Tuesday, September 07, 2010

The consultant way

This image was shared by my friend's friend on Facebook. After I went through the whole story in the comic I somehow felt that the Genie is more apt for a consultant than a professor( that too from IIT)
So this is my take on Consultants :)
A professor atleast will never guarantee success but plays a role of facilitator, whereas on contrary a consultant gives a very bad picture of your present( you may even feel like you are the biggest loser) and a gives a rosy picture post implementation. This can as well stir a discussion on the ethical stance of each of the professions.Which may go on for pages..so lets not deviate

Consultant is a person who comes in the middle of client's life [which was running peacefully till then], gives gyaan [read bullshit], confuses, scares, then provides a simple solution(on paper), charges hefty and disappears. After which only the client wakes up wondering what happened all the while.


You will get a good understanding on how a consultant visualizes and communicates the same to clients from the below image. This is typically in a software development cycle.

There is an old joke on consultant
A shepherd was herding his flock in a remote pasture when suddenly a brand-new BMW advanced out of the dust cloud towards him. The driver, a young man in a Broni suit, Gucci shoes, Ray Ban..
sunglasses and YSL tie, leaned out the window and asked the shepherd... "If I tell you exactly how many sheep you have in your flock, will you give me one?" The shepherd looked at the man, obviously a yuppie, then looked at his peacefully grazing flock and calmly answered "sure". The yuppie parked his car, whipped out his IBM ThinkPad and connected it to a cell phone, then he surfed to a NASA page on the internet where he called up a GPS satellite navigation system, scanned the area, and then opened up a database and an Excel spreadsheet with complex formulas. He sent an email on his Blackberry and, after a few minutes, received a response. Finally, he prints out a 130-page report on his miniaturized printer then turns to the shepherd and says, "You have exactly 1586 sheep. "That is correct; take one of the sheep." said the shepherd. He watches the young man select one of the animals and bundle it into his car.
Then the shepherd says: "If I can tell you exactly what your business is, will you give me back my animal?", "OK, why not." answered the young man. "Clearly, you are a consultant." said the shepherd. "That's correct." says the yuppie, "but how did you guess that?" "No guessing required." answers the shepherd. "You turned up here although nobody called you. You want to get paid for an answer I already knew, to a question I never asked, and you don't know crap about my business...... Now give me back my dog."
The bread and butter of a consultant comes by creating confusion among clients.

"If you cant convince them confuse them". 

Being a consultant the best part of the job is you don't really have to know much.A few jargons to bamboozle people is enough. Some very common jargons without which a consultant job is not done are synergy, value add, competitive advantage, value proposition etc. If you have any please to comment.

In my organization there is an interesting definition for consultant

"A consultant is person who comes and insults"

-Yours truly
Unknown (Yet another consultant)

Photo credit: Genie by Devesh Bhimsaria,Software development cycle
Joke : Consulting sheep

19 comments:

  1. really hilarious.
    loved the IIT one
    and the consultant tree one was just too too good

    and the shepherd one ultimate:D

    and that too from a consultant:)

    PS :still laughing.

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  2. WD :)
    ok someone laughed..am happy :)

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  3. @Joven
    sorry buddy..am deleting ur comments..u r no different from a spammer

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  4. hehe...

    good one !! IIT one !!!

    consulatnt is one who comes and insults...lolz....

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  5. He hehe Right no wonder they hate me when I said i am a consultant he hehehe :)

    no i am kidding would never become one now that you have mentioned

    the joke was hilarious and the tree awesome :)

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  6. I am a programmer .. but picture is not that good for me IS IT :) he he he

    by the way what do you doo :)

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  7. @Nikki
    :P

    @Bikramjit... thanks buddy for dropping by.. u r a celebrity for me :)

    yea tree picture clearly depicts how things go wrong in perceptions n communication

    I did mention what I am in the post ending:)

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  8. hii
    I loved the cartoons and the sheep joke!

    :)

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  9. @AS
    none of those are my creations..mentioned the sources also :) glad u liked them

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  10. Liked the IT one the best! ;) Keep them coming! :D

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  11. thanks Sourav..sure will pour more in the coming posts..

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  12. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  13. hey ..
    LOL..good one..Liked Aladdin's story :P...Tell me one thing ..R u a consultant seriously? :) ..if Yes, you must be enjoying confusing people :P :P..Hey one more question y u chose name as UNKNOWN. You can choose any other name. Any specific reason..

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  14. Hey Muks..nice to see u here in my blog..am happy that I could make u laugh over the post...
    Yes..I am a consultant :).. sometimes u have to confuse others..if the client turns out to be smarter one..:)
    and the last one is really good question u know..and that is the reason I created 2 tab pages for About Blog n About Me

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  15. Hey that was super funny the tree images and the way clients get billed at the end of the day, was a true picture! I myself know how being a consultant is and how funny it is to play with clients mind at times!! Really a good one...

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  16. @Palak
    hehehe :)) I am sure you would have seen yourself being described there :P
    cool you liked it :)

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  17. Hi Murali,
    Thanks for dropping by...nice to see a comment from a professional writer :) you are perfectly right, it is like the chinese whisper.

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  18. I'm reading 2 years later.. And I love it! It's nice knowing there is an archive of your writings somewhere.. your own finger print somehow
    You know this is also the job of a bad psychologist :P
    ... And practically any "diagnosing" job.. LOL

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  19. Hey Buddy.
    Thanks for commenting on a old post and refreshing my memories back..

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I welcome brickbats as well..so hit me hard with your comments..