IT Consultancy

[Sequoia]

Hence the reason I used the term Associate Consultant. My company does in no way regard me a fully qualified consultant (and I don't consider myself one). It will take a number of years for me to move on from that poisition.

What is a consultant? Well someone who can give expert advice in their field to a third party/customer. If a company spends 3-4 years training someone in their products and services so they can effectively deploy/ support them for their customers, then in my eyes, that is a consultant whether they have years and years of experience and a Phd or not.

Well, we all have our own opinion. In my eyes, 3 or 4 years training in your company's products does not make you (or anyone) a consultant. It might make you a salesman, it might make you a pre or post sale support advisor, or analyst, or specialist, and it might make you a very good one of any ofthese. But it doesn't make you a consultant. I stress, though, this is my view, and NOT in any way a criticism of you.

You certainly don't need a PhD to be a consultant. I didn't say you did. That just happened to be the route I took. What you do need to be is an expert, and in my opinion, with three or fours years in business you simply don't have the breadth of experience to be an expert. You might well be fully trained in your company's products, but consultancy is FAR more than knowing your own products. It's problem driven, and if you're tied to a single solution provider, you're part of either the sales chain, or the sales support chain.

Bes, I'm not saying my definition of consultant is right and yours is wrong. All I'm saying is that MY opinion is that 3 or 4 years simply does not make anyone a consultant. It makes them a junior with three or four years experience. If someone came into my company with that level of experience, and called themselves a consultant, I'm going to regard them as a youngster with a pompous title, not as a consultant. That doesn't mean they aren't good at what they do, but in my view, in no way are they qualified as a consultant.

The thing is, so many companies these days, and for years, have been calling woefully inexperienced people "consultants" that the term has lost it's original meaning, and maybe any meaning at all. I've had company's send "consultants" to me who turn out to have had a few weeks (yeah, WEEKS) training. Well, that's a trainee, not a consultant. But some companies seem to think it looks good if they call their staff "consultants". It doesn't.

 

[Sequoia]

Indeed it is widely abused, i really dont see or classify myself as an IT consultant even though i do a lot of consulting work through the company i work for. Id rather be called a company director as i feel that has more to do with my day to day jobs, running the company and attending meetings whereever in the world they may be. But the consultancy work i do get now and again is interesting and quite fun at times.

Indeed.

I have no real idea of your background, Spawn, but I will say I've come across some exceptionally bright people at extremely young ages. Especially in technical fields, being early twenties or even late teens is no barrier to being expert in a technical field. My post above does NOT mean that relatively young people can't be good, very VERY good indeed at what they do. I know that. I've hired several. But there is, in my opinion, ONLY one way to gain the breadth of expertise to be a true consultant, and that is putting in the time to gain the experience.

Oh, and that also doesn't mean that age or experience alone makes you a consultant. Just as I've met some gifted youngsters, I've met some arrogant elder people that seem to think just having the years is enough, regardless of their level of expertise, regardless of the skill set, and regardless of how current their knowledge is. Cobblers to that. Age doesn't necessarily make you wise. It may just make you old.

But a true consultant has a broad mix of skills, and absolutely key to that is people skills. A true consultant is something of a cameleon, able to adopt a manner that will let him (or her) relate to shop floor staff, to the ladies in HR, to middle management, or to the board of a Fortune 100 company. And by "relate", I don't just mean pass some pleasant time over a cup of tea, or a glass of Chardonnay, I mean you have to be able to do your job, get the information you need, get people to do what you want and need them to do, sometimes under adverse conditions, and often without them even realising what it is you need them to do, or tell you. That alone is a skill set that requires time and experience to polish, and I haven't even got to technical or business skills yet.

 

[JonC]

I work for a company called CHP consulting, a IT consultancy dealing with asset finance.

