Think You Know Consulting? Think Again.

Inside a Consulting Project: Structure, People, and Process

Intro

Consulting is often seen as a black box, where talented consultants lead the projects, with junior team members and thus solutions are delivered. But what actually happens during a consulting project? In this post, I’ll walk you through what a consulting project entails, how many people work in them, how the teams are formed, how long projects can take & the locations of these projects.

What is a Consulting project entails?

A consulting project is not a one size fits all skeleton that you can keep on recycling, I mean in some cases it can be, but most of the time there is a twist in requirements which needs to be refined. There are various stages of a project, such as pre-sales, discovery, design, build, testing, deployment, go-live, early live support (or post-go live support).

Some projects start with a small number of 1-2 consultants, sometimes slightly more who are working on a sale before the project turns into fruition, which is usually where the consultancy is essentially pitching their skills, competencies and ability to deliver the work the client is after. There is no guarantee that pre-sales all turn into billable projects, as you are up against other competitor consultancies, proving why you’re the best pick over the competition.

Once the client agrees to work with the consultancy, then a contract called SoW (Statement of work) is issued and signed between parties, which legally binds the two businesses together for the agreed work. This can take quite some time to put together as there are some clauses certain clients want to have in place, such as payment milestones, penalties if any deadlines are missed, contingency in the pricing so they’re covered from a finance perspective if things take longer during the project and so forth.

After the agreement has taken place between a client and consultancy then what happens is a time is decided to commence the “kick-off/initiation” of the project which normally starts with a discovery/high-level design. As you can tell, there are so many different terminologies that are used, wait until I get into the acronyms they have in consulting, you’ll think you learned them all, then another thousand are discovered!

How many people work in consulting projects?

In consulting projects, the team size depends on the scope of the work to be completed. Scope means, work which is agreed, and signed in the SoW (Statement of work). Before the SoW is signed, a timeline with resources and costs for resources for a set period of time is shared to the client, and explained, so then they get a clear indication of how long this work can take, what they can have built for them in the time agreed regarding the solution to their problem they are after, and then they usually take this information away and ensure internally that they have the resourcing in place to support this project. If they don’t have all the people in line in their organisation to work with the consultancy, then they can stagger start dates to align with when they expect to have the people ready. “People planning” is absolutely crucial for projects, being understaffed is a nightmare for the clients as those few employees not only need to do their day jobs, but they have expectations to support and work with the consultancies on the ground doing the implementation work too.

Often, clients get consultancies to build software for them based on regulatory requirements, so there are short timelines, and in which case timelines being shorter means more people are needed in order to deliver the work successfully and efficiently. This can mean a wider team in a project plan is needed. So, in short, project team sizes are impacted by several factors such as how many software solutions are to be built for the client, when the client needs the work completed by, costing (as there is competition don’t forget), any “free” resources which can be thrown into the offer package, this is usually more junior resources, but sometimes it can be a slightly senior resource for x amount of days to sweeten the offer.

How are consulting project teams formed?

Consultancy teams are put together based on the solution to be implemented. From a technical delivery standpoint, there is usually a project manager who handles all the communications between the consultancy and client. Then there is a solution architect, who is focused on how the work to be done will fit into the clients existing software landscape, these guys work closely with the technical consultants on the ground who they delegate jobs to do. There are also technical lead(s) depending how many solutions are being implemented in each phase, these folks are specialised in the solution being implemented & lead the sub teams with more junior consultants with what they need to build.

Having said all the above, there is no pre-defined template for a project team structure, this can vary project to project, however, there become similarities in team sizes the more similar projects take place, which in turn turns into a sort of expected structure.

How long can these projects take?

The length of projects can vary, some can be as little as a month, others can go on for multiple years with more than one phase, where phase 2 is not going to commence until phase 1 is completed as they are inter-dependent.

The extension of further work is also down to how you consult, if you are a robot consultant who just takes orders without any initiative to spark imagination for the client, or give more than they want in some cases, then it can deter clients from working with you further. This is because you don’t think beyond the current work in front of you, so, this can give a chance for competition to swoop in and impress in the gaps you left. Alternatively, if you can start to be more strategic and give thought and care to the client’s future aspirations, it not only helps your growth, but it shows you’re invaluable to keep and that is taking you in the footsteps of a leader.

Some projects have an anticipation of multiple years of work with one client, but when a poor job is done in one project, doubts can creep into a clients mind, and they could decide to discontinue further work with the consultancy. This is why it’s very important to keep good working relations with clients and impress wherever possible. Good delivery leads to further project phases (in most cases but not all!) and the saying goes when you’re billable, which means on a project generating revenue for your consultancy who you work for, then you have that job security.

What are the locations of consulting projects?

Most projects are remote nowadays, but it doesn’t mean there are no in-person projects about. Certain organisations demand in office presence for specific strict departments. On top of that, for certain activities/phases in projects, an in person presence keeps that personal touch in the relationship, which you will struggle to form across virtual meetings. You might wonder, why do I need to have any in-person time at all when we have virtual applications such as Microsoft teams/Hangout/Zoom? Well, being in person, you can have conversations with people who you may often never get the chance to speak to, being away from a screen gives a personal touch, and you might even be part of an accidental conversation which can help your growth perspectives. Furthermore, you can learn soft skills, which are not really soft when you see them executed in person, such as handling conflicts face to face with a senior member of the client, or even your own team. This sort of clash of opinions can happen, and it’s not like you can hide with a video or audio off on a video call, you’re front and centre, expected to diffuse the situation.

Conclusion

If you made it this far then I must have written something of value. I hope you took some learning from this read, if so, that’s mission accomplished for me.

Consulting projects & the inner details are bigger than you may think, so I certainly will go further into finer details in future blogs.

If you have any specific topics that you'd like me to cover then please drop me a message directly on LinkedIn, or reply in the comments below.

Thank you for your time, until the next one 😊