There are three key secrets to getting promoted in a
consulting firm.
Here is one of them:
"Do what is needed, not just what is asked."
In your first few weeks and months in consulting, you will
typically be assigned TASKS.
This is just temporary to make sure those who interviewed
you did not make a mistake!
How your career progresses from this point forward will vary
quite a bit depending on the client you serve, your manager,
your firm, your office and numerous other factors.
Your responsibility will fall along a spectrum with tasks on
one end and outcomes on the other.
It is the difference between a manager saying, "Please
analyze sales records for the last three years and test
these hypotheses." vs. "You have been assigned the XYZ
division, figure out how to grow it by 50% over the next
three years."
So the question is: how do you transition from a
task-orientation role to an outcome-oriented one?
Sometimes you'll get a manager or partner who will just
throw you into the deep end and you'll have a ton of
responsibility right away. Other times, you will need to
prove yourself before you transition over.
Here's the key to making that transition. When you are
assigned tasks, focus not just on what was asked of you, but
also on what is needed to help the client achieve the GOAL.
The "goal" is NOT get these 3 tasks done. The goal is the
OUTCOME the client is trying to achieve.
What typically happens in the middle of an analysis is you
discover something unexpected. Perhaps the data indicates
your team's (or client's) initial hypothesis is totally
wrong.
Just like in a case interview where when you discover
something unusual and you have an "Oh, that's interesting"
type moment, you are usually within striking range of
uncovering a major insight.
Now you have two options when you reach this point.
The first is to just finish up your task assignment.
The other is to finish up your task assignment (what you
were asked to do) and then refine the hypothesis based on
the new information, and test it analytically (BEFORE
being assigned the task by a partner or manager).
(This is doing what is needed...e.g, anticipating and doing
the natural next step, before it is "assigned" to you.)
When you present to a partner or manager, out of every
three or four presentations you deliver, there will often
be one slide within a presentation that will contradict the
hypothesis the partner and manager had in mind.
This slide will get everyone's attention.
And once they digest this conclusion, the partner will
usually start thinking, "Hmm... if that's the case, then I
wonder if X is true."
Now if you are just doing what is assigned, most likely the
manager will look to you and say, "Why don't you look into
this deeper level analysis tomorrow."
If you are doing what is needed (not just what is asked of
you), you would then say, "You know, I was thinking the
EXACT SAME THING... and if you turn to the next slide, you
see it shows that X actually IS true."
It is this magic moment that your reputation in a firm jumps
up a notch.
I had many, many such presentations at McKinsey where a
partner would see a slide, reach a natural conclusion, and
automatically wonder if a revised hypothesis was true... only
to find that I answered that question on the next slide.
I rarely did this in my first year (as I didn't realize this
was possible), but routinely did it in my second year.
Once you do this often enough, your managers and partners
come to realize that you can solve problems INDEPENDENTLY.
(This is THE phrase you want to be associated with you)
The role of those review meetings suddenly changes.
Before the meeting's focus was on the manager or partner
reviewing your results and THEM driving the next step in
the analysis.
But, once you switch over to being an independent problem
solver, the meeting's role becomes one where you are simply
keeping the manager and partner informed -- so they can
answer basic questions from the client about your part of
the project intelligently.
Once again, it is very important than you transition from a
task-oriented problem solver to an outcome-oriented,
independent problem solver. And the key to that is to "do
what is needed, not just what is asked."
As I mentioned earlier, this idea of doing what is needed,
not just what is asked is one of three key strategies to
get promoted in consulting.
Friday, 20 January 2012
Tuesday, 10 January 2012
IN CONSULTATION YOUR REPUTATION IS EVERYTHING
In consulting, your personal reputation is everything. It is
the one thing by which everything else in your career
revolves around.
Here is the thing with reputations.
Once your reputation is set (whether it is good or it is
bad), it is very hard to change.
