Author: Carter McNamara

Welcome to this six-part series on the foundations of consulting. If you have not been following along with us, then we encourage you to read parts 1-4, referenced from the bottom of this article. Part 1 establishes the basis for the series by using Peter Block’s definition of a consultant as someone who is trying to change another person, process or organization, but who has no direct control over what they are trying to change. (We highly recommend his book “Flawless Consulting.”) This article describes the many commonalities between external and internal consultants.

What Is an External Consultant?

An external consultant is someone considered not to be an official, ongoing member of the organization. The relationship of the consultant to the organization is determined usually by a project’s contract or Letter of Agreement. He or she is paid on the basis of a particular project having certain desired results and deliverables from the consultant. Payroll taxes are not withheld from the person’s paycheck – the person pays their own payroll taxes.

What Is an Internal Consultant?

An internal consultant is someone considered to be an official, often ongoing member of the organization. The relationship of the consultant to the organization is determined usually by a job description and various personnel policies. He or she is paid on the basis on their ongoing role in the organization. Payroll taxes are withheld from the person’s paychecks.

Differences Between Internal and External Consultants

The extent of differences between both types of consultants depends on the type of consulting provided by the consultants and how the consultants choose to work. For example, technical consultants are often perceived as having highly focused and credible skills that are seldom questioned. They often use similar skills and tools to get the job done. The results of their services are often quickly determined. Thus, members of an organization might perceive little difference between this type of internal and external consultant.

In contrast, consultants focused on organizational and managerial development usually have to establish their credibility over time. Their skills are sometimes highly questioned – members of the organization might even be skeptical of the need for any change in the organization. Results of the consultant’s work can take months or years to realize. Consequently, members of an organization might perceive huge differences between these types of consultants.

Official, legal and administrative differences are often easy to distinguish. However, for several reasons, the differences are disappearing between consultants guiding organizations through change. Internal and external consultants are learning similar kinds of best practices and approaches for change. Both types of consultants often focus on highly facilitative approaches to working with clients. Both types of consultants, if they are committed professionals, adopt similar overall goals and working assumptions as consultants.

Traditionally, internal consultants are considered to be members of an organization whose primary job is to assist other people working in other areas of the organization. Often these internal consultants are in large organizations and from training and development or human resource departments. The typical small business usually does not have the extensive range of resources that warrants having an internal consultant.

Traditionally, an internal leader would not be considered an internal consultant. However, that perception is changing. With recent emphasis on the importance of using a highly facilitative and collaborative leadership style when guiding change, leaders are beginning to operate more like internal consultants for change then ever before. Consequently, some would consider leaders in the organization to sometimes play the role of internal consultants.

See the following table for a concise comparison between external and internal consultants.
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Look for the articles in this series, including:

1. What Do Consultants Do?
2. How Do Consultants Work?
3. Most Important Goals and Working Assumptions of Consultants
4. Major Types of Consultants
5. Internal and External Consultants
6. Good Reasons – and Poor Reasons – to Hire Consultants

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For more resources, see the Library topics Consulting and Organizational Development.

Information in this post was adapted from the book Field Guide to Consulting and Organizational Development by Carter McNamara, MBA, PhD. For training on consulting skills, see the Consultants Development Institute. For more resources, see the Free Management Library’s topic All About Consulting .

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Carter McNamara, MBA, PhD – Authenticity Consulting, LLC – 800-971-2250 Read my blogs: Boards, Consulting and OD, and Strategic Planning .

Part 1 of this series is What Do Consultants Do?, which defines a consultant (as Peter Block puts it) as someone who is trying to change another person, process or organization, but who has no direct control over what they are trying to change. That post also listed numerous roles that a consultant might play during a project, e.g., coach, facilitator, trainer, advisor — and many others.

In addition to the various roles in consulting, there are various approaches to consulting, as described in this post. This post describes two very different approaches to consulting: a systematic, planned approach versus an organic approach.

