Consultants don’t do anything

In the video, a man dressed in athletic shorts stands on a train platform. He puts chalk on his hands and limbers up. As a train approaches the station, he positions himself next to the train track reaching out to slow the train to a stop. As passengers disembark our super athlete puts more chalk on his hands and limbers up some more. As the train starts to depart he runs next to it and throws it forward hurtling the train on to the next stop.

As a retired consulting lifer I write about consulting on social media thereby exposing myself to ridicule and lots of consulting jokes, most of which I have heard multiple times before. Someone attached the video descried and pictured above. It is a creative version of the old consulting joke:

“A man walks into a pet store to buy a money. The store owner shows him three monkeys says:

‘That one is $600 -he plays the banjo.

That one is $1200. -he tends bar. He can understand ten languages and mixes cocktails.

That one is $4000.’

“$4000? What can he do?” says the man

The shop owner says, “I’ve never seen him actually do anything, but he calls himself a consultant.’”

 

This is a common theme. A client once said as much as he recommended me to another CEO.

“You understand, Alan doesn’t do anything. He makes you do all the work and then sends you a bill.”

Ralph added, “but my company is always better when I hire him.” That part was said sotto voce. I heard the under his breath part and felt good about it. To me it was evidence that I transferred ownership back to my client, which was a source of pride to a process consultant like me. Evidently the CEO heard the doesn’t do anything part; anyway, he didn’t hire me.

Thinking back, my client was probably embarrassed to publicly admit that he hired a consultant, someone who didn’t do anything, but waste your money. Perhaps he really did look upon me with disdain, but if so, why did he hired me several times over fifteen years.

So perhaps giving the impression that one asked for help is perceived as weakness and that is one reason for consultant jokes.

Consultants don’t know anything

“A consultant is a man who knows a thousand ways to make love, but doesn’t know any women.”

“A consultant is a person with a black briefcase, more than 50 miles from home, who has an opinion on absolutely everything without the hinderance of knowledge or experience.”

“A consultant tells a sheep farmer that he can tell him exactly how many sheep he has if he’ll give him one sheep as payment. Without waiting for an answer, the consultant pulls out a computer and begins analysis.

Shortly, the consultant raises his head gives a number and takes a sheep.

The shepherd says ‘Typical consultant!. You use a computer to give me information I already know, get the numbers wrong and expect me to pay you. Now go away and gimme back my dog!”

 

Consultants may deserve some of this criticism. Planning strategy and executing it are different and executing is an order of magnitude more difficult. So the “if you’re so smart, why ain’t you rich?” argument has some merit.

Also there are many times when someone who has worked in an industry for their entire life might know more than someone who has just done some analysis. “Consultant, eh? Good money for old rope” was how a Scottish borderlands truck manufacturing manager put it to me on my first project.

There are times when consultants do suggest something new and valueable precisely because they have worked in many different companies in many different industries. But as a consultant you can’t assume what you see hasn’t been seen many times before by those with years of experience in one company or industry. A little humility is called for. Never be afraid to say “I don’t know.”

Consulting firms should never send junior consultants on site without a thorough briefing on the company and industry.  I loved the learning curve that a new project represented, but I did work with consultants whose view of their own intelligence and ability to sound knowledgeable led them to shortcut even reading the briefing deck or annual report.

“I just need three interviews to understand everything I need to know and figure out the problem,” an experienced consultant once bragged.

Values, Attitudes and Ethics

I  summer-interned at Harbridge House Europe, while at the London Business School, I talked with the Managing Partner, David Hussey, who responded to my inquiry about his job.

“Consider a group of people, educated to the point of considerable ego, who have come to such an elevated view of themselves that they believe that people should pay them for their advice. Now imagine managing such people. Managing consultants is an oxymoron, a complete and utter contradiction in terms.”

“Arrogant” is a word one often hears to describe consultants. This comes from the ego that David Hussey described. It comes from thinking you are smart, and from the insecurity that causes some consultants to be allergic to saying “I don’t know enough to talk intelligently about that” or “I really can’t take credit for that idea. That was Bill in your marketing department.”

Some think of consultants as being inherently dishonest.

“A consultant borrows your watch to tell you the time and then steals your watch.”

“How many consultants does it take to change a light bulb?

What’s your budget?”

“I’m looking for a one-armed consultant.”

Why?
Every consultant I’ve met constantly says ‘On-the-other hand’ while they have one hand on your shoulder and the other in your pocket.”

 

“The Devil promised the consultant he could make him rich and famous beyond all expectation if only the consultant would sell his soul, and the souls of his entire family and descendants for five generations.

The consultant said, “What’s the catch?”

“Hiring consultants to conduct studies can be an excellent means of turning problems into gold, your problems into their gold.” Norman R. Augustine, president and chief operating officer of Martin Marietta

I have seen consultants who are less than truthful. “This is the worst I’ve ever seen”

I have seen consultants sell by inducing fear. “You better hope [the analysts, your bosses, the board] don’t get wind of how bad this is.”

I have also seen consultants walk away from a project where they couldn’t be helpful or offer value. I have seen consultants teach clients what they did so the client could solve the same problem themselves the next time. I have personally done both of those things, bu my values and attitude weren’t always so perfect. I found it easier to maintain my values working for myself than when I worked for firms.

I often described my values to colleagues and new consultants I trained or coached:

• Be helpful – but remember that help is defined by the recipient, not you. Wait to be asked to help because help that isn’t asked for isn’t help; it’s interference.
• Focus on results – a client hired you to increase revenue or profit. Make sure that will be delivered. If they hired you for people stuff make sure you have a metric that can be delivered.
• Remember and respect that it’s the client’s business -your job is to help them change to the better and in a sustainable way and then leave. Pitching additional work when the client has not achieved results from your curre3nt project may get you promoted, but it damages your credibility and that of the entire profession..

I’d like to say that such values eliminated my exposure to consultant jokes. It did not.

Consultants even tell jokes on themselves.

“You might be a consultant if:

• You introduce yourself to your next door neighbor,  for the third time this month.
• You feel naked without “The Oracle” (your laptiop) hanging from your left shoulder.
• You are annoyed that your spouse doesn’t offer turn-down service and leave chocolates on your pillow..
• Your backyard barbecue conversation includes words like, paradigm, value-added, synergy, and heuristics.”
• You have a workplan for weekends.”

“A surgeon, an engineer, and a consultant argued about which was the oldest profession:

Surgeon: And God created woman from Adam’s rib – obviously a complex surgery!

Engineer: Before that God,  designed the world’s first infrastructure engineering project. He created heaven and earth and brought forth Order from Chaos.

Consultant: Ah, and who do you think created the Chaos.”

As a consultant it helps to keep your values and attitude on straight and to be able to laugh at yourself

 

 

Here is the Link for the video described above

 

And the link to shamelessly hawk my book.