If you are seen favorably, more partners want you to work
with them, you get more choice of projects, you're able to
pick better projects, better clients, and better teams... and
not surprisingly, this often leads to you performing even
better.
Conversely, if your reputation starts off poor in a
consulting firm, you start a downward spiral.
Fewer partners want you to work on their engagements. You
get the worse managers (the ones nobody else wants to work with).
These managers don't coach you very well if at all... without
the coaching, you tend to do worse than your peers (while
still being held to the same standard) and the entire
process repeats and reinforces itself: If you ever end up in any professional
services business where your reputation was poor, the best
thing you can do is just quit and start over with no
reputation at another firm.
Apparently (and I now agree with this), having no reputation
is much better than having a bad reputation.
So what separates consultants who are strong performers vs.
those who are not?
While the list of distinguishing characteristics is long,
one trait that many McKinsey partners and engagement
managers often talk about is "coach-ability."
A new consultant is not expected to know everything from day
one. However, what is expected is that a new consultant will
be open to, listen to, and react favorable towards feedback.
So if your manager tells you that you need to do certain
things differently, if you are coachable, you will listen
and make improvements.
If you're not, you will be considered un-coachable and
stubborn... and often that is the beginning of the end of
one's career at a firm.
The people who often have the most difficultly with this
coach-ability trait are the consultants who have the highest
IQs and the biggest accomplishments before starting in
consulting.
Often this type of person finds it inconceivable that they
could possibly be doing something so poorly, when they used
to be so successful.
Rather than working on improving these new skills, they
start to argue with the manager as to why the manager or
partner is wrong.
This is not to say that managers and partners are always
right, but if you are arguing every feedback point... and
you're getting consistent feedback from multiple sources,
take a hard look at the data and consider that maybe the
feedback is right.
Some people have a very hard time with this, and ultimately
it hurts their careers -- hopefully only temporarily, but
often permanently.
This lack of "coach-ability" is really just a more specific
instance of someone generally being unwilling to learn from
others.
This more general trait is one that is absolutely positively
mandatory in consulting.
If you do not want to have to learn new things, don't go
into consulting!
You learn something new every day -- whether you are a new
analyst or a director with 20 years experience.
It is a factual reality of the profession (and some people
like me love it... others find it torture).
This is important to realize.
It is often very obvious which consultants in your office
are the ones who just got assigned to a new project. You can
often tell just by walking by their desk.
How can you tell?
They are the ones with a 1 - 2 foot stack of papers on their
desk that they are busy reading to "get up to speed" on a
new industry, a new client, and a new type of business
problem.
Often there are dozens of industry reports to read, dozens
of client materials to review, and entire stacks of practice
development training materials geared around a particular
kind of problem.
In most consulting firms, your colleagues will all have
strong learning skills.
Incidentally, this is one reason consulting firms favor
candidates with strong academic backgrounds -- at least you
don't have to worry that they are not capable of learning
something new (now getting them to be willing to learn is
something entirely different).
It's unlikely you will be more talented than your
colleagues. So the only differences between you and your
colleagues is what you learn and when you learn it.
For each project, there is a generally an obvious set of
documents to learn. Often one of your colleagues on a client
team (generally the one who used to be the "new" person on
the team prior to your arrival) will pass along his or her
big stack of papers to you... and eventually you will pass it
along to the next new person.
The project-specific learning materials tends to just
materialize when you need them. So everyone tends to learn
the same things at the same time in the lifecycle of their
role on a project.
Again, there is not much difference here.
Then there are the things one learns across multiple
projects... the skills of being a savvy consultant.
Most people will learn these skills within their first
two years of their consulting career.
Some will learn some elements of this through their firm's
new consultant training. Others will learn through feedback.
And finally, others will learn through trial and error.
the one thing by which everything else in your career
revolves around.
Here is the thing with reputations.
Once your reputation is set (whether it is good or it is
bad), it is very hard to change.
If you are seen favorably, more partners want you to work
with them, you get more choice of projects, you're able to
pick better projects, better clients, and better teams... and
not surprisingly, this often leads to you performing even
better.
