Years ago, I was a partner at The Staubach Company, one of the industry’s most prominent tenant-only advisory firms.  The Staubach Company was a highly ethical business, full of skilled tenant advisors.  One of the firm’s core value propositions was that its advisory services were free of conflict.  The conflict narrative is powerful in how it seemingly separates the conflict-free advisor from most other brokerage firms which serve both occupiers and landlords.  Tenant-only firms often differentiate themselves with statements like, “…when you hire us, you never have to be concerned that we’re beholden to a landlord who pays us millions of dollars each year in fees”;  or “…we fight harder for you because we’re not concerned about our relationship with the landlord”.  To the unknowing audience, these statements can make it seem that all so-called “full-service” firms (those with diverse practices) are incapable of providing ethical, conflict-free occupier advisory services.  When you consider the spectrum of tenant-only firms is very small, as a sales tactic, this is a brilliant approach in that it significantly narrows the competitive landscape, making it more probably the tenant-only firm will be hired.