Consultants might even do the same approach differently, for example, some consultants might involve the client in the consulting process much more than others. However, research suggests that, for more complex projects, the more you collaborate with your client in carrying out the particular approach to consulting, the more successful you all will be in accomplishing the preferred results in the project. That collaboration requires strong people skills — that’s the topic of another series of blogs 🙂

Systematic and Planned Approach

Many consultants use a systematic, or planned, approach. They tend to include the following phases, or some variation of them – perhaps with different names for each phase. A planned approach is much more cyclical in nature, than this numbered list.

Contracting Phase

The first phase is the contract phase, where the consultant and client explore the client’s problem (or exciting goal) and how it might be addressed. They learn more about each other, and decide whether to work together or not. This phase includes completion of a formal agreement to proceed with the project.

Discovery Phase (Diagnosis Phase)

In the discovery phase, the consultant and client clarify the problem, using various approaches to get more information. They try to separate the symptoms of the problem from its real causes. They analyze the information they’ve gathered, and come to conclusions about what actions should be taken. They share their findings with other key personnel in the organization.

Action Planning Phase

The action planning phase is where the consultant and client, and ideally more employees in the organization, firm up their action plans for addressing the problem, with specific goals to be achieved, who will achieve them, and by when. It’s very important that the actions be relevant and realistic.

Implementation Phase (Change Management Phase)

The implementation phase is where the action plans are implemented. The priority in this phase is to sustain momentum in the implementation – hopefully, generating a great deal of learning. Continual evaluations ensure the implementation is on the right track to solving the problem.

Project Evaluation Phase

The evaluation phase measures whether the problem has been solved. Other aspects of the project are also evaluated, including the quality of the collaborative relationship and the learning in the project.

Project Termination Phase

All projects should end with a Termination phase, in which the consultant and client decide what to do with the results of the evaluation. They might cycle back to an earlier phase, continue the current project, or terminate the project.

Organic Approach to Consulting

Some consultants use a rather organic approach. They get a strong sense of what they think the client’s problem is, and determine what they’ll do for now to solve it. The way they work with clients seems to naturally unfold during the project. Advantages of this approach are several.

1. This can work very well for small projects or for cultures that don’t prefer structured approaches to problem solving or achieving goals.
2. It can also seem to produce quick successes in a project, when the consultant very quickly suggests what the problem or goal is and how to address it.
3. It can result in lower project costs because the consultant is continuously making rather quick decisions and suggestions.

The organic approach also has some disadvantages.

1. The consultant might not have taken the time to do the discovery needed to find the real causes of the client’s problem, rather than reacting to its symptoms.
2. Without a systematic discovery, many of us consultants tend to see only those problems that can be fixed with our favorite tools. For example, if we’re coaches, then we see primarily the need for coaching. If we’re advisors, then we see primarily the need to give advice.
3. The consultant’s estimate of the time to complete the project, might vary widely, thus, costing far less, or for more, than the client expected.
4. It can also be very difficult to involve clients in a way that they fully understand because the consultant is continually intuiting the situation — it can be very difficult to explain the results of one’s intuition 🙂

This post is not claiming that any one approach to consulting is always best. The best approach to use depends on the nature and needs of the client, more than the preferred approach or technical expertise of the consultant. A good consultant might have a variety of approaches and roles to use, and knows when to call in other expertise when needed.

What approach to you use?

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Look for the articles in this series, including:

1. What Do Consultants Do?
2. How Do Consultants Work?
3. Most Important Goals and Working Assumptions of Consultants
4. Major Types of Consultants
5. Internal and External Consultants
6. Good Reasons – and Poor Reasons – to Hire Consultants

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For more resources, see the Library topics Consulting and Organizational Development.

Information in this post was adapted from the book Field Guide to Consulting and Organizational Development by Carter McNamara, MBA, PhD. For training on consulting skills, see the Consultants Development Institute. For more resources, see the Free Management Library’s topic All About Consulting .

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Carter McNamara, MBA, PhD – Authenticity Consulting, LLC – 763-971-8890 Read my blogs: Boards, Consulting and OD, and Strategic Planning .

Peter Block, in his seminal book, Flawless Consulting, explains that a “consultant” is someone who is trying to change another person, process or organization, but who has no direct control over what they are trying to change. Usually, that change is intended to improve performance – the effective and efficient achievement of goals.