Conversely, if your reputation starts off poor in a
consulting firm, you start a downward spiral.
Fewer partners want you to work on their engagements. You
get the worse managers (the ones nobody else wants to work with).
These managers don't coach you very well if at all... without
the coaching, you tend to do worse than your peers (while
still being held to the same standard) and the entire
process repeats and reinforces itself: If you ever end up in any professional
services business where your reputation was poor, the best
thing you can do is just quit and start over with no
reputation at another firm.
Apparently (and I now agree with this), having no reputation
is much better than having a bad reputation.
So what separates consultants who are strong performers vs.
those who are not?
While the list of distinguishing characteristics is long,
one trait that many McKinsey partners and engagement
managers often talk about is "coach-ability."
A new consultant is not expected to know everything from day
one. However, what is expected is that a new consultant will
be open to, listen to, and react favorable towards feedback.
So if your manager tells you that you need to do certain
things differently, if you are coachable, you will listen
and make improvements.
If you're not, you will be considered un-coachable and
stubborn... and often that is the beginning of the end of
one's career at a firm.
The people who often have the most difficultly with this
coach-ability trait are the consultants who have the highest
IQs and the biggest accomplishments before starting in
consulting.
Often this type of person finds it inconceivable that they
could possibly be doing something so poorly, when they used
to be so successful.
Rather than working on improving these new skills, they
start to argue with the manager as to why the manager or
partner is wrong.
This is not to say that managers and partners are always
right, but if you are arguing every feedback point... and
you're getting consistent feedback from multiple sources,
take a hard look at the data and consider that maybe the
feedback is right.
Some people have a very hard time with this, and ultimately
it hurts their careers -- hopefully only temporarily, but
often permanently.
This lack of "coach-ability" is really just a more specific
instance of someone generally being unwilling to learn from
others.
This more general trait is one that is absolutely positively
mandatory in consulting.
If you do not want to have to learn new things, don't go
into consulting!
You learn something new every day -- whether you are a new
analyst or a director with 20 years experience.
It is a factual reality of the profession (and some people
like me love it... others find it torture).
This is important to realize.
It is often very obvious which consultants in your office
are the ones who just got assigned to a new project. You can
often tell just by walking by their desk.
How can you tell?
They are the ones with a 1 - 2 foot stack of papers on their
desk that they are busy reading to "get up to speed" on a
new industry, a new client, and a new type of business
problem.
Often there are dozens of industry reports to read, dozens
of client materials to review, and entire stacks of practice
development training materials geared around a particular
kind of problem.
In most consulting firms, your colleagues will all have
strong learning skills.
Incidentally, this is one reason consulting firms favor
candidates with strong academic backgrounds -- at least you
don't have to worry that they are not capable of learning
something new (now getting them to be willing to learn is
something entirely different).
It's unlikely you will be more talented than your
colleagues. So the only differences between you and your
colleagues is what you learn and when you learn it.
For each project, there is a generally an obvious set of
documents to learn. Often one of your colleagues on a client
team (generally the one who used to be the "new" person on
the team prior to your arrival) will pass along his or her
big stack of papers to you... and eventually you will pass it
along to the next new person.
The project-specific learning materials tends to just
materialize when you need them. So everyone tends to learn
the same things at the same time in the lifecycle of their
role on a project.
Again, there is not much difference here.
Then there are the things one learns across multiple
projects... the skills of being a savvy consultant.
Most people will learn these skills within their first
two years of their consulting career.
Some will learn some elements of this through their firm's
new consultant training. Others will learn through feedback.
And finally, others will learn through trial and error.
Sunday, 8 January 2012
HOW TO ANALYSE DATA IN CASE INTERVIEW
One of the skills that's being tested during a case interview
is something I call data sufficiency.
Basically, you have a bunch of data and the question is do
you have ENOUGH data to make a particular conclusion.
