Ioana Dumea, SPHRi

Perhaps the most important blockage that surfaces when an organization has a hard time making decisions for moving a project forward is the lack of executive buy-in. If you encounter the variety of blockages mentioned by Mr. Pawar (below), escalate! Go directly to the top decision-maker and for each milestone have him/her name the stakeholders per the RACI matrix. Make sure to report all stalemates and risks resulting from indecision for each milestone to the Steering Committee so that everyone is aware of who is holding back the project's progress. Since consultants are required to move the project forward within a fixed timeline, and in an organizational context full of inefficiencies, escalating is often the most effective strategy.

If the second case applies and the client boss will not align on project goals, usually that is an indication of imminent scope creep and this will require an internal meeting to review the SOW and the Work Breakdown Structure, followed by a client meeting to explain impact and find a middle-ground. The meeting with the client is usually a hard one. Data on budget overburn, potential deadline extension or additional workload pressure on both consulting and client teams need to be presented clearly and should be based on KPIs client has agreed to in the SOW. Quick note: this is why the SOW is so important; the more open-ended the milestones and deliverables in the SOW, the more the client can expand scope and limit the negotiation process.

First let’s clarify which boss we are talking about: 1) the consulting boss or 2) the client boss. In the first case, I am yet to encounter a situation where the consulting boss will not align to the initial project goals. Usually, project goals are decided by the clients themselves, and consultants and their bosses usually promise to deliver on those goals in the proposal and upon winning the project. I have encountered scope creep goals that the consulting boss will not align on because of their impact on project profitability or team health. That usually requires an escalation and organizing a strategic meeting with other consulting teams and senior partners to identify concerns & solutions that please both clients and consulting bosses.

When displeased with the level of industry knowledge shown by the consultants, replacing consulting companies (even mid-project sometimes), should be the prerogative of the client and one that should be used more than it currently is. I would advise the client to interview consulting project team as it is important to assess their individual knowledge rather than relying on the cumulative knowledge the company promises. I would also advise clients to move away from Time & Material projects to Fixed Cost ones - good consultants are organized enough to deliver on Fixed Cost projects.

The most effective way of convincing clients of one’s industry expertise is by demoing for them the tools and resources that will be used in the project in a session I like to call a Proof-of-Knowledge Demo (POKD). Once the client gets to see the industry databases consultants use for benchmarking and for their recommendations, along with the numerous templates and trainings that have been created in previous projects, and how each can be easily customized, they will feel at ease that we are able to hit-the-ground-running as soon as the project is won. Measuring the win-rate after a POKD is a clear indication of how successful that type of session can be.

First, for the rehearsal session, do not schedule it the day before the client presentation. Try to collect all information and have the dry run 2-3 days before the client meeting. This way there is time to collect all the feedback from team members without putting a lot of pressure on the team to make revisions under extreme time constraints. Don’t expect the dry-run to be only 1 session. As the team leader I would go to the different people individually to discuss their parts and provide feedback 1-on-1 before the all-team rehearsal session with the senior leadership – that way most of the major issues have been ironed out and all the team members can feel comfortable with their level of preparedness for the meeting.