How to Hire and Manage Consultants

While you might be lucky enough to survive in business with little or no advice from others, you will certainly not maximize your potential for success by doing so. All CEOs and entrepreneurs need advice in a wide variety of constantly changing areas…That said, I’m always somewhat perplexed as to why people hire certain professionals. The nature of my business is that I often succeed other advisors who have failed in their assignments, and I have witnessed first hand the carnage that can occur from unsuccessful engagements/implementations with third party professionals. So, in today’s post I’ll share some thoughts on both selecting and managing outside advisors…

Even though many of the CEOs and entrepreneurs reading this next sentence won’t agree with my conclusion, I am nonetheless obligated to share the reality of what is most often times the harsh truth…When you engage a professional advisor, the outcome you receive will most often times be the outcome you deserve. You see, as with any other profession there are excellent practitioners, middle of the road journeyman, well intended light-weights, and brilliant academics with no practical experience or common sense. The reality is that if you hire someone who doesn’t meet your needs, the fault rests with you.

Making things even more complex is the fact that talent, while clearly an important consideration, is only one factor in determining whether your engagement will have a successful outcome. A smart advisor doesn’t necessarily translate into a good advisor. Just because someone possesses an advanced degree doesn’t mean they have any practical experience. Most consultants don’t graduate from business school with any real world business experience. Furthermore, the real world experience they do possess may offer little benefit or applicational value to your specific circumstances. It is imperative that you select advisors who are not only a subject matter experts in their practice area, but that also possess solid business acumen and a bit of savvy. I have a very simple rule that I’ve followed for years in evaluating whether or not to hire a consultant: If an advisor is not fluent in my business, they won’t be retained by me to represent my business…end of story.

As nice of a thought as it might be, the reality is that you cannot just hire an advisor and expect all of your problems to be solved. As a C-level executive you should be bright enough to realize that if you turn the asylum over to the lunatics, chaos will certainly ensue. At the risk of enraging many in my profession, consultants and advisors are not superheroes, they are role players. Now mind you, the role can be of a complex or critical nature, but it is still just a part of the equation. The outcome of your engagement will be largely be dependent upon the following items:

1. Problem Identification: You’d be surprised at how many executives retain professional advisors to either solve problems they can’t even define or articulate, or worse yet, to provide a solution to a problem or challenge that doesn’t even exist. If you don’t know what you’re trying to accomplish, how are you going to direct and manage an outside advisor. Moreover, how are you going to assess whether you are receiving great advice or flawed counsel? Don’t engage an advisor unless you know specifically what it is you are trying to accomplish.
2. Selection: Did you hire the right advisor for the right reason? The first step in the selection process should not be based upon talent, price, availability, geography, past track record, etc. Rather it should be based upon value alignment. Do the consultants engaged share your values, understand your culture, understand your market, and understand your objectives? If not, their track record and their solutions will be meaningless. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve witnessed companies select advisors who were “high-powered” or “trendy, hip, and avant-garde” only to find their recommendations to be nothing short of a train wreck because they were not consistent with the values of the client they were supposed to be serving. Why would you ever let someone tinker with your brand, your credibility, and your business who didn’t share your values? Trust me when I tell you that if you do, you’ll regret it…
3. Cost: Hire the best practitioner you can afford, not the cheapest you can find. As with any profession, there is value in experience and knowledge, as well as a competitive advantage to be gained with talent, reputation and connections. Never hesitate to get a second opinion as there are very few stock answers to any business issue.
4. Accountability: The best way to manage your engagement risk is to be proactive not reactive. Assess your risks and take aggressive and proactive measures to mitigate said risks by being actively involved in the management of the engagement. As a principal owner or senior executive the buck stops with you. You need to manage the advisor and the process to the best possible outcome, and this cannot be accomplished with a passive management style. You can either manage the engagement process or let it manage you. Make sure the project deliverables are clearly understood, and that a plan with benchmarks, milestones and deadlines is put forth outlining how to reach said deliverables.

So how do you know if the advisor you’ve hired is as good as they say they are? Match-up their rhetoric with the following warning signs:

1. Beware the Part-Time Expert: My father has an old saying that I’ve found to be very accurate over the years: “part-time efforts, yield part-time results.” If the person seeking your business has a day job that constitutes something other than the services he or she is pitching, run for the hills. If your potential advisor is moonlighting then they really have no business asking for your business.
2. Beware of those with no Social Presence: If you want to get to know someone, do a little social snooping. If you don’t like how an advisor engages online, you probably won’t like what you see when you get face to face. If your would-be advisor cannot be found online, doesn’t blog, tweet, or is invisible on the major social networking platforms you might want to rethink their qualifications. Important Caveat: the mere existence of a website, blog, YouTube channel, LinkedIn profile, Facebook account, or a Twitter page doesn’t guarantee competence…anyone can amass thousands of followers on Twitter – those with a large following on Twitter often just follow-up to the Twitter maximum, wait for others to follow them back, delete the others and then repeat the process. Look for someone who has amassed a quality list of followers, who has more people following them than they follow, and who actively engages with their followers.
3. Beware the Expert without Clients: No referenceable clients equals zero credibility. Your position should be one of “don’t tell me – show me.” It’s one thing to show you their own work, but quite another to show you demonstrated success on behalf of paying and satisfied clients. Equally as important, have they served clients similar to you? Have they served clients who have already been where you want to go? Don’t let someone cut their teeth on your business. Experience counts.
4. Beware the Expert without Industry Recognition: Good advisors cannot remain in stealth mode. Talent can’t hide, because news of performance spreads. If your so called expert doesn’t have a professional body of work you may want to think twice. If your expert isn’t referenced as such by credible, independent third parties, isn’t published, doesn’t speak, lecture or teach, hasn’t received any industry recognition, etc., then they might not be a true expert.
5. Beware the Expert too Aggressive in their Pursuit: There is a big difference between professional follow-up and desperation. Let me be blunt…most professionals at the top of their game haven’t made a cold call in years. In fact, even in this down economy they typically have more business than they know what to do with. If your world-beater of a consultant is chasing you down like a hungry dog after the meat wagon then you may want to take pause.
6. Beware of Bargain Basement Expertise: In most cases the reality is that you get what you pay for…True expertise doesn’t come cheaply, but is well worth the investment. Few things in business will get you in as much trouble as not getting advice and counsel when needed, or worse yet, getting poor quality or incorrect advice. I would much rather pay an expert a larger fee for 30 minutes of their time and get what I need rather than pay someone $50 dollars an hour who is hoping to fake it until they can make it…Questionable advisors will take much longer to get from point a to point b (if they get there at all), and will likely cost you more money at the end of the day when contrasted with true professionals.

As a consumer of professional services, the phrase “Caveat Emptor” (Let the buyer beware) applies in spades. If you take an informed and proactive approach to managing your engagement risk you will fare better than those who don’t. A plus might just be that if you hire the right advisor for the right reasons, you may in fact end-up developing a strong personal and professional relationship that won’t end-up as subject matter for another horror story or consulting joke.

Thoughts?

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Mike Myatt, is a Top CEO Coach, author of “Leadership Matters…The CEO Survival Manual“, and Managing Director of N2Growth.