This is certainly something that is tested during a live,
in-person, face-to-face case interview.
It is also a skill that is often tested in a variety of formats
including written tests before the first case interview.
An example of this is the McKinsey Problem Solving Test
which is a written test that evaluates your data sufficiency
skills (among others).
In parts of the McKinsey Problem Solving Test (also known
as the McKinsey PST), you are given a bunch of data and
some possible conclusions. Your job is to figure out which
conclusions are or are NOT supported by the facts presented.
Now this test is not intended to torture you (though I know
some people might argue with me on this one).
It turns out this is a very important skill once you're on the
job as a management consultant, especially as a first year
analyst or associate.
Data sufficiency is an important skill to master. Other
firms also look for this skills -- though how they do it
varies from McKinsey.
Most firms will just test for this skill implicitly during
a case interview and test verbally throughout the case.
Some firms, notably Monitor and in some countries BCG,
are testing for this skill in written tests similar to McKinsey's.
These are all variations of the same thing.
Given a set of data, will you determine the correct, logical, and
factually supported conclusion every time?
It's important because if you can NOT do this correctly 100%
of the time, then consulting firms can not put you in front of
client without extremely close supervision -- in other words,
they can't hire you.
is something I call data sufficiency.
Basically, you have a bunch of data and the question is do
you have ENOUGH data to make a particular conclusion.
This is certainly something that is tested during a live,
in-person, face-to-face case interview.
It is also a skill that is often tested in a variety of formats
including written tests before the first case interview.
An example of this is the McKinsey Problem Solving Test
which is a written test that evaluates your data sufficiency
skills (among others).
In parts of the McKinsey Problem Solving Test (also known
as the McKinsey PST), you are given a bunch of data and
some possible conclusions. Your job is to figure out which
conclusions are or are NOT supported by the facts presented.
Now this test is not intended to torture you (though I know
some people might argue with me on this one).
It turns out this is a very important skill once you're on the
job as a management consultant, especially as a first year
analyst or associate.
Data sufficiency is an important skill to master. Other
firms also look for this skills -- though how they do it
varies from McKinsey.
Most firms will just test for this skill implicitly during
a case interview and test verbally throughout the case.
Some firms, notably Monitor and in some countries BCG,
are testing for this skill in written tests similar to McKinsey's.
These are all variations of the same thing.
Given a set of data, will you determine the correct, logical, and
factually supported conclusion every time?
It's important because if you can NOT do this correctly 100%
of the time, then consulting firms can not put you in front of
client without extremely close supervision -- in other words,
they can't hire you.
Friday, 6 January 2012
The Importance of Budget Building
Budgeting is one of the most important skills to have to keep your expenses on track, and achieve freedom from debt and financial flexibility. Creating a personal budget will also help develop strong money management skills.
Personal budges allow you to make plan for the future and attain greater financial security. By using a budget, you'll know how much money is coming in every month as well as how much needs go out to cover your expenses. Once you know the difference, you can either adjust your lifestyle so that there's less wasteful spending, or you can take the money that's not being used to save for you or your family's future needs.
Many people don't realize how useful it can be to plan a budget, budgeting will allow you to find and save the money you need for any number of things, including vacations, college, a new home, or retirement.
Using a budget will teach you to value your money, and help you understand its power in your life if you know how to spend it more wisely. Also, if you find that you're in debt, having a budget in place will help you to conquer it quickly. Once you're out of debt, you can more effectively save for your future.
To create a budget, you should find a budgeting platform that you're comfortable with. Most people like to use a simple spreadsheet application on the computer. There are also several different budget software options available on the internet for download, either for pay or for free. Of course, if you're not comfortable using the computer, you can always make a budget with pen and paper.
Create two columns: one for income, and one for expenses. You'll want to begin by listing all of your fixed expenses: loan repayments, fixed-contract bills, etc. After this list your "variable" expenses: things which you have to pay for in a predictable manner, but which might cost a little more or a little less each month; these things could be food, entertainment, dining out, and many others.
