Experiences of a Professional Consultant: Servicing the Client

Here are some thoughts on client service and things you can do to improve your odds that the client will be happy with your performance:

For simplicity, I like to think of all engagements as one of three types. This helps me to quickly get the right hat on when going through the door.

- Staff augmentation. This will include all the interim roles and acting like an extra to fill in with work overloads. You may or may not have a management role.

- Project work. This usually involves various types of process improvement for everything from soup to nuts, or the application of specialized skills to solve a problem.

- Clean-up work. This is a special kind of project work. For those with experience in it, you will know what I am talking about and why I make this a third category.

Service, service, service. Every engagement is unique in its situation, client, people, and role. At the start of the project, you really don’t know much about the client or the specific details of the situation, and they don’t know much about you. I believe the key is to develop an attitude of servant leader. Your ultimate power resides in your knowledge, work product, and wisdom to navigate the client situation and to ultimately provide sound advice and solutions.

Let your work speak for you. Give the client the benefit of the doubt and assume they are competent. Over time, your work will speak for itself, and as the client begins to truly appreciate your presence, you will be given more opportunities. This is earned on every project.

Communicate, communicate, communicate. Make sure your communication style matches with what the client wants. This includes not only the methods (email, personal meetings, presentations, work plans, and phone conversations) but also the timeliness and content.

Stay in your lane. This is particularly important for senior consultants who have had a lot of line management experience but very little consulting experience (or none at all). Initially, the client only knows you from your interview and what they have been told by J Curve. There may be a strong desire to give unsolicited advice. This is a mistake and one of the biggest reasons for early failure by senior individuals. Advice will only be accepted once you have gained the client’s respect through your work product and professionalism. Put yourself in their position before you speak. They don’t know you and you don’t know them. I learned this very early on…the hard way.

Don’t overextend your work product and increase risk for yourself and J Curve. Keep liability low. This may involve things like not signing tax returns or other legal documents unless you have an approved interim position through J Curve to do so. It should never be done in your role as the de facto Controller because you are the most experienced person out there. It may involve any number of situations where reliance will be placed on your work product. However, remember that your work product is the property of the client. They paid for it. They must review and approve it before they present it to others. You must make sure this is the case. I have found emails to be the best way to clearly but subtly accomplish this.

Unless you have an interim role with authority, you are an influencer now. You no longer have line authority. Clients will rarely accept all your recommendations. This should not bother you. They may know things about the situation you do not, or they may feel there is a better way to go and they may be right.

Don’t gossip about what you find. At many clients, if you are there long enough, you will see things that just don’t work well and therefore provide opportunities for improvement. Don’t go completely native at the water cooler. Remember, you are not an employee. Mention opportunities to your J Curve contact if you believe they could lead to another consulting opportunity.

Don’t take a narrow view of your work product. Think of it as how you write your emails, how you verbally communicate, how you conduct yourself in (or run) meetings, how timely you respond to inquiries, how you present yourself daily to the client, and how you interact with employees, to mention a few. While the substance of the work product is the most important thing, the quality of its presentation still matters, believe me. Always spend some time reviewing your work product and do not fool yourself that an Excel model, Word document, PowerPoint presentation, or email that is poorly organized and has many spelling mistakes is not noticed by the client. What would you want to see in their shoes? Your excellent example really will inspire others.