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Evren Ozkaya identifies the only two skills you need to be a consultant.

Since my “official” consulting journey started back with McKinsey & Company, and now continues with my own venture at Supply Chain Wizard into the endless and exciting world of challenges and opportunities, I had the privilege to see so many different consulting projects, programs, initiatives in various countries, companies and industries, that I think it is time for me to look back and tell a few words about consulting.

For the small percentage of world population who are in the consulting business, it may not be a mystery (for US, the estimate is about 250,000 consultants per wetfeet.com, which makes less than 0.1% of population or 1-in-1000). But for the vast majority of the people, consulting is still a “new” and increasingly interesting field of occupation, where more and more people would like to jump right in. I think world needs more consulting talent, and my objective is to inspire the future generations of consultants, and hopefully take part in cultivating, educating and preparing some of them for a successful consulting career. If you want to be encouraged on the future prospects of consulting, I highly recommend the HBR article “The Rise of the Supertemp”.  

First of all, no single corporate job could beat the combination of experiences, learning and fun I have accumulated in my consulting career, and that’s why I love being a consultant. Looking back, I have fond memories of helping a medical device manufacturer redesign its entire supply chain planning, supporting a consumer packaged goods company in Midwest to optimize its global manufacturing and sourcing network, spending time in Mexico and Honduras training client teams, conducting a full operations diagnostic of a diaper manufacturer company in Turkey, helping a US-based Private Equity firm assessing a target company in Education industry, preparing project proposals for leading global retailers for their distribution network optimization and even spending considerable time in trash collection stations and landfills around the country to optimize their operations. More recently, having a chance to live in Rome, Italy for about 3 months to support a major humanitarian logistics organization and projects we took on as a company in India, Turkey, Rwanda and in Europe are all adding up to great excitement, pride, continued learning and fun. In my latest blog post “Launch your startup and go global”, I believe I have captured some of this excitement and learnings. 

Key points include:

• Get a practice partner
• Find a case coach
• Read case examples

Read the full article, The Only 2 Skills a Consultant Needs, on LinkedIn.