- •In praise of the fourth edition
- •CONTENTS
- •FOREWORD
- •The concept of consulting
- •Purpose of the book
- •Terminology
- •Plan of the book
- •ABBREVIATIONS AND ACRONYMS
- •1.1 What is consulting?
- •Box 1.1 On giving and receiving advice
- •1.2 Why are consultants used? Five generic purposes
- •Figure 1.1 Generic consulting purposes
- •Box 1.2 Define the purpose, not the problem
- •1.3 How are consultants used? Ten principal ways
- •Box 1.3 Should consultants justify management decisions?
- •1.4 The consulting process
- •Figure 1.2 Phases of the consulting process
- •1.5 Evolving concepts and scope of management consulting
- •2 THE CONSULTING INDUSTRY
- •2.1 A historical perspective
- •2.2 The current consulting scene
- •2.3 Range of services provided
- •2.4 Generalist and specialist services
- •2.5 Main types of consulting organization
- •2.6 Internal consultants
- •2.7 Management consulting and other professions
- •Figure 2.1 Professional service infrastructure
- •2.8 Management consulting, training and research
- •Box 2.1 Factors differentiating research and consulting
- •3.1 Defining expectations and roles
- •Box 3.1 What it feels like to be a buyer
- •3.2 The client and the consultant systems
- •Box 3.2 Various categories of clients within a client system
- •Box 3.3 Attributes of trusted advisers
- •3.4 Behavioural roles of the consultant
- •Box 3.4 Why process consultation must be a part of every consultation
- •3.5 Further refinement of the role concept
- •3.6 Methods of influencing the client system
- •3.7 Counselling and coaching as tools of consulting
- •Box 3.5 The ICF on coaching and consulting
- •4 CONSULTING AND CHANGE
- •4.1 Understanding the nature of change
- •Figure 4.1 Time span and level of difficulty involved for various levels of change
- •Box 4.1 Which change comes first?
- •Box 4.2 Reasons for resistance to change
- •4.2 How organizations approach change
- •Box 4.3 What is addressed in planning change?
- •Box 4.4 Ten overlapping management styles, from no participation to complete participation
- •4.3 Gaining support for change
- •4.4 Managing conflict
- •Box 4.5 How to manage conflict
- •4.5 Structural arrangements and interventions for assisting change
- •5 CONSULTING AND CULTURE
- •5.1 Understanding and respecting culture
- •Box 5.1 What do we mean by culture?
- •5.2 Levels of culture
- •Box 5.2 Cultural factors affecting management
- •Box 5.3 Japanese culture and management consulting
- •Box 5.4 Cultural values and norms in organizations
- •5.3 Facing culture in consulting assignments
- •Box 5.5 Characteristics of “high-tech” company cultures
- •6.1 Is management consulting a profession?
- •6.2 The professional approach
- •Box 6.1 The power of the professional adviser
- •Box 6.2 Is there conflict of interest? Test your value system.
- •Box 6.3 On audit and consulting
- •6.3 Professional associations and codes of conduct
- •6.4 Certification and licensing
- •Box 6.4 International model for consultant certification (CMC)
- •6.5 Legal liability and professional responsibility
- •7 ENTRY
- •7.1 Initial contacts
- •Box 7.1 What a buyer looks for
- •7.2 Preliminary problem diagnosis
- •Figure 7.1 The consultant’s approach to a management survey
- •Box 7.2 Information materials for preliminary surveys
- •7.3 Terms of reference
- •Box 7.3 Terms of reference – checklist
- •7.4 Assignment strategy and plan
- •Box 7.4 Concepts and terms used in international technical cooperation projects
- •7.5 Proposal to the client
- •7.6 The consulting contract
- •Box 7.5 Confidential information on the client organization
- •Box 7.6 What to cover in a contract – checklist
- •8 DIAGNOSIS
- •8.1 Conceptual framework of diagnosis
- •8.2 Diagnosing purposes and problems
- •Box 8.1 The focus purpose – an example
- •Box 8.2 Issues in problem identification
- •8.3 Defining necessary facts
- •8.4 Sources and ways of obtaining facts
- •Box 8.3 Principles of effective interviewing
- •8.5 Data analysis