One of the greatest frustrations of consulting is the desire to change your client’s organization, but not having direct influence to accomplish that change. Experienced consultants have learned to work with – and even appreciate – the indirect nature of effective consulting.

You might argue that a leader acting as an internal change agent is not an internal consultant because he or she does have at least some direct control over staff members. However, there is not nearly the extent of direct control that you might assume – especially during long, but successful journeys for change.

The highly collaborative and facilitative internal consultant or leader does not always exercise direct control and often is quite successful in guiding change. Thus, a successful leader during change is acting much more like Block’s definition of consultant than you might realize.

It might be useful to consider the many perceptions that people have of consultants and the many roles that consultants might play in a project. Consultants often act as:

• Advisor — giving expert advice to solve a problem or achieve a goal.
• Coach – helping individuals clarify and achieve goals and also learn.
• Collaborator/partner – working with people to benefit from the relationship.
• Educator/trainer – helping others develop new knowledge, skills and insights.
• Expert – providing content expertise in certain areas.
• Facilitator – helping a group to decide what it wants to accomplish and then helping the group to achieve those desired results.
• Problem solver – clarifying problems, using various styles and approaches to “solve” them.
• Researcher – collecting, organizing and analyzing information.
• Facilitator – guiding groups or individuals through learning experiences.

Other roles might include analyst, synthesizer, impartial observer, critic, friend and mentor. These are mostly positive roles. Of course, some people have strong negative impressions of consultants, as well. They might view consultants as outsiders, charlatans or even as nerds.
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Look for the articles in this series, including:

1. What Do Consultants Do?
2. How Do Consultants Work?
3. Most Important Goals and Working Assumptions of Consultants
4. Major Types of Consultants
5. Internal and External Consultants
6. Good Reasons – and Poor Reasons – to Hire Consultants

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For more resources, see the Library topics Consulting and Organizational Development.

Information in this post was adapted from the book Field Guide to Consulting and Organizational Development by Carter McNamara, MBA, PhD. For training on consulting skills, see the Consultants Development Institute. For more resources, see the Free Management Library’s topic All About Consulting .

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Carter McNamara, MBA, PhD – Authenticity Consulting, LLC – 800-971-2250 Read my blogs: Boards, Consulting and OD, and Strategic Planning .

Welcome to this six-part series on the foundations of consulting. If you have not been following along with us, then we encourage you to read parts 1-5, referenced from the bottom of this article. Part 1 establishes the basis for the series by using Peter Block’s definition of a consultant as someone who is trying to change another person, process or organization, but who has no direct control over what they are trying to change. (We highly recommend his book “Flawless Consulting.”) This article describes good reasons and poor reasons to hire consultants.

Good Reasons to Hire External Consultants

1. The organization has limited or no expertise in the area of need, for example, to develop a new product or program for customers and clients.
2. The time of need is short-term, for example, less than a year, so it may not be worth hiring a full-time, permanent staff member.
3. The organization’s previous attempts to meet its own needs were not successful, for example, the organization developed a Strategic Plan that was never implemented.
4. Organization members continue to disagree about how to meet the need and, thus, bring in a consultant to provide expertise or facilitation skills to come to consensus.
5. Leaders want an objective perspective from someone without strong biases about the organization’s past and current issues.
6. A consultant can do the work that no one else wants to do, for example, historical data entry. (Some would argue that this is not really a consulting project.)
7. A funder or other key stakeholder demands that a consultant be brought in to help further develop the organization.

Poor Reasons to Hire External Consultants

The following reasons are likely open to disagreement – some people would argue that some or all of the following are good reasons to hire a consultant.

