HOW TO THRIVE AS AN
INDEPENDENT PROFESSIONAL
I was chatting with an independent consultant at an event last night, and he told me, “I’m having a hard time finding project opportunities, and I don’t know what I’m doing wrong. I’ve got three decades of experience, so usually if I sit down with someone and talk to them about their business, I’m able to find a way that I can be helpful, but I’m not getting the opportunity to have those conversations.”
This short episode was my response.
Will Bachman 00:02
I was chatting with an independent consultant at an event last night. And he told me, we’ll, I’m having a hard time finding project opportunities. And I don’t know what I’m doing wrong. I’ve got three decades of experience. So usually if I sit down with someone, and I talk to them about their business, I’m able to find a way that I can be helpful, but I’m not getting the opportunity to have those conversations. This was my response. All right. Let’s assume that you own your apartment or house. Do you just invite a plumber over to your house to have a leisurely conversation with you to wander through your house discussing sink fixtures, toilet bowls and the drain line to the sewer. exploring ways the plumber might be helpful. Probably not. The plumber knocked on your door, asking to catch up and have a coffee. You would tell the plumber to get lost you call a plumber. When you need a plumber. You call a plumber when the drain under your sink is leaking, or when your toilet is overflowing. You call a roofer when your roof is leaking, you can’t electrician when the breaker pops and you can’t reset it. 99% of consulting projects happen the same way. A consultant is a crafts person, no different than a plumber or roofer or electrician. clients don’t want to just shoot the breeze with us and explore how we might be helpful. When they have something break. Then the look for the right specialist to fix it. Our job is to ensure that we are Top of Mind the first specialists that a client calls when they need help. That’s it for this short episode of Unleashed the show that explores how to thrive as an independent professional Unleashed is produced by Umbrex, the first global community connecting top tier independent management consultants with one another and I’m your host Will Bachman. Every week I send out an email with summaries of each Unleashed episode, transcripts of each episode and often some bonus material. If you’d like to receive that weekly email, send me a note at unleashed@umbrex.com Thanks for listening