- •Box 8.4 Cultural factors in data-gathering – some examples
- •Box 8.5 Difficulties and pitfalls of causal analysis
- •Figure 8.1 Force-field analysis
- •Figure 8.2 Various bases for comparison
- •8.6 Feedback to the client
- •9 ACTION PLANNING
- •9.1 Searching for possible solutions
- •Box 9.1 Checklist of preliminary considerations
- •Box 9.2 Variables for developing new forms of transport
- •9.2 Developing and evaluating alternatives
- •Box 9.3 Searching for an ideal solution – three checklists
- •9.3 Presenting action proposals to the client
- •10 IMPLEMENTATION
- •10.1 The consultant’s role in implementation
- •10.2 Planning and monitoring implementation
- •10.3 Training and developing client staff
- •10.4 Some tactical guidelines for introducing changes in work methods
- •Figure 10.1 Comparison of the effects on eventual performance when using individualized versus conformed initial approaches
- •Figure 10.2 Comparison of spaced practice with a continuous or massed practice approach in terms of performance
- •Figure 10.3 Generalized illustration of the high points in attention level of a captive audience
- •10.5 Maintenance and control of the new practice
- •11.1 Time for withdrawal
- •11.2 Evaluation
- •11.3 Follow-up
- •11.4 Final reporting
- •12.1 Nature and scope of consulting in corporate strategy and general management
- •12.2 Corporate strategy
- •12.3 Processes, systems and structures
- •12.4 Corporate culture and management style
- •12.5 Corporate governance
- •13.1 The developing role of information technology
- •13.2 Scope and special features of IT consulting
- •13.3 An overall model of information systems consulting
- •Figure 13.1 A model of IT consulting
- •Figure 13.2 An IT systems portfolio
- •13.4 Quality of information systems
- •13.5 The providers of IT consulting services
- •Box 13.1 Choosing an IT consultant
- •13.6 Managing an IT consulting project
- •13.7 IT consulting to small businesses
- •13.8 Future perspectives
- •14.1 Creating value
- •14.2 The basic tools
- •14.3 Working capital and liquidity management
- •14.4 Capital structure and the financial markets
- •14.5 Mergers and acquisitions
- •14.6 Finance and operations: capital investment analysis
- •14.7 Accounting systems and budgetary control
- •14.8 Financial management under inflation
- •15.1 The marketing strategy level
- •15.2 Marketing operations
- •15.3 Consulting in commercial enterprises
- •15.4 International marketing
- •15.5 Physical distribution
- •15.6 Public relations
- •16 CONSULTING IN E-BUSINESS
- •16.1 The scope of e-business consulting
- •Figure 16.1 Classification of the connected relationship
- •Box 16.1 British Telecom entering new markets
- •Box 16.2 Pricing models
- •Box 16.3 EasyRentaCar.com breaks the industry rules
- •Box 16.4 The ThomasCook.com story
- •16.4 Dot.com organizations
- •16.5 Internet research
- •17.1 Developing an operations strategy
- •Box 17.1 Performance criteria of operations
- •Box 17.2 Major types of manufacturing choice
- •17.2 The product perspective
- •Box 17.3 Central themes in ineffective and effective development projects
- •17.3 The process perspective
- •17.4 The human aspects of operations
- •18.1 The changing nature of the personnel function
- •18.2 Policies, practices and the human resource audit
- •Box 18.1 The human resource audit (data for the past 12 months)
- •18.3 Human resource planning
- •18.4 Recruitment and selection
- •18.5 Motivation and remuneration
- •18.6 Human resource development
- •18.7 Labour–management relations
- •18.8 New areas and issues
- •Box 18.2 Current issues in Japanese human resource management
- •Box 18.3 Current issues in European HR management
- •19.1 Managing in the knowledge economy
- •Figure 19.1 Knowledge: a key resource of the post-industrial area
- •19.2 Knowledge-based value creation
- •Figure 19.2 The competence ladder
- •Figure 19.3 Four modes of knowledge transformation
- •Figure 19.4 Components of intellectual capital
- •Figure 19.5 What is your strategy to manage knowledge?
