I hear from and speak to many independent consultants and small consultancy owners who struggle with how to get in front of the right type of people, how to make their consultancy stand out and how to balance getting business with doing business. In short, they struggle with working on versus working in their business.
As more and more disillusioned, corporate workers make the break for the freedom of running their own consultancy, the need for consultants to get the balance right between working and in and working on will grow.
Portuguese sailors discovered the dodo in the late 16th century on Mauritius. The dodo had no natural predators before the arrival of humans, and so it showed no fear of its new neighbours. The dodo was so named by the sailors who mistook its lack of fear for a lack of intelligence and named the bird from the Portuguese "doudou," meaning "simpleton."
As soon as humans inhabited Mauritius, the dodo's fate was inevitable. Dodos had few defences and proved to be easy prey for humans and their imported livestock. By late @17the century dodos were extinct. They had not known predators, had not been able to defend themselves and had therefore not survived. They couldn’t adapt because they didn’t see the threat to doing what they had always done.
I hear from and speak to many independent consultants and small consultancy owners who struggle with how to get in front of the right type of people, how to make their consultancy stand out and how to balance getting business with doing business. In short, they struggle with working on versus working in their business.
As more and more disillusioned, corporate workers make the break for the freedom of running their own consultancy, the need for consultants to get the balance right between working and in and working on will grow.
Why then, in a growing market, do many new and for that matter, established consultants act like aspiring dodos – waddling towards extinction?
Why then in a world where the customer’s expectations are widened by choice and availability are many consultants taking a “same as”, “me too” unimaginative, safe and generalist stance?
Why then in a competitive environment where the landscape and inhabitants are constantly evolving, do new and established consultants not recognise the need to compete on new or different terms?
Now you may say that’s a bit harsh and yet the evidence is all too apparent, at the many online and offline networking clubs, events and forums. Consultants are struggling and yet they still perpetuate dodo tendencies.
So what can be done?
Well firstly recognise the signs. Here are 5 signs that you may go the way of the dodo!
1. A Brand That Bores
Everything from business cards to brochures to your website is an access point for your potential customers. If it doesn’t attract them, you’ve lost them. If it doesn’t “speak” to them you’ve lost them. If it doesn’t differentiate you, you’ve lost them. If you’ve lost them beware the dodo.
2. A Confusing or Fluffy Proposition
Specific, clear and focused is the future for consultancy. Generalist, fluffy catchall propositions do not help potential customers make a buying choice. Have a niche, understand their problems, needs and desires and develop products and services, which address them.
Consultants that convey they can do everything for everyone are demonstrating dodo tendencies.
3. Lone Ranger Leadership
Working on a business is the area many consultants and small business owners struggle with the most. One of the main reasons is that their lone ranger alter ego gets in the way. The need to control, be in control and do everything themselves means “doing” gets in the way of leading. By this I mean lone rangers focus on getting clients, delivering for clients AND doing all the other “stuff” as well. This leaves little time for thinking reflecting, planning, reviewing and innovating; important leadership work and ON the business activity.
Why do some people do this? Because
• They are control freaks
• They think they have to
• They think they can’t afford or trust anyone else to do it for them
• They think “how” instead of “who”
• They don’t know there is another way
• They don’t know they are acting like dodos!
4. A Busyness Not A Business
Processes, systems and structure are the foundation of any business. Without them busyness drives activity because there is no frame of reference or context for decision-making and prioritisation of activity.
Finance, marketing, sales, service delivery, operations etc as functional aspects of a business need structure and processes that support the delivery of your brand for your customers – whether you are a global corporation or a sole trader.
How your business does business can now be a real differentiator in many markets and therefore, you need to make it easy for your current and potential customers to do business with you.
“We need you to fill out these forms to get you in our system” is a ME led process not YOU driven process
“Please press 1 to wait a long time, press 2 to wait longer and press 3 to be left in oblivion” are not customer friendly and customer wowing processes!
Processes that put barriers between you and your customer or you and effective delivery for your customers are dodo processes.
5. Imitation not Innovation
Copying your competitors, benchmarking the best and improving what’s already being done are strategies that many consultants adopt and for a time and for a few, they might work. Consultants who really want to stand out, wow their niche and set their customers juices flowing innovate rather than imitate
“Simple logic suggests that if you do what everyone else does, you'll get pretty much the same results. But great successes -- and spectacular failures, to be sure -- come from daring to be different… Being different often means coming up with the obvious insights that turn industries upside down and create the competitive edge that others toil for decades trying to copy." Jeffrey Pfeffer Professor of Organizational Behavior in the Graduate School of Business at Stanford University
Innovation doesn’t need to be radical, (although it could be) outrageous, (although it could be) or provocative (although it could be), yet what if? and what next? are questions or perspectives that will keep the dodo alive.
Change for change sake or new for new sake is not the point. A mindset that balances evolution and revolution is.
Consultancy is a growing profession with a less than glowing history. There are many consultants who didn’t really think about their business, who didn’t question and challenge their brand proposition and who didn’t interact with a niche, who subsequently went the way of the dodo.
Will that be you?
©Beverley Hamilton August 2006
About the Author
Beverley Hamilton MD of One Step Further helps Consultants grow a profitable consultancy and still have time for a life. To get a free 5 part ecourse – Discover the 5 Most Common Incorrect Assumptions Independent Business Consultants Make, go to https://www.OneStepFurther.co.uk/ You can contact Beverley on +44 (0)1344 625713 or at bev@onestepfurther.co.uk
