By industry: Professional services
Practice automation for professional services firms.
Intake and engagement letters that run themselves, client documents collected without chasing, deadlines that cannot slip, and billing that follows the work.
- First workflow live
- Client intake, usually inside the first sprint
- Usually owned by
- Managing directors and practice owners
- Built on
- Microsoft 365, Google Workspace, DocuSign
- Judged on
- Time to engage a new client and Document chase effort
In short
Professional services automation means new clients onboarded from an intake form to a signed engagement letter and identity check, documents requested and chased automatically, every deadline tracked across matters with reminders, and time captured and turned into invoices at period end. SBD builds it around your practice management, document and accounting systems, in your accounts.
Who this is for
Who brings us in, in professional services.
- Managing directors and practice owners
- Practice managers and operations leads
- Fee earners who own client relationships
- Billing and finance teams
Is this you?
If three of these sound like your week, this page is about your business.
- Staff chase client documents by email
- Engagement letters take more than a day
- Deadlines are tracked in personal calendars
- Timesheets are filled from memory
- Principals ask for matter status in meetings
What it costs today
Where professional services loses the hours.
Client documents are chased by hand
Staff send the same request three times by email before the records arrive, and the work waits.
Intake and engagement letters take days
A new client means forms, identity checks, conflict checks and an engagement letter, each done manually.
Deadlines live in calendars and heads
Filing dates, limitation periods and renewals are tracked by individuals, and a missed one is a liability.
Time is captured late or not at all
Timesheets are filled on Friday from memory, so billable work leaks and invoices go out late.
Work in progress is invisible
Principals cannot see which matters are stalled or over budget without asking.
Client updates are ad hoc
Clients ask for status because nobody told them, and each answer takes a search.
For accounting, legal and advisory firms
Stop chasing clients for documents.
Bring your last month-end and the client who took three reminders. We will show you what a request that chases itself looks like.
Show us your intake
By company size
Professional services at 10 people, and at 1,000.
- 1 to 10
A principal, a few staff, and every document request sent from someone's own inbox.
- 11 to 50
A practice system for the record, email for everything else, and a billing crunch every month.
- 51 to 200
Several teams or offices, deadlines tracked differently in each, and work in progress invisible to the principals.
- 201 to 1,000
A firm with central operations, risk and compliance teams, and still a manual intake process.
What we build
What we build for professional services teams.
- 01
Intake to engagement letter
An intake form starts identity and conflict checks, generates the engagement letter from your template, sends it for signature, and opens the matter when signed.
- 02
Document collection that chases itself
A portal or secure link lists what each client owes, sends reminders on schedule, and files what arrives against the matter.
- 03
Deadline tracking across matters
Every statutory and contractual date held against its matter, with reminders to the owner and escalation as it approaches.
- 04
Time capture to invoice
Time captured from calendars and activity, reviewed by the fee earner, and turned into invoices or interim bills at period end.
- 05
Matter dashboard
Status, budget used, outstanding items and next deadline for every matter, visible to the principals.
- 06
Client status updates
Updates sent at each stage of a matter, so clients hear before they ask.
The workflows
The professional services workflows, and what sets each one off.
- 01 Client intake
When an intake form is submitted
ThenIdentity and conflict checks run, engagement letter sent for signature, matter opened
- 02 Document request
When a matter needs client records
ThenRequest sent, reminders on schedule, documents filed on arrival
- 03 Deadline reminders
When a deadline enters its warning window
ThenOwner reminded, escalated to the principal if unactioned
- 04 Time to invoice
When a billing period closes
ThenTime summarised, reviewed, invoice raised
- 05 Client update
When a matter reaches a stage
ThenThe client told, the update logged
The numbers we move
How a professional services build is judged.
