The Tribune

By Ian Ferguson

The consultancy business has grown tremendously over the past decade, with many companies place their growth and sustainability into the hands of management consultants.

When organisations hire consultants to help them improve their business, they often don’t identify exactly what they hope to achieve and then, during the evaluation process, pine over the loss in value due to deliverables unachieved.

A consultant is a professional who provides professional or expert advice in a particular area, including but not limited to: Management, accountancy, law, human resources, marketing, finance, engineering, security, talent management and many other specialised fields.

In the global setting, consultants are considered qualified to consult based on three critical criteria.

These include:

• A strong commitment to academic qualifications, having earned advanced degree sfrom reputable institutions of higher learning with a consistent quest for knowledge and research.
• In excess of 10-15 years of experience in the specific area of consultation.
• Possessing a track record of measured success in the specific field of consultancy.

While this dialogue automatically dismisses and strikes ‘off the list’ many of the individuals referring to themselves as consultants, it shows that greater accountability must come to the profession if standards are to be raised.

A consultant is usually an expert or a professional in a specific field, and has a wide knowledge of the subject matter. The role of consultant outside the medical sphere can fall under one of two general categories: Internal and External consultants.

Internal consultants are typically contracted by a company to offer expert advice in some area of specialisation. These internal consultants are given deliverables tied to the goals and objectives of the company.

External consultants are employed on the outside on a temporary basis, and are brought in to address some specific gap within the company for a specified period of time.

The overall impact of a consultant is that clients have access to deeper levels of expertise than would be feasible for them to retain in-house, and they can purchase only as much from the outside consultant as desired.

Here are some examples of consultants that your companies may want to secure to improve your bottom line:

*Strategy consultants working on the development of, and improvements, to organisational strategy alongside senior management in many industries.

• Human resources or HR consultants, who provide expertise around employment practice and people management.
• Internet consultants, who are specialists in business use of the Internet and keep themselves up-to-date with new and changed capabilities offered by the web. Ideally, Internet consultants also have practical experience and expertise in management skills such as strategic planning, change, projects, processes, training, team-working and customer satisfaction.
• Process Consultants who are specialists in the design or improvement of operational processes, and can be specific to the industry or sector.
• Public Relations or PR consultants dealing specifically with public relations matters external to the client organisation, and often engaged on a semi-permanent basis by larger organisations to provide input and guidance.
• Performance consultants who focus on the execution of an initiative or overall performance of their client.
• Information technology consultants in many disciplines such as computer hardware, software engineering or networks.
• Marketing consultants who are generally called upon to advise around areas of product development and related marketing matters
• Talent management consultants who are usually assigned to human tesource departments to assist in various interventions and build an organisation’s human capacity.

NB: Ian R. Ferguson was educated locally, regionally and internationally, having earned a Master’s Degree in Education from the University of Miami. During the course of his nearly 20 years in education, talent management and human resources, he has served both the public and private sector in senior management roles. He currently serves as manager of the Chamber Institute, and as a local consultant in the field, having assisted hundreds of local and regional businesses in improving business and service excellence through their human capital.