- •19.3 Developing a knowledge organization
- •Figure 19.6 Implementation paths for knowledge management
- •Box 19.1 The Siemens Business Services knowledge management framework
- •20.1 Shifts in productivity concepts, factors and conditions
- •Figure 20.1 An integrated model of productivity factors
- •Figure 20.2 A results-oriented human resource development cycle
- •20.2 Productivity and performance measurement
- •Figure 20.3 The contribution of productivity to profits
- •20.3 Approaches and strategies to improve productivity
- •Figure 20.4 Kaizen building-blocks
- •Box 20.1 Green productivity practices
- •Figure 20.5 Nokia’s corporate fitness rating
- •Box 20.2 Benchmarking process
- •20.4 Designing and implementing productivity and performance improvement programmes
- •Figure 20.6 The performance improvement planning process
- •Figure 20.7 The “royal road” of productivity improvement
- •20.5 Tools and techniques for productivity improvement
- •Box 20.3 Some simple productivity tools
- •Box 20.4 Multipurpose productivity techniques
- •Box 20.5 Tools used by most successful companies
- •21.1 Understanding TQM
- •21.2 Cost of quality – quality is free
- •Figure 21.1 Typical quality cost reduction
- •Box 21.1 Cost items of non-conformance associated with internal and external failures
- •Box 21.2 The cost items of conformance
- •21.3 Principles and building-blocks of TQM
- •Figure 21.2 TQM business structures
- •21.4 Implementing TQM
- •Box 21.3 The road to TQM
- •Figure 21.3 TQM process blocks
- •21.5 Principal TQM tools
- •Box 21.4 Tools for simple tasks in quality improvement
- •Figure 21.4 Quality tools according to quality improvement steps
- •Box 21.5 Powerful tools for company-wide TQM
- •21.6 ISO 9000 as a vehicle to TQM
- •21.7 Pitfalls and problems of TQM
- •21.8 Impact on management
- •21.9 Consulting competencies for TQM
- •22.1 What is organizational transformation?
- •22.2 Preparing for transformation
- •Figure 22.1 The change-resistant organization
- •22.3 Strategies and processes of transformation
- •Figure 22.2 Linkage between transformation types and organizational conditions
- •Figure 22.3 Relationships between business performance and types of transformation
- •Box 22.1 Eight stages for transforming an organization
- •22.4 Company turnarounds
- •Box 22.2 Implementing a turnaround plan
- •22.5 Downsizing
- •22.6 Business process re-engineering (BPR)
- •22.7 Outsourcing and insourcing
- •22.8 Joint ventures for transformation
- •22.9 Mergers and acquisitions
- •Box 22.3 Restructuring through acquisitions: the case of Cisco Systems
- •22.10 Networking arrangements
- •22.11 Transforming organizational structures
- •22.12 Ownership restructuring
- •22.13 Privatization
- •22.14 Pitfalls and errors to avoid in transformation
- •23.1 The social dimension of business
- •23.2 Current concepts and trends
- •Box 23.1 International guidelines on socially responsible business
- •23.3 Consulting services
- •Box 23.2 Typology of corporate citizenship consulting
- •23.4 A strategic approach to corporate responsibility
- •Figure 23.1 The total responsibility management system
- •23.5 Consulting in specific functions and areas of business
- •23.6 Future perspectives
- •24.1 Characteristics of small enterprises
- •24.2 The role and profile of the consultant
- •24.4 Areas of special concern
- •24.5 An enabling environment
- •24.6 Innovations in small-business consulting
- •25.1 What is different about micro-enterprises?
- •Box 25.1 Consulting in the informal sector – a mini case study
- •25.3 The special skills of micro-enterprise consultants
- •Box 25.2 Private consulting services for micro-enterprises
- •26.1 The evolving role of government
- •Box 26.1 Reinventing government
- •26.2 Understanding the public sector environment
- •Figure 26.1 The public sector decision-making process
- •Box 26.2 The consultant–client relationship in support of decision-making
- •Box 26.3 “Shoulds” and “should nots” in consulting to government
- •26.3 Working with public sector clients throughout the consulting cycle
- •26.4 The service providers
- •26.5 Some current challenges
- •27.1 The management challenge of the professions
- •27.2 Managing a professional service
- •Box 27.1 Challenges in people management
- •27.3 Managing a professional business
- •Box 27.2 Leverage and profitability
- •Box 27.3 Hunters and farmers
- •27.4 Achieving excellence professionally and in business
- •28.1 The strategic approach
- •28.2 The scope of client services
- •Box 28.1 Could consultants live without fads?
- •28.3 The client base
- •28.4 Growth and expansion
- •28.5 Going international
- •28.6 Profile and image of the firm
- •Box 28.2 Five prototypes of consulting firms
- •28.7 Strategic management in practice
- •Box 28.3 Strategic audit of a consulting firm: checklist of questions
- •Box 28.4 What do we want to know about competitors?
