Quite soon after a company starts to succeed, the people who work in it begin to be stretched and they often need the help of a business consultant. This is usually quite a difficult decision to take because it means a increase in costs and also is seen as risky. Here is my guide to finding your ultimate business advisor and business mentor.
Organizations need to hire a business consultant for a variety of reasons. In some cases, they face a situation where they need some advice that they don't have internally to grow. They may need advice from an expert advisor in a specialist field such as telemarketing. In cases like this, you should look for the agency with the best, blue-chip experience that you can find. People in larger companies are highly trained and they are exposed to extensive specialist techniques and knowledge. In other cases, there may be several strategic choices facing a business, and no clear agreement about which route is best. If this is your issue, then an external advisor can take an objective view of the alternatives and then come up with a rational recommendation about which choice will deliver the best results. Make sure that the business consultant that you choose has enough consulting experience to do this type of work as it requires a lot of human skills as well as technical knowledge. The third main type of business consultancy engagement is where the business is facing a large project and does not have enough resource to manage and drive the project to completion. Your primary consideration in this type of project is to find advisors who have a strong track record in delivering projects like yours. This will usually equate to them being willing to roll up their sleeves and get involved at every stage.
It is unusual to find a good business consultant under the age of 45. Unless someone has 25 years of business experience behind them and perhaps 15 years at senior management level, then it is unlikely that they will have the right combination of skills, knowledge, and gravitas to give the right advice at the right level in your organization. Other characteristics to look out for are an extensive network of senior business contacts, membership of a significant organization, and an ability to speak without fear. This last point does not mean that you should seek out a trouble maker, but at the same time you do want someone who is not afraid to speak out and give you the benefit of their experience.
No matter what your reason for hiring a business consultant, there are some things that you should always look for:
1 The agency should be able to quickly understand your business problem and to begin to talk in terms of solutions.
2 Ask for practical examples of where they have solved similar issues.
3 Ask for a proposal from the business consultancy and expect it to be delivered in 2-3 days.
4 In the proposal, how long does it take for the agency to get working, and are you paying for this warm-up time?
5 Will you be working with the consultant that you have been talking to or will a junior team take over?
6 Is the work broken into stages, with breaks at each stage? If you are not sure whether to proceed or not, ask for preliminary stage with an early review. That way, you can sample the work of your business advisors, and make sure that you are happy before you proceed to a full commitment.
At the end of the day you also need to consider the working environment in your business as well. Are you and your staff working too hard and feeling the pressure? If this is the case then you need to design the business consultancy engagement so that this pressure becomes more bearable. After all there is no point in loosing a key member of staff just as you have found your ultimate business consultant.