Archives for August 2016

Why does your company need a consultant?

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Why do YOU need a business consultant? To provide solutions to specific challenges, to constructively criticize, to facilitate new systems, to implement new business ideas, or to bring in an experienced outsiders evaluation and point of view? Maybe your company is working on a challenging problem or project and needs an unbiased opinion. Our consultants will not let you down.

A company normally comes to consultants because they are great at these 5 things:

  • Separating people from the problems
  • Focusing on interests, not positions
  • Generating a variety of possibilities
  • Creating evaluation criteria
  • Solving problems

Consultants generate options before deciding. Sometimes clients jump to conclusions because they have been in the industry for many, many years, or because “it has always been done that way”. Consultants are more willing to start with a blank white sheet of paper and begin brainstorming.

Consultants are really good at generating options because they spend the time getting the data and really thinking through the problems at hand. At the beginning of a project, consultants look at all potential scenarios, and look for hypotheses everywhere.

▪  They brainstorm new ideas; at this stage no ideas are ruled out

▪  They interview people up & down the org chart

▪  They keep asking “why” until they get to the core reason

▪  They dig until they get to the root causes and find out what the real drivers are

▪  They reach out to industry experts who know the larger trends

It’s very common for consultants to structure multiple options for the client to choose from. This acknowledges that there are multiple potential solutions, but there are trade-offs.  It really depends on the clients’ time frame, appetite for risk, budget, and opinion. There is often 1 primary recommendation, but multiple implementation options.

There are many different types of consultants, whether you’re a small or big company, there is someone out there who will help you get to where you want to be. Here at Fidelis Companies, we specialize in Engineering, BioPharma, and IT. SiteSuite came out with 4 main types of consultants:

  1. Specialist – world class capabilities in selected area
  2. Game changer – game changing answers that no one else can provide
  3. Vendor – adequate performance + low cost + no hassle
  4. Total solution provider – total package from a reliable supplier