The Consulting Fundamentals Training course is a great place to start to find out all about Consultants, Consulting and the activities they perform. This supports your learning from the Consulting Leadership Workshop.

1. Introducing the Consulting Fundamentals Course. Watch this first!

2. What’s in the course? Watch this second!

3. Now work your way through each of the sections. Happy Learning!

The Consultant

Consultants come in varieties. You can be a facilitator, working to extract solutions from clients, or you can be an expert, trading on your knowledge and deep experience of your topic. You may prefer to work internally, embedded in an organisation in a permanent capacity; or externally, as a fully independent operator. And there are a number of company structures that might support you in your career.

Capability

Your Capability is what you have the ability to do. You need to consider how to continually develop personally – for your benefit and that of your clients. You must strive to assess how your capability matches the client and market need. Finally, you need to continually demonstrate your capability so that your clients have a real feel for what you do and how you can help them.

Services

Your Services are what you deliver as a consultant. A client will engage with you because they have a need. As a consultant, you will engage them because you provide a service which matches that need and, typically, because the client has a shortage of such skills in-house. But what is the best way to define what you do and what services you provide? By function, by domain, by delivery method, by intellectual property (IP)? These are all valid ways of doing it, but whatever you decide, relevance and consistency are key.

The Client

The next focus is the Client. The client is the consultant’s customer, and without the client, there would be no consultancy! This interaction is fundamental but varies between situations in the types of clients you interact with, the closeness to each one, their specific motivations and fears, and the importance that both of you attach to the relationship.

Strategy

Your strategy is what brings the consulting, capability, services, and client elements together. In addition, you need to consider fundamental aspects of how you wish to perform your consultancy activities, including your purpose (also known as your mission), your values, and your vision for the future. You may also need to consider more detailed planning, such as roadmaps and targets. Finally, you need to consider how you communicate your strategy to potential clients and colleagues.

Consultant Abilities

In this course module, learn all about how consultants can develop soft skills to compliment their expert skills.  Communication, Problem Solving, Self Management and Collaboration skills are the skills that all consultants need to continually develop.

Consultant Activities

In this module, you learn about the 13 complementary activities that consultants need to perform, from marketing and sales to create business to knowledge management and customer service to ensure that current and future service is high quality.