Aspiring MBD leaders – Advice from a CFO

April 27, 2026|Accountants, Kim's Blog, Lawyers, Management Skills, Marketing|

This article is one in a series supporting the Home – PM Forum training course Aspiring Marketing and Business Development Leader – PM Forum. As careers progress, it’s increasingly important to develop knowledge of and collaborate with those in disciplines and functions beyond marketing and business development. So I asked Steve Rowan – former Deputy Chief Operating Officer (COO) and former Chief Financial Officer (CFO) of leading law firms – what advice he would offer to aspiring marketing and business development leaders. Aspiring MBD leaders – Advice from a CFO.

About Steve Rowan

Steve Rowan is a long time Advisory Board member of the Managing Partners’ Forum |

He is a Chartered Accountant and former law firm Chief Financial Officer (Reynolds Porter Chamberlain LLP which is now RPC and Edwards Wildman Palmer LLP – where he was also Deputy Chief Operating Officer and responsible for global business development, marketing, communications and business intelligence teams).

He’s also a qualified and experienced executive coach – specialising in career transitions – and a mentor. And a member of the European Mentoring and Coaching Council.

Steve Rowan | LinkedIn

Mountain Ash Coaching & Advisory | Steve Rowan

Aspiring MBD leaders – Advice from a CFO

Communicate and collaborate

Steve is keen to stress that as MBD professionals progress through their careers they must be increasingly skilled at communicating and collaborating with the functional heads of other business services and the leaders of service teams. They must learn how to work together effectively to tackle the complex and cross-firm challenges in professional services firms. Initially this will be at operational board level and later at Executive Board.

“Business services people must work together as a unit regardless of their speciality”

He suggests the bowtie and diamond method of internal communication – KAM Basics – Bowties and Diamonds. Helping peers at the same levels of seniority across departments forge mutual understanding – so CFO and CMO, Head of Finance with Head of MBD, Finance Managers with MBD managers etc. This promotes internal education and builds in cross-team support.

This aligns with the advice to progress towards being a T-shaped leader (Future Marketing Manager – T-shaped people, senior promotions)

Always highlight the benefits

Whenever you are proposing a new MBD strategy, programme or project – or even requesting new behaviours – you must lead with the answer to “What’s in it for me?” (WIIFM). This is something that all MBD should excel in – after all, business development is all about communicating the benefits over the features. The “why?” rather than the “what?”.

This requires marketing and business development professionals to really understand the drivers, needs and interests of the partners and also the other functional heads. So listening skills come to the fore to develop deeper empathy. You’re not listening – What you’re missing and An introduction to emotional intelligence (EQ) and empathy (Video)

Navigate the politics with aplomb

As you become more senior, the more you need to tune into and work with the influencers. These are often the partners who generate the most profit for the firm and who top the remuneration charts.

“Who has the soft power? Who really shakes the tree? What floats their boat?”

This extends to understanding the soft power dynamics in a practice. And the wisdom to know when and how to pick your battles.

Steve mentioned a recent panel (with Professional Services Recruitment Agency | Totum Partners | London, UK) where senior business function leaders were advised to “act like a civil servant” and be seen as neutral rather than risk backing the any political horse.

Know the key numbers

Aspiring MBD leaders need to know their way around the balance sheet and profit and loss account. And they must show their interest in those commercially vital numbers – as it’s a key focus for the firm’s Board, leaders and partners.

The numbers help you understand the business and identify who will be the future business development drivers – those who generate clients, business and profits. And knowing who is in the ascendant supports your ability to navigate the future politics and influencing challenges.

This commercial acumen positions you well within the firm. It also means that you can anticipate any unintended consequences of proposed programmes. This awareness really makes a difference. Woe betide aspiring MBD professionals who fail to acknowledge the opportunity cost of fee-earner time intensive programmes that sap too much from today’s billing figures. But also be aware that some partners want to stay closely in touch with initiatives, sometimes leading to inefficiencies. We had an interesting discussion about how firm’s build in accreditable non-billable time costs to budgets and profitability accounting.

