You will be asked how to accomplish any task in any facet of your industry in the most expeditious and economical way. Thereafter, you may be asked to actually do the work yourself. If you demur on the second part, you are an ivory-tower-beard-stroking consultant. If not, you are a working consultant. The working consultant is usually busier, earns more money (it's the same hourly fee whether you work or talk), gains a better reputation faster, and has the confidence of the client by dint of the fact that he is willing to put into practice what he has preached, rather than pontificate and run.
You will be asked for pure, hard, current information dealing with your profession or industry. You must either have this information at hand or be familiar with the referential sources from which you can glean it. These sources may repose in an extensive library in your office or in a public library or both. Your primary requisite for this kind of consulting is the careful reading of every respected trade or professional publication in your field. Your clients generally don't have the time to do this. You must make the time.
There is a big secondary benefit to extensive reading. It will save you lots of time and money; remember that now time and money are the same in your work. You will get a complete overview plus all the "meat" of any seminar, lecture, or convention you thought you might attend for your own educational purposes. Oft times the concepts will present themselves more clearly by reading about them in your chosen surroundings than by actually attending these meetings. Seminars, meetings, and conventions are obscured and obfuscated by booze, hullabaloo, stupid questions, fatigue, and agenda items that insult your intelligence and experience. Of course, if you just want to take a tax-deductible trip to get away from it all, that is a different matter. Also, good contacts can sometimes be made at conventions to which prospective clients in your field may throng. Generally, however, you can accomplish more for yourself and for your clients by staying home and "tending your garden," reading all the while. Once in a while, you may be asked to attend a convention in your client's behalf for your regular fee; that is a convention not to be missed.
You will be asked to make a pitch or present a deal for a client. Why doesn't he use one of his salesmen or do it himself? Because he is smart. Coming from you the deal has more credibility and sincerity. Besides, the one to be pitched to may be another one of your clients or just someone in the field who has confidence in you.
You will be asked to do a feasibility study on a project the client would like to undertake but for which he wants outside objective reassurance. Conversely, you will be asked to do a similar study because the client does not want to take a particular course of action and wants to present an unbiased, independent report to his board of directors; he wants this report to tell them that the project in question is foolhardy and the executive in charge is not merely lazy. In either case, never accept an assignment in which the client tells you beforehand the conclusions he wants. It may force you to fudge and lie - a detriment to your reputation and integrity.
You will be asked to recommend a candidate to fill a sensitive job opening. Conversely you will be asked if you know of any job opportunities. Be careful here. Never recommend either way, unless you know the job is suited to the person and vice versa. Again, your reputation is on the line. Never accept or request a fee for this service (unless of course you are a personnel consultant). If you are able to handle this form of request (gratis) expertly and to the satisfaction of both parties, your reward will come in the form of consulting work from this quarter further down the line, out of respect and gratitude.
You will be asked to sit in on a brainstorming session just because you have a good mind and because you are objective. The purpose here is to have you come up with some ideas that the other attendees may miss because they are too close to the situation and "cannot see the forest for the trees.'* You will be asked to carry out a job or a chore that the client thought up but is too lazy to do himself. An exaggerated, ludicrous, but true example of this is the time a client paid me my hourly fee to take a bunch of mail to the post office and have every piece registered.
Getting to the periphery of this subject, if your client is located out of town, you may be asked to entertain a V.I.P. while he or she is in your city.
Finally, you will be asked to write reports about everything: feasibility studies, progress, regress, methodology, budgets, what you think, what your client thinks, the state of the industry, and personnel evaluation. You should be able to write concisely and clearly in an organized way with a good command of the language.
Believe it or not, all of the above will take up about half of your time. Another 25 percent of your time should be taken up in the constant pursuit of new business, which is, marketing. Treat your marketing function as though it were a permanent client on permanent retainer. The remaining 25 percent of the time is where the real creative part comes in.
It isn't just that you should never stop thinking. It's that you should never stop doing. Doing what? Doing what you are thinking about. You have heard the expression "Ideas are a dime a dozen." Not true. Ideas are a nickel a gross. Ideas, in fact, are worthless unless someone does something about them. Most of us at one time or another have asked "Why don't they do something about?" Who are "they?" Why don't you?
Well, that is what I do with the other 25 percent of my time. I'm constantly musing about how my profession can be improved, and continuously trying to come up with ways to make those improvements happen. Whenever I get an idea that seems sound, I pick up the phone and call a respected executive with clout, make an appointment, and tell him my idea. Almost everyone will talk with a consultant gratis. By the way, I am not anal retentive about these ideas; as we discovered, by themselves they are worthless anyhow. At this point, one of several things will happen:
- The person across the desk will clap me on the back, tell me that I'm a genius, adopt or adapt the idea for his firm and dismiss me. Always remember, no one pays for unrequested ideas.
- He will accept the idea and ask me to carry it out for him for a fee. Or
- He will tell me that my brainchild is unworkable and give me sixteen good reasons why. Whereupon, I will either fold my tent or go back to the drawing board. Or
- He will reinforce my idea but tell me that he is just too lazy or too busy to do anything about it.
