Nice series of articles about client advisory boards in Fast Company
Saturday, March 19, 2011 at 10:07AM Lisa Nirell recently posted a nice three-part series on client advisory boards of the Fast Company website.
I wish it had not started out with the story of a failure. The lesson is correct. May be more inspiring to have opened with a success story, describing how an advisory board provided a transformative experience for a company – there are certainly plenty of those!
The series has lots of good tips, including providing for adequate preparation, choosing a venue, selecting the right participants, gradually deepening engagement with board members, and doing an ROI analysis.
The articles are oriented to companies that are considerably larger than a typical advisory practice, so some advice may not apply. For example, asking for five days commitment over the course of the year may be necessary if you are flying in participants to the central meeting place. A typical advisory firm with a geographically centralized client base would more likely ask for 2 to 4 evenings per year from their board members.
Even with the difference in orientation, the articles have lots of gold nuggets that you will find useful as you consider putting together your own advisory board.