1. The organization wants a consultant to lend credibility to a decision that has already been made, for example, the Board of Directors has decided to reorganize the nonprofit, but the Chief Executive Officer disagrees – so the Board hires a consultant to lend expert credibility to their decision. Many consultants might consider this reason to hire a consultant unethical.
2. A supervisor does not want to directly address a problem of poor performance with one of the employees, so the supervisor hires a consultant to do the job that the employee should be doing. This is an irresponsible action on the part of the supervisor.
3. The organization does not want to pay benefits (vacation pay, holiday pay, pension, etc.) or go through the administrative processes to withhold payroll taxes (social security taxes, federal taxes, etc.) for a position — a position that seems consistent and long-term, e.g., longer than a year or more — so the organization hires a consultant. This reason for hiring a consultant is likely to be illegal and could result in the organization paying fines and penalties to the appropriate government agency. The organization should proactively contact the IRS to discuss this situation.

What do you think?

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Look for the articles in this series, including:

1. What Do Consultants Do?
2. How Do Consultants Work?
3. Most Important Goals and Working Assumptions of Consultants
4. Major Types of Consultants
5. Internal and External Consultants
6. Good Reasons – and Poor Reasons – to Hire Consultants

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For more resources, see the Library topics Consulting and Organizational Development.

Information in this post was adapted from the book Field Guide to Consulting and Organizational Development by Carter McNamara, MBA, PhD. For training on consulting skills, see the Consultants Development Institute. For more resources, see the Free Management Library’s topic All About Consulting .

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For more resources, see the Library topics Consulting and Organizational Development.

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Carter McNamara, MBA, PhD – Authenticity Consulting, LLC – 800-971-2250 Read my blogs: Boards, Consulting and OD, and Strategic Planning .

(This post was written by co-host, John Dupre.)

I was recently talking to a group of students in a master’s program in OD. They were interested in pursuing OD consulting, whether it be internal or external. The problem with offering advice is that there are so many definitions of OD now. The profession has become filled with niche players……executive coaching, team building, process improvement, change management, etc. The days of listening to clients talk about what they are struggling with and coming up with an original proposal are over. We now have expert solutions often in search of problems.

Nonetheless, it’s critical to figure out what you care most deeply about in your work….. what gives you passion and what values you aren’t willing to violate. This can then serve as a compass to guide you through your career. I can still remember the exact moment I gained clarity for myself……

Years ago I was interviewing for a job in a large consulting firm in NYC. They put me through a long, exhaustive interviewing process before they finally offered me the job. I was excited about the offer. It paid quite well and I liked the consultants who I had met.

After they had offered me the position but before I had accepted, I was sitting in the Senior Partner’s office informally chatting. He wanted to get a sense of the type of work that I loved so he asked me to describe a project that I had enjoyed.

I thought about it and said, “ I love two types of projects. On one hand, I like projects that enable me to work with employees to figure out how to improve their business. For example, say I’m working with a team of people representing a bottling operation in a brewery, and the team has figured out how to redesign the bottling operation to reduce costs, simplify the process, and increase production. I love that type of project.”

“On the other hand, I love projects in which there are none of those types of breakthroughs. But, at the same time, several people come up to me, shake my hand and say, “ I just wanted to thank you. You have changed my life at work. You have pushed me to act with courage, you have helped me accept my own contribution to problems, and you have challenged me to take responsibility. I’ll never be the same.”

“ I also love that type of project.” And then I paused and said, “Actually, the projects that I love the most are those second types….. they are more personal and more sustaining.” The moment that I said this, I could see the Senior Partner kissing me off. Not in a cruel way. He just realized that it was not a good fit. So he said, “ I don’t think you should accept the offer, John. You are more interested in personal change, in having an impact on people. In many ways, you are more of a social activist. This is worthy, but it is not our intent. We focus on business results, your first type of project….. the project you did not choose.”

It hit me over the head. He was absolutely right. I had never really thought about it—the high salary and the glamour of the position had seduced me. I loved organizational change projects and had years of experience in leading them. But I was passionate about changing peoples’ lives at work. It’s what I cared most deeply about. They are both connected but are not the same thing. So, I turned down the offer and began to shift directions in my career.

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For more resources, see the Library topics Consulting and Organizational Development.

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John Dupre is an organization development consultant who designs innovative ways to involve people in building more productive and satisfying workplaces. He can be reached at http://www.johndupreconsulting.com/.