Business consultancy, once an art, has, as many other
professions, opened itself to pedestrian intellects. On
occasion, following the consultant's advice leads to
bankruptcy.
To protect yourself and your business, choose wisely.
When considering a consultant ask him or her what they intend
to do. You want a response as simple and clear as possible.
You are listening to hear for something like;
"I intend to walk through all aspects of your business as a
client,"
or "I intend to join your work force as an employee".
You don't want to hear the long words and complicated
concepts some recent graduates throw around to make
their job seem so very technical.
I recall once telling a C.E.O. I intended to watch telephone
usage and he became livid.
"That's all?"
"No, but it's a start."
He considered me a complete duffer and hired a firm which
cost him an arm a leg and his favorite kidney which basically
notated telephone usage to see which employees spent most of
the day on the phone not working.
Of course, they made other recommendations, as I would of,
but when it comes to an immediate need to downsize yesterday,
this is one of the knee jerk responses.
In one "clean-up" situation I came in to find that another
consultant had seen the computers running a Legacy system,
instantly settled that this was the problem, and had the
company purchase a dozen new computers running the latest
Gatesware.
The business came to a dead stop as twenty years of work
which was saved under the encryption of the Legacy, could
not be read by any other system.
The old computers had run the Legacy with memory to spare,
but couldn't have run Windows '98. Of course, if one doesn't
use memory gobbling software, one does not need a great
deal of memory.
This business ceased to function until I located the one
person who had this Legacy system and could reinstall it.
What boggled the mind was how any one calling him or herself
a consultant could look at the physical machines and not at
the program it was running or the work it was producing.
This is the key feature; it's not the color of the walls,
it is the material that makes up the walls. A good consultant
can see the plyboard or the concrete, a pedestrian one, that
the wall needs painting.
Before you hire consultants, make sure they know what
they are doing, can explain it to you in simple language
and are prepared to walk through your business, from top
to bottom to ensure that the advice they are giving is
tailored to your company, not paragraph 876 from a text
book.
