Killing Management Consulting, Or Appreciate its True Value
Management consultants are business coaches, necessary for every “sport” if you want to excel
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Former Chairman and CEO of IBM, Lou Gerstner managed one of the biggest corporate turnarounds when he took over IBM in 1993 had a consultant who worked with him. I joined IBM Software division from 1996 to 1998 before gotten seconded out to a subsidiary. During that time I had the privilege of listening to him and interacted with him during a company event. I asked him a question about making IBM software division and the other two divisions into independent entities under ”IBM Holdings”, which he pondered for a moment before answering. I didn’t agree with his answer and neither was he satisfied with it as it seemed. Later on, he came over to shake my hand and it was kind of an affirmation on the difficulty of the question.
I brought up this point to accentuate the need to ask hard questions when it comes to strategy formulation or solving complex problems. Rarely employees are willing to ask such penetrating questions risking their political capital when these questions can lead to negative repercussions. Worst still, when the solutions conceived with lack of insights mislead management to investing egregiously creating a disaster. As for an external consultant, they are paid exactly for this purpose, provide an independent view with experience and expertise that is apolitical focusing on objectives. Hence, selecting the right consultant to partner during a difficult part of the transformation journey is critical. Stemming from this point, we can draw experience from what Lou Gerstner said to the consultant whom he had selected. He said to the consultant,
“And then, there is very small number of people who are truly knowledgeable about the industry, and very insightful, like yourself,” he said. “You have a really good FEEL for the industry. Perhaps that’s because you used to be within the industry?” he speculated. The bottom line, he said, was that he has learned to discriminate between the various people who were trying to offer him advice. Source: Gertsner: Gertner: The Untold Story by Annex Bulletin
Picking out from the statement above, I would like to highlight the words “insightful” and…
