Category: Book

Ethics and Lying When you play the role of the consultant, you are usually expected to be the expert in everything. In reality, you will be placed in situations where things are very new to you. This is where the fine line between being a professional and outright lying can be difficult to navigate. Many…

Under Promise, Over Deliver You will hear this phrase numerous times on many different clients and it is a part of every consultant’s motto. There is nothing wrong or unethical about committing to work you know will be feasible to accomplish in the given time and will not require additional stress and extra hours. This…

Scoping the Work Correctly Nine women cannot make a baby in one month. When staffing projects and analyzing the work that needs to be completed there is a common fallacy that if you throw more bodies at the work, it will get completed faster. You will find this does not always hold true. Although there…

Offshoring Many firms use a practice called offshoring. Offshore resources on a project are team members who are located in a different country overseas or in a different continent. Offshoring is often used as a method to get work done for a client at a significantly lower cost. Usually, resources who work in another country…

I can Teach it to You, but I cannot Understand it for You One of the biggest frustrations you will have as a consultant will be in trying to explain a concept or an idea to another and them not being able to grasp it. You may even be reminded of the quote, “if you…

Scope Creep “Can you please add a new order management screen for international orders…?” or “Can you please write up the quarterly close process since you are already doing the monthly process?” There are a million ways a client will ask you to do a bit more than what you signed up for. Sometimes these…

Quick Wins and How to Say No In client services, the ability to go above and beyond is not just necessary, it is a must. Just floating by and doing the bare minimum may be enough to successfully complete the items listed in the statement of work, but your ultimate goal should always be on…

Questions and How to Ask Them A consultant’s job is to create answers and asking a good question is the number one tool you have in your consultant’s tool belt to get those answers. As you try to figure out the hidden problems and the clever solutions, you will be interviewing your clients in what…

What Does My Client Do? The very first thing you must learn before you set foot through a client’s front door is the basic understanding of what they do, their goals and how they generate revenue. Initial insight can be found on the company’s website under their mission statement or the “about us” section. Dig…

User Acceptance Testing The User Acceptance Testing phase, commonly abbreviated to UAT, is where the actual users of the system begin to test and validate the systems and processes in place. They will be responsible for ensuring everything has been implemented to the agreed upon requirements. They will click through screens, run reports, compare spreadsheets…