For these items, put down an estimated amount of how much you currently spend. Add together all the totals in the expenses category, then list any income, and add that together as well. Don't forget to deduct taxes and other costs from your gross income to get your net income.
Subtract your expenses from your income to find the difference. If you have a surplus, then you can use that money for savings: vacations, a home, or even for emergencies. If, however, you find that you have a deficit, try to find places where you can adjust the amounts that you pay so that your budget is at least balanced. (Variable expenses are a good place to start.)
You'll find at 20-25% of your total costs can be reduced simply by cutting back in areas like entertainment and paying off your credit cards. If you're able to pay off your debts quickly, that's more money that you gather interest on in savings, rather than paying interest on it.
Also think about comparing your budgets from month to month to see if there are places where you're doing better, or could be doing better with a little tweaking...
Personal budges allow you to make plan for the future and attain greater financial security. By using a budget, you'll know how much money is coming in every month as well as how much needs go out to cover your expenses. Once you know the difference, you can either adjust your lifestyle so that there's less wasteful spending, or you can take the money that's not being used to save for you or your family's future needs.
Many people don't realize how useful it can be to plan a budget, budgeting will allow you to find and save the money you need for any number of things, including vacations, college, a new home, or retirement.
Using a budget will teach you to value your money, and help you understand its power in your life if you know how to spend it more wisely. Also, if you find that you're in debt, having a budget in place will help you to conquer it quickly. Once you're out of debt, you can more effectively save for your future.
To create a budget, you should find a budgeting platform that you're comfortable with. Most people like to use a simple spreadsheet application on the computer. There are also several different budget software options available on the internet for download, either for pay or for free. Of course, if you're not comfortable using the computer, you can always make a budget with pen and paper.
Create two columns: one for income, and one for expenses. You'll want to begin by listing all of your fixed expenses: loan repayments, fixed-contract bills, etc. After this list your "variable" expenses: things which you have to pay for in a predictable manner, but which might cost a little more or a little less each month; these things could be food, entertainment, dining out, and many others.
For these items, put down an estimated amount of how much you currently spend. Add together all the totals in the expenses category, then list any income, and add that together as well. Don't forget to deduct taxes and other costs from your gross income to get your net income.
Subtract your expenses from your income to find the difference. If you have a surplus, then you can use that money for savings: vacations, a home, or even for emergencies. If, however, you find that you have a deficit, try to find places where you can adjust the amounts that you pay so that your budget is at least balanced. (Variable expenses are a good place to start.)
You'll find at 20-25% of your total costs can be reduced simply by cutting back in areas like entertainment and paying off your credit cards. If you're able to pay off your debts quickly, that's more money that you gather interest on in savings, rather than paying interest on it.
Also think about comparing your budgets from month to month to see if there are places where you're doing better, or could be doing better with a little tweaking...
Anger management
Understanding anger
It's important to realise several things about anger before you start tackling it. First, anger is a normal process that has allowed humans to evolve and adapt. It isn't a bad thing in itself, but problems occur if it isn't managed in the right way.Anger is also a mixture of both emotional and physical changes. A big surge of energy goes through your body as chemicals, such as adrenaline, are released.
Once the cause of the anger is resolved, you may still have to deal with the physical effects - all that energy has to go somewhere. This can be taken out on another person, such as a partner, or an object - by punching a wall, for example. This last option can lead down the road to self-harm.
The other alternative is to suppress the energy until the next time you're angry. This may mean you release so much pent-up emotion that you overreact to the situation. Realising this can lead to feelings of shame or frustration when you reflect on your actions, and to further repression of your feelings.
On the other hand, just letting your anger go in an uncontrolled fashion can lead to a move from verbal aggression to physical abuse - don't forget, the other person is probably feeling angry with you too.
But there is a flip side to anger. Because of the surge of energy it creates, it can be pleasurable. This feeling is reinforced if becoming angry allows the release of feelings of frustration, or if a person's response to your anger gives you a sense of power.
