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| Mastery |
Anyone who has an email box has seen a message like this one:
"Discover How To Easily & Automatically Explode Your Sales While Slashing Your Marketing Expenses With Our Simple Proven System For Less Than $1/Day."
Most people dismiss such offers as bogus, but enough people respond to these silly appeals that we keep seeing them over and over. It's understandable--people want ways to get things done faster, more profitably, and with less effort.
What's bothersome is how pervasive this marketing tactic has become. It's no longer confined to late-night infomercials, but has spilled into the mainstream advice business. You don't have to look far to find people hawking programs that promise you unparalleled wealth as a consultant in just a few short hours per week.
What these "marketers" conveniently omit from their pitches is the science of accomplishment. In his book Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell notes that, for anyone to reach the top of a field, it takes roughly 10,000 hours of practice--the equivalent of three hours of practice a day for about ten years. According to Gladwell, no one has yet found a case where world-class expertise was accomplished in less time.
The trouble is that no one explains that until after you buy the sure-fire marketing system. Some of these "gurus" seem to be suffering from expertise amnesia: having achieved a certain level of mastery, they forget what it took to get there and think anyone can do it. The "low-hanging fruit" for a real expert could look like the Manhattan Project to a beginner.
The real way to achieve success as a consultant is to find your own path to mastery. The sooner you commit to that path, the sooner you'll reap the rewards. The simplest advice: treat the quick-fix artists as a distraction and get on with it.
Enjoy this month's issue.
And send me an email if you have comments.
Mike McLaughlin
Editor
Join the Conversation:
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| Beating Feast or Famine Blog Round Up |
 Last month on our Beating Feast or Famine blog, we focused on essential strategies for selling professional services, including how to choose the clients you work with, the importance of the client's buying experience, and an easy way to improve your sales presentations.
Here are samples and links for some February blog posts. If you haven't already subscribed to the blog's RSS feed, you can easily do so using the subscribe button on the top right corner of any blog page.
Make One Small Change in Your Sales Presentation - If you want a simple, effective way to make your sales presentations stand out from those of your competitors, ignore the wisdom of the crowd.
The Client's Buying Experience Beats Sales Techniques - Your job: create a buying experience that works for your client, not a selling process that works for you. Don't focus on how to sell to the client; work to identify and create the conditions under which the client wants to buy.
11 Reasons to Walk Away from a Sale - One of the most overlooked sales skills for services sellers is figuring out when to walk away from a sale. In some cases, the decision is a no-brainer because there's not a fit between what you do and what the client needs. As your sales effort progresses, though, it gets more and more difficult to pass on an opportunity.
10 Reasons to Choose a Client - How do you decide which sales opportunities are right for you? Find at least three reasons why you might choose to work with a client, and one of them can't be, "I don't have anything else to do, so why not?" Here are 10 good reasons.
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| MCNews 12 Index of Professional Services |
You might say that the MCNews 12 Index took a breather in January (the Index fell). In February, the MCNews 12 Index firms got back in the race, as the Index erased nearly half of its January loss.
Still, the Index remains below its starting point of 1,000, as it has been since August 2008. In spite of that, there's underlying strength in the MCNews 12 companies. If you removed Satyam Computer Services from the Index, the recalculated MCNews 12 Index would easily rise above 1,000.
For Satyam executives, the challenge over the past year was to reorganize the company and rebuild client trust in the wake of a crippling financial scandal. The company appears to be on the path to recovery. Executives announced plans to hire 4,000 more people in the next three months, and its financial condition is improving. The company has a manageable level of debt, and the stock is trading below book value.
Though unsettling economic news will likely continue to whipsaw the market, you can find positive indicators. The Conference Board Measure of CEO Confidence struck a note of optimism--it was 64 after the fourth quarter of 2009, up from 63 in the previous quarter.
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MCNews 12 Index |
YTD
Change |
| February 2010 |
945 |
-4.5% |
| January 2010 |
910 |
-8.0% |
| December 2009 |
990 |
+46.1% |
British consumers grew a bit more upbeat in February, taking the GfK NOP Consumer Confidence Index higher by three points. And, according to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, the Australian unemployment rate was at 5.3 percent in January. That reflects the largest rise in the number of people employed in Australia since December 2006.
Of course, there's bleak news too. The Conference Board Consumer Confidence Index, which had increased in January, declined sharply in February. The Index now stands at 46.0, down from 56.5 in January. The baseline for this Index was set at 100 in 1985; the February reading is its lowest point in 27 years.
Even in Australia, where unemployment appears to be stabilizing, consumers are wary. The Westpac–Melbourne Institute's Consumer Sentiment Index fell by 2.6 percent in February.
Don't be surprised if fluctuation continues in the MCNews 12 Index as investors decide how to process the mixed signals the market is sending. But, according to a study by Robert W. Baird & Co. (see article below), consultants are optimistic about the future.
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| Interview: Jeffrey Hollender |
"I often joke that, if you put all the Fortune 500 CEOs in a room and asked who was running a responsible business, 500 hands would go up."
