Outside help through business consultants… Some have tried it, some have never thought of it, and some thrive because of it. Is it for you? Take a look below and learn how this powerful resource can not only provide expert opinion and experience; but it might just save your business!
We are a firm specializing in lean consulting. We see examples of how outside consulting, and in particular our service, can be an extremely important ingredient in business success. However, we wanted to hear from others to help emphasize the point and also to learn some new perspectives. So we recently sent out a query using Help a Reporter Out (www.helpareporter.com). Our goal was to learn a little from business owners, executives and even consultants about how outside consulting support should be an invaluable and integral component of just about any business strategy.
Read on to hear from a few of our respondents. The overall theme we enountered while studying these businesses was that the commitment and risk associated with partnering with consultants is very low, but the upside payback can be and most often is something you may never achieve or even dream of on your own.
Freedom From All Internal Constraints
Mike Jaffe writes to us that the outside perspective leaves all kinds of constraints, such as power plays and others, off of the table…
- Different vested interest – Many times the direction and lens with which internal staff attempt to direct strategy and problem resolution is influenced by what’s also in their own best interests in terms of self-preservation and demonstrating value. While this is not always a bad thing, it can be very limiting and short-sighted for defining innovative and longer term direction for an organization. An outside consultant can take an approach that’s role-agnostic, seeking to define or redefine roles, responsibilities and specific strategy to what’s best for the overall firm or group without getting entangled in the political maneuvering or suppressing ideas because it will affect one individual’s status. Good external consultants have the ability to ask difficult questions, as well as make challenging statements to push clients to consider new alternatives.
- Not tied to legacy success or failure – Many times companies find themselves doing the same things over and over while expecting different outcomes. “This is the way we always do it” or “this is how we do things around here” may provide some comfort and familiarity in approach, but an outside and objective perspective can use varied experiences to bring industry knowledge and other best practices into your strategic thinking to help you step outside the familiar and relate to people and challenges in new ways. By unveiling old limiting beliefs, behaviors and habits, a fresh, new perspective is revealed.
- Ability to unlock upside potential and possibility – key to successful leadership is continuous personal change. Managing a business is like any role in life – it often requires the keen eye of an outsider to point out your blind spot and introduce you to new possibilities. For some of us, being challenged with the right questions is all that is needed to change old thinking and behavior. For others, only pointed, direct feedback will spur us to change. The best consultants/coaches will have self-reliance as a key objective. In other words, they don’t just provide solutions, but they teach their clients to fish.
- Greater focus, clarity and purpose – Outside consultants and coaches have one focus – to serve that client in a way that adds the most value to the client and their organization. They are not ensconced in the myriad roles and distractions that pull on internal staff, mired in the many meetings that, while valuable, are not nearly efficient enough. On any given day we are surrounded by little fires to extinguish which, if we let them, will divert us away from our priorities and goals. An executive consultant/coach shows you how to best evaluate each course of action and prioritize tasks while remaining ‘outside of the noise’.
- Influence across groups/teams – Many companies are increasingly relying on cross functional teams, project teams, and virtual teams, to get things done with fewer resources and in less time. It can be difficult having one of the internal teams take the lead without spurring resentment and power positioning among the different groups. Powerful and objective facilitation led by a trusted outside resource enables all of the teams and their leaders to feel empowered and accountable, so that all feel they have a voice and can contribute towards a shared goal.
~Mike Jaffe, aka The Human WakeUp Call™ - Jaffe Life Design LLC; Transformational Coaching, Motivational Speaking, Engaging Teambuilding; www.humanwakeupcall.com
The Ability To Pull “The Brand” From Within
Thorsten Hoins believes that the outside consulatant can and will pull hidden, latent, or unknown skills out from the owner that will result in business growth…
It can be summed up in this company tagline: “All Successful Company Founders Have This Priceless Power – – But Few Develop The Skill To Harness It”
It is believed by some business leaders, like Mr. Hoins, that most every company owner or founder has this innate ability to propel powerful execution throughout every facet of their business, but they either don’t know it or they don’t know how to harness it.
Case in point is brand stewardship: To business owners, it comes intuitively and thus stays under-leveraged. Once consciously deployed, it leads to a myriad of advantages: cost savings (no need to hire a CMO), accountability (ability to evaluate and direct brand work with copywriters, designers, PR pros), expert knowledge, and others.
