How to Launch A Consulting Business - Yes, You! For years I was terrified at the idea of working for myself. For all those years I said, Ha ha, thats not me - entrepreneurism? No thanks! I was 100% dead-set against the idea of going out on my own. Nope, not my deal! I would tell anyone who asked. Im a company kind of gal. I already knew the most important thing there is to know about consulting. Ill tell you what that thing is in a second. Heres how I learned the most important thing: my boss sent me on my first consulting job. My boss was the president of the company where I was HR Manager. My friend and mentor Ray said A CEO friend of mine down the street from your office wants some help with his HR practices. I was twenty-eight. I said to my boss, You know Ray, right? Ray has a client down the street who needs some HR help for his business. Its a manufacturing company. You should do it, said my boss. It will be good for you. I said, I have no idea how to do something like that. Thats why youre the perfect person, he said. Do it after hours, after you finish your day here. I talked to Ray. I talked to the client, a manufacturing CEO three doors down from our company in the same industrial park. On the day of our first meeting, I walked down the street with dread in my heart and my little notebook and pen in my purse. What if I screwed up? What if I embarrassed myself? Ray knew better than I did, and my boss did too. It was a ground-up HR assignment. Do you have the required posters in your breakroom? How about an Equal Employment Opportunity policy, and safety processes? Can I see your employee handbook? Thanks! How do you hire new employees? I broke it down. It was a very satisfying assignment -- I looked forward to going to the guys facility three doors down and organizing his HR systems. Its always easier to solve other peoples problems than your own! The veil was lifted. Geez Louise, I said to myself, this is like breathing. I already knew that the Big Lie in business was then and is still now the fiction that business is complicated and esoteric and too lofty for stupid people like you and me to understand. Thats the Big Lie. Everything that matters in business is actually as simple as pie, but people who think it grows their flame to make other people look and feel stupid pretend that the goofy business jargon, the weenie rules and the fussy details are the important stuff. Those things are all means to an end. They are tools. Unfortunately the Godzilla culture has elevated silly tools and methods to an exalted place. Thats why we started the Human Workplace movement, to yell from our rooftop and encourage other people to yell from theirs that real business is nothing more complicated than smart people banding together to do cool things. We wanted to start a movement to get everybody talking about the fact that the Emperor of Business has no clothes. We wanted to remind working people not to let anyone make them feel stupid because they dont understand a business term or the latest buzzword. People who obsess about buzzwords are fearful, pitiable creatures who deserve our compassion. Young people just starting out in your careers, listen to your Aunt Liz! You are awesome right now, and anyone who tries to make you feel Less Than Professional by telling you they know more than you do is someone who never learned that the most powerful people are the ones who help other people the most. I finished the consulting project for the guy three doors down and the scary force field around consulting started to crumble. Nonetheless, I stayed in corporate America for another eighteen years, and the crust built up again. That project was fun, I said to anyone who asked, but I wouldnt want to be a full-time consultant. Id hate it. The truth is that I was afraid of what I thought consulting was. I thought it was scary. I thought Id be on the spot all the time, having to demonstrate my HR prowess over and over. Turns out all of my fearful thoughts were dead wrong. Consulting is fun and easy. Its satisfying and empowering, too. I think everyone should be a consultant -- correction, I think everyone IS a consultant, already, an expert in one thing or many things that could help people around them. I know youre an expert. You can flex your consulting muscles in 2014 even if you keep your current job. You can launch a part-time consulting business on the side. (Just make sure your employer doesnt have a weenietastic No-Moonlighting policy in place before you start! If they do have one, write to Michael for advice. He will either counsel you to talk the higher-ups out of that silly, fear-based policy or advise you to start a stealth job search.) Everyone should consult, the same way everyone should exercise. Consulting is exercise, in fact -- you grow all kinds of muscles getting out and talking with people about their business problems, then digging in to help solve those problems and billing your clients for your contribution. Here are the five big muscle groups youll grow when you hang out a consulting shingle: Pain-Spotting -- getting altitude on your prospective clients Business Pain Perspective-Taking -- seeing the world through your clients eyes Storytelling -- telling Dragon-Slaying Stories that illustrate your powerful experiences Framing -- putting your clients needs into a cohesive frame, and Probing -- interviewing clients and others to understand their situations fully. There is something special about the money you earn as a consultant. It has a different weight from salary dollars, where you get the same amount every pay period and have nothing specific, output-wise, to tie those salary dollars to. When you consult and get paid for it, you know exactly where the money came from. A salary chart on the wall in HR has nothing to do with that income. You earned it the old-fashioned way, solving someone elses expensive problem. That is the essence of the new-millennium workplace worldview we promote at Human Workplace. Even if you keep your full-time gig for years into the future, adding a consulting arm to your revenue engine can only benefit you. It is not difficult to launch a consulting practice. In the U.S., you dont need to incorporate to consult, but most lawyers and accountants will recommend that once your consulting engine has some steam going, you create a legal entity. The incorporation process is trivial. Youll need a few tools, a bookkeeper close at hand and some business cards. Setting up your consulting business is simple; more of your energy will go into zeroing in on your consulting focus and understanding the business pain that will bring clients to your door. Youll need a brand, but you mustnt stress over that. You can consult under your own name for ages, or forever. Marketing collateral is a tiny piece of the puzzle for most newbie consultants and may not even be necessary. You already have a brand. You already have a following. I dont care if youre 68 or nineteen years old. My teenagers have businesses of their own. They have been listening (voluntarily or not) to their mom talking about career self-determination since they were in diapers. Running your career like a business is not an optional course of action in 2014. It is a practical necessity. Get your business cards for pennies at Vistaprint or any of the office supply stores. Pick any branding you want -- you can change it for a few bucks whenever you feel like it. My friend Jody wanted to keep her business options option. She got business cards that said Jody Smith, Available for Lunch on them. People loved those cards! Theyd always ask Jody, But are you available for lunch? Over lunch, she got to understand her clients and where she could help them. Its a new day. Youre an expert now, and some of your expertise -- possibly most of it -- is bottled up, unavailable to people who need it and who would love to get your help and pay you for it. You can tap that expertise, monetize it in 2014 and grow your flame at the same time. If a corporate Sally, entrepreneurial wuss like me can step into consulting and live to tell the tale, why not you? by Liz Ryan, CEO and Founder, Human Workplace
Posted on: Mon, 17 Mar 2014 11:54:52 +0000
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