Every build has a number written into the blueprint. These are the ones professional services builds are measured by, and how we measure them.
| Metric | Before | After | How it is measured |
|---|---|---|---|
| Time to engage a new client | Days | Same day | Time from enquiry to signed engagement letter |
| Document chase effort | Several emails per request | Automatic reminders | Manual follow-ups sent per matter |
| Missed or late deadlines | Found too late | Flagged in advance | Deadlines within warning window without action |
| Unbilled time | Leaks every month | Captured | Recorded time against estimated time worked |
Documents and records
The paperwork that generates itself.
Names and tax rules differ by country. We build for the ones you file under, whether that is VAT, sales tax or GST.
Systems we connect in professional services
What is usually already there, and what we add.
Anything with an API or a database we can read works the same way. Each tool links to its page in the integrations directory.
- Your practice management system
-
Microsoft 365 -
Google Workspace -
SharePoint -
DocuSign -
Xero - QuickBooks
-
Sage -
HubSpot -
Notion -
Airtable -
n8n
Proof
Proof from builds like this.
- Customer story
Lightweight project management system
Per-person task sheets syncing to a live admin view, the same pattern as a principal's view across matters.
Read the story - Customer story
Lead enrichment and sales automation
Enquiries qualified and answered in minutes with a person in the loop, the front end of client intake.
Read the story
The offer
The practice operations starter
Thirty days to intake that runs itself, documents that arrive without chasing, and deadlines that cannot slip.
- Week 1 to 2audit of intake, documents, deadlines, time and billing with hours on each
- Week 3blueprint, first build chosen by payback, usually document collection or intake
- Week 4 onintake to engagement, document chasing, deadline tracking, time to invoice
- Accounts in your name, runbook, training for fee earners and admin, sixty days of hypercare
What this does not do
So the scope is clear before the call.
- Legal, tax or accounting advice. We automate the practice around it.
- Replacing your practice management or document system. We build around it.
Terms, defined
Professional services terms, in plain English.
- Engagement letter
- The agreement that sets the scope, fees and terms of a client relationship.
- Matter
- A single piece of client work, with its own documents, deadlines, time and billing.
- Work in progress
- Time recorded on a matter that has not yet been billed.
Questions
What people ask about professional services automation.
Do you work with our practice management system?
We connect to systems with an API and build around them, whether that is a legal practice management tool, an accounting practice suite or a project system. Where there is no API, we work from exports and email.
How do you handle client confidentiality and privilege?
Everything stays in your accounts. Access is by role and logged. AI steps, where used, go through business APIs that do not train on your data, or a self-hosted model if your obligations require it.
Can you run identity and anti-money laundering checks?
We connect to the checking provider you use, run the check as part of intake, and file the evidence against the client. The provider does the check; we make sure it is never skipped.
Is this for accountants, lawyers or architects?
All three, and other advisory firms. The pattern is the same: intake, documents, deadlines, time, billing and client updates. The templates and deadlines are yours.
Will it change how fee earners work?
As little as possible. Time capture reads from where they already work, document requests go out without them, and reviews happen in one screen.
Reading
- Strategy
We tried AI and nothing stuck
The sentence we hear on most first calls. It is almost never about the AI. The four reasons tools get abandoned in small companies, how to tell which one you have, and the one change that makes the next attempt stick.
- Systems
How much should an AI agent be allowed to do?
An agent with an unscoped token dropped a production database and its backups in nine seconds. The permission model we use for every agent: read widely, write narrowly, spend with a cap, and escalate when unsure.
Related
- Industry
Consulting and agencies
Onboarding that runs on the signature, reporting that assembles itself, proposals built rather than rewritten, and the firm's knowledge answerable. Billable people do billable work.
- Function
Finance and accounting
Close faster, chase less, and see the numbers without waiting for month end.
- Function
Compliance and risk
Make the audit trail a by-product of doing the work, not a project you run afterwards.
By industry: Manufacturing, Distribution and logistics, Consulting and agencies, Service and e-commerce, Healthcare, Real estate, SaaS
Professional services
Talk to us about the practice operations starter.
Bring the one professional services workflow your team still runs by hand. You leave the call with a yes or no on fit and the first thing we would build.
Book the call