These are my notes on the consulting process. In general, the following rules apply to the consulting process:

1. Simplify complexity
2. Look for long-term relationships
3. Gain new business from existing clients
4. Everyone is responsible for finding or creating new business
5. Consulting is a people business; communication is key

A consulting practice creates a process that wraps around all their work. This process is a value-add for their engagements. This process should not be deviated from, even if the client wants a different process.

Your Consulting Process

Your goal is to define a project methodology and adhere to it. This differentiates you from other consulting firms.

Spend time during the sales process to convince clients you are the best for a software development job because you follow your own software development life cycle process, that you have created and shared with them. If this is the case, it is important to show the client that you are following your own steps and that the steps are being completed according to the engagement schedule and the rules of your methodology.

Kickoff

During kickoff, and initial communications with a client, your consulting process should be explained to the client. Trust and empathy should also be conveyed to clients on initial engagements.

Trust

According to The Trusted Advisor, these are the five things that may destroy trust with a client on an engagement:

1. Compromising the confidences of an individual.
2. Not picking up the sense that a client may have questions, uncertainties, or unhappiness about a certain aspect of your work.
3. Going around or behind the client to get something done, even if it was something important.
4. Engaging in “I am sometimes wrong but never in doubt” behavior.
5. Blowing a deadline that’s important to the client.

Why is trust so important according to The Trusted Advisor:

1. To gain repeat business from the same client;
2. To gain new business through referrals from your client;
3. Trusted relationships have less time-wasting procedures;
4. Trusted relationships have a combination of high profit and are more enjoyable for the advisor.

RESOURCE: The Trusted Advisor by David H. Maister (et. al.)

Empathy

To garner empathy with clients during a project, you must realize the top fears of all clients:

• Loss of control
• Risk of failure
• Not getting what they want
• The consultant does not understand my business
• The consultant will recommend more expensive solutions than the problem requires
• The consultant does not understand the client’s budget constraints
• The solution costs too much
• The consultant does not have enough skills/expertise

Understanding client fears and addressing them helps the communication process.

Communication

As an IT consultant you need exposure to different kinds of people and different kinds of communication. Sometimes you deal with people who are fact driven and tell you what they want the final outcome of a system to produce. Other people use communication to build relationships. Both sets of people need to be told exactly what you will do for them: what it will require and exactly how the final outcome will function. This helps them understand the effort that you put into the project and it shows them sides of the project that they did not consider. It is important for clients to trust you, but that does not mean you should build the system your way and assume they will like it. They need to be involved in the process even if they do not want to be. Generally, clients want to be involved in the creative process. Do not leave them out of the picture and assume your design is what they want.

Always define the next steps. If any client with an open project is wondering—at any point in the project—what is the current status of my project: you have failed in your communication with them. Every communication with the client should cover the things you promised to discuss with them, any new concerns, and what you will discuss with them and accomplish for the next time you speak.

Managing client expectations is the name of the game. Always present yourself as an advocate for your client. Be genuinely concerned for their situation, problem or project goals. The client is simply looking for one of these things in every situation:

1. Availability – The client is looking to make some process or function easy for themselves, possibly because it is difficult currently.
2. Affability – The client is looking to be closer and/or more accessible to their customers or at least appear that way.
3. Ability – The client is looking to do some function that is entirely new to them. In this situation your expertise may be what the client is seeking out.
4. Accountability – The client wants the consultant to be responsible for functioning, fixing and improving some function or process.

The more you can empathize with the client’s goals the easier it is to formulate your communication with your client. Think to yourself, how would I feel receiving this email or statement of scope? Does it effectively communicate and address all of my client’s concerns?

Project Estimation

Before you scope out any project with pricing associated with it, two pieces of information are required:

1. Full understanding of the client’s budget to define realistic scope
2. Full understanding of the client’s goals (“must haves” versus “nice to haves” versus “no one really wants to haves”)

Try to keep estimates high-level so client’s do not pick and choose the functionality they want and try to create their own estimate from yours. This creates a new set of problems for you to address.

Break out scope into phases, break out each task into its proper phase, assign one or more resources to each task, associate the time estimate to each resource in a task, associate the resource with an hourly price and a profit margin including any expected overhead. Add demos and meetings at the end of each logical phase for the client to see the work. Total the work thus far and add percentages to the total for project management and meetings.

During the sales process, never commit to starting a project right away. It doesn’t look good if you have full availability immediately.

Proposal/Responding to RFPs

The proposal defines the deliverables of an engagement. It defines the project team and is a precursor to the project plan. It tells the client your pricing structure and is delivered with a formal request for business. When answering a request for proposal, the proposal is your interface to the client and a representation of who you are and what you will deliver. The proposal tells the client why you deserve their business. Proposals are important since they:

• Frame/describe the problem
• List customer objectives
• Define engagement scope
• Describe deliverables
• Describe costs and benefits
• Create schedule and project plan
• Display timing and fees
• Define your quality management process and project management methodology
• Define the customer roles and commitment

The proposal should address the entire client organization to ensure by-in from the entire organization. Do not assume the client reading the proposal is from the department requesting the business. The CEO and anyone who has a vested or non-vested interest in the project may be reading the proposal.

Future Work Scenario

Some clients are adept at working with consultants. It may be how the majority of their work is accomplished. These clients may tend to add scope or replace small chucks of scope with larger chunks of scope and ask you to define what makes it larger or different where they assume it should be the same or smaller. They also employee the “future work scenario” which is difficult to avoid or not allow it to influence your current work or project. They implore you to just do this work now for the current project and you can make up the cost later with the other, bigger project that they want to do next or next year. In consulting it is easy to be influenced by this future work scenario, but there is never a guarantee that the work will produce itself and there is no guarantee that the work will go to you. You can tell that a client is adept at this strategy when they initially discuss several projects and want to focus on one first. They already have you thinking about all of the projects that may come in the future.

Role Playing

During the sales process it is necessary to gather the team together and perform some role playing for the purpose of covering all basis and playing devil’s advocate for an unfamiliar client. To truly get a lot of good feedback the sales team should pitch a proposal to a team acting as the client and then they should switch so the sales team acts as the client. This may also reveal team members as talented debaters.

Following Up

In any business, once the product is delivered or the service is complete, the company should follow up with the buyer to ensure satisfaction. It is a poor sign of a business that does not do this. In consulting you can learn a lot about your success by following up with the customer after a project is complete. Ideally you want to know what parts of the system work well and which under-perform or are less used. Building metrics into components can allow you to see the useability of a system. Following up with surveys and meetings can help find the comfort of the client after the engagement. It is important to get information from the users of the system and not just the C level. They will tell you what they love and hate about it.