The biggest slip that inexperienced accountants can make in client relationship management is to overlook the ‘relationship’ part. After all, accountancy hinges on a deep personal understanding of clients and their goals.

“When we talk to accountancy clients, we typically ask them what they think of their current firm,” says Peter Kane, Managing Director of business development advisers BD Consultancy. “We also ask them why they awarded work to that firm, rather than another.

“The consistent message we get about firms that leave negative impressions is that they focus far too much on the technical nature of the work and not enough on who their clients are as people – or what their businesses are trying to achieve.”

Executive Coach Oliver Deacon agrees: “Everyone assumes that the accounting profession is a job about the numbers, as in technical insight and analysis. But we’re in a people business. People buy from people.”

Technology is exerting a powerful influence on the accountant/client relationship, says Deacon. That is taking away the human touch. While technology is helping accountants to become increasingly slick, some are starting to let process efficiency take over.

“In five years, artificial intelligence will be doing all the technical work that accountancy practices do. Therefore differentiation will come down to two things: first, how good is the quality of your relationships? And second, how deeply can you understand your clients’ challenges? It’s always an 80/20 thing: in accountancy, machines are great at doing 80% of our job. So we really need to excel at the 20% that only humans can do.”

Kane refers to business author David Maister as a strong source of wisdom on this issue: in his seminal book The Trusted Advisor, Maister laments professionals who obsess over the disease and ignore the patient, he explains.

Think about the client’s perspective

For Deacon, a classic mistake is failing to think about a problem from the client’s perspective. “You may think that their problem is the need to get a tax return done,” he says. “But the tax return itself is not the problem. It’s that the client is too busy and exhausted to organise their details. Or that they have no idea how much the final bill could come to and are quite panicked and nervous about that. In those scenarios, strong people skills are vital.”

Don’t rely on email

Kane warns against an overreliance on email. Consider swapping some emails for phone calls, as it may be healthier for the overall relationship. It may also be worth going to see the client once or twice a week. “Email is very transactional. It’s hard to build a proper rapport, and humour often doesn’t land.”

Look at things holistically

To capture the essence of what client relationship management means, Kane cites the sporting phrase “heads-up football”. “Don’t just look at your feet – or the task in front of you,” he says. “Look at the whole space and do some horizon scanning. How can you help your client look round the corner? How will macro events impact their business and family?”

Going further

Building up a reserve of trust and affinity with a client paves the way for highly beneficial client management approaches.

Ask questions to get a deeper understanding of their business

An accountant with a good foundational relationship can ask the primary contact on the client’s side who else in the business is worth contacting, to gain a much richer understanding of its workings and goals. “It’s somewhat flattering to the client for you to ask their advice,” Kane says. “And it helps to seal the collaboration more tightly, by inviting them to suggest a course of action that they’ll be more likely to support further down the line.”

Play devil’s advocate

Kane notes that good trust creates a space of psychological safety for the accountant to play devil’s advocate, challenge the client and even hold robust, constructive debate. That elbow room can be essential if a client seems too dogmatic about pursuing a path that the accountant regards with caution.

Sell solutions as the absence of a problem

“Frame any potential solution as the absence of the problem,” says Deacon. “In other words, encourage the client to picture what their life would look like without that one thing that’s bugging them. That will create a pull for whatever remedy you’ll try to sell in.”

Always give them options

Perhaps, Deacon suggests, that should be remedies plural: “As problems come up on the client side during the relationship, always give them options. Don’t just focus on that one, amazing tool you have in mind. Giving a client options is a powerful means of providing them with a greater feeling of control.”

Help them take action

Following that, he says, help them commit to a decision. “Think about how to persuade the client to commit and say: ‘Yes – that’s what I want to do.’ How are you going to make it easier for them to take action by choosing one of the pathways you’ve discussed?”