smeda.info

A long-term assignment is wrapping up and you’re about to saddle-up and mosey down that dusty road into the warm, golden sunset.

Hold it.

What’s wrong with this picture?

If you’re a consultant, instead of being that stoic, lean and mean stranger, who rides into town, sets things right, or who stirs them up, depending; you’re more likely to be, at the end of that engagement, a wobbly basket case who can barely summon the gumption to press the elevator’s down button.

How come?

Well, man or woman, as I see it, you’re going to have a case of the postpartum blues, partner.

What are those, you’re wondering, especially if you’ve never been a parent? They’re the odd and often radical emotions you feel after you have carried a baby to term, introduced it into the world, and your hormones are in a transitional state.

You grew and bonded with this marvelous organism and now it is much more independent.

That’s exactly the feeling you get when a big-time consulting assignment is approaching “term.”

You have separation anxiety. How are you, soon to be two, going to get along without each other?

“But they’re not ready!” we wail, when we’re really speaking about ourselves.

What are WE going to do without THEM is really the question.

If you’re a good consultant, you do bond with clients, creating lots of identification in the process.

When I was part of the largest civilian Navy management training program in history, 18,000 senior managers trained in 18 months; members of our consulting team actually identified so much with our client that they joined-up at the end of the assignment.

My U.S. Navy coffee mug, in fact, is about eighteen inches to my right as I type this article. What does that tell you?

Where we stop and they start, where dependency turns into independence, is never clear to the consultant. Saying goodbye is especially hard when we’ve inaugurated an entire unit or business function or when we’ve saved a ship (pardon me) from sinking.

Having consulted for more than 20 years, and running a seminar for consultants and coaches at UCLA Extension and elsewhere, I console myself and my colleagues with these three thoughts:

(1) This is the life we have chosen for ourselves, and being able to have a big impact and then to leave in a timely way to engage the next challenge is exciting and rewarding.

(2) Consultants aren’t marathoners, we’re sprinters. Great in the 100 or 220 we FLY cross-country, we don’t run it.

(3) We should be like those teachers that say: “At the beginning of the year I’m happy to see students coming, and by the end of the year, I’m happy to see them going.”

Still, when we’re the ones riding all by our lonely into those sunsets, we need to buck-up and say: “Hey, it’s ok; even consultants get the blues!”

Accessing Knowledge and Experience of Big Businesses:

Small business consulting services provide you complete information on different aspects of running small businesses smoothly. Services of experienced and professional small business consultants can make a great difference to the growth and success of your business. By hiring their services you get the advantage of knowledge and experience of big businesses customized to suit your requirements. When you hire a small business consulting services, you get more time to concentrate on the core activities of the business, thereby increasing the productivity.

Get the Competitive Edge and Increase Productivity:

Small business consulting services not only work as short-term business advisors but can also be your long-term aide. Moreover, you get competitive advantage and even compete with big corporations that have support staff on site. Another advantage is that hiring small business consulting services helps in increasing the employee productivity. This is because there are several one-time tasks that can be performed without involving employees who are running your business smoothly. In addition, you get the advice of experts whenever you need it without having to keep someone permanently and pay for it.

Professional Business Plan:

Small business consulting services help the small businesses right from starting a new business to achieving their ultimate goal. When you start a new business you need funds for it. For managing the finance for starting a new business or expanding an existing business, you require a professionally prepared business plan. In fact, a business plan is the document that makes the first impression on people or institutions interested in financing your business. Professionally managed small business consulting services can make this process hassle free for you.

Sound Marketing Plan:

Similarly, when you wish your sales to increase, you require a sound marketing plan. Small business consulting services can provide you a comprehensive marketing plan by performing a detailed market analysis. They will prepare the marketing plan after making a thorough analysis of the size of the market, competitors, customers, growth, segments, and the behavior of customers buying your type of product. With the help of a marketing plan and further assistance from small business consulting services, you can develop effective strategies for marketing your products or services and reach your goal.

Designing and Managing the Web Site:

In this age of Internet it has become essential for every single business to have a professionally designed and managed Web site. Small business consulting services will help you not only in designing the website but also in growing your business on the Internet.

Imagine if you were no longer threatened by consulting commoditization and the resulting loss of firm revenues. What if you could leverage technology in a way that would increase your profit margins and open doors of unlimited add-on consulting opportunities?

You are painfully aware that service-capability selling by a consulting organization no longer works. Clients are increasingly seeking productized consulting solutions to common business problems.

Now absorb this information: Gartner reports that the consulting organizations that will ultimately survive in the future will be those that create standard, repeatable consulting services.

What then, is the secret to building a thriving consulting practice in the face of commoditization?

1. Do This to Stand Out in a Commoditized Crowd
Al Ries, author of The 22 Immutable Laws of Branding observed that most professional service firms are good at generating prospects, but not at branding. The key is not what you do (the commodity) but the way you do it (your brand).

Just imagine what would happen if you productized your common business services and then competed on the merits of your brand.

