My First Blog…

by

 Typewriter
I recently joined Thought Ensemble so this is my first official blog as a member of the TE team.  Since I’m getting back into consulting I thought I’d start off by offering some perspective that I‘ve gained over the years, both as a consultant and in industry.  A couple years ago, following a dozen years at a large consulting firm, I went to the “dark side” and ventured into what many consultants view as a slow, stogy, no-growth, dead-end role – a job in “industry.”  Having just transitioned back into
consulting I’ve gained some perspective about our clients:
First, “industry” roles and the people in those roles are not as inferior as many consultants would like to believe.  There used to be a saying around how a year in consulting was analogous to a dog-year where each year of consulting was like 7 years in industry.  Unless your role is purely transactional this is absolutely not true.  Just like in consulting firms, in a large corporation you have targets, metrics, responsibilities and the need to rally a team around a common goal.  The pressures of next quarter’s results, a yearly cost takeout goal or operational improvement targets are all very real.
Second, consultants don’t always appreciate the “burn” of REALLY owning the results of a given initiative.  I remember my first project when I was fresh out of college.  It was a large, messy systems development project and my final deliverable was a large binder of specifications, test results, process maps and other documentation.  At the end of the project I jubilantly rolled a cart around the office and handed out 3 inch binders (that I had just spent $1,000 at Kinko’s to get produced) full of deliverables.  My work was done!  I was literally on a plane later that day never to return.  What I didn’t appreciate until I had an industry job was that the “industry” people that have to live with the new way of doing things and measure up to the expectations and projected benefits.  You will be around when the jury is in and the actual benefits are known.  If something didn’t meet expectations you will still be there and have to explain why, probably by yourself, because the consultant in many cases will be long gone.
Third, when you choose to engage a consultant you have to make tradeoffs.  A good friend and former boss had a great pithy way to describe the three attributes of any consultant:

1.  Accurate:  Do they know what they are doing?  Are they going to give you the right answer?  Is the advice sound?  Are the benefit projections correct?

2.  Fast:  Can they turn things around in the desired timeframe?  Will they iterate forever to get to an answer?  Can they operate under significant time pressure?  Can they adapt as timelines change?

3.  Cheap:  How much do they cost?  How many of your resources will they require?  How big is the team?  What skill/experience level do they bring?
You get to pick two.  You can have accurate and fast, but it will cost you.  You can have fast and cheap, but the answer will likely be wrong.  You can have cheap and accurate, but it will take a lot of time.  So, choose wisely and with eyes wide open.
However…while I am not going to claim that Thought Ensemble can do all three from above, from my short time here I think we come closer than most other consulting firms.  Our team has significant experience at other “big” consulting firms and in industry so we will get the right answer.  We are nimble and flexible so we can move fast as we bring our “ensemble” to our client’s needs.  And while I wouldn’t call us “cheap” we are not working with you just to land a big SAP gig and embed an army of fresh-faced kids who will learn how to be consultants on your dime.
I’m excited to be part of the Thought Ensemble team.  Thanks for reading.

READ MORE

The Magic of Mortals

The Magic of Mortals

Daily we wake up to new developments in automation, Artificial Intelligence (AI), and Machine Learning (ML). Across sectors and industries, automated solutions prove highly successful in surpassing the capacity of the human brain for certain tasks, improving...

read more
Leveling Up: How to Hone Your Skills at Home

Leveling Up: How to Hone Your Skills at Home

Leaders have been trying to crack the code on talent development for years. Recent studies have shown, however, that strength-focused leadership [read: intentionally elevating the qualities that already come naturally to us] is the clear winner for developing talent...

read more
Fake Case Study: Jack of all trades vs. Master of One

Fake Case Study: Jack of all trades vs. Master of One

  Listen to any earnings call or executive presentation and you will likely hear the terms “top line” and “bottom line.” These are words used to describe a business’s performance. According to Investopedia, the words are defined as follows: Top line refers to the...

read more
Your Personality Is Showing

Your Personality Is Showing

There I was, minding my own business one evening, digging into my organization's SEO performance (as one does), when I came across something interesting. Search terms related to "MBTI" — or the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, developed by Katherine Cook Briggs and Isabel...

read more
Lessons From a Change Manager Who Hates Change

Lessons From a Change Manager Who Hates Change

Hello. My name is Monique, and I’m a change manager who hates change.   After years of receiving “consulting therapy” from various mentors, I am now able to say these words out loud and proudly. But for a long time, it felt more like an admission of guilt. I mean, who...

read more
Creativity as a Cure

Creativity as a Cure

The topic of creative solutioning has been front and center these days as we talk more and more about organizational adaptability in the face of dynamic and uncertain times. For example, I recently read about a project that got me thinking about specific priorities...

read more
Thought Ensemble, a Pariveda Company — Why Now?

Thought Ensemble, a Pariveda Company — Why Now?

Big news over here as we close out the year - we have been acquired by Pariveda, a 750-person consulting firm in 12 markets across North America! We are now “Thought Ensemble, a Pariveda Company” and I’ll be serving as the Managing Vice President continuing to lead...

read more
Thought Ensemble Joins Pariveda Solutions!

Thought Ensemble Joins Pariveda Solutions!

Dallas, December 9, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Pariveda, a leader specializing in solving complex technology and business problems, announces the acquisition of Thought Ensemble. With the addition of Thought Ensemble, Pariveda now provides holistic business strategy,...

read more
Thoughts on Colorado’s Equal Pay for Equal Work Act

Thoughts on Colorado’s Equal Pay for Equal Work Act

It was about a year ago that we first started hearing about Colorado’s Equal Pay for Equal Work Act (SB19-085) and I knew it was going to be national news. We’d just gotten past the “Rocky Mountain High” jokes, and our lovely state was trying to break new ground...

read more