Different people are motivated by different things. It’s very important to know what really motivates you. Otherwise, the quality of your work will suffer. When helping another person, it’s very important to know what really motivates them, as well, so that you can build those motivators into your work with them. Consider from among the …
Professional Development/
Consulting & Freelancing
Technical and Interpersonal Skills Aren’t Enough for Consulting
Peter Block, in his seminal consulting book, Flawless Consulting, writes, “There is a set of skills that is an essential part of consulting over and above technical expertise and interpersonal skills – and these are consulting skills” (Jossey-Bass, 2000, p. 6). Yet, the myth continues that technical and people skills are sufficient for successful consulting. …
There are numerous sources of online information about how to market a consulting business, for example, use your browser to search at inc.com, marketingsuccess.com and entrepreneur.com. We have been teaching consulting skills for many years, and the advice that we hear from our students about what has been successful for their marketing often does not …
If you and your client decide to terminate the project because it was satisfactorily completed, or for a technical reason, or because of a sudden interruption, then be sure to terminate it in a way that maintains a respectful relationship. Consider these guidelines. Produce a Final Project Report Both you and your client should complete …
Welcome to this 3-part article on managing resistance in consulting projects. This Part 1 describes resistance and how to recognize it. Part 2 will describe how to deal with resistance from your client. Part 3 will describe how to deal with your own resistance as a consultant. What is Resistance? What Causes it? An important …
Years ago, I remember going out on sales calls with one of the partners in our consulting firm, Marv Weisbord. We would most often be asked in to help a leadership team that was struggling. So, we’d be sitting with a group of managers listening to them talk about their difficult issues. I’d find myself …
Welcome to this six-part series on the foundations of consulting. If you have not been following along with us, then we encourage you to read parts 1-4, referenced from the bottom of this article. Part 1 establishes the basis for the series by using Peter Block’s definition of a consultant as someone who is trying …
Part 1 of this series is What Do Consultants Do?, which defines a consultant (as Peter Block puts it) as someone who is trying to change another person, process or organization, but who has no direct control over what they are trying to change. That post also listed numerous roles that a consultant might play …