Not a bad bunch to work for, money's quite good, and I pretty much do my 40 hours a week. Plus they look after us quite well, went to sweden last weekend for a spot of snowmobiling and husky sleding (and a reasonable amount of drink).


jonc

 

[M0KUJ1N]

imo "consultant" is an overused term and has become analogous to "eningeer", wheere it has become used more widely and thus has lost some of its prestige and meaning. For me, an engineer isnt someone who installs fridges- it is someone who is educated to degree level, has achieved Chartered status and actually *designs* fridges from the ground up. Consultant (in IT circles anyway) is much the same. If I were to be totally honest, I think the IT industry as a whole has to adopt CEng status wholesale as a post-degree professional qualification of this calibre would demonstrate the technical knowledge, academic ability and professional experience required to fully justify the term of "consultant". It would also benefit people like me who see pre-degree quals such as MCSEs, CCNAs etc as basic, boring and pointless but thats another story

 

[Ex-RoNiN]

imo "consultant" is an overused term and has become analogous to "eningeer", wheere it has become used more widely and thus has lost some of its prestige and meaning. For me, an engineer isnt someone who installs fridges- it is someone who is educated to degree level, has achieved Chartered status and actually *designs* fridges from the ground up. Consultant (in IT circles anyway) is much the same. If I were to be totally honest, I think the IT industry as a whole has to adopt CEng status wholesale as a post-degree professional qualification of this calibre would demonstrate the technical knowledge, academic ability and professional experience required to fully justify the term of "consultant". It would also benefit people like me who see pre-degree quals such as MCSEs, CCNAs etc as basic, boring and pointless but thats another story

Don't believe the BCS hype.

 

[M0KUJ1N]

I dont- if I did I'd be a member (as it happens Im a member of the IoP and looking at achieving CSci/CEng status fairly soon). However its still a valid point and if the BCS did a better job of regulating and promoting its membership, and if employers actually believed in its qualifications we wouldnt be in the situation we are in now.

 

[Ex-RoNiN]

I dont- if I did I'd be a member (as it happens Im a member of the IoP and looking at achieving CSci/CEng status fairly soon). However its still a valid point and if the BCS did a better job of regulating and promoting its membership, and if employers actually believed in its qualifications we wouldnt be in the situation we are in now.

Heh, the BCS is a complete joke, and I command you for not giving them money

What annoyed me (to say the least!) about the BCS is that they came marching into uni and announced that with membership in the BCS, two yrs of experience, our degree, and one exam we can achieve CEng status. Erm, what

A code monkey doesn't qualify for anything anywhere near CEng. Nor does a system admin or web admin. Its a bit like Civil Engineering. Yeah, a builder, a plumber, an electrician, they are all part of it. Do they come close to the all-round skills of a civil engineer? No they don't. Its the same with IT. The fringe jobs (programmers, admins) are not in the same leage as system architects, or the pinnacle of IT, consultants. System Architects and Consultants are to IT what real Civil Engineers are to building. Similarly, programmers and admins are to IT what plumbers and electricians are to Civil Engineering.

I know this may annoy a few people, but guys, look the facts in the eye - IT has reached maturity. There is now a very large, highly educated workforce out there that allows employers to no longer worry, how to complete IT projects or how to design products. The how-to is no longer relevant, anyone can do it these days. The industry is now shifting towards answering the questions "What can we actually do with IT" and "How can we add business value to our/our clients' business". I'm sorry, but a sys admin or a programmer can not answer these questions, as they have too much niche, and not enough general knowledge. This is what differentiates the professionals from the specialists. The specialists are replacable, but the professionals are the ones that are key for a business.

Think of electricity - once companies like Siemens and General Electric figured out how to make electricity, how to store it and how to transport it, their attention shifted from making electricity to using electricity. IT is going through the same thing, and the industry is very ill-prepared.

I do realise that a lot of this doesn't really apply to SME's, but even there the requirements to specialists have risen. Knowing one or two programming languages will get you nothing but laughts. You have to know several languages, and be able to learn new ones quickly.

/rant

 

[Jonnycoupe]

Also, the term "consultant" is widely abused. Far too many call themselves that, or are called that by their employer, when their expertise and/or experience come nowhere close to justifying the term.

Can be anywhere near as abused as the word Engineer

 

[Sequoia]

Can be anywhere near as abused as the word Engineer

Typo? You mean "Can't"???

If so, I can't really say. I've seen a lot of people claiming to be "consultants" over the years, and a fairly small percentage actually deserved the description. With some, it was an utter farce.

But I don't know enough about engineering to be qualified to judge.

 

[SexyGreyFox]

As I said before, "consultant" is a widely abused term.

Just like the word 'engineer'. I'm regarded as an engineer but with no qualifications at all.
On Radio 1 the other day Chris Moyles had a phone-in guest who was a Network Scientist.
He fitted computers into hospitals but was considered a Network Scientist.