- •Box 28.5 Environmental factors affecting strategy
- •29.1 The marketing approach in consulting
- •Box 29.1 Marketing of consulting: seven fundamental principles
- •29.2 A client’s perspective
- •29.3 Techniques for marketing the consulting firm
- •Box 29.2 Criteria for selecting consultants
- •Box 29.3 Branding – the new myth of marketing?
- •29.4 Techniques for marketing consulting assignments
- •29.5 Marketing to existing clients
- •Box 29.4 The cost of marketing efforts: an example
- •29.6 Managing the marketing process
- •Box 29.5 Information about clients
- •30 COSTS AND FEES
- •30.1 Income-generating activities
- •Table 30.1 Chargeable time
- •30.2 Costing chargeable services
- •30.3 Marketing-policy considerations
- •30.4 Principal fee-setting methods
- •30.5 Fair play in fee-setting and billing
- •30.6 Towards value billing
- •30.7 Costing and pricing an assignment
- •30.8 Billing clients and collecting fees
- •Box 30.1 Information to be provided in a bill
- •31 ASSIGNMENT MANAGEMENT
- •31.1 Structuring and scheduling an assignment
- •31.2 Preparing for an assignment
- •Box 31.1 Checklist of points for briefing
- •31.3 Managing assignment execution
- •31.4 Controlling costs and budgets
- •31.5 Assignment records and reports
- •Figure 31.1 Notification of assignment
- •Box 31.2 Assignment reference report – a checklist
- •31.6 Closing an assignment
- •32.1 What is quality management in consulting?
- •Box 32.1 Primary stakeholders’ needs
- •Box 32.2 Responsibility for quality
- •32.2 Key elements of a quality assurance programme
- •Box 32.3 Introducing a quality assurance programme
- •Box 32.4 Assuring quality during assignments
- •32.3 Quality certification
- •32.4 Sustaining quality
- •33.1 Operating workplan and budget
- •Box 33.1 Ways of improving efficiency and raising profits
- •Table 33.2 Typical structure of expenses and income
- •33.2 Performance monitoring
- •Box 33.2 Monthly controls: a checklist
- •Figure 33.1 Expanded profit model for consulting firms
- •33.3 Bookkeeping and accounting
- •34.1 Drivers for knowledge management in consulting
- •34.2 Factors inherent in the consulting process
- •34.3 A knowledge management programme
- •34.4 Sharing knowledge with clients
- •Box 34.1 Checklist for applying knowledge management in a small or medium-sized consulting firm
- •35.1 Legal forms of business
- •35.2 Management and operations structure
- •Figure 35.1 Possible organizational structure of a consulting company
- •Figure 35.2 Professional core of a consulting unit
- •35.3 IT support and outsourcing
- •35.4 Office facilities
- •36.1 Personal characteristics of consultants
- •36.2 Recruitment and selection
- •Box 36.1 Qualities of a consultant
- •36.3 Career development
- •Box 36.2 Career structure in a consulting firm
- •36.4 Compensation policies and practices
- •Box 36.3 Criteria for partners’ compensation
- •Box 36.4 Ideas for improving compensation policies
- •37.1 What should consultants learn?
- •Box 37.1 Areas of consultant knowledge and skills
- •37.2 Training of new consultants
- •Figure 37.1 Consultant development matrix
- •37.3 Training methods
- •Box 37.2 Training in process consulting
- •37.4 Further training and development of consultants
- •37.5 Motivation for consultant development
- •37.6 Learning options available to sole practitioners
- •38 PREPARING FOR THE FUTURE
- •38.1 Your market
- •Box 38.1 Change in the consulting business
- •38.2 Your profession
- •38.3 Your self-development
- •38.4 Conclusion
- •APPENDICES
- •4 TERMS OF A CONSULTING CONTRACT
- •5 CONSULTING AND INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY
- •7 WRITING REPORTS
- •SUBJECT INDEX
Management consulting
by the information explosion than management consultants. Learning must be a life-long job for consultants”, wrote Michael Shays in 1983, when he was President of the Institute of Management Consultants in the United States.1
How does a consultant learn? What is the most effective way of developing a competent consultant? University education can provide the future consultant with a solid fund of knowledge and some analytical tools. However, like managers, consultants learn from experience above all. This includes the consultant’s own direct experience, on assignments in which the task is to deal with problems and situations that provide meaningful learning opportunities. In doing so the consultant also learns from the clients’ experiences. Furthermore, the consultant learns from other consultants – his or her colleagues in a team, the team leader and other superiors, consultants who worked for the same client previously, and other members of the profession.
