More than 15 million people in this country earn their livings by serving clients, and their numbers are growing every day. Unfortunately, far too few develop the skills and strategies needed to rise to the top in a world where clients have almost unlimited access to information and expertise. Supported by more than one hundred case studies and wisdom gleaned from interviews with dozens of leading CEOs and prominent business advisors, Clients for Life identifies what clients really want and lays out the core qualities that distinguish the client advisor -- an irreplaceable resource -- from the expert for hire -- a tradable commodity.

• Experts are specialists; advisors become deep generalists who have broad perspective.
  
• Experts are for hire; advisors have selfless independence, balancing client devotion with objectivity and detachment.
  
• Experts have professional credibility; advisors develop deep personal trust.
  
• Experts analyze; advisors synthesize and bring big-picture thinking to the table.
  
• Experts supply expertise and information; advisors are educators who provide insight and wisdom.
  

Portraits of history's most famously successful advisors, including Machiavelli, Sir Thomas More, and J. P. Morgan, underscore these timeless qualities that modern professionals need to develop to excel in today's competitive environment.

This book is a substantial re-write of the author's earlier book on management consultancy that has established itself as a leading book on this topic. This re-write focuses upon the analysis of the impact of e-business on the consulting industry as well as examining the changing structure of the industry and emerging segmentation. It also includes recent material on the efforts of consulting firms to manage knowledge more effectively and includes new and more examples and interviews.

A volume in Research in Management Consulting Series Editor Anthony F. Buono, Bentley College Boards and Management Consultants, the eighth volume in the Research in Management Consulting series, explores the growing complexity associated with the growing demands on boards of directors and the challenges raised by evolving expectations of what constitutes ""good"" governance. As a way of better understanding the ramifications for management consulting, particular-and timely-emphasis is placed on the evolution of expectations and needs in relation to boards and their operation. The chapter authors, as noted above a truly international group of experts, more than succeed in raising the reader's awareness of the consequences that the evolving nature of corporate boards are having on the function of directors, how this function is being redefined by the players themselves-and what all of this change means for consultants and the realm of management consulting. Significant questions are raised and explored throughout the volume, from the extent to which these changes will lead to new social, moral, ethical, and professional challenges and opportunities, to how the relationships between consultants and their traditional clients-managers, administrators and employees-might evolve. As management consultants become more actively involved in governance issues, their role will clearly change, but will such changes enhance or constrain the role they have traditionally played in organizations?

This book traces the emergence and development of the relationship between management consultancies and the British state. It seeks to answer three questions: why were management consultants brought into the machinery of the state; how has state power been impacted by bringing profit-seeking actors into the machinery of the state; and how has the nature of management consultancy changed over time? The book demonstrates the role consultants played in major developments in the postwar period. Specific case studies interrogate how consultancies influenced the policy fields of health service reform and social security benefits. This book will redefine debates amongst business historians and historians of the postwar British state about the nature of management consultancy and public sector reform.

Even though corporate clients continue to spend millions of dollars on consultant-based solutions, the success rate of these high-priced remedies is far from what it should be. No matter how wise and creative the input of a consultant, says Robert H. Schaffer, it will pay off only if the client does what is necessary to benefit from the advice. But often there's a big "implementation gap" between what client's must do to make a project succeed and what they are actually able and willing to do.
In this new and revised edition of the landmark book "High-Impact Consulting," Robert H. Schaffer reveals how senior managers unwittingly collude with their consultants to perpetuate the great waste inherent in "the five fatal flaws of conventional consulting." Drawing on his own work with companies-- Motorola, Rio Tinto, IBM, General Reinsurance Corporation, The World Bank, and other successful organizations-- Schaffer offers a field-tested approach to working with consultants that has proven to get results. He identifies the key elements of an effective project design?particularly that project objectives are defined in terms of client results rather than just consultant deliverables. The process enables clients to be certain that the work is carried out in ways that ensure success.
The author explains the importance of accomplishing results quickly and then using these "rapid-cycle wins" as vehicles for sharpening management skills, strengthening work disciplines, and introducing new technology. In addition he tells managers and consultants how they can build on these early successes and tackle larger accomplishments and organization wide improvements.
This thoroughly updatededition features valuable new insights and illustrative cases. It also includes a wealth of practical new tools that make the book a user-friendly, quick reference for both client managers and their consultants.

