It’s great to be a consultant • Hacker News Board

Re: It’s great to be a consultant

#121

Post by jrumbut » Tue, Jan 18, 2022, 3:24 PM UTC

Cederfjard wrote: post #72

franze wrote: post #14

The secret on how to become a great consultant: Take all the blame, distribute all the praise. Here is the thing, being a consultant is a thankless job, and it needs to be. If a project does not go as planned, the success does not happen. Take the blame. You are an external, it does not matter. They got you into the company to improve the state of the client, to improve them. If it does not happen, you are to blame.…

Is your experience that this is universal, though? I could easily envision organizations (based on my own experience, albeit not as a consultant in that sense) that would take your representation at face value - if things go south and you take the blame, they will blacklist and badmouth you, and vice versa they will love you if you can somehow hoard all the credit for a success. Perhaps it rarely plays out that way,…

This is something like an added benefit. If an organization has a good culture they'll like what you're doing and keep you working for then, if not then they'll get rid of you and free up your time something better.

As far as hoarding credit for a success, certainly a lot of people make that work for them but I'd like to think the other way is more sustainable. Maybe I'm fooling myself though?

Re: It’s great to be a consultant

#122

Post by Ostrogodsky » Tue, Jan 18, 2022, 3:24 PM UTC

franze wrote: post #14

The secret on how to become a great consultant: Take all the blame, distribute all the praise. Here is the thing, being a consultant is a thankless job, and it needs to be. If a project does not go as planned, the success does not happen. Take the blame. You are an external, it does not matter. They got you into the company to improve the state of the client, to improve them. If it does not happen, you are to blame.…

Maybe in tech,but that is not the case in other businesses, I would argue that big consulting firms, like McKinsey, do exactly the opposite. It seems a winning strategy.

Re: It’s great to be a consultant

#123

Post by eitland » Tue, Jan 18, 2022, 3:32 PM UTC

haspok wrote: post #104

skinkestek wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do like I (and the author of the article seems to do) do: Work for a consulting company. Company have sales, accounting and a lawyer. I have all the benefits described in the article.

You are also paid peanuts (compared to real contractors/consultants), and you have close to zero say of what projects / clients you get to work on / with. And you are essentially just a cost cell in an excel spreadsheet for the HR of the consulting company (interestingly, clients may respect you more). At least that was my experience. So you can have the best of both worlds, or the worst...

Well, you can do as I do and work for a company that is owned by the employees. I have plenty to say about were I work as long as there is a good opportunity and if there are none that our sales team can find I wouldn't have found them on my own anyways I'm afraid ;-)

But yes, I still only have a very good salary, not what HN would expect for "real contractors" but it is stable and worry free and I have good colleagues.

Re: It’s great to be a consultant

#124

Post by brimble » Tue, Jan 18, 2022, 3:44 PM UTC

mjburgess wrote: post #78

leeter wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This 100%, I've literally been hired onto a client to basically tell management something their internal team had been saying for ages. The challenge wasn't telling management that; but rather getting them to (politically very carefully) open their eyes to the fact they had the solution (and the people to implement) right in front of them the entire time. That was a very tricky situation as the management didn't trus…

Yeah, this is pretty universally the job of a management consultancy: interview the staff, and report what they're saying.

They're also the "legit" channel for corporate espionage (or, research sharing, if you prefer), especially for processes and such. They didn't make up that "best practice" they're teaching you now—they stole it from your competitor. They'll figure out if you're doing anything better than them and clue them in on their next engagement. And the wheel keeps on turning.

Re: It’s great to be a consultant

#125

Post by RickJWagner » Tue, Jan 18, 2022, 3:48 PM UTC

mjburgess wrote: post #78

leeter wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This 100%, I've literally been hired onto a client to basically tell management something their internal team had been saying for ages. The challenge wasn't telling management that; but rather getting them to (politically very carefully) open their eyes to the fact they had the solution (and the people to implement) right in front of them the entire time. That was a very tricky situation as the management didn't trus…

Yeah, this is pretty universally the job of a management consultancy: interview the staff, and report what they're saying.

Haha, I checked this against my internal memories from 'Office Space'.

Re: It’s great to be a consultant

#126

Post by tata71 » Tue, Jan 18, 2022, 3:51 PM UTC

brimble wrote: post #124

mjburgess wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, this is pretty universally the job of a management consultancy: interview the staff, and report what they're saying.

They're also the "legit" channel for corporate espionage (or, research sharing, if you prefer), especially for processes and such. They didn't make up that "best practice" they're teaching you now—they stole it from your competitor. They'll figure out if you're doing anything better than them and clue them in on their next engagement. And the wheel keeps on turning.

Good for consumers, in some cases, I'd say.

Re: It’s great to be a consultant

#127

Post by sails » Tue, Jan 18, 2022, 3:59 PM UTC

tiffanyh wrote: post #115

Counter argument for those who think consulting is "great" (because it's not - at least from a business owners perspective). TLDR: consulting has huge variable costs, you have to float A LOT of money, no reoccurring revenue, difficult to differentiate since people are your "product". - the business model of consulting is extremely grinding, difficult and exhausting for business owners - your "product" is your people,…

Great summary. Consulting not a great business to build to sell.

Curious how these businesses possibly survive a slower market?

Only thing I can imagine is the job market slows proportionally and your people/staff won't have better options.

Re: It’s great to be a consultant

#128

Post by baobabKoodaa » Tue, Jan 18, 2022, 4:06 PM UTC

immutology wrote: post #42

Is this "consulting" or "contracting"? In my mind, "consulting" is knowledge work. Your role is to lend knowledge and expertise, help with strategy, architecture, tool/platform selection, etc. "Contracting" is high-skill grunt work. Your role is to code your fingers off, deliver-deliver-deliver, typically according to someone else's (possibly ill-conceived) plan. Have these things truly become synonymous?

You got the types of consulting right, but the terminology wrong. Yes, one type of consulting is lending your expertise, another type is lending a pair of hands. Either of these types of consulting work can occur under "contracting", "freelancing", or other types of business relationships. Often a "pair of hands" consult is hired "until further notice", so it's not always contracting.

Re: It’s great to be a consultant

#129

Post by danjac » Tue, Jan 18, 2022, 4:13 PM UTC

sudosysgen wrote: post #105

danjac wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Social security systems in European countries tend to be based around people earning a regular salary losing their jobs, rather than consultants having occasional dry spells between projects. This is a problem with the gig economy in general - our social security nets aren't very well designed for it (perhaps an argument in favour of UBI, or at least some different thinking into how social security should work for th…

You can't expect society to pay for you regularly if you choose to become a consultant. You need to charge more and keep a buffer.

If someone pays the same taxes and contributions into society as others, then surely they are entitled to something in return? I get there's no easy answer here but gig workers are also "consultants" who may not be earning enough to build a buffer.

Re: It’s great to be a consultant

#130

Post by PeterisP » Tue, Jan 18, 2022, 4:14 PM UTC

brimble wrote: post #124

mjburgess wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, this is pretty universally the job of a management consultancy: interview the staff, and report what they're saying.

They're also the "legit" channel for corporate espionage (or, research sharing, if you prefer), especially for processes and such. They didn't make up that "best practice" they're teaching you now—they stole it from your competitor. They'll figure out if you're doing anything better than them and clue them in on their next engagement. And the wheel keeps on turning.

The essence of consulting business is that if you ask a consultant what the time is, they take your watch, look at it, tell you the time, and keep the watch.

On the other hand, there is real value unlocked by simply getting information from team A to team B in a dysfunctional organization that is totally unable to do it themselves; and most large organizations are dysfunctional in this sense.