Learning on the job, by practising consulting, is therefore the main and generally recognized method of learning. This is how most consultants acquired their proficiency in the past, and even now some consultants advocate that on- the-job learning is the only way to become competent in consulting. However, learning on the job alone is not enough and should be supplemented (but not replaced) by other learning opportunities, including formal training in courses and workshops. This is the approach that we adopt in this chapter, and that is increasingly supported by leading firms and professional associations of consultants.
37.1 What should consultants learn?
A remarkable diversity of personalities, clients, subjects handled, intervention methods and consulting firms’ philosophies is a prominent feature of the consulting profession. Because of this diversity, there are probably as many different paths to individual proficiency as there are consultants. As in other professions, some individuals will learn faster than others and achieve higher proficiency, owing to a happy concourse of a number of circumstances: talent, drive, educational background, complexity and novelty of assignments executed, and leadership and support provided by the consulting firm.
The training and development policies of consulting firms, and of the profession at large, tend to respect this diversity, offering a range of choices that permit learning to be harmonized with individual needs and possibilities. At the same time, the profession has aimed to achieve the necessary minimum level of uniformity and standardization, reflecting the common and prevailing needs of consultants at various stages of a typical professional career. Leading consulting firms and professional associations have devoted a lot of energy to these questions. As the profession is a young and rapidly evolving one, and distilling common needs and principles from constantly changing diversity is not easy, the task is far from being completed. Nevertheless, some useful guidance and support materials, outlining the consultants’ professional profiles and common knowledge base, are available.2
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Training and development of consultants
Elements of consultant competence
Generally speaking, a consultant’s competence can be described in terms of personality traits, aptitudes, attitudes, knowledge and skills. These elements of competence are interlinked and influence each other.3
Personality traits and aptitudes were mentioned in the previous chapter in the discussion on recruitment criteria. Traits determine how a person will react “to any general set of events which allow the trait to be expressed”.4 Thus, traits define a typical thought pattern and resultant behaviour characteristic of a person in a variety of situations. Examples of personality traits are propensity to take initiative, ambition, flexibility, patience, self-confidence, shyness, and the like. Examples of aptitudes are manual dexterity or linguistic ability.
Attitudes are a person’s feelings for or against certain issues, and therefore they reflect values that a person holds. They concern matters of human preference and result from choices between competing interests. Examples of attitudes or values are a preference for oral rather than written communication, tolerance of other people’s religious beliefs and cultural values, or preference for having people of certain nationalities or technical backgrounds as direct collaborators.
Knowledge is retained information concerning facts, concepts, relationships and processes.5 It is useful to distinguish between general and specialized knowledge. In consulting, general knowledge concerns economic, social, political and cultural processes, institutions and environments that constitute a general background for consulting interventions in specific organizations or systems. There are then two sorts of specialized knowledge. The first concerns the object of consulting, i.e. the consultant’s special sector or technical area of intervention. Examples of sectors are manufacturing, banking and insurance, while examples of technical areas are marketing, production organization, job evaluation and corporate strategy. The second area of knowledge concerns consulting per se – its principles, processes, organization, methods and techniques.
Skill is the ability to do things: to apply knowledge, aptitudes and attitudes effectively in work situations. Skills too can be broken down into several groups. Some of the consultant’s skills will be generic, e.g. social and cultural skills. Other skills will be common to consultants and their clients (managers and entrepreneurs). The difference will be in the required breadth and depth of mastery of certain skills. Probably the consultant will be more skilful in interviewing and providing advice than a typical manager, but may lag behind managers in the skills of organizing, coordinating, mobilizing people and speedy decision-making. There are, then, the skills that are particular to consultants, advisers and other helpers whose job has been described as “getting things done when you are not in charge”.6 These professionals have to be competent in assessing the problems and opportunities of organizations for which they are not responsible and where they have not worked, developing and presenting proposals, providing feedback and reports to decision-makers and their collaborators, and so on.
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Management consulting
The difference between the content and the level of competence is significant. Thus, various elements of managing consultancy projects are listed among key consultant skills and components of their body of knowledge. However, there will be a difference in the required level of this competence between an entry-level consultant and a partner supervising several major projects. This difference will have to be duly reflected in training programmes for various levels of consultants.