It's important to acknowledge and keep an eye on this side of the problem - it can have an almost addictive element.
Recognising why you get angry
It's important to be aware of the positive feelings you get from anger as well as the negative ones.By recognising the positive and negative feelings associated with your anger, it's important to find other means of achieving and concentrating on the positives ones.
Each person's positives are different, so there will be different solutions for everyone, but some strategies might include:
- Trying a non-contact competitive sport.
- Learning relaxation or meditation.
- Shouting and screaming in a private, quiet place.
- Banging your fists into a pillow.
- Going running.
Anger management techniques
However, this still leaves the problem of dealing differently with those situations that make you angry. This takes practice.The first thing to do is list the situations that make you angry. Note down exactly what it is about them that makes you angry - it may be the immediate situation, or it could be that it represents a build-up of issues you haven't resolved.
Now ask yourself four questions about your interpretation of these situations:
- What evidence is there to show this is accurate?
- Is there another equally believable interpretation of what's going on here?
- What action can I take to have some control of the situation?
- If my best friend were in this situation, what advice would I give to them?
If your anger isn't resolved by this, make sure you've given enough thought to what exactly you’re angry about. You need to be sure exactly before you can resolve it. It will usually involve a person, but not necessarily the one who's the target of your anger in the situation and this is the person you need to work the situation out with.
To do this, find a time to raise the problem when you feel more in control of your temper. It may be a good idea to agree a time in advance.
CUDSAIR
It may feel like a tall order to discuss the issue without getting angry, but following a plan may help. Professor Richard Nelson-Jones has developed a good structure to use, called CUDSAIR. This stands for:- Confront.
- Understand.
- Define.
- Search.
- Agree.
- Implement.
- Review.
Next, it's important to understand each other's view of the situation. It may help to agree that each person should be able to say what they think about the problem without being interrupted by the other. After this, identify areas where you disagree. Don't discuss the disagreements yet, just agree that you disagree. This is how you define the problem.
The next step is to search for solutions. Here, be as outrageous as you like - but again, don't make personal attacks. Generate as many possible solutions as you can - at the moment, it doesn't matter how unrealistic they seem.
Finally, you have to agree on a solution. This is probably the most delicate part of the whole process. It's important that you both make concessions and acknowledge those that the other person has made. It's also important not to have unrealistic expectations - it's likely that the final solution won't be ideal for either of you, but the resulting compromise will probably be better than the problems the anger generated.
It's important that you both keep to the agreement. It's also important not to overreact to any breaches. Point them out, but there's no need to get angry. You have the agreement to back you up.
However well you both stick to the agreement, it's worth having a review some time in the future to go through the CUDSAIR model again and see if things can't be improved further.
Time to Rethink Business Strategies
Many companies are being forced to set a new direction in the post-crisis environment, and these new mandates mean a regenerated need for consultants. However restricted budgets and the continuation of the challenging business environment mean that many corporations are reconsidering their relationships with consultancies and many feel this may lead to significant changes in the consulting industry overall. With a slow return of positive global economic indicators, numbers for the consulting industry are coming back up to pre-recessionary levels: billing rates are increasing again, as they did for years before economic disaster struck in 2008, pipelines are bulging and recruiters are busy.
Even with a downturn in public sector business, reports show that private sector growth is positive fueled primarily by the financial services industry. Overall, fee income from banking in the U.K. grew by 35 percent in 2010 as compared with an overall fee growth in the private sector of 10 percent. Consulting demand from other service lines such as TMT, energy & utilities, pharmaceuticals & life sciences and retail & consumer goods are all strong, with most of the demand driven by supply chain and logistics work, whereas risk, regulation and broader operational consulting is fueling the demand in financial services.
Off to a Good Start
Many publicly-traded consultancies are off to great starts. Accenture has had a strong start to the year with nearly 20 percent growth over last year, reporting its second highest level of consulting bookings ever in their first quarter earnings report, while the Management Consulting Group, which owns Kurt Salmon and Proudfoot, has seen an 88 percent increase in operating profits.