Understand the financial strategy and budget cycle

Of course, you will need an understanding of the business strategy of the firm and its financial drivers. And a key feature of the annual calendar is the budget cycle.

MBD professionals need to understand the firm’s profit ambitions – and what will drive profit growth. MBD plays a critical role in driving that growth – understanding market demand, identifying new market opportunities and finding ways to maximise the swift conversion of new leads, projects and clients.

The firm’s financial strategy will show what profit is to be generated. And how much of that profit will be reinvested back into the business. The annual cycle of forecasting and planning will be set in the Board’s agenda.

“Don’t come to the table with an unrealistic and round numbered budget. It just suggests a lack of thought. And don’t just pitch in the previous year’s budget with a hefty uplift”

He shared that most firms have access to benchmark data which indicates MBD spend (although what firms included in these figures varies) is usually between 2.5% – 3% of revenue.

Take a look at the Meridian research (Annual Strategy and Marketing Benchmark Meridian West) which shows that overall growth in MBD budgets is slowing – from 6.5% growth last year to 5.6% this year as leaders reprioritise spending towards technology.

We had a little chat here about the merits of zero-based budgeting. Or, in marketing terms, the objective and task method of budgets. Budget Process – Digital Marketing Lesson – DMI. Show what you want to do and how much it will cost – and what it will achieve over what estimated period (the essence of Return on Investment). He suggests that each proposed MBD project spend is assessed for the largest potential ROI to help prioritise choices (prioritisation of expenditure).

Professional service firms are resource-limited. And hard choices have to be made. He suggests splitting the proposed MBD budget between essential, desirable and nice to have. This helps focus minds. Although he admits that sadly many firms don’t take a long term view of investment – so a three year payback may be hard to swallow. And that often marketing and training budgets are unfortunately the first and easiest to be chopped. Hence the vitality of working closely with colleagues across operational disciplines to determine and agree business priorities over the next budget cycle, for example.

He returned here to stress the importance of knowing and working with the practice’s influencers. Know the MBD supporters and engage their support for Board level negotiations.

Appreciate different PSF models

For a long time, professional services firms used the partnership model. Risks and taxation issues led to the increasing take up of LLP structures.

As firms develop more online services and embrace the impact of artificial intelligence we see the emergence of different business structures and financial models.

Recently, there has been an influx of private equity (PE) investment into law and accountancy firms. This was addressed recently at the March 2026 Managing Partners’ Forum Growth Conference (an article on this event is in the pipeline). This has led to a shift in strategy and profitability expectations – favouring large scale, repeatable workflows, scaling programmes and prioritising the maximisation of short term profitability to support early exit strategies.

In the PE world, the role of MBD becomes more important as there is a constant need to know where the growth is coming from.

Be aware of international differences and overhead allocations

As an aside, Steve mentioned a quirk affecting those working, for example, in UK and USA based firms.

Those who have training in finance will appreciate the difference between accruals and cash (Accrual Accounting and Cash Accounting | Differences | Agicap). As a rule of thumb, UK companies work with accruals and US firms in cash. Knowledge of this difference could avert misunderstandings for MBD professionals.

I also asked about the common challenge when the proposed spend spans beyond the MBD function. Classic examples would be the web site (where MBD manages brand and content) whilst the IT team manages hosting and maintenance) and the CRM (which MBD may drive but all members of the firm will use).

Steve explained that this may differ across firms. Most will have budgets for business functions and also for practice areas. Where costs are to spread across the firm or multiple divisions the finance team will advise on overhead allocation. Often the costs are shared on a cost per fee-earner headcount basis.

(It’s interesting to see how law firms allocate real estate and office occupancy costs in the business: The Lawyer UK 200 workspace report – Lawyers and real estate)

Summary

So to summarise, his advice would be:

Learn how to communicate and work collaboratively with other business functions
Always highlight the benefits
Navigate the politics with aplomb…be the neutral ”civil servant”
Know the key numbers (Know your way around the balance sheet and profit and loss account)
Understand the financial strategy and budget cycle
Appreciate different PSF models
Appreciate international differences and overhead allocations. If in doubt, ask the finance team

In addition, MBD professionals need to be able to: