From the category archives:

Core Competencies

Two principles for keeping project management simple

by Peter Osborne on November 12, 2010 · 0 comments

I ran into someone earlier this year who was evaluating consultants to help the chief executive of a mid-sized company manage the creation of a business plan that would ultimately go to prospective investors.  I quickly pointed him toward a couple of other companies where I had done something similar.  But no, he wanted to test my expertise so he started throwing around a bunch of “project management phrases,” for lack of a better term.  No, I had to tell him.  I don’t use Gantt Charts, Risk Impact/Probability Tables, Influence Maps, or Critical Path Analysis.  Silly me.  My approach to project management is far simpler, but it historically had been difficult to put into words.

Until I subscribed to and listened to the Manager Tools podcast on iTunes.  I remember I was on a long drive to King of Prussia (PA) and nodding as I listened to the hosts describe (Mark) Hortsman’s Law of Project Management.  It described my strategy perfectly, in simple terms that a Bulldog like me could embrace. 

I’ve managed dozens of projects over the year and didn’t realize my philosophy was Who Does What By When.  When everyone focuses on that simple principle, reporting is easier and everyone understands his or her role. Layer on the constant reminder that People Are the Engine of Project Success and you’re pretty much there.  My job as a project manager is to see the threats to project completion when things are going well and make the appropriate adjustments, and to eliminate any barriers to the job getting done the rest of the time. 

There are those who will say you should get certified through the Project Management Institute or some such organization — and maybe they’re right for huge, complex projects but I’m not so sure.  I think you can be very successful if you make sure everyone does their job and leaves enough time for the next person to do theirs.   Recognize people throughout, especially when they make it easier for someone else to succeed.

What strategies do you use to manage projects to completion, in time and on budget?  Have I oversimplified the process?

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Will one of these posts help change your consulting approach?

by Peter Osborne on November 7, 2010 · 0 comments

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So many good posts from the past week that a few good things fell by the wayside.  I’m glad I’m now offering different links over on Bulldog Simplicity that focus on, not surprisingly, ways to remove the complexity in your business and personal life.  Enjoy these; I hope one or more have an impact on your consulting business.  And, as always, please provide a link in the Comments to posts that you found helpful recently.

Is It Stupidity or Laziness?  Who should you be focusing your marketing efforts on — new customers or prospects? Bill Kennedy has a no-nonsense answer.

15 Insights from 15 Years.   A look back at 15 years in the advertising and PR business, but most of Indra Gardiner’s observations are dead-on for consultants and small business owners too.

Arm Your Sales Team With the Necessary Tools to Grow.  You can look at this post in one of two ways — if you’re moving past the entry-level consultant point you need to be thinking about this kind of stuff.  And if you’re not, the companies that Mark Suster is talking about may need your help implementing these processes.  Go find them.

The 11 Harsh Realities of Being an Entrepreneur.  Keeping in mind that the target audience for this site are people who are new to consulting and/or new small-business owners, this list from the OnStartups.com site provides a good grounding of the challenges you face.  There’s another interesting post on this site this week called 23 Tweetable  Startup Insights from Seth Godin, where the writer says he followed Seth’s blog for the past few months and captured a bunch of thoughts that work for startups and entrepreneurs.  Also worth a click.

No, That IS NOT a Competitive Advantage.  I’m cheating here a bit, because this post was published this past summer but someone tweeted it this week.  The writer, Jason Cohen, has a blog that is now one of my favorites because it focuses a lot of attention on differentiating yourself in competitive markets.  Read this post, but explore the A Smart Bear site a bit (starting with the rest of this series). 

Top 25 Small Business Tips.  A very quick read of 25 ways to run your business more effectively from a variety of successful consultants and online marketing experts via Marco Carbajo.  There will certainly be a few you think are obvious,  but it’s worth a couple of minutes to see if there are any you aren’t doing today.

Professional Services Firms and Social Media.  This post provides a summary of some recent research (and the recommendations) around how professional-services forms are using (or are not using) social media. 

The 39 Social Media Tools I’ll Use Today.  The headline alone does not scream simplicity, but this post by Jay Baer does provide a great overview of what people use to keep track of everything they’re doing with social media.  Worth a look.  You probably won’t use all 39, but you may find a few new ones to try.  Jay also did a nice interview this week with SmartBlog on how to build a better corporate blog that’s worth a look.

22 Tips to Differentiate Your Brand Presence.  There are a lot of consultants and small businesses jockeying for position against people with similar products, services, and approaches.  Is yours differentiated from the person down the street?  Pam Moore offers some suggestions.

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LinkedIn headlines: Don’t waste the real estate

by Peter Osborne on September 13, 2010 · 0 comments

This is the fourth (and final) part of a multi-part series on making changes to your job-seeker (or full-time job) LinkedIn profile to reflect your decision to consult or seek project work.  The entire series can be found here.

Find a way to make your LinkedIn Professional Headline truly memorable

Reporters spend most of their time writing the leads to their stories. People selling their homes make sure the front yard looks great.  The last thing you do before going on a job interview or date is check to make sure there’s no spots on your shirt or tie or foreign objects stuck in your teeth. 

So why do so many people write awful headlines for their LinkedIn profiles?

This series started after I helped JibberJobber.com founder Jason Alba with responses to his posting, LinkedIn Professional Headlines: Yours Probably Sucks.  Go ahead and take a look.  We had about 40 people ask for help and you’ll get an idea of whether I can help you.  I guess I’m sad that Jason stole the best headline for this post subject, but I think mine works too. 

You have 120 characters to get someone’s attention with your headline.  Who’s going to see it?  Your connections.  Your connections’ connections.  And their connections.  And people who search using keywords that can be found within your Profile.  And prospective clients (or employers).  You get the idea.

I took a quick look at my Connections’ headlines.  What did I find?

  • Company names that tell me nothing.  These are the consultants who just assume some combination of letters and numbers, last names paired with the phrase Consulting Group or some such name, and the Something Group are going to lead to click-throughs.  They’re not.
  • Job titles and company name. These are the employed people who are either deliriously happy with their current situation or don’t realize that if someone wants to find people who work at Bank of America, she is far more likely to use the Advanced Search option.  This group includes the people who don’t realize that there is no Central HR Agency that dictates consistency over the responsibilities of an SVP, Senior Marketing Manager, Director, Vice President, General Manager, or any of a myriad of ambiguous titles so your title doesn’t help you all that much.
  • Name. Ask me for a FREE something.  OK, I cheated here.  I don’t think any of my Connections did this, but there are lots and lots of people who jump right to the offer on their (Not So) Professional Headlines. 

Guys, everyone is a Marketer.  Pretty much everyone is in Business Development.  That doesn’t tell me what you do.  That doesn’t tell me what value you bring.  That doesn’t cause me to click on your name among the 10 names on any given page of Search Results.  Plug the word “Marketer” into the LinkedIn search engine and you’ll get 57,000 results (which is actually less than I would have guessed).

Most of your headlines just take up space.  Or to extend the metaphor of my headline, they are vacant lots that don’t help you one iota.  Here are some tips to get people to open your Profile so they can find the real you (if you’ve done something to beef up the Summary and other sections inside):

  • Tell me why I should care about you.  Let’s face it.  You’re on LinkedIn to either find a job (a new one or a better one), find clients, or find someone who can help your business be more successful.  You want dates? Go to Facebook.  You want to build relationships? Probably Twitter.  Your LinkedIn profile better tell people who you are, what you’ve done, and what value you’re going to bring a reader.  If it doesn’t, then you’re wasting your time and the reader’s.
  • Answer the Question Readers are Asking.  If you can do this in your headline you’re ahead of the game.  The questions include What Do You Do? What Makes Your Unique? What Problem Do You Solve? Why Should I Do Business With You?
  • Grab someone’s attention.  Use strong verbs. Differentiate yourself. Get them to want to read more.
  • Keep it tight.  Remember, you have 120 characters.  That’s about the amount of space you get for a Twitter message that you’re hoping gets retweeted.  Make it quick. That’s a decent amount of space, actually You don’t have to tell the whole story.  You just have to pique someone’s curiosity.  A lot of you only use 20-30 characters.  That’s like my son finishing a 60-minute math test in 15 minutes.  Good results rarely come from that,
  • Test different approaches.  Come up with a few headlines and replace them every week or so.  Then keep an eye on the Who’s Viewed My Profile section of your front page.  There are two metrics — Number of Views and Number of Times You’ve Shown Up in Search Results.  Higher numbers won’t necessarily lead to lots of calls, but it gives you a better chance.  See if you get comments from people who know you.

Have you seen headlines that you thought were particularly effective?  Would you like me to provide you with feedback on yours.  Use the Comment box below.

P.S.  The advice I’m providing will help you beef up your LinkedIn profile without outside help.  But if you don’t want to spend the time or realize that this is not something you’re particularly good at, I will be happy to take you on as a client.  Just drop me an e-mail or you can go to a page that will enable you to learn more and even sign up then and there.

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Respect the tomato–be more productive

by Peter Osborne on August 28, 2010 · 1 comment

I have found that one of my biggest challenges as a consultant is time management.  I have To Do lists.  I have plenty of opportunities and prospects.  But I get distracted easily.  I haven’t gotten to the point where I can turn off my e-mail notifications while I’m working.

Can you stay focused for 25 minutes at a time?

But I’ve been trying a time-management technique named for a tomato as a way to work through my own personal game of Whack-A-Mole with an increasing number of projects.

Simply put, the Pomodoro technique asks you to work on a specific task — and that task alone — for 25 straight minutes.  Then you get a five-minute break before you move on to your next Pomodoro.  Shut everything else off.  Turn off your e-mail, unless you’re expecting something that’s absolutely critical.

The “system” includes a To Do Sheet, an Activity Inventory Sheet, and a Record Sheet that you can get from the Pomodoro website.  You put all the things you need to accomplish on the Activity Inventory Sheet.  At the beginning of each day, you put the specific tasks you need to complete on the To Do Sheet, prioritizing them where possible.  Then you just work through the sheet.  If you’re interrupted, you capture the reasons why.

I could see someone deciding not to do the paperwork and just focusing on the 25-minute segments.  But the important thing is the effort to focus, to “get the checkmarks” if you will.  How often do we try to juggle a number of different projects, jumping back and forth as input arrives via e-mail or a visit to your office or cube?  This technique offers a different way to compartmentalize your day-to-day tasks.  There’s even an application to let you put a Pomodoro clock on your desktop.

What do you do to fight all the distractions that rear their heads during the day?

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Assess your skills, then address weaknesses

by Peter Osborne on July 13, 2010 · 0 comments

Peel back the layers and dig deep to identify weaknesses to focus on

Assessing your strengths and weaknesses is a critical first step in determining whether your personality and skills (i.e., your core competencies) are a good fit for the challenges of a portfolio career.

My strengths in a corporate environment came from my ability to see problems (particularly barriers to marketing success) and bring people together to solve them.  My communication skills helped a lot in that respect, but my success was tied in no small part to my ability to navigate the corporate infrastructure and get people moving toward a common goal.  The challenge is translating those skills to my current path.

But I’m not as comfortable at building strong one-on-one relationships, at going to a function and meeting people in a business atmosphere.  I hang back; I worry that I don’t come across well.  That’s why I signed up for Keith Ferrazzi’s Relationship Masters Academy, to learn some skills that will help me more effectively sell myself to prospective clients (and, I suppose, prospective employers). 

One thing I’ve learned is that maybe my skills weren’t as weak as I thought.  One RMA exercise asked us to describe a way we drove accountability at the team or individual level.  I submitted the Daily Huddle that I used to run at Bank of America (here’s a version that I published in my Bulldog Simplicity blog) and was somewhat surprised to “win” the weekly contest.  Well, Keith described the Huddle in his blog post today.  And suddenly, my weakness is a well-publicized strength.

The point is, you need to take a hard look in the mirror and decide where you come up short.  What skills do you lack that might have made a difference when it came down to you or someone else (either when the layoff decisions were being made or today, when you compete for a job or project)?  What skills do you need as a free agent (consultant or project person) that you really didn’t need (or that you got from another member of your team) in your last job?

Then go develop those skills.  If you can’t (or won’t), then a portfolio career might not be for you.

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Leave your comfort zone and be exceptional

by Peter Osborne on July 2, 2010 · 0 comments

We all need to get out of our comfort zones.   People trying to make money consulting or doing project work for the first time after years in the corporate world often stumble when it comes to selling themselves, to defining and communicating their brands and then effectively positioning themselves as the solution to someone’s problem.

This is a great clip from Wednesday night’s So You Think You Can Dance.  Contestant Alex is an accomplished ballet dancer who was asked to do hip-hop with, for the first time in the show’s history, someone of the same gender.  Watch the entire seven-minute clip (the sync is a bit off) because it gives you some perspective on what it took for Alex to leave his comfort zone and do something completely different and in a way that not only exceeded everyone’s expectations but apparently set a new standard for the show.

If this doesn’t motivate you to use your core competencies to try something completely different, I don’t know what will.

Please share some examples of ways you’ve taken your strengths and applied them to something new or took the time to learn a new skill that really paid off.

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Reduce choice to improve your sales results

by Peter Osborne on June 22, 2010 · 0 comments

Are you giving your prospects too many choices?

I believe that if three different people raise the same issue over the course of a week, it’s worth listening.   Today’s idea is Limit Choice.

It started with coming across Groupon, which is one of those businesses where customers are a great deal on a single item.  The deal depends on either a certain number of people taking it or it’s there until the supply runs out.   I signed up and while I haven’t bought anything yet, the deals are great and I anticipate I will participate before too long.  But I did subscribe to their feed.

A few days later I was listening to an interview where Gary Vaynerchuk, the author of “Crush It,” was offering some advice to start-ups.  He’s a bit over-the-top, but one of his pieces of advice had to do with simplicity and limiting choice.  Gary was talking about how he had tested the “Groupon” model in one of his retail wine stores by replacing a rack near the front that held 10 bargain wines with just one.  The result?  ”We’re crushing it,’ he said.  ”We’re selling these bottles at a staggering rate, one that trumps residual loss of not selling many products in that space.”

All this ended with a conversation with another consultant about one of the key “rules” we followed when offering credit-cards through the mail in a previous life.  We tested everything and inevitably found that Choice Suppresses.  The more variations on a card offer — different designs, different pricing, different value propositions — the fewer responses we received.

This concept is very important as you launch and market your consulting practice, particularly if you expect to have a portfolio career where you work for a number of different clients.  As I look back on the past year, I think I threw too many things against the wall when marketing to prospective clients.  I had a one-page document with 10 different “core competencies” across three categories.  It’s too many and I believe I’ve probably lost prospects who might have benefited from my skills but got lost looking at the others.

Try this exercise:  List your marketable skills and points of differentiation (i.e., segment the different ways you can solve a prospect’s problems).   For each skill, list specific prospects and/or places you can find prospects (e.g, a specific LinkedIn group, association membership lists).  Create separate landing pages on your website for each skill and link them from customized marketing pieces.

I’ll close with a link to a blog I wrote elsewhere that includes a great clip from the movie City Slickers reinforcing the importance of reducing choice and focusing on that one thing that differentiates you from the competition. 

Think about places where you might be offering excessive choice to customers and what impact that might be having on their buying decision.  Are there opportunities to reduce the choice — perhaps by careful targeting of benefits or skills — and actually increase response?

