The Top 5 Ways to Scale Your Business
A conversation with Alana Nicholl, President and CEO of Jerry Weinberg & Associates Sandler Training
For our fifth episode of the Pro Concepts podcast, I sat down with Alana Nicholl, President and CEO of Jerry Weinberg & Associates, the local Southfield office of Sandler Training. Sandler is one of the largest sales and performance training organizations in the world, operating in over 30 countries. Alana has been part of the business for 17 years and is second generation into it, just as I am at PCIA. We connected quickly over that shared experience.
This conversation is packed with practical advice that applies whether you run a five-person firm or a fifty-person one. If you are serious about growth, these five concepts are worth your time.
A Note on the Word "Sales"
Before we get into the list, I want to address something that came up in our conversation, because it matters for how you read everything that follows.
In the professional services world, whether you are an architect, an engineer, a CPA, or an attorney, the word "sales" tends to make people uncomfortable. Firms call it business development. They call it marketing. They call it client relations. Anything but sales.
But here is the truth Alana put clearly: if your organization needs revenue to keep the lights on, everyone in it is in sales. The receptionist who answers the phone is in sales. The project engineer who manages a client relationship is in sales. The principal who shows up at an association event is in sales.
Alana suggested replacing the word "sales" with the word "help," and I think that reframe is worth holding onto as you read through these five strategies. We are not pushing something on people. We are helping them, and understanding that distinction makes everything easier.
1. Design the Vision First, Then Build the Org Chart
The most common mistake Alana sees in businesses trying to scale is that they design their future around their present. They look at who they have today and try to figure out how to get bigger without changing the structure. It does not work.
The right sequence is to start with the vision. Where do you want the organization to be in five or ten years? What does the revenue look like? What does the team need to accomplish that? Once you have that picture, you build the org chart that serves the vision, defining the positions first before you fill them with people.
This matters because when you are smaller, everyone wears multiple hats. That is fine at a certain stage. But as you grow, those blended roles become a ceiling. You end up searching for what Alana calls purple unicorns, one person who can do three different jobs well. That person rarely exists. When you actually write the position down, you often realize it is two or three roles, not one.
Start with the structure. Then figure out how your current team fits into it and what gaps you need to fill. The vision drives the org chart, and the org chart drives the hiring.
2. Adopt the Mindset That Everyone Is in Sales
This one follows naturally from the conversation above. Once you accept that the entire organization is in some way responsible for growth and client experience, it changes how you hire, how you train, and how you hold people accountable.
Alana used the term "director of client experience" to describe what a receptionist or office manager actually is, and I think that framing is right. The first person a client or prospect encounters sets the tone for the entire relationship. That is not a minor function. That is a high-leverage moment.
The firms I walk into that have the strongest culture, the ones where you can feel the difference the moment you step through the door, are the ones where everyone understands that their role connects to the success of the business. In ESOP firms, where staff have an ownership stake, that sense of responsibility tends to show up most clearly. But it does not require an ESOP to cultivate ownership mentality. It requires leadership that communicates expectations and ties people's roles to the bigger picture.
3. Define Your Ideal Client Profile
Growth becomes a lot harder when you do not know exactly who you are trying to serve. Alana calls this the ideal client profile, and she is direct about how few organizations have actually defined it well.
When you do not have a clear target, a few things happen. Prospecting becomes unfocused and inefficient. You end up taking on business that is not a good fit, clients who are a drain on resources, relationships that are difficult, work that pulls you away from what you do best. And over time, you water down your offering trying to be everything to everyone.
At PCIA, we have been niche-focused since 1988. Our clients are professional services firms: architects, engineers, CPAs, attorneys. We are pulled toward other opportunities regularly, and we decline them. Not because we could not help, but because staying focused on what we know is how we actually serve our clients well. When you know an industry deeply, you know the questions to ask, the risks to flag, the conversations that matter. You cannot replicate that across 20 different industries.