With cash reserves high and demand rebounding for consulting services worldwide, it was inevitable that consultancies would dip back into the acquisition market in 2011.
A handful of big name firms have added pieces, ranging from small regional units to large international players in the past few weeks.
Ernst & Young for instance, picked up the private boutique ISA Consulting to strengthen its advisory division. With the acquisition of the smaller firm’s business performance
management, business intelligence and data integration areas, E & Y is attempting to be better positioned to provide business insight and drive improved corporate performance. Deloitte, KPMG and Capgemini are also actively expanding their business advisory and business consultancy divisions.
Campus Recruiting Heating Up
Another indicator of growth in the consulting industry is that MBAs are enjoying record levels of recruitment attention from consultancies in 2011, and if top MBA forecasters are correct, demand will continue to increase by as much as 37 percent in 2011. Virtually all of the leading firms are hiring and large players like Accenture and IBM expect continued growth in this activity as client companies look to reduce costs. Experienced hires are also on the rise due in part to high attrition rates driven by consultants who have not seen pay raises over the last three years.
Reports predict that consultancies will have to hire 23 percent of their current headcount in order to tackle attrition and meet growth rates. For companies faced with the difficult tasks of rebuilding key business units damaged in the crisis or in the following economic downturn, hiring consultancies to address their business concerns is an expensive undertaking. Consequently, many large multinational corporations are looking for alternatives to traditional consultancy engagements and in some cases this has given rise to the use of internal consulting units.
In-house consultancies are small departments staffed with project, change or strategy managers responsible for solving many of the same problems their employers would have hired outside consultants to accomplish. Not only does the addition of an internal consulting division save money, but it also provides an organization with high quality reusable skills and resources.
A Threat From Within?
Industry experts believe that these internal consulting units pose a genuine threat to traditional consulting firms and look to Germany where this trend has gained significant traction. The downside, however, is that in-house consulting divisions will struggle to provide insight on matters that require specialized knowledge, and may also be too close to their own brand and too invested in the corporate power structure to make the hard decisions, and deliver the demonstrably objective messages, regularly sought from external unbiased consultants.
Another trend growing in popularity is the “consultant-manager” or interim manager role. This role often comprises of a former senior consultant hired into the client’s organization, with the specific experience and in-sights of the consulting industry, whose mandate is to supervise and direct the work of both independent consultants and internal teams.
Obviously, this approach guards the client against costly “project creep” which gives rise to the growth of large-scale programs employing scores of junior consultants, which may be more beneficial to the consultancy than to the client. The consultant-manager is responsible for making projects shorter, more intense, and less lucrative for the consultancies. The advent of these two new approaches could theoretically curb growth in consulting and leave us with a very different looking consulting industry.
A third option is seen in the growth of small, sleek consulting firms such as Satori Consulting, which have models heavily weighted towards senior consultants with experience from Big Four firms. Satori’s business model aims at putting competent, seasoned consultants into a client’s business operations and allowing them to add project management direction and process expertise into projects delivered through the client’s internal resources.
This paradigm takes the benefits of other approaches and rolls them into one. “Our business model protects the client from having to buy the large consulting teams that are typical large company sales models demand. Partners at the big firms are under enormous pressure to sell millions of dollars worth of work clients tell us that this pressure can become apparent when it comes to projects. On the other hand, Satori’s model allows the client to pay only for what they need, optimize their talent in-house and still get the independent, fresh perspective of a skilled, independent, senior consulting professional,” explains a partner at Satori Consulting.
Conclusion
Whatever your approach, it seems clear that with an improving, yet uncertain, economic climate and the largest financial regulatory changes in history, consulting is on the rise. How businesses decide to fold consulting services into their organization will be an important strategic decision that could well decide a firm’s competitive advantage in a changing and challenging marketplace.
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