Jeffrey Hollender is cofounder and chairman of Seventh Generation, and the author of How to Make the World a Better Place and What Matters Most. In his latest book, The Responsibility Revolution: How the Next Generation of Businesses Will Win, Hollender gives his perspective on the opportunities and obstacles business leaders face now and in the future.
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| Frowning on the Frontline |
When you enter any retail store, restaurant, or airport, the quality of your experience is mostly determined by the work and behavior of the "frontline" employees and their managers.
Given the importance of the customer's experience to long-term business success, it's alarming that more than two-thirds of senior executives are only "somewhat satisfied" or "not at all satisfied" with the performance of their frontline managers. Making matters worse, more than 80 percent of frontline managers say they are not satisfied with their own performance.
The problem, according to researchers at McKinsey & Company, lies in the way organizations have designed frontline managers' jobs. For the most part, these managers are one part bureaucrat plus one part fire fighter.
Too many frontline managers spend their days filling out compliance paperwork, gathering performance data, or solving the latest crisis. They devote too little time to coaching their employees, anticipating problems, or building their own skills. In fact, many organizations offer little or no professional development for their frontline managers in essential leadership skills.
As is often the case, there's a gap between what executives perceive to be the issue and how managers view it. More than half of managers say that time taken up by administrative activities is the biggest barrier to improving their performance. In contrast, slightly more than a one-third of executives see administrative tasks in the same light.
In a small percentage of companies (11 percent), frontline managers do spend most of their time directing, coaching, and developing others. Executives in those companies are almost twice as likely to be satisfied with their managers' performance (39 percent vs. 20 percent). These organizations are also more likely to offer training programs on developing interpersonal and customer service skills.
For some executives, especially those in large organizations, the idea of re-tooling job design and training programs for frontline managers may seem daunting, and not worth the effort. Instead of examining the root cause, they may opt to handle problems with frontline employees through "forced turnover."
Consultants who focus on operations improvement and organizational effectiveness can make a compelling case for helping clients improve the performance of frontline employees, even if clients believe the effort is complex.
Small improvements in frontline operations can deliver big benefits in customer retention, satisfaction, and word-of-mouth marketing. With consumers continuing to demand more for less, the time is right for executives to take this issue on.
You can read more about this in the McKinsey Quarterly. There's no cost, but you do need to be a subscriber to see the full report.
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| Training Opportunities for Consultants |
The Institute of Management Consultants (IMC) offers numerous training sessions on consulting skills and behaviors, ethics, service delivery, practice management, marketing, and business development. Below are some of IMC's upcoming programs, all of which contribute to IMC's CMC certification.
Applying the IMC USA Code of Ethics in Business
March 2, 2010, 2:00pm EST
What kind of ethical issues do you face, and how does IMC's Code of Ethics apply to them? Using examples and cases from real-life situations, this webinar provides an overview of the IMC Code of Ethics and helps you understand your choices when ethical challenges arise.
Death by Power Point
March 11 and March 18, 2:00pm EST
No matter the forum, the way you frame and communicate your message is the single most important part of attracting clients, delivering value, and building your business. This webinar offers specific advice on how to effectively develop and deliver a compelling presentation.
Strategies for a Successful Client-Consultant Relationship
April 28, 2010, 2:00pm EST
In this interactive session, you'll learn practical approaches for creating a climate that promotes lasting client relationships. You will also receive a "tool kit" with models, forms, and processes that will ensure open communication, mutual respect, and bottom-line results.
You can find out more about these programs and others from the IMC Calendar of Events.
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| What's Ahead for Consulting? |
Researchers at Robert W. Baird & Co. asked more than 500 consultants that question as they tried to get a handle on the market consultants will face for the rest of 2010. The survey respondents offered these four perspectives on the rest of the year:
1. Don't be surprised if the market turns around in 2010. What's not clear is if an uptick in business for consultants represents a return to a stronger market. It's possible that new spending is focused on initiatives clients just can't delay any longer.
2. Budgets will remain tight, in spite of expected growth. Consultants cautioned that their clients' public statements have been optimistic, but increased budgets have not necessarily followed. Clients still appear to be taking a wait-and-see attitude about spending on consultants.
3. Billing rates aren't likely to be threatened. Consultants are bullish on the direction of billing rates, as fears about significant price pressure from the lower end of the market proved to be unfounded. Consultants shouldn't expect significantly more price competition than they already experience.
4. Sustained growth is still in the future. Consultants believe that the industry won't change materially until the economy shows more signs of life. Banks must reopen the credit markets and businesses must put together a record of strong performance before consultants expect a real recovery in spending.
Expectations for the industry have improved for 2010, but that optimism must be kept in perspective. When compared to 2009, many consultants believe that there's nowhere to go but up.
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| Coming
Attractions |
"We're seeing bullishness on the part of CIOs to undertake bigger programs than they did last year."
Next month, we'll talk with Mark Livingston, Senior Vice President of Cognizant Business Consulting. Livingston is a long-time consultant, having done stints at AT Kearny and Deloitte before agreeing to lead Cognizant's consulting practice.
We'll ask him to shed some light on the trends he's observing in the market and how firms and individuals can succeed in a shifting market.
Look for the next issue of Management Consulting News on April 6, 2010.
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