A Guide to Federal Contracting: Principles and Practices demystifies the federal buying process, providing in one volume a succinct yet thorough treatment of federal contracting requirements or regulations. Bringing together concepts of business, law, politics, public and social policy, pricing, and contract placement and administration, Dan Lindner draws on 40 years of federal government experience to cover the vast spread of this important process that impacts our daily government operations. This completely updated second edition incorporates the nearly 16 regulatory changes that have occurred since the first edition was published and adds new subsections on Product Planning and Placement, Major Systems Acquisition, Cloud Computing, Cybersecurity, Other Transaction Agreements, Corporate Budget, and Work Breakdown Structure.

The book clearly shows how small consultancies grow successfully and is presented in an accessible way. The book has a strong digital angle, as this is something relatively new to consulting firms. The book draws on research with 50 CEOs of start-up consultancies. Written by a leading authority on building consultancies, and recognised author in the areas of management consultancy.

The book clearly shows how small consultancies grow successfully and is presented in an accessible way. The book has a strong digital angle, as this is something relatively new to consulting firms. The book draws on research with 50 CEOs of start-up consultancies. Written by a leading authority on building consultancies, and recognised author in the areas of management consultancy.

* Provides a step-by-step guide for completing a successful student consulting project, which should be essential reading for specific experiential Business Consulting modules, as well as recommended reading for students studying Small Business Management and Strategic Management at postgraduate and MBA level. * Fully updated 6th edition, including new tools and resources, new real-life examples, material on technologies and remote working, and a focus on student employability. * Promotes a conceptual understanding of the consulting process.

Organization Development and Society: Theory and Practice of Organization Development Consulting offers a new approach for the practice of organization development (OD). The new approach, a habitus oriented OD (HOOD), sees consultees' thinking and behavior a result of habitus, a cognitive structure developed historically in endless interactions between human behavior and social structures. HOOD has two goals: The first goal is to redefine the objectives of individually oriented OD. The focus on habitus and social structure allows individually oriented OD scholars and practitioners to keep their subjective approach, which searches for consultees' inner world. However, this subjectivity searches not only for consultees' psychological but their social dispositions. It views the individual level, the habitus, as a site of social dispositions that from within the individual consultees generate thoughts and behaviors in a way that closely corresponds with the organization's social structure; with power relations and social positions and with accepted metaphors and common language. The HOOD links the concept of habitus to the field of OD and in so doing provides an alternative way to incorporate the individual and the social in OD. HOOD's second goal is to re/position OD between organizations and society and thus to produce a consulting practice that is both pragmatic and human. It is pragmatic since incorporation of habitus enables the consultant to liberate consultees' perspectives and behavior from the organization's social and structural hoops and to use these perspectives in processes of change and development. Considering the habitus as central to consulting projects is human since it enables consultants (and consultees) to identify the responsibility for organizational problems (and other phenomena) not only at the level of the individual but also at the level of the organization and the environment outside the organization.

This title was first published in 2002: The history of management consulting in Britain is a subject that has received little attention in the past in terms of research or publication. This work redresses the gap in the knowledge base of business and management history, presenting the historical situation in the context of management consulting. Identifying the beginnings of consultancy services in the mid-nineteenth century, Ferguson charts its progression through a series of time frames that span the twentieth century. Utilizing a series of consistent themes, such as service delivery forms and training, which can be compared and contrasted across time, the book provides not only a history of management consultancy services, but also shows how the take-up and form of services was heavily dependent upon the prevailing attitudes within business to the role of management. The thoroughly researched and well-presented arguments in this book will greatly add to our knowledge of British management during the twentieth century.

Whether you are preparing for a management consultancy career or only want to acquire widely applicable consultancy skills, you will need a clear and concise introduction to this area. This fully updated second edition text provides you with a practical, step-by-step guide to learn the proven successful methods and techniques of the world's leading management consultancy firms. Detailed descriptions and real-life illustrations enable you to develop consultancy skills for structured problem-solving, critical thinking, collaboration and communication. Additionally, this text provides rich insights into the latest developments in the consultancy industry and their firms. It includes alumnus of a top management consultancy firm and is essential reading for aspiring consultants as well as anyone dealing with consultants in their career.

This title was first published in 2002: The history of management consulting in Britain is a subject that has received little attention in the past in terms of research or publication. This work redresses the gap in the knowledge base of business and management history, presenting the historical situation in the context of management consulting. Identifying the beginnings of consultancy services in the mid-nineteenth century, Ferguson charts its progression through a series of time frames that span the twentieth century. Utilizing a series of consistent themes, such as service delivery forms and training, which can be compared and contrasted across time, the book provides not only a history of management consultancy services, but also shows how the take-up and form of services was heavily dependent upon the prevailing attitudes within business to the role of management. The thoroughly researched and well-presented arguments in this book will greatly add to our knowledge of British management during the twentieth century.

