I need my key account to trust that our partnership will hold if I ever leave.

I need my key account to trust that our partnership will hold if I ever leave.

Clients notice who carries the relationship. When every answer, every fix and every introduction runs through one person, they see a one-person show, even when a system runs behind it. The partnerships clients trust most are the ones the whole team can run.

Five questions to see if your team can do this job today:

1. Could your client describe your growth strategy and name who on your team owns each part of it?
2. When a problem comes up, does your client know who to call besides you?
3. Does each of your client's key contacts have a peer on your team?
4. Do those relationships reach VPs, directors and managers, beyond your top contacts?
5. If you asked your champion who runs the partnership, would they name more people than you?

Two or more no's, and your client may see a one-person show.

In one of my largest key accounts, I started talking with the client about my next move during a golf outing, and I could tell they weren't having it. They were worried that if I left, everything they had built with me would fall by the wayside.

What they didn't see was how much of the work I had spread across 30, 40, even 50 people. We were running a system. Every key account person on my team who touched the account knew every relationship. Each one had peers at the client: VPs at the first tier, directors at the second and managers at the third, so attention, service and impact reached every level.

My leaving wouldn't change what the team knew or how it operated. I was the voice of all that work, but I wasn't the reason it was happening. It was happening inside the system we built.

A partnership that lasts looks like a team running a system, with someone the client knows at every level.

Our system, the Vitality Index, shows your key account teams where they stand today, the work it takes to level up, and how to do it, until they reach a vital partnership that lasts.

If your client lost you tomorrow, who would they call first?

We built a free, 4-minute Key Account Risk Assessment. It gives you a risk score for your key accounts across team alignment, account planning, account transitions, and visibility. Link in the comments.