TRUE STORIES FROM THE FIELD
In the following seven sections, I briefly describe a series of real situations and the lessons learned from each experience.
Section 1: Understand Your Client
Understanding your client is the fundamental skill necessary for any consultant.
Even though you are contracted to provide a specialized service, your client is “your boss.”
It is important to understand the client and their perspective on the problem and their expectations. You also need to understand the organizational culture so that you can carry out your tasks successfully without any side issues.
Section 2: Potholes and Pitfalls
The stories in this section focus on the various things that you would never expect to occur.
These are stories about situations one could never predict, but you need to deal with them. You need to find ways to adjust and refocus to successfully complete your project.
Section 3: Ethics and Professionalism
These two topics should go without saying in any consulting field. Unfortunately, such is not the case.
These stories cover a range of ethical and professional situations. Many of these situations are seldom easily resolved.
Our experiences with these issues are dealt with in these stories.
Section 4: Expert Witness and Hearings
Consultants in many fields may find themselves providing evidence in a variety of legal or quasi-legal settings. Consultants may seek out expert witness opportunities–most will not. Hearings are often adversarial and result in considerable stress for the consultants. Stories in this section relate to my experiences and how I managed to develop a positive attitude towards being an expert witness and taking part in hearings.
The lessons learned in my situations can be helpful to any consultant involved in hearings.
Section 5: Referrals/Networking
Referrals are an excellent way to get projects because people in your network recommend you.
Networking is an essential activity to get consultant visibility. Networking takes time but is a useful marketing approach. With visibility and a reputation for doing good work, referrals will come easily.
These stories show the benefits of both.
Section 6: Serendipity
The stories in this section are amazing in terms of how I and my colleagues and company benefitted from a series of events that we did not initiate or control. The fact is that if you stay active and visible—keep doing what you are doing and do it well—good things might come your way.
Section 7: Indigenous Peoples
The work with Indigenous Peoples requires a good understanding of the cultures and the histories of their relationships with various governments and other organizations. The projects require a different attitude and approach from consultants to achieve success.
While my Indigenous Peoples’ projects are all Canada based, the lessons learned can also apply to other cultures and other parts of the world.
1.0 Understand Your Client
The stories in this section convey the circumstances I have experienced in seeking to meet my clients’ needs while fitting in with each client’s organizational culture. Each of these real experiences help to identify the kind of thinking that was in the minds of the clients as well as the importance of understanding your client. You, as the consultant, need to recognize that the leadership in every organization has values and perspectives. Organizations want those values and perspectives to be observed by everyone working with them and for them. It is essential that you fit in with your clients so they can concentrate on the work that you are doing rather than being pulled away by differences in values. Opinions on something that you may find to be irrelevant may be central to their belief system and their operation. This set of stories will clearly show you a wide range of situations where it was important to understand and recognize the needs of each client.
I Will Break Your Neck
My company was competing with many large consulting organizations to carry out the strategic plan for a mid-size city. It was a very tough competition and there were over twenty proposals submitted. Eventually the city was down to half a dozen for interviews. The date scheduled for our interview was not one I could attend. Being that I was the consultant project director, it made it difficult for me as I was committed to make a major presentation on the same date at the annual conference for the American Society for Training and Development in Los Angeles.
I could not get the city to change the meeting time. To make our best presentation, several senior staff from our company attended. Since I was the project director, I decided to do something a little different. This was in the 1980s— long before FaceTime calls and Zoom meetings. I decided to make a video indicating I was sorry that I could not be there (including why I could not attend). I laid out for the city how I thought we would implement the project and why it would be to the benefit of this council and the citizens to hire us to do the job.
Interestingly we won the job and the council members who selected us kept referring me as “the video man” because of the little extra effort we put in to convince them we were the right team for the job. My colleagues and I found the reference to “video man” entertaining because I was then, and still am, one of the least technologically competent people on the planet!
Before we started the project, I was to meet with the mayor who was not involved in the consultant selection process. The mayor at the time happened to be an ex-football player who was very proud of being a football player. He had trophies and footballs and game pictures throughout his office. The mayor and I talked for a while as he and I were trying to get to know each other. He mentioned to me: “l understand besides being a consultant, you are also a university professor,” and I said yes. Then he looked me in the eye and said, “If I ever hear the word ‘holistic’ come out of your mouth, I am going to break your freeken neck!” This conveyed to me that he had issues with the kind of wording that academics use, and this would set him off and would lead to a more difficult relationship. I responded that “l don’t even know what that word means so you don’t have to worry about me using it.” I never used it at all during the year that it took to carry out the strategic plan which, by all accounts, was very well done and in large part implemented by the city.
Lessons Learned
As always, you need to fit in with your client and the culture of the organization. You need to be careful not to do anything that would disrupt the relationship by making the client feel you are not properly linked with them.
Do whatever it takes to meet your client’s timelines at the proposal stage. Do not expect the client to accommodate your constraints. I never liked the word “holistic” anyway. It is among the words used by academics and politicians when they really cannot explain what they are talking about.