If you’ve been reading my blogs over the years, you’ll recognise the same drumbeat beneath every topic: make it simpler, make it smarter, make it serve people. I’ve written about pricing and productivity, talent and leadership, marketing and client experience, and systems, data, and the great unbundling of work by technology. I’ve nudged (and occasionally shoved) firms to try new things, measure what matters, and stop doing what doesn’t. This “final” blog isn’t a goodbye so much as a handover note…what I’d want you to keep close as the next chapter unfolds.

1: Strategy is a verb

Plans never changed a firm; cadence did. The best practices set a rhythm: quarterly prioritisation, monthly dashboards, weekly huddles, and daily clarity about who’s doing what by when. Don’t over-intellectualise strategy; operationalise it. One page, five priorities, owners, dates, and the courage to say “not now” to everything else.

Keepers:

• Start with customer problems you are uniquely placed to solve.
• Tie every initiative to a number you’ll track.
• Kill zombie projects fast, freeing capacity is growth.

2: Price the value, not the hours

I’ve argued for years that timesheets are a source of truth, not a pricing mechanism. Value is created in the gap between what a client fears and what you help them achieve. Price that outcome, show your working, and stop apologising for margins. Subscriptions work when the bundle solves persistent problems cash flow, compliance, and strategic guidance, not when you just repackage hours.

Keepers:

• Price before work; scope like a hawk; change orders without guilt.
• Publish your “non-negotiables” (responsiveness, quality, proactive advice).
• Measure price confidence, not just price realisation.

3: Make marketing useful

The best marketing is service disguised as content. Every article, checklist, webinar, or workshop should move a client one square forward on their board. Ditch the generic thought leadership; be specific and local. If your audience can’t see themselves in your examples, you’re broadcasting, not connecting.

Keepers:

• Start with customer problems you are uniquely placed to solve.
• Tie every initiative to a number you’ll track.
• Kill zombie projects fast, freeing capacity is growth.

4: People first, then process, then platform

You’ve heard me say it: systems without standards are theatre. Document how great work is done, then automate. Recruit for curiosity and care; teach for craft; promote for judgement. Culture isn’t the slogans on your wall, it’s the behaviours you tolerate when things get busy.

Keepers:

• Scorecards for roles, pathways for growth, feedback that’s weekly and kind.
• A “red flag” list of behaviours you won’t accept, no matter the billings.
• Leaders who go first: in transparency, in learning, and in owning mistakes.

5: Data beats opinion (but only if it’s tidy)

Dashboards don’t fix messy underlying data; they decorate it. Standardise names, services, stages, and sources. Decide what a “lead,” “qualified,” and “won” mean, once. Run your practice like an experiment: formulate a hypothesis, test it, gather evidence, and iterate. Celebrate the learning, not the outcome.

Keepers:

• A small, stubborn set of metrics: capacity, velocity, margin, NPS/CES, and pipeline health.
• Clear definitions, so every report tells the same story, regardless of who runs it.

6: Technology is a team sport

Whether it was the leap to cloud, the rise of APIs, or now AI, the pattern is the same: tool first is noise; workflow first is music. Identify friction, design the future state, then bring in the tech. And yes, AI is already useful for summaries, first drafts, reconciliations, reminders, and pattern-spotting, but it amplifies whatever system it’s plugged into. Bad process plus AI is just faster chaos.

Keepers:

• “Human in the loop” as a principle for any critical output.
• A living register of automations with owners, value, and guardrails.
• Pilots with small teams, short cycles, and real success criteria.

7: Advisory is a posture, not a product

Advisory happens the moment you ask a better question. It’s curiosity made useful: “What are you trying to achieve?”, “What would ‘enough’ look like?”, “What happens if we don’t decide?” Package the conversations, yes, but don’t let productisation squeeze out the humanity.

Keepers:

• Pre-work that earns a meaningful first meeting.
• A cadence of forward-looking conversations, not just rear-view reporting.
• Stories and scenarios your clients can act on tomorrow.

8: Community compounds

I’ve often drawn lessons from radio: curate thoughtfully, respect the audience, and keep the signal strong. Professional communities work the same way. Share playbooks, not just opinions. Shine a light on younger voices. Partner more. When you invest in the ecosystem, your firm grows anyway, because trust flows where generosity starts.

Keepers:

• Host forums where peers can safely compare notes.
• Document what you learn and give it away faster than you’re comfortable with.
• Measure community health the way you’d measure a pipeline.

9: Resilience is operational

Tough seasons expose weak assumptions. Build buffers: cash, cross-skilled teams, redundant systems, and clear succession. When something breaks, write the post-mortem, change the standard, and move. Resilience isn’t bravado, it’s design.

Keepers:

• Single points of failure, named and eliminated.
• Disaster rehearsals and checklists you actually use.
• A default calm: “What do we know? What can we do next?”

If there’s a single through-line across all these years, it’s this: progress rewards the practical. The firms that win are the ones that keep showing up, keep improving the small things, and keep serving with clarity and care. Tools will change. Rules will change. Markets will wobble. People will remember how you made their work and their lives easier.

Thank you for walking this road with me. Keep your cadence. Keep your standards. Keep your heart for clients and your curiosity for what’s next. And if you ever wonder where to start, start here: one page of priorities, one brave price conversation, one useful piece of content, one process made clear, one person coached, one experiment run. Then repeat.

That loop never really closes. It just keeps compounding.

David Smith conducts firm reviews and facilitates the development of strategic plans and business plans. Contact David at da*********@******nk.com to explore how he can help your firm.