What is Consultancy and the Consulting Process?

What is Consulting?

Consulting is a process followed by specialist experts who have a wealth of business and management experience, to identify structural and organisational areas of concern, ascertain their causes and develop solutions to overcome them.

Management consulting is a discipline and profession which covers the totality of change affecting an organisation and could produce solutions for problems ranging from a loss of market share to bottlenecks in production, from a lack of customer confidence to inappropriate management structures.

Training consultancy is an implicit part of organisational development and looks at using learning and developing solutions for skills gaps or skills weaknesses within the organisation's workforce.

Financial consultancy is a discipline followed by financial experts who are able to examine the financial sector of the organisation, identify areas of weakness and structure solutions to overcome those areas of weakness.

The Consultancy Process

In the first instance the consultant is reliant on the management team recognising that there is a problem which has to be solved. When there is a problem which the management team do not recognise it as such, that in itself is a problem.

Sometimes the consultant has to look very hard and asked quite pertinent probing questions to be able to find the real underlying causes for the manifested problem areas.

As you may appreciate this can be quite difficult on occasion, especially when there are unreceptive line managers, or people who are seeking to preserve their power base by telling you what they think you want to hear.

Through asking the appropriate questions the consultant is both trying to identify the real areas of concern, established a rapport with the client, as well as her own credibility. All of the qualifications under the sun will have brought the consultant will and it is only their skills, experience and knowledge which will take them forward.

Once an understanding is obtained the customer will produce a specification document which will outline the problem areas, present one or more solutions and make a recommendation. The consultant will have developed enough detail within each of the solutions presented for the client appeal to make a decision. And that decision will be required before any progress can be made.

There are two types of management consultancy. The first type focus on the strategic picture and on producing what they see as the solution. They do not take any part in the implementation and evaluation of that solution.

The second type are able to take the solution in which the client has agreed, advice on its implementation, or where required implement it and then participate in the evaluation.

Both types of management consultancy have their merits and are keen to add value to the client organisation.

What is PLGA and What Do They Do?

PLGA Limited is a Boutique Consultancy in the Organisational Change, Risk Management and Strategic Change marketplace and PLGA (Performance, Leadership, Goals, Achievement) are specialists in:

• Managing projects of all sizes,
• Building the capacity of project managers and project teams to deliver their projects
• Engaging Stakeholders and managing their expectations
• Developing senior managers to discharge their responsibilities effectively as decision makers on Project Boards and as Project Sponsors.
• Identifying and Developing Opportunities for businesses and individuals, at all levels and across markets and sectors

We have produced a series of articles which will help readers to prepare themselves for managing projects of all sizes.

Considering that more than 70% of projects across-the-board, regularly file to achieve their objectives and targets, and felt very strongly that project managers and potential project managers, and indeed program managers, should be given every assistance to help them to succeed.

In this series of articles we have given the benefit of our many years of applied project management, the synthesis of the training that our experienced and specialised project management and programme management trainers have given to our many clients, and the aggregation of the value within the collective years of experience.

Here is a little about the author these articles. Pashori is the CEO of PLGA Limited and is an accomplished Projects and Programme Manager.

He is an experienced Change Specialist. He has successfully designed and delivered change in a range of public and private sector organisations, embedded improvements to their business bottom line, gained a high degree of positive feedback and excellent customer satisfaction.

He is an Author, Speaker and Executive Coach, Business Coach and Mentor. Pashori speaks on many events and would be pleased to speak at your event or that of someone you know. More is contained in the Bio section below.

The life of a project manager is never easy as he/she is forever in the firing line for many things, constantly looking over their shoulder and ever under pressure to produce.

Many people raise issues during the life of the project and even though the project is all about implementing change, these issues raised further change which has to be taken on board and managed.

He is very passionate about the way projects, programmes are managed and change is designed and implemented. Some of the many areas to be considered include the stewardship process, sometimes called the Business Planning Cycle, developing your business case, identifying the objectives for the change, looking at a feasibility study, producing a basic set of information to minimise up front expenditure unnecessarily, obtaining permissions, building your project management team, managing quality and risks, planning and developing your project plan, managing progress has successfully, ensuring that the configuration works, managing people and finances, the role of decision-making is at an ensuring that they understand it, handing over and post-project evaluation.