A body of consultant knowledge and skills
In Chapter 6 we referred to a defined “body of knowledge” – an overview of the areas of generic competence of a mature and experienced management consultant. As a rule, such a document will indicate common threshold competencies, not those required for doing a particular job or achieving superior performance.7
It is useful to refer to a complete text of a body of knowledge in designing a training programme for consultants. However, it is important to remember that these documents are not intended to lay down the scientific foundations of consulting as a field of learning. The reader may well conclude that, in his or her particular context, other topics should be covered in training, or the topics listed should be grouped and presented in a different way. Irrespective of differences in terminology and layout, the principal areas covered in a common body of consultant knowledge will normally be close to those outlined in box 37.1. The multidisciplinary nature of consulting is obvious, as the topics listed draw on sociology, psychology, statistics, economics, management and organization theory, and other disciplines. Some topics are confined to the description of good or best experience without aiming at scientific analysis and theoretical justification.
Substantive area of expertise and the business environment
Training and development in the substantive areas of the consultant’s expertise and in the wider business, institutional, legal and social environment are becoming ever more important. There are several reasons for this. New recruits to consulting may have an excellent technical background but a rather narrow perspective and limited knowledge of the environments in which businesses operate. As they progress in their careers and accept more complex assignments, many consultants need to master new areas and widen their knowledge base to cover areas outside their original background and main area of competence.
Another reason is the extremely high speed with which management concepts and techniques emerge, gain importance and popularity, and become obsolete – to be replaced in many cases by other concepts and techniques. This race for originality and novelty forces consultants to be always fully up to date and well informed. While it is not easy to recognize the difference between essential state-of-the-art developments and passing fads, a management
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Training and development of consultants
Box 37.1 Areas of consultant knowledge and skills
Orientation to management consulting
●Nature and objectives of consulting; consultants and clients; consulting and change
●Basic consulting styles and approaches
●Types of consulting services and organizations
Consulting and other professions
●Management consulting as a career
●Organization of the profession
●Professional ethics and conduct
●Historical development, present position and future perspectives of consulting
●Professions close to consulting (audit, legal advice, training, etc.)
Overview of the consulting process
●Framework and stages of a consulting assignment (project)
●Entry
●Diagnosis
●Action planning
●Implementation
●Termination
Analytical and problem-solving skills
●Systematic approach to problem-solving in management and business
●Methods for diagnosing organizations and their performance
●Data collection and recording
●Data and problem analysis
●Techniques for developing action proposals
●Creative thinking
●Evaluating and selecting alternatives
●Measuring and evaluating project results
Behavioural, communication and change management skills
●Human and behavioural aspects of the consulting process and the consultant–client relationship
●The client’s psychology
●Behavioural roles of the consultant and the client
●Consulting and culture
●Techniques for diagnosing attitudes, human relations, behaviour and management styles
●Techniques for generating and assisting change in people and in organizations
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Management consulting
●Managing conflict
●Communication and persuasion techniques
●Teamwork and the conduct of meetings
●Using training in consulting; assessing client training needs; designing training programmes
●Management and staff training concepts and techniques
●Courtesy and etiquette in consultant–client relations
●Effective report writing and presentation
Marketing and managing assignments
●Principles of marketing in professional services
●Marketing approaches and techniques
●Consultant selection criteria and procedures
●Proposals to clients (planning, preparation, presentation)
●Consulting contracts and their negotiation
●Fee setting
●Structuring, planning and staffing an assignment
●Managing and controlling an assignment
●Reporting to the client and to the consulting firm
Managing and developing a consulting practice
●Considerations in establishing and structuring a consulting firm; legal forms
●Economics and strategy of a consulting firm
●Governance, organizational culture and management style in professional firms
●Knowledge management
●Recruiting, developing and remunerating consultants
●Financial management of the firm
●Operational management and control; monitoring performance
●Leading and coaching consultants
●Quality assurance and management
●Professional responsibility and liability
●Information technology in professional firms
●Internal administration and office management
consultant cannot afford to answer a client enquiring about a new technique: “I’ve never heard of it”, “You can ignore it, it’s not important to you”, or “Our firm does not use this technique”.
Furthermore, information and telecommunications technology is omnipresent and rapidly changing in all sectors and functions of management. Training and retraining in IT and its management applications have therefore become a standard part of any consultant development programme.
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