Brand Stewardship is the skill that Howard Schultz, Steve Jobs and Sam Walton brought to Starbucks, Apple and Walmart. It is the skill that drives every scalable business strategy you will ever undertake. And it is the skill that is most often overlooked, misunderstood or delegated to the wrong people.
~Thorsten Hoins - Space 2 Scale; Helping business owners realize the freedom that comes with branding – or rebranding – a proven concept or going concern and positioning it for take-off; http://www.space2scale.com/
Time is Money – Why Not Save Both?
Jeff Touzeou of Hummingbird Media believes the advantages come from the highly-tuned skills and money-saving capabilities associated with outside IT consultants….
One of Jeff’s clients, a hi-tech IT consulting firm, Astreya, serves some of the largest companies in the world with outside tech consulting support. Hi tech is an area where outside consultants (once again, in this case “outsourced infrastructure support”) provide an enormous cost benefit because these folks are experienced in a targeted area, and help these clients set up in new geographies, other locations, etc. very, very quickly. More companies are opting for this approach since it is proven and they ONLY focuses on these specific skill sets.
Clients know they are getting the real deal.
~Jeff Touzeau - Hummingbird Media, Inc.; Public Relatons and Corporate Ccommunications Serving the Consumer Electronics, Pro Audio and Networking Communications Markets; http://www.hummingbirdmedia.com/
Checklist for Evaluating Outside Consultant Performance
Deon Binneman makes a good point by providing a checklist for reviewing work done by an outside consultant. All yes answers are the preferred and usual response when a good consulant comes on board and makes a positive change!
(Source: Adapted from Managing the Professional Service firm – David Maister)
Did the Consultant….
– Make it their business to understand what was special and unique about you and your company?
– Listen carefully to what you say and what you wanted, rather than substitute their own judgment for yours on what needs to be done?
The first two questions speaks about doing adequate diagnostic work, such as adequate scoping of the project and determining gap analysis. ~DB
- Give good explanations what they are doing and why? I love this about my doctor & dentist. Since they know I am interested and have medical experience in the Armed Forces, they always tell me in detail about what procedure they will follow or about what medication they will prescribe. BUT they do it without being over scientific nor complicated. ~DB
– Let you know in advance what they are going to do?
– Keep you sufficiently informed on progress? This is something which I also discovered in my research (Disclaimer: I run Marketing a Professional Practice in the Southern African space). It is vital to keep clients in the loop. I do that weekly when busy on a project if no defined communication was imposed. You never know when a client might be in a meeting and be asked for an impromptu progress report by other internal stakeholders. ~DB
– Avoid confusing jargon? This is vital to keeping lines of communication open. Better still: try and use the language of your client or their terminology. ~DB
– Keep promises on deadlines? Another vital aspect especially should there be internal audit review processes. ~DB
– Document their work activities well?
– Make sure they were accessible and available when you needed them?
– Make you feel as if you were important to them?
– Show an interest in you beyond the scope of the task?
– Were helpful beyond the specifics of the project? This also amounts to the sharing of resources and coaching and guiding your client in whatever gaps you may see. ~DB
Most clients say that if they found a provider that RELIABLY behaved in the words described, they would be:
– More likely to return to that provider
– More willing to refer to that provider
– Less fee-sensitive about that providers’ services
It is not only what you do or what value you have to offer, it is also about How you do things. Like many relationships analyses have shown – it is normally the small things that can destroy a working relationship. ~DB
~Deon Binneman - speaker, seminar leader, trainer, consultant, coach, thought leader and change agent that advises companies how to build, sustain, protect and restore business reputations with stakeholders; http://www.deonbinneman.wordpress.com
So,… there you have it! Some great reasons to seek someone out who can look in from the outside! The highlights:
- No internal constraints
- Ability to pull and leverage that brand power from the top
- Expert technology nd cost/time savings
- Meet and exceed the needs of the client
Please visit the links to out contributors’ sites for more details on how you ca use outside consultants to give your business that boost that may not come from inside!
Related articles
- What Exactly You Must Know About A Strategy Consulting Business (plusstuff.com)
- 8 Tips for Building & Sustaining a Thriving Consultancy Practice (businessinsider.com)
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