The Winter (Spring, Summer, Fall) of Our Discontent, by Alan Weiss

The Winter (Spring, Summer, Fall) of Our Discontent

By Alan Weiss

I’m encountering so many whining, moaning, complaining consultants that you’d think they were forced into this profession at gunpoint. It’s not like they entered the profession only after finishing four years of post-graduate work, interning, and amassing six figures of debt.

Most just mentioned to passersby, “I’m a consultant, do you need one?” and they were off and running. Not exactly a high cost of entry.

So why do I constantly hear:

No one wants to talk to you if you’re not with a recognized firm.

It’s tough to get budget freed up for your project.

I can’t get my calls returned.

It’s difficult to deliver and market concurrently.

What if I get too much work to deliver in a quality manner?

I’m paying a fortune for my staff.

Insurance is killing me.

This economy is terrible.

The prospect is a plane ride away and wants me to cover my expenses.

Wahwahwahwahwah…

If this profession is so terribly difficult, or the travails are so severe, or the spirit just isn’t willing, then go into insurance, or auto sales, or franchise ownership, or teach school. (In my opinion, all of those require a lot more work than intelligent consulting, but what do I know?) Just stop whining.

The reason the profession is so difficult for some—while others thrive right next door—is that the sufferers don’t understand their own complicity in their malaise. This is the marketing business, not the methodology business. That is, no matter how great your intellectual property or beautiful your 19-step matrix or intriguing your call for “personal power hierarchies,” you need to get in front of people who can give you money. Most of us, including me, never underwent schooling or formal processes to teach us marketing and sales. So, we need to learn and develop those skills.

Average methodology coupled with superior marketing (not “slicksterism,” but merely creating and meeting client need) will always prevail over great methodology and average marketing. And, of course, outstanding marketing married to excellent methodology creates great wealth for a lot of us.

You need to stop worrying and bemoaning dumb, minor, and irrelevant issues, which include: obtaining too much business (we’ll get to that problem when it actually happens); building staff (you don’t need staff if you’re doing under a million in business, and even beyond); worry about how much publicity to pursue (as much as you can, your name can’t be seen too much); agonizing over a logo or tag line (they don’t make or break business); constantly trying to maximize technology (executive-level buyers do not troll the Internet looking for consulting help).

It’s time to come to grips with an ineluctable fact: If many people are successful in this profession and you are not, it’s NOT the profession that is the distinction. That doesn’t mean you’re doomed. It means there is one or more of three things missing from your armamentaria:

Skills: You need to develop new competencies.

Experiences: You need to watch and do things, and get feedback.

Behaviors: You need to modify you behavioral set (e.g. become more assertive or less patient).

You’ll note that bemoaning your fate is not one of the options. Join a professional association, find a mentor, attend some workshops, take on pro bono work, read books, experiment—whatever it takes and whatever suits you.

The Law of Unqualified Distinctions says that if someone is doing it, you can too, theoretically, unless you are deficient in skills, experiences, and/or behaviors. Those three dimensions are, to a great degree, remedial. (Behaviors can be tough to change radically for long periods. It’s difficult for high-detail people to become comfortable with ambiguity on a daily basis, for example.) The longer you make excuses, the longer you avoid the real avenues which can transport you to success.

Astoundingly, I meet people who call themselves consultants who don’t read the Wall Street Journal and have never read Peter Drucker. I meet some who don’t deign to join professional associations, who don’t want to publish nor speak at public events. They can tell you their 9-point process for conflict resolution, reconcile Maslow’s Hierarchy for modern corporations, and diagnose your learning style, behavioral profile, “brainedness,” or emotional intelligence. But they can’t interest you and they can’t get in front of a buyer. They form mastermind groups and astound each other with their erudition.

They also wonder how they will make the next mortgage payment.

I begin to yawn when someone asks, “What’s your consulting model?” (I don’t have one.) I get animated when someone says, “What are the three best ways to reach a buyer?” (I remember one consulting group which told me, “We don’t like to use the words “closing business” here, because it sounds crass.” I told them I had a similar adversity to the words “failure” and “poverty.”)

After all, unless you’re in front of a buyer, you can’t close business, and if you can’t close business you can’t help that buyer. And all those beautiful, theoretical models will only be dusted off when consultants talk to each other.

Four seasons of discontent make for a lousy year. You probably already understand consulting. Now learn the business.

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Alan Weiss, Ph.D. is the author of twenty-five books, including Million Dollar Consulting, which appears in seven languages. He runs the unique Million Dollar Consulting™ Colleges three times a year. You can reach him at www.summitconsulting.com, where you can also download hundreds of free articles.