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Must Read: D.School Bootcamp Bootleg

by Peter Osborne on May 30, 2010 · 0 comments

http://dschool.typepad.com/files/bootcampbootleg2009.pdfDo I need an MBA to get a consulting job?

It’s a question I hear every now and then from people trying to make the decision about consulting.  I hope not — since I don’t — but you need to be able to explain what makes you different, what skills you offer and methodologies you use (or might use, depending on the situation).

That’s why a New York Times article in January about reinventing the MBA curriculum got my attention.  As one person put it, “At business school, there was a lot of focus on ‘You’ve got a great idea; here’s how to build a business out of it.’  The d.school said, ‘Here’s how you get to that great idea.’”

The “d.school” is a reference to the growth in “design thinking,” which has been described as a process for practical, creative resolution of problems or issues, the essential ability to combine empathy, creativity, and rationality to meet user needs and drive business success.  There’s an engineering focus to all this (the Stanford d.school is part of the Engineering School), but that’s missing the point of today’s posting.

So here is the point: The Stanford d.school has posted a terrific document on its site that outlines what drives the development of great ideas.  The D.School Bootcamp Bootleg starts with seven mindsets — including “Bias Toward Action” and ”Create Clarity From Complexity” (my favorite) and ”Show, Don’t Tell.”  It goes on to introduce modes like “empathize,” “define,” and “test.”  And then it outlines a variety of strategies (or methods) that are integral to design thinking.

Lest this sound overly academic — and some of the pieces will lead to glazing of the eyes — the Bootleg will help you better understand your customers or come up with that “one big thing” before you go too far down the road. 

Business books seem to be getting shorter lately…and packed with more usable information.  This one is 36 pages and well worth your time.  Read through it.  Think about how you’ve used the concepts without actually knowing you were employing design thinking.  Pick some things to try.  Keep them if they work and try something else if they don’t.  

Use this document — but think of it as a toolkit — and when the time comes perhaps you can overcome the lack of an MBA with a skill set that enables you to develop great, marketable ideas.  Or even better, maybe there’s something in here that will enable you to articulate a methodology you’re already using or may find useful in your consulting practice.

How about you?  How have you used some of these methodologies — interviewing for empathy, powers of 10, and so on?  What worked and what didn’t?

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Assess your value to a client before they do

by Peter Osborne on May 12, 2010 · 0 comments

Getting to know your prospective client will make for a great marriage later

Networking and sales prospecting will only get you so far.  At some point, you need to convince a potential client that you will provide value that exceeds what they’re paying you (i.e., ROI).  Whether you’re responding to an RFP or meeting with the prospective client to discuss their needs, you should be trying to figure out how to answer some or all of these questions:

  • Can you add something worthwhile to the company’s total output?
  • Can you help the company get closer to achieving its goals?
  • Can you make the company more efficient (i.e., streamline processes, market more efficiently, save them time)?
  • With the budget available, can you do a comprehesive and effective job?
  • Do you have skills that don’t exist somewhere else in the company (or are resources so stretched that the person or people who do have them can’t be moved to this project)?
  •  Will this project be seen as a must-have or a nice-to-have (i.e., will you have executive support)?

Ask open-ended questions to get at the answer to these questions throughout the sales process and then ask yourself two questions:

  • Are my skills a good match for their problems or needs?

The answer to this question will lead you to the next one:

  • Is it worth spending additional business-development time on this prospect (i.e., developing proposals and presentations and attending meetings?

Focusing on this approach will help you sell more effectively, enabling you to focus your most precious asset — your time — on the right prospects and help you to tie your core competencies to the client’s most pressing needs.

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Five ways to get more business from LinkedIn

May 11, 2010

LinkedIn is probably best known for helping business people network to find jobs.  But many successful consultants are finding that their LinkedIn network can also be a great source of new business.  Here are a few ways you can find new clients: Request targeted recommendations.  Take your list of core competencies and ask people you’ve worked [...]

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