 

[Yas786]

Just like the word 'engineer'. I'm regarded as an engineer but with no qualifications at all.
On Radio 1 the other day Chris Moyles had a phone-in guest who was a Network Scientist.
He fitted computers into hospitals but was considered a Network Scientist.

Hehe thats a good one, what other names will they think of next.

In my field of work, we call them the monkeys ie the guys who do all the dirty work like putting in equipment, cables etc etc. Usually the official word we give them is network or IT engineer but that still doesnt really mean anything that they dont have engineering degrees as of such lol.

 

[HangTime]

My experience of work has put me in contact with very few people I would consider a consultant in my way of thinking. I've recently spent a couple of weeks with a consultant from a company who are going to be outsourcing some of our work, detailing what needs to be done, and the way it is currently being done. Now, this consultant may have been:

-Very knowledgeable in a specific (different) field
-Personable, a good communicator and a conscientious worker
-Has a focussed approach to looking at systems and suggesting potential pitfalls and solutions

BUT, the fact remains that - by his own admission - his level of knowledge, experience and technical expertise is far lower than my own (as far as this area of the business is concerned). So at the end of the day, the person making the recommendations is not doing so from an optimal position. OK, so he's written some documents maybe marginally better layed out than I could have done, but it's certainly nothing I couldn't have knocked up myself to a higher level of accuracy.

Likewise, we once had a consultant come in to work out which supplier was the best to use for Office supplies. I think he was with us for two (not full) days, and it cost us over £500 in fees (cheap compared to some consultancy fees for sure, but still money down the drain). Yet if anyone had bothered to ask me I could have simply taken the data they were given, knocked up a spreadsheet based on usage&cost statistics and given them the same answer, for a tenth of the price.

But I'm getting a little egotistical with my anecdotes here. We did have one guy at our IT centre (working for a 3rd party company) who was our 'go-to' guy as far as a lot of problems went. But he was never granted the title of Consultant and ended up leaving for a better job elsewhere. Likewise there's a chap who works for Xerox I still keep in my contacts even if I don't speak with him for over a year, because if anyone knows the answer about our systems, he will.

I guess what I'm driving at is that maybe Management are too focussed on job titles rather than looking at what people can actually do. There are many companies (and to a lesser extent, industries) where skills really aren't all that transferrable. Or perhaps a better way to look at it would be to say that in some firms, knowledge is relatively more important than skills compared to other firms. Businesses look externally for help when in many cases they are simply paying an over-the-top rate to train the 'consultant', let him work his magic for a short period and then off he goes, taking all that time and money invested in bringing his knowledge up to a certain level with him.

 

[Skyfire]

I was thinking of doing a MCDST - 2 exams. how much will they cost?

 

[teaboy5]

Hehe thats a good one, what other names will they think of next.

In my field of work, we call them the monkeys ie the guys who do all the dirty work like putting in equipment, cables etc etc. Usually the official word we give them is network or IT engineer but that still doesnt really mean anything that they dont have engineering degrees as of such lol.

You might call them the monkeys, but without them putting in networks etc, you might not have a job, i wonder who put the network etc in where you work. The way you said, make me think, that you think you are above them.

 

[Moby-Dick]

You might call them the monkeys, but without them putting in networks etc, you might not have a job, i wonder who put the network etc in where you work. The way you said, make me think, that you think you are above them.

those that can , do ; those that can't ,advise ?

 

[Sequoia]

You might call them the monkeys, but without them putting in networks etc, you might not have a job, i wonder who put the network etc in where you work. The way you said, make me think, that you think you are above them.

I think that term was used light-heartedly. Personally, I wouldn't use such terms, but the fact remains that the skill set used to lay cable or install computers is substantially lower than that required to sort out the long-term strategic IT needs of a blue chip company, then present the analysis and recommendations to the board. Or, alternatively, to go through the proposals of suppliers and spot the gotchas. As I said some time back, consultants need a breadth of expertise (at least), as well as depth, and a range of other skills, to justify the term.

That's why I said you don't become a proper consultant in two or three years. It takes longer than that to gain the experience it needs to see things in the proper context, and to have gained the experience to comprehend what you are seeing.

I would also point out that the difference between consultancy and other specialisms doesn't necessarily mean you look down on others. If someone's good at what they do, I respect them for that. If they can grow, I respect them for that. And some of today's specialists and technicians will be tomorrow's consultants ..... when they have the depth and breadth of expertise to justify it, and if they have the nous to out it to good use.