Alana put it well: define your ideal client profile, document it, and make it part of how you onboard new people. When the boundaries are clear, the whole team can execute more purposefully.
4. Measure Leading Indicators, Not Just Lagging Ones
This is the concept that I found most immediately actionable for our own organization. Most businesses track lagging indicators: revenue, profitability, margins, accounts receivable. Those numbers matter, and you absolutely need them. But by the time you see them, it is too late to course correct. The race is already over.
Leading indicators are the activities that drive those outcomes, and they are the ones you can actually manage in real time. For a business development context, that might be the number of first appointments scheduled with prospects, outreach attempts made to existing clients, or referral conversations initiated. For a client success role, it might be the number of proactive check-ins completed in a week.
Alana uses a cookbook analogy that I love. A recipe tells you exactly what ingredients to use, in what quantities, at what time, to get a specific result. You do not just throw things into a bowl and hope for the best. Business growth works the same way. Define the activities your people need to do consistently to produce the results you want, measure those activities, and coach against them when they fall short.
Top performers actually want this clarity. They want to know what success looks like so they can meet it and exceed it. The accountability that comes with well-defined KPIs is not micromanagement. Inspect what you expect, communicate it clearly, and then let your people run.
5. Know Where Your Growth Is Coming From
This is the strategic piece that ties everything together. When you are focused on scaling, you need to understand which category of business your growth is actually coming from, because the approach is different for each one.
Alana breaks it into four buckets.
The first is what she calls "keep" accounts. These are clients who are already buying everything you offer. They are great relationships, and your goal is to protect and maintain them. There is no expansion opportunity here, but losing one would hurt. These accounts deserve proactive attention.
The second is "expand" accounts. These are clients who are buying something from you but not everything. There is more available within the relationship, whether that is additional service lines, additional locations, or adjacent needs you are positioned to address. Alana's observation is that most organizations treat expand accounts like keep accounts, meaning they service them without proactively looking for more. The worst version of this is when a longtime client tells you they just bought something from a competitor because they did not know you offered it. That is a systems failure, not a client failure.
The third bucket is "recapture." These are former clients who, for one reason or another, are no longer working with you. Reaching back out to understand what happened and whether the relationship can be restarted is one of the most overlooked growth strategies in most organizations.
The fourth is new business from clients you have never worked with before. This is where ideal client profile and prospecting activity come back into play. Do you have a specific target list? Are your people actively working it, or is your new business growth primarily reactive?
The point Alana made that stuck with me is this: most people hear something seven times before it truly registers. If a client does not know about a service you offer, that is on you. Not because you did not mention it once, but because you did not mention it enough.
Bonus: Leverage Technology to Stand Out
Alana added one more thought that is worth including. The technology available to businesses today, especially for communication and client engagement, is significant and largely underused.
Video in particular has become one of the highest-performing tools for prospecting and client outreach. Tools like Vidyard and Loom allow you to send a short, personal video message in place of an email, and the open rate difference is substantial. Under a minute for a prospecting message. A couple of minutes for a how-to or onboarding walkthrough. These are not complicated productions. They are simple, direct, and human in a way that a text email often is not.
The same principle applies internally. Step-by-step written documents can be replaced with short instructional videos that are faster to create, easier to follow, and more consistent in how information gets passed along. If you are not exploring how technology can make your team more efficient and your client relationships stronger, you are leaving an advantage on the table.
Scaling a business is not just about working harder. It is about building the right structure, defining who you serve, measuring the right things, and being intentional about where your growth comes from. Alana laid out a framework that is practical, honest, and immediately applicable.
If you want to dig deeper, the Sandler team offers a complimentary consultation for listeners of this podcast. Reach out and mention Pro Concepts, and they will walk you through an assessment of where your business stands across these areas.
To reach Alana Nicholl and the Jerry Weinberg & Associates Sandler Training team, visit jerryweinberg.sandler.com or connect with Alana on LinkedIn.
To reach PCIA, visit pciaonline.com or call 800-969-4041.