Buffalo Wings, Secret Sauces, and Simplicity

This article was originally published in the November 2023 issue of Inside Public Accounting.

Every MP has been pitched on a technology solution or new management approach that will magically solve all their problems. Sophisticated promises to unlock the secrets to success are common, and while they’re attractive, they’re most likely illusory.

There’s no “secret sauce” to success, asserts sales expert Bruce Ditman, the former CMO of New York-based IPA 100 firm Marcum (FY22 net revenue of $1.2 billion). Ditman, founder of marketing consulting firm Chief Seconds, recently spoke with IPA Monthly about why firm leaders often fall into that trap, how they can avoid it, and how it relates to Buffalo wings.

Here is a lightly edited version of the conversation.

So was it Buffalo wings that got you thinking about secret sauces?

I’ve been thinking about this for a long time, but I was ranting to a friend about how there are no secret sauces, and literally these things are in front of me while I’m saying this, and then it really just hit me like a lightning bolt. Here’s what hit me: Traditional Buffalo wing sauce only has about three ingredients — hot sauce, butter, and vinegar — and yet we drive all over the state of Connecticut to decide who makes good ones, who makes bad ones, which are the best. There is no secret sauce to making great Buffalo wings, so why are some great and some terrible? And that’s what really crystallized this vision.

Why are some great and some terrible?

It’s got to be execution. It’s in the act of making them and making them frequently — not dressing them — where they become great.

What’s the allure of complexity?

The allure is two-fold. One is people feel intimidated, stymied or frustrated by functions that they don’t feel they can do. A secret sauce both lets them off the hook for those feelings, while also offering them a simple solution to a complex problem.

Explain what you mean by ‘lets them off the hook.’

There are tasks that we consider mundane or undesirable — doing homework when you’re young or making sales calls at work. We know we need to be doing them, but we

don’t and we feel bad about that. When you’re presented with a secret sauce solution for the thing that does bother you, or you don’t want to do, or you feel you’re not good at, it allows people some comfort. ‘I knew there was some secret knowledge out there that I didn’t have, and that’s why I’m uncomfortable with it, feel like I’m not good at it, or don’t want to do it.’

You say there is no secret sauce but what is it? Just doing it?

I’d say ‘just doing it’ is reductive. You don’t really know anything until you can teach it.

You’ve written, “Simplicity is not about shortcuts; it's about unlocking your full potential through clear, focused strategies, applying them simply and holding yourself accountable.” Tell me more.

I reject unknowability as a virtue and, by extension, complexity as a virtue. Complex things are made up of simple things, and if you haven’t gotten it down to that level yet, keep digging.

One of the most corrosive secret sauces is the idea of ‘the natural.’ A mentor of mine could almost smell an Excel spreadsheet and tell you what was wrong. I’ve never seen anything like it in my entire life. A natural is someone who actually enjoys doing the things that other people don’t. When we look to naturals for direction, we are setting ourselves back. What we need to look at is people who have done the work, who have acquired the ability. Mickey Mantle would have made a terrible batting coach.

Let’s get down to a specific example at an accounting firm where you’ve seen this happen.

Let’s talk about sales and marketing at the partner level. It is very common when it comes time for the partner retreat to trot out the best business development partners and ask them to tell everyone how they did it. What you’ve done is taken a bunch of naturals and put them on stage

— basically a bunch of Mickey Mantles saying, ‘The key to hitting home runs is swinging the bat.’ What I think firms need to do is to treat this like real skill acquisition.

What was your motivation in wanting to speak publicly on this?

I think this is incredibly important. People spend a lot of money hiring or buying secret sauces, and when they don’t work, not only have you spent the money, but that experience can be corrosive internally. I think it’s important for firms to say, ‘If you can’t explain to me in simple detail how this works, then it probably isn’t going to work.’ If people are out there selling a secret sauce instead of empowering people to be successful, shame on you.

Say I’m a firm partner and I say, ‘OK I get all this conceptual stuff, but what am I supposed to do now?’

There are common areas where this applies — hiring, recruitment, retention, employee satisfaction and business development.

The best sales tactic in the world is education. If you want to sell your partner group or your firm that they should be doing business development, then educate them on how to do it. Break it

down into simple tasks, such as five people to call. It’s a lot easier to dial the phone when you have a phone number. Let’s talk about what we can say on the phone, and what are other people saying that gets a good reaction. Build a sales culture bit by bit. Get people together to

talk about what’s working or not, or what happened that was surprising. I think that by having more communication around this, things suddenly become less unknowable.

What’s your main takeaway?

Be wary of anyone selling a secret sauce. Be relentless in your pursuit of understanding a complex thing until the point where you can see its simple constituent parts, and be vigilant against anyone saying that a complex thing is actually simple. Things are hard to do, simple doesn’t mean it’s easy, but it’s knowable and achievable.