Not everybody has what it takes to make a consultant, but not everybody has the mindset or expertise to be a network administrator either. I can lay simple mains wiring (and have done so), but I don't class myself as an electrician, and there are MANY electrical jobs I wouldn't dream of undertaking. I also make a decent job of extracting a tune from a guitar or keyboard, but I most certainly don't regard myself as a musician, because my skills are limited, fairy narrow and somewhat pedestrian.

At the core of this is what you mean by "above them"?

Do I think everybody is equal? No.
Do some have greater potential than others? Yes.
Could everybody be a Renoir, or Mozart, or Pasteur? No.
Could anybody be a consultant? No.

So, as a consultant with several degrees and > 30 years business experience, do I regard myself as far better qualified, experienced and knowledgeable than someone still wet behind the ears from Uni with a year or two in the job? Damn right I do.

But "above them" in that I regard younger or less experienced people as inferior people? Hell, no. People are people, period. Some have skills and abilities I don't have, and I have skills and abilities others don't have.

Calling myself a brain surgeon doesn't make me one, and calling someone a consultant when they don't have the necessary expertise or experience doesn't make them one either .... but it does devalue the title. And THAT, of course, is why people and companies use that description ... precisely because it implies a level of knowledge and expertise.

Of course, there's no accepted definition of what 'consultant' is .... which is why I said ages ago that this is my opinion, based on my definition of the term. But given that, it remains the case that most people calling themselves (or called) consultants aren't up to the implications of the title.

 

[Sequoia]

those that can , do ; those that can't ,advise ?

Those that advise, do so because it's far better paid, and they've already served their apprenticeship "doing".

Those that do would like to be taken as those that advise, which is why they lay claim to the title .... and hopefully the hourly rate.

 

[kitten_caboodle]

Those that advise, do so because it's far better paid, and they've already served their apprenticeship "doing".

Those that do would like to be taken as those that advise, which is why they lay claim to the title .... and hopefully the hourly rate.

I'd agree with that. I was a consultant for a while, but it wasn't for me. Forgot what my home looked like, and decided to pack it in.

I got into it by them approaching me after seeing my CV on Monster. Experience I had was what they were looking for and bingo

 

[Sequoia]

I'd agree with that. I was a consultant for a while, but it wasn't for me. Forgot what my home looked like, and decided to pack it in.

Yeah, that's often a part of it. I've spent so much time on planes I'd probably qualify as cabin crew.

Some of my friends think business travel is somehow exotic. If you're in the US this week, Europe next week, then a few days in Japan and come back via Singapore and a couple of days in Zurich, it must be glamourous, right?

Well, for a year or two, maybe. After that, its a drudge, whether in economy or first class. And if you miss large chunks of the kids growing up ....

I've dome pretty well for myself, one way and another, and I have few regrets ..... but some of the home life I've missed in earlier years tops the list. Getting the experience necessary has a distinct price attached. Not everybody wants to pay it, even if they have the ability.

 

[kitten_caboodle]

Yeah, that's often a part of it. I've spent so much time on planes I'd probably qualify as cabin crew.

Some of my friends think business travel is somehow exotic. If you're in the US this week, Europe next week, then a few days in Japan and come back via Singapore and a couple of days in Zurich, it must be glamourous, right?

Well, for a year or two, maybe. After that, its a drudge, whether in economy or first class. And if you miss large chunks of the kids growing up ....

I've dome pretty well for myself, one way and another, and I have few regrets ..... but some of the home life I've missed in earlier years tops the list. Getting the experience necessary has a distinct price attached. Not everybody wants to pay it, even if they have the ability.

Very true. Irony is that i wanted to to it for ages, and jumped at the chance when they came knocking. Not long before that happened i'd met my partner and for the first time I really resented not being around much. The company jollies were great at first but after a while they just seemed a bit empty and I couldn't join in as much as the others because I didn't want to be at work and wanted to go home. Rather than a nice meal in a flashy resturant and drinks on the company, I'd have been happier with a chippy tea watching Corrie with my OH.
The money was fantastic, as were the benfits but I was miserable, and in the end I went for the happiness over money option. I'm worse off financially, but I am also much happier. Less pressure, less stress and I love what I'm doing now.

But saying that, there are those that thrive in it, my Mum is one of them - she does the same thing and loves it!