Skills blog

For over four decades, LDL has worked with accountancy firms across the UK, helping partners and teams strengthen the commercial skills that sit alongside technical expertise. In recent conversations, one phrase keeps coming up: “We’re doing more work than ever, but it doesn’t always feel like we’re being paid.” Fees are being challenged more frequently. […]

You know those occasions when it really counts — the big presentation, the high-stakes sales meeting. You want to be at your best when it counts, but what ensures you will perform at the upper range of your talent and skill?

Selling has evolved. Virtual sales meetings, typically on Zoom or MS Teams, are now standard practice. Surveys confirm many buyers actually prefer it. Virtual selling is here to stay.

There’s a famous joke about a tourist who asks a local for directions, only to receive the reply: “Well, if I were you, I wouldn’t start from here.” The same can be said about defending your price – to avoid price objections, you need to start in the right place. And that means building value […]

Your sales career is going reasonably well. You usually achieve your goals. You work hard. But now you want to move up a gear and make larger sales and manage some of your organisation’s key accounts. Where do you start? The crucial point is to realize that when you move into larger sales, you need […]

Taylor Swift has extraordinary interpersonal skills. She is a superstar at ‘people buy people first’. Yes, she is an incredible songwriter and singer, but these skills alone are not usually enough to produce such spectacular, global success. It’s her ability to win people over that warrants further investigation. So, just how does she get people […]

Top sportspeople when they are not playing at their best, know the key to get back on form is to revisit the basics. Golfers use a coach to check their swing, tennis players their shots. Mastery of the fundamentals is where excellence begins. The same applies to sales and leadership.

You’ve heard it before – people buy people first, and whatever else second. It’s one of the timeless principles of selling and it is as true today as it has always been. If people don’t feel they can work with you, if they don’t feel comfortable or trust you, they will usually not tell you – but they

‘Fall In Love with the Problem, Not the Solution’ is the title of the best selling book by Uri Levine. Written as a practical guide for startups and entrepreneurs the book highlights the importance of fully understanding the concerns of your target market and making that your priority, NOT your solution. The same applies to selling. In fact, it