A collection of papers exploring the development of knowledge and value in management consulting. The papers are divided into three sections on: the management consulting industry; trends and techniques in management consulting; and reflections on management consulting.

Management consultanting and investment banking have been held up as industries at the forefront of contemporary globalization. Using an interdisciplinary approach ranging across economics, economic geography, sociology and management studies, Andrew Jones analyses the nature of globalization within business service transnational corporations in these sectors. Using qualitative research with leading business managers, he focuses on the social and cultural nature of "doing" global service business in an era of increasing integration of the world economy.

This book is a primer for those interested in a career in this dynamic, multidisciplinary field as well as a handy reference for practicing consultants. Combining theory and practice advice into a concise, readable format, the book is an accessible introduction to the types of projects you will encounter as an environmental consultant and lays the groundwork for what you'll need to know in this challenging and rewarding profession. Also available with this book, under the Additional Resources tab, are PowerPoint lectures that correspond with each chapter. New in the Second Edition Covers the latest environmental issues, including emerging contaminants, and the latest technological advances in environmental investigation and remediation New chapters dedicated to vapor intrusion investigation and mitigation and to Brownfields redevelopment and project financing. An expanded chapter describing the staffing, budgeting, and execution of environmental projects. Descriptions of the remediation processes under RCRA and Superfund Descriptions on how each chapter's subject matter applies to the job of the environmental consultant. Dozens of new figures, photographs, and tables designed to enhance the reader's understanding of the subject matter. Problems and questions to be used for homework assignments or classroom discussions.

Fuel your business' transition into the digital age with this insightful and comprehensive resource Digital Business Transformation: How Established Companies Sustain Competitive Advantage offers readers a framework for digital business transformation. Written by Nigel Vaz, the acclaimed CEO of Publicis Sapient, a global digital business transformation company, Digital Business Transformation delivers practical advice and approachable strategies to help businesses realize their digital potential. Digital Business Transformation provides readers with examples of the challenges faced by global organizations and the strategies they used to overcome them. The book also includes discussions of: How to decide whether to defend, differentiate, or disrupt your organization to meet digital challenges How to deconstruct decision-making throughout all levels of your organization How to combine strategy, product, experience, engineering, and data to produce digital results Perfect for anyone in a leadership position in a modern organization, particularly those who find themselves responsible for transformation-related decisions, Digital Business Transformation delivers a message that begs to be heard by everyone who hopes to help their organization meet the challenges of a changing world.

Although consultants influence the outcome of major endeavors in the fields of management, finance, government, and engineering, few attempts have been made to establish the tenets and techniques of consulting. In Principles and Practices of Professional Consulting, author Steven C. Stryker outlines the basic tools required of this critical skill. In doing so, he looks into the history of consulting, the consulting process itself, and the key practical skills and techniques that are needed for successful consulting. Case examples based on real-life situations aptly demonstrate the applicability of the material to current consulting activities. After introducing the topic and presenting some background information, this book goes through the process of consulting from meeting and securing clients, to planning and implementing a proper strategy, to terminating and evaluating assignments. It provides techniques and principles at each stage of the process which are sure to improve one's consulting practice. This book presents much crucial information that can be immediately used by professionals and students in various disciplines. It is both comprehensive, covering all the essential aspects of professional consulting by uniting theory and practice into a single resource, and accessible, presenting this information in a clear-cut manner that allows it to be easily used by anyone wishing to learn more about the important art of professional consulting.

This volume advocates accurate case outcome prediction that does not rely on symmetric modeling. To that end, it provides theory construction and testing applications in several sub-disciplines of business and the social sciences to illustrate how to move away from symmetric theory construction. Each chapter constructs case outcome theory and includes empirical analysis of outcomes. Chapter 1 provides a foundation of symmetric variable directional-relationship theory construction and null hypothesis significance testing versus asymmetric case outcome theory construction and somewhat precise outcome testing, while Chapters 2-6 investigate these principles through a range of applications. This volume will be very useful to researchers and professionals in manufacturing, service, consulting, management, marketing, organizational studies, and more. It will also be an excellent resource for advanced statistics students in building and testing case outcome models. Data sets are included so that readers can replicate findings presented in each chapter, and grow to present and test additional theories.