Clients don’t hire consultants to learn about our unique frameworks or totally novel perspectives or listen to our thought projects on topics like AI, data strategy or new product development. They hire us to help drive outcomes.
Sometimes these are outcomes that the client has already defined, other times they need some help divining what should actually result from a particular strategy or project.
Naturally there is a tension between the design of something and the realization of the thing. For consultants, there is a struggle between the abstract, ambiguous, hand-waving strategic things and the super technical, hyper focused lost in the weeds things.
Oftentimes we lose sight of the actual reason for working a problem with a client. We become so involved and invested with the details of HOW that we forget WHY.
The outcome is what matters. Keeping focus on that is not always easy.
In a recent conference hosted by IASAGlobal.org dealing with Business, Innovation, Leadership & Technology (BIL-T) and focused on driving real world outcomes, my friends and I were asked to host a live session of our podcast. With a dose of editing legerdemain and a degree of intrepidity, we managed to craft an episode from the live talk.
In this episode:
- What are ‘good’ behaviors with regard to delivering outcomes?
- What should consultants be caring about?
- Are Client and Consultant outcomes always aligned?
- How do consultants balance what the client wants vs what is achievable?
- How do consultants know the right level of detail for the audience/client/group?
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