacking in thecommercial aspect.
And for those that have thatdown, but struggle more with
delivering projects on budget,perhaps engaging someone to
provide training on businessfinances, like Alfie, who we
spoke to in a previous episode,so that they really understand
how the over servicing has anegative impact on the business
(35:54):
and support them in developingtheir PM skills.
Better yet, get everyone that'sin this kind of role better
trained on both sides of therole so that they're both more
commercially aware but also muchmore sensitive to the way a
project should be deliveredprofitably.
That's it for today's episode.
Quick question, if you'reenjoying the podcast, have you
(36:15):
shared it with a friend orcolleague?
If not, this is your cue, pleasedo so.
And, have you subscribed to theHandbook Newsletter?
This is written by myself and itgoes out every other week, and I
talk about my own experiencewith the most recent topic
covered in the podcast, andshare the key takeaways from the
guest interview, so It's easyfor you to remember what was
(36:35):
discussed in case you want toaction and implement any of
those ideas at your own agency.
You can sign up for thenewsletter at scoro.com/podcast,
scroll down on that page andyou'll see the newsletter signup
form.
And don't forget to share yourfeedback or suggestions with me
for the podcast, including anytopics you want to see covered
or people that you think shouldbe on the show for an interview.
(36:58):
You can DM me on LinkedIn.
I'd love to hear from you.
I'm atlinkedin.com/in/harvnagra.
So one more time, please sharethe podcast and spread the word,
sign up for the newsletter andDM me your thoughts and
feedback.
That's it for me.
I'll see you in the nextepisode.
Thanks very much.
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