Delivery team optimization, or what some call “resource management”, is one of the most important functions in a professional services firm. Delivery team optimization involves aligning team members to appropriate projects via decision criteria. When the job is done well, the firm should produce strong billable utilization (which corresponds to revenue) while maintaining happy clients and employees. Essentially all high-performing professional services firms of scale have a disciplined approach to delivery team optimization.

Delivery team optimization is vital because it impacts the three most important pillars that support high performance in professional services: client satisfaction, employee satisfaction, and revenue generation. The needs in each of these areas can be summarized as follows:

• Clients want a pleasant engagement experience and want their project completed on time, on budget, and with the expected level of quality.
• Employees want to do work that matches their skills and interests, and they expect a reasonable workload.
• Optimal revenue is enabled through consistent billable utilization.

Each of these three pillars above can only be fully satisfied when the right people are assigned to appropriate projects at the ideal time.

The Utilization Trap

Some firms fall into a bad habit of making project team assignments exclusively through a billable utilization lens. While it is obviously important to get the team highly billable, doing so without considering employee or client satisfaction is a mistake.

When a delivery team member becomes known as a “guru” on a certain type of engagement, that person tends to get assigned to that one engagement type over and over. For some employees, that consistency may be ideal, but for many others, it can become monotonous. It is critical that the person responsible for assigning team members to projects is aware of the career objectives of each person within the delivery organization.

Also, certain individuals may not be a fit for specific projects or project roles. For example, if you run a software engineering consultancy, putting a backend developer into a project management role might not work out. The engineer might not know the responsibilities of that project manager role and may not have the skills to deliver success.

In general, chasing utilization for utilization’s sake will eventually bite you.

Avoid Excessive Utilization Silos

A common mistake that firms make is to get involved in too many service lines (types of projects) while the firm is still small. This usually happens because the firm leaders don’t want to turn down potential revenue. When a firm is experiencing a surplus of bench time, there is a tendency to grasp at any type of project that will “get people billing”.

Occasionally delivering a fringe project isn’t a problem so long as there is enough skills overlap and the firm can produce a quality work product. But when one or two fringe projects evolve into a new practice, it has the potential to create one or more utilization silos within the firm.

For example, an accounting firm that focuses on corporate tax preparation might have a client who asks the firm to deliver an annual audit. Realizing that there are currently consultants on the bench, the firm leaders agree to do the audit work. A few other clients ask for audits, and the firm starts marketing an audit practice. But as it turns out, the employees who do onsite audit work need a different set of skills than the employees working on tax returns back at the office. The new audit practice has created a utilization silo.

A utilization silo exists any time there is a project role that only a subset of personnel in the firm can satisfy. Almost all firms will have some number of utilization silos because of the distinct roles on project teams. For example, a firm that delivers websites would have utilization silos related to project management, creative design, engineering, and testing. In order for the company to perform well, it must manage high utilization across each of those four distinct skill areas.

The challenge of aligning team members to billable work increases every time there is a new distinct project role within the organization. While most firms want to grow, the best way to do that is by selling projects that can be delivered with the same types of skills that already exist within the company. Each time a new skill is added, the challenge of optimizing utilization across the firm increases.

Decision Criteria

When assigning personnel to projects, it is important to consider a variety of factors. Too often, the decision is simply based on the skills alone. Here is an overview of some of the factors to consider:

• Applied skills: Does the team member have the core skills needed to deliver the work?
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• Presentation and soft skills: Is this an onsite client-facing engagement or one that can be delivered from the home office? Will there be a lot of meetings or conference calls where the team member will need to speak or present?
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• Writing ability: Will the project require written deliverables? Is this person a proficient writer? Does this person enjoy writing?
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• Location and travel tolerance: If the work is onsite, does this team member live in the same city? If not, does the member have travel concerns or restrictions?
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• Foreign language: Would it be advantageous to assign a member to the project who can speak and write in a particular foreign language?
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• Experience level: Does this person need to be highly experienced? This can depend on the role as well as the current composition of the project team.
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• Industry domain knowledge: Does this person have specific expertise within the client’s industry? For certain types of engagements and clients, this can be critical.
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• Career path alignment: Does the work align with this team member’s career objectives and goals (as outlined in past performance evaluations)?
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• Leadership: Will this person be expected to lead a portion of the team? Has this person done that well in the past?
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• Similar past projects: It can be helpful to have people on the team who have successfully delivered similar projects in the past.
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A Dedicated Function

Delivery optimization is best done by a dedicated person (or team) within the professional services firm. When someone attempts to manage delivery optimization while also being billable, it often results in poor staffing decisions. It takes near continuous attention to optimize the project assignment process effectively.

The person responsible for delivery optimization should report to the delivery leadership of the firm and should also have close coordination with the sales and recruiting teams. It is important to know the types of opportunities that are likely to close in the weeks and months ahead. This information can help plan out future staffing assignments and also inform the recruiting priorities of the firm.