Practice This

by Knut Burmeister

Failure happens. I slip and I fall. It happens more than I want it to happen. I am on my quest to find out what are the early signs of a failure. Geoffrey M. Bellman shares good perspective on it in his book The Consultant’s Calling: Bringing Who You Are to What You Do, New and Revised.

Here is Bellman’s list:

• There are too few resources.
• There is too much training.
• There is a lack of leadership.
• Change is pursued as an event.
• Change is pursued in isolation.
• There is "flavor of the year" change.
• There are many unconnected changes.
• Meaning is lost in methods.

Let me share with you my personal view on each one of the above statements.

There are too few resources

There are two patterns of failure related to it.  One is when a customer allocates few resources but asks a consultant to deliver much more beyond it. The other pattern is when a consultant is over motivated and takes on a project that is under-budgeted. The result is always the same – frustrated consultant and unsatisfied customer. Here are few techniques I found useful to reduce the risk:

• Create boilerplate SOW’s – make sure sales folks sell what I can deliver. I can clearly remember a fiasco when I was assigned to a gig scoped to do something I had no clue.
• Work in iterations and share updated reports with the customer – get the customer onboard early in the gig [follow core principles – fail fast, turn chicken into pigs]. In the beginning I thought it is best to keep quite and just put the work done on the table in the end. It has proven to be completely wrong – I delivered great result nobody needed.
• Say No when asked to do more than agreed in the scope – stay on track. Saying yes can make friends in the beginning but in the end everyone will be disappointed by no results delivered at all due to overload – been there, not a great experience. You can say Yes to more work but make sure to trade it off for something else in the scope – stay within budget.

There is too much training

I love training. I guess everybody does. The more I observe or attend trainings I understand that most of people love it because it is for the sake of breaking the work routine and less for the sake of learning. Breaking the routine is fine, but that’s no-goal. The goal is getting smarter. I also observed that those who intend to get smarter after the training have hard times since most of the trainings I have observed are this-is-how-it-works style vs. this-is-what-you-should-be-doing style. I deliver training myself, I love doing it. What worked well so far is asking the audience to bring their own situations on the table and try solving it using the material that was learned through the training. Most of the time it works, but sometime I see some of my materials are theoretic – such materials gets improved by taking it to the field and testing it in practice.

• Is the trainer a practitioner – does he practice what he preaches?
• Is the training about how it works vs. what you should be doing?
• Are the practices covered in the training were successfully applied in the field?

There is a lack of leadership

Consultant is a change agent. Consultant uses his to influence without authority – it is essential critical skill but it is almost impossible to deliver first class service without a backup from the authorities. One of managers told me lately something along these lines “find decision maker who cares about it, if there is no such guy – cancel the project.”

• Who’s behind the initiative?
• Who’s against it?
• Is he a leader?
• Does he possess the power?
• WIIFM for the him?

Change is pursued as an event

Consultant usually is called when there is a crisis. It is the easiest way for consultant to build trust – save the day, save the customer. What I usually do is use such situation to explain that fixing specific problem won’t assure it won’t happen once more – the process is broken. I offer process improvements. Some customers get onboard, some not. Those who adopt process improvement they invest in their future, I usually leave such customers and rarely return to them – I like it. Thos customers that do not adopt the process improvements keep calling me to fix very same problems – I get bored, and usually leave such customers myself.

• Is there a long term plan for the initiative?
• Are there specific short term goals?
• Are there specific long term goals?

Change is pursued in isolation

Another variation of doing same work twice (three times, four times, etc.) is when a group at customer’s tries to make a change without proper communications outside the group. it is not common for me to work for a customer doing same work twice for different groups. Not that I am trying to support such work to increase the income – the contrary is true. I hate such work and I actively communicate such situation. The sad part is very often there are less than healthy competition among the groups and they just do not communicate. In the end there are two or more similar initiatives in the same organization. That surely invites antagonism and sentenced for a failure in the long run.

• Who’s affected in the organization by the initiative?
• Who might be interested/required to run similar initiative?
• What’s political map?

There is "flavor of the year" change

I fell in this trap few times. I was invited several times to support an initiative that just turned out to be “flavor of the year.” My enthusiasm was killed, no real results were achieved but the management reported a checkmark next to the action item up their chain. It quite easy to spot the “flavor if the year” initiative. I am using it to built a network of real supporters in the field. If I get support from people who care about the change chances it will survive after the checkmark is reported.

• Is it industry buzz?
• Is it a buzz inside the organization?
• Who might be seeing it as a real value besides the buzz?
• Does he have the power?
• WIIFM for the guy?

There are many unconnected changes

That’s another flavor of “Change is pursued in isolation.”

Meaning is lost in methods

Oh my – this is my favorite. I refrain saying 100% but surely the majority assume that change is a matter of tools or new techniques or methods. Fool with a tool is still a fool. Process matters. Tools support the process. Process and principles come first, then come the tools, techniques, and methods.

“As to methods there may be a million and then some, but principles are few. The man who grasps principles can successfully select his own methods. The man who tries methods, ignoring principles, is sure to have trouble.” Ralph Waldo Emerson

Practice This – Get Results

• Make sure resources are allocated – if underbudgeted ask for it, reduce the scope, or call the whole thing off.
• Find the powerful guy behind it – get support from inside.
• Do not be fashionable – use proven practices and strive for actual results.
• Read The Consultant’s Calling – change or strengthen your view on consulting and how it can help you become a better you with less failures.

My Related Posts

• Is Your Project Going To Fail?
• Consultant Overcomes Constraints and Reaches the Goal in 5 Steps
• Follow The Three Laws of Performance
• 3 Basic Conditions For Successful Consulting Gig
• 5 Stages of Successful Consulting Gig