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| | 22-year-olds. There are
plenty of people out
there who have been
working for a number of
years in either
professions or industry
who occasionally wonder
if consultancy might be
for them - but aren’t
really sure what skills
are required and whether
they might have them.
Industry recruitment
But people do make the
crossover every year -
and not in small numbers.
“We do a lot of our
recruiting from
industry,” says Sej
Butler, recruitment
manager for IBM Business
Consulting Services,
which is both the UK and
the world’s largest
consulting group. “I’d
estimate that somewhere
between a third and a
half of all our new
people come from industry
- and at all levels.”
What IBM is looking
for, he says, varies:
“We’re looking for people
who have worked on
transformational change
programmes; those who
have leading roles or
those who have been
project leaders on large,
complex projects; also
people with certain
professional
qualifications.” But, he
adds, if you come in at a
junior level, “it’s a lot
easier for people without
ready-made skills. At
senior levels you want
people who can hit the
ground running.”
What consultancies
look for, says Tim
Robinson, a partner at
Accenture, is a fairly
broad set of abilities:
“The skills include
having personal
credibility with clients
and being able to build
ownership with clients.
Individuals need to have
stature and gravitas, and | |
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| | good communication
skills.” Moreover, he
adds, empathy is
important too: they need
to be sensitive to the
environment the client is
in, whether that is a
particular corporate
culture or national
culture. “Ultimately it’s
about having good
antennae,” he says.
Robinson says that
there is also a strong
organisational element:
“They need to have good
management skills - to be
able to organise and
direct work, and to
analyse and define
problems.” Consultants,
he explains, “will often
find themselves in a
situation where they have
to filter lots of
information and a myriad
of issues to find out
what the real issues are
and how to address
these.”
Alison Wilcox,
director of development
at the Hay Group, takes a
more personal approach:
“I suppose the thing that
strikes me more and more
is that a lot of it is
just about building
relationships - building
and managing
relationships so you get
to the point where you’re
trusted. It sounds very
simplistic, but it’s not
- you often have to say
‘no’ to things people
really want to do. It’s a
long game - you are
building up a trusted
advisor role and all
sorts of emotional
intelligence comes into
play. Basically, it’s all
about trying to get into
the rhythm of the culture
of the client.”
As these three views
indicate, many of the
skills that go to make a
good consultant would
actually be valued in
most situations. Rebecca | |
|
| | Fawcett at Towers Perrin
says that for this reason
potential recruits are to
be found everywhere: “A
lot of what makes a good
consultant are relatively
soft skills. If you’re
looking at people to
build networks and
relationships, you could
source them from any
sector.” For certain
areas, she adds, it can
be more specific:
obviously a creative
media consultant or a
communications consultant
is likely to have a
background in a related
field. But for more
general roles, the
individual is more
important than the
background. “We’ve even
had a former teacher,”
she adds.
Of course, there will
be some people who are
employed more because
they have a very deep
knowledge in specific
sectors. Ian Jordan,
head of Capgemini UK's
Consulting Services says:
“A good consultant can be
one who has a depth of
knowledge or experience
in certain areas -
finance, wealth
management or even
something as specific as
RFID skills (radio
frequency
identification), for
example - but is also
someone who is able to
bring together facts and
processes to allow you to
drive change.”
Indeed, some of the
people with knowledge of
a specific area at a very
high level will also be
attractive because of the
client base they can
bring with them. But, at
that level, they will
need to justify their
salaries.
There is also, says
Butler, the rather
interesting phenomenon of | |
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| | people in their fifties
who leave the financial
services industry and
take a substantial pay
cut to go into
consultancy: surprising
as it may sound, the
hours are rather less
onerous.
Finally, while all
consultancies look for
fairly bright people -
you have to think on your
feet, after all - some
still have a thing for
‘rocket scientist’ types.
Whatever their origin,
many of these recruits to
consultancy find one
particular aspect of
their new environment
difficult to cope with:
adapting their work/life
balance. The reason?
Consultants travel all
the time and this can
strain relationships,
especially for those with
families, where the
partner works regular
hours.
Sej Butler,
recruitment manager for
IBM Business Consulting
Services, agrees. “The
single biggest problem
for people who come to us
from other industries,”
he says, “is the
lifestyle of consultants
- the high degree of
mobility. You leave work
on a Monday, live in a
hotel, and come home on a
Friday. There’s no
routine at all. It’s the
single biggest issue but,
unfortunately, it’s the
nature of the work.”
Our thanks go to the
MCA and Educate for
allowing us to adapt this
content from Changing
Tracks. For further
details of the
publication and how to
receive a copy, go to:
http://www.changingtracks.
co.uk.
| |
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| | During the Management
Consultancy Careers Fair
last month, the
Management Consultancies
Association launched a
new publication for
people interested in
pursuing a career in
consulting.
Top-Consultant
provided editorial for
Changing Tracks and
here we highlight some of
the key lessons to emerge
from the book. First up –
what makes a good
management consultant?
Consultants need to
have good management and
organisational skills, be
able to direct work and
be good at building
relationships, and, most
importantly, be happy to
work irregular hours,
says Rhymer Rigby.
“A few years ago on a
train in Vietnam, my
girlfriend and I were
sharing a carriage with
two recent graduates who
were taking a gap year.
We got chatting and one
of them said that, when
he got back to England,
he’d be starting work as
a consultant. Making
polite conversation, my
girlfriend asked him what
he’d be consulting in. He
looked at her as if she
was mad and questioning
his very integrity and
replied: ‘Why consultancy
- of course!’”
This is a true story -
and the silliness aside -
it serves to illustrate
an important point: while
lots of people have a
vague idea of what
consultants do, they’d be
hard pressed to know what
makes a good consultant
-and that isn’t just | |
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