2. Do This to Profit From Commoditization
You probably already know this, but productizing services with pre-defined project plans not only accelerates project completion but also increases firm profit margins.

Think of how many of your current services could be pre-defined and delivered as a solution package. What affect would that have on your profit margins?

3. Do This to Move Beyond Commoditization
Most experts agree that it costs 6-12 times more to acquire a new customer, than it is to expand your offering into existing customers.

Can you imagine the doors of add-on opportunities that will open to you as you successfully deliver a productized commodity service?

Now for the best news of all: productizing your services couldn’t be easier. Software technology exists that allows firms to quickly productize services with project plans, resource plans, billable hours and even client collaboration.

But be sure to select a software partner that provides:

1. ASP software (the last thing you need is technology hassles)

2. Cross-platform software (you need a solution that fits in any environment)

3. Customization (you are the business expert, not them)

4. Commissions (you should be making money with their software)

Learn more about wining the commodity game; get your free copy of the guide “3 Steps to Build a $100M Consulting Firm” at [http://www.attask.com/partner/consult-signup.html]

Chad Perry has held key executive positions in the high-tech industry both small and publicly traded organizations. His background includes sales, customer service and operations. Mr. Perry has led large-scale business redesign efforts encompassing field sales, inside sales, channel sales, consulting, system engineering, and field marketing organizations.

All of us have heard of marketing professionals. Some of us have even worked as marketing professionals ourselves. And some of us have probably heard of marketing agencies. But how many of us can, in all honesty say that we have heard of the term marketing consulting? I for one hadn’t. Of course I had heard of consultants and IT consultants to be more precise, but I had never before heard about marketing consulting as a field and what’s more, hadn’t the faintest idea who would be involved in such an activity.

All that changed when I got onto a domestic flight and found someone sitting next to me. When we made our introductions, I was pleasantly surprised to know that he worked for one of the largest organizations in the region. I myself had some dealing with them and wanted to know how he figured in the scheme of things. Which is when he told me that he worked in marketing consulting. More intrigued than anything else, I carried on a conversation with him.

Seeing that I hadn’t the faintest idea about marketing consulting as a field, he proceeded to brief me about the industry. (Yes! It had become fashionable enough in the recent past to call the thing an industry by itself. I wonder how many people out there actually work in the industry of marketing consulting [http://www.first-finance-magazine.com].

According to my friend, they numbered in the hundreds of thousands!) But what exactly did someone in the marketing consulting industry do? Well, they did marketing like anyone else. What made their professions consulting as opposed to most of us is that they brought an element of analytics to the field.

In traditional marketing, for long people believed that if the product was good, it sold itself. This changed when it was observed that a few salesmen with the right ideas were able to sell a whole lot more than all the others put together. Thus was born the field of marketing. Soon, manufacturers discovered that marketing activities took up a whole lot of their time, leaving them with precious little to do research and development. Thus, they began to seek outsiders who could do their marketing for them. These outsiders were pure play marketing consultants. And the one reason they were hired and paid highly is because they came armed with several years of knowledge and acumen that they could use to enhance the profits of their pay masters.

Why Hire A Legal Nurse Consultant?

The president of a major law firm that represented roadway construction companies in the Southeastern United States once said: “I don’t need to know the nuts and bolts of paving a road as long as I have an expert who does.” And thank goodness he did have such an expert because, as I informed him, you don’t pave a road with nuts and bolts.

What he meant by his comment was it is better for an experienced expert witness to explain complicated issues to a jury than for an attorney to stumble his way through them. That is certainly the case when it comes to explaining complicated medical issues at trial.

What is a Legal Nurse Consultant?
Many attorneys who practice personal injury law have no firsthand experience with the healthcare system and don’t even know how to read simple medical records. I will refrain from naming the dozen or so friends of mine who practice personal injury law as medical record illiterates. So how do they have any idea whether they have a valid medical malpractice, slip and fall, whiplash or other personal injury case? They rely heavily on Legal Nurse Consultants.

A Legal Nurse Consultant is someone with a nursing degree who reviews, analyzes and summarizes medical records for an attorney. As a Legal Nurse Consultant you may choose to work for plaintiff or defense attorneys, governmental agencies, insurance companies or private corporations. You may choose to work in the geographic area where you are currently located or to move around the country. Many agencies will pay for your move should you choose to do so.

What does a Legal Nurse Consultant Do?
A Legal Nurse Consultant advises attorneys both prior to, during and after trial (usually on appeal) on medical issues. If you are a person who does not like to give live testimony at trial you do not have to. There are a number of consulting opportunities that do not require trial testimony. If you are (like many attorneys) a frustrated actor, then expert trial witness testimony may be right up your alley.

Most Legal Nurse Consultants deal with cases involving medical and nursing malpractice, personal injuries, products liability, toxic and environmental cases, worker’s compensation, workplace injury, criminal and family law issues. You can find more information on becoming a Legal Nurse Consultant on this website.