Consulting Framework

1. CONSULTING
FRAMEWORK
Presented by
BIDHU

2. What is Consulting ?
Consultant
 A consultant is a person in a position to have some
influence over an individual, a group, or an organization but
has no direct power to make changes or implement
programs.
 The core transaction of any consulting contract is the
transfer of expertise from the consultant to the client.
Manager/Client
 A manager is someone who has direct responsibility over
the action.The moment you take direct responsibility, you
are acting as a manager
 IdentifyWho is the Client, Power, Influence in the
organization

3. What are the skills?
 Technical Skills:- How much do you know about the industry ? Or how much you can possibly know through your contacts/
from Experts ?
 Interpersonal Skills:- How well you can charm people to accept your view
 Consulting Skills
 Entry & Contracting: -This sets the tone of the project, check about constraints
from client, State what you need to accomplish your job
 Discovery & Dialogue
 Analysis & Decision to act
Agree on the Objectives of the study
Agree on the dimensions of the study, Set clear scope, out of scope
Agree on the methods of the study
Agree on the measurable metrics of the outcome
Client buy in is a Must
 Engagement & Implementation
Help the client learn the problem
Self realization of the problem
Build the competencies in the client
 Extension , Recycle &Termination

5. Contracting Items
1. The Boundaries ofYour Analysis
2. Objectives of the Project
3. The Kind of InformationYou Seek
4. Your Role in the Project
5. The ProductYouWill Deliver
6. What Support and InvolvementYou Need
from the Client
7. Time Schedule
8. Confidentiality
9. Feedback toYou Later

6. Consulting Process Flow
1. Define the Initial Problem:- It is not just up to the client to make the initial problem statement.
You should feel free to add your 50 percent, even at this early stage.
2. Decide Whether to Proceed with the Project:- In deciding whether to proceed, you also
have some choice. If the project is set up in a way that you think it won’t succeed, you should
negotiate the terms. Or if u feel there is going to be less contribution from the client side then l
Learn to say NO if needed
3. Select the Dimensions to Be Studied:- Given your expertise in the project, you may know
best what aspect of the problem should be analyzed.The client, though, has operating
experience with the problem and the people and can be asked what to look for.
4. Decide Who Will Be Involved in the Project:- Doing the job by yourself is always simpler
and faster. Having people from the client organization takes more time and agony, yet this
involvement directly encourages commitment and promotes eventual implementation of the
work.
5. Select the Method:- The client is in the operation for long, so ask the client for how the data
to be collected & what data to be.You as consultant decide what is relevant for you.
6. Do Discovery:- Let the client go through the same discovery phase along with you.
7. Find the Key People who has the all the info:-
8. Gather data & make sense of data:-
9. Provide Results & Recommendations:-
10. Decide on Actions:- Have a say on actions and track on the actions
11. Go back to step 1 if this does not solve 100 % of the problem & client agrees for it

7. What is the Problem ?
 Ask Questions
 Why ?Why not ?
 Employ Ishikawa Diagram
 What are the Assumptions ?
 Problem mayn’t be the problem
 Back up the problem with Facts
 Benchmark to confirm the problem
 This is 99 % of your consulting

8. Doing Research
 Don’t reinvent the wheel, start with existing
secondary data
 Annual Report is the gospel
 Interview the right people
 Interview , don’t lead
 Open Ended Questions
 Let Interviewee’s boss set up the meeting
 Interview in Pairs
 Paraphrase
 Be sensitive to the interviewers feeling
 Manage difficult interviews
 Practice Positive Deviance in difficult times

9. Building the Solution
 Fact Based Solution
 MECE Framework(Mutually Exclusive & Collectively Exhaustive)
 Hypothesis Driven Approach(Build/verify IssueTree)
 All Key Drivers of the Problem addressed ?
 Can you define a Elevator Speech ?
 Make the solution comes from facts
 Make the solution fit the client
 80-20 rule also applies here
 Client Buy In is a must
 What is out of scope
 Things need to be in to watch list

10. Selling the Solution
 BuildTrust with People in Clients organization
 Selling the Solution
 When people feel that something is important and
they have some control, they will be motivated to
exert the effort to make things work.
 When they believe that something is important
but they can exert no control, the common
tendencies are to become cautious or defensive,
play it safe, withhold information, protect
themselves from blame.
 Internal Commitment from Client

11. Building the Solution-Example.
 Value & Purpose
 Mission &Vision
 PESTLE
 Porters 5 Forces, Industry reports, Benchmarking, Gap Analysis, SWOT
 McKinsey - 7S(Strategy, Systems, Structure, Skills, Staff, Style, Shared
Values)
 Ex: A marketing problem , take 4 P as the starting point
 Drivers :– Fixed Cost,Variable Cost, Sells, Marketing Expenditure, Sells
per employee etc..Then IssueTree, Benchmarking, Best Practices,
Alignment with 7C,
 Tools: -Ansoff’s Matrix ,Balance Scorecard, Benchmarking, Business
Process Re Engineering, Change Management, Core Competencies,
CRM Practices,Value stream mapping,Value chain
 Support with data:-Annual Reports, Industry Data, Primary Data,
Analytics, Causal Relationship-Hypothesis testing, Solution Design,
Solution Presentation, Solution Effectiveness

12. Clients are Skeptical
 Is this consultant someone I can trust? Is this
someone I can trust not to hurt me, not to
con me—someone who can both help solve
the organizational or technical problems I
have and, at the same time, be considerate of
my position and person?

13. Q&A

14. Thank You