Wednesday, September 22, 2010

McKnight Mentor Program

Now William brings consulting to the consultant.

My six-month retainer-based Mentor Program offers access to help the individual or organization create total business transformation. With my focus on your success, I provide you full, end-to-end solutions leveraging where the practice is and where it needs to be.

Designed to support independent consultants, consultants employed at consulting firms, those who operate as consultants but without the title and entire firms, practices and project teams, this program allows you to gain insight, advice, mentoring and knowledge transfer. Be ready for business transformation.

Topics covered during the program include any of the following, with a focus on your issues:

• Client management
• Staffing decisions and issues
• Marketing challenges
• Client engagement
• Engagement execution
• Reputation building
• Publicity ideas and outlets
• Social media and internet strategy
• Business instantiation
• Long-term planning
• Fee strategies
• Service planning
• Exit strategies
• Life balance
• Goal-setting and achievement
• Image makeover
• Collateral review
• Critical business decisions
• Managing capital

There are two options.

Option 1 is access via scheduled phone calls and guaranteed-response email as needed.

Option 2 is less client-directed. With Option 2, I will create a program of consulting mastery for you, based on your situation. The program will consist of milestone-based structure and review towards those specific goals. It is designed for complete and intense acceleration of your concept.

I propose a conservative approach to business spending in my book, but I can see no better place to invest for consulting success than in the McKnight Mentor Program I’ve designed.

Given the personal nature of the Mentor Program, space is limited. Contact me today to discuss the option that is right for you.

"I wanted to thank you for the mentoring that you have given me over the past few years and helping me mature as an entrepreneur. In my opinion, the program will improve the quality of consultants and ultimately benefit the clients better.

William has been Mercury's go to person for shifting the perception of our value and empowering us with the tactics needed for success. He offers an unbiased opinion and cuts a lot of the noise.

Mercury in turn passes on this valuable advice to our clients uses it to build the organization to support the industry trends, ultimately helping us grow stronger."

Vinay Balasubramanian
President
Mercury Software Consulting,Inc.

“My consulting business, Netra Technologies, Inc., has benefitted tremendously from William’s advice on a variety of topics including adoption of a better business model, improved profitability, business expansion, etc. It was really nice to get mentoring from someone who has been there and done it like, William McKnight. The value we received has far exceeded our costs and we look forward to continuing the mentoring service for the foreseeable future.”

Madhur Limdi
Managing Principal
Netra Technologies, Inc.

Monday, September 6, 2010

The benefits of working at a System Integrator/Consulting

The following question came into me some years ago at one of the forums I blog at in my industry.  It contains some industry jargon, but I thought the main points would be interesting to anyone in consulting.

The Question:

I am currently a principal data architect with a System Integrator (SI). I feel that being with a SI limits our involvement in client organizations' data architecture decisions. In turn, this limits our exposure to broader areas of data management, and subsequently the career path.


We are more driven by the client architecture team's decisions. I feel that if I been in the client organization, I probably would have had much more exposure and potential for growth in the data management field.

I feel beyond a certain role. Should I move out of the SI companies and shift to being part of the business organization's data management function?

The Answer:
Hello, and thanks for your question about data architect careers. System integrators do a variety of things for their clients -- from strategy through implementation and production. I certainly believe that there is no better position than a strategy consultant for contributing to important data architecture decisions at client organizations. You are probably part of implementation teams and yes, by then, many broader decisions have been made. You should always feel free to contribute your ideas for change and progress to your project leaders and clients. More importantly, with a System Integrator, you should be getting exposure to and understanding how and why decisions are made in a variety of environments, which is the best experience for enhancing your credibility, which will enable you to contribute to client decisions. In my experience, credibility is the number one factor that will enable you to contribute to decisions, not your organization or title. Be sure to work that end of the spectrum.

So, in general, looking at SI organizations versus client organizations, I disagree that being with a client organization is better for your goals.

Chapter 8: The Role of the Consultant available free of charge

I've made "Chapter 8: The Role of the Consultant" available free of charge at http://www.williammcknight.com/filedownload.html.