Wednesday, November 17, 2004
Beware self-serving consultants
Beware self-serving consultants
By Scott Withrow, Builder.com | Wednesday, November 10 2004 6:05 PM
A number of years ago, a colleague and I were discussing a growing trend in larger organisations to hire external consultants at a massive fee to investigate and describe the organisation's woes and propose a new business agenda.
These consultants seemed to appear overnight and, in a surreal whirlwind of confusion, they would identify key business processes and underlying IT support systems that needed to change or be replaced.
My colleague and I noticed that the recommended solutions were often suspiciously in favour of the expert's consultancy. For example, one Big Eight consulting team recommended replacing a functional system with one supplied by a different vendor. We found it odd that the new system had all the same functional components as the one that was replaced--until we learned that the consulting group had a partnership with the new vendor.
On another occasion, a consultant recommended a thorough analysis of the organisation's business processes, with the goal of identifying candidates for reengineering. The recommendation identified many core systems that could benefit from redesign; this extensive effort could be led by a team of SMEs from the expert's consulting group.
No wonder many IT managers view management consulting groups as a parasite on corporate information systems. Many companies enter into such consulting engagements to get an honest evaluation. Unfortunately, there are a growing number of engagements that are little more than a pretext for the consultancy's own fortunes.
Judging consultants
The trick is being able to distinguish between the two kinds of consultancies. For starters, if you witness the following actions from a consultant, then you may want to rethink the business relationship:
* The consulting group is selling the most recent technology hype without informing you of the downsides.
* The consulting group quotes industry analysts but offers little or no examples of practical implementations.
* The consulting group presents recommendations that directly or indirectly benefits the consultancy's bottom line.
This means that it's imperative for you to do your research, particularly determining whether the consulting group has industry experience and, if so, finding out if their clients were pleased with the consultant's recommendations; also, be sure to do a background evaluation of key SMEs.
As an application development manager, it's your responsibility to ensure that your system(s) support the business and that business processes meet or exceed requirements. You should inform senior management if a consulting arrangement appears to be only minimally beneficial to your organisation or even contrary to its goals. After all, it's money that should be used for the benefit of the organisation (or, as my team would say, for good not for evil).
A word of caution: In many cases, alerting management about questions you have about the consultants is deemed a political action. Many bright, hard-working application development managers have been reassigned for pushing the no-consultant button without the proper support. The best way to approach this topic with management is to identify, document, and communicate your thoughts about the consultants. Then, it's up to senior management to decide what course of action to take.
Scott Withrow has more than 20 years of IT experience, including IT management, Web development management, and internal consulting application analysis.
By Scott Withrow, Builder.com | Wednesday, November 10 2004 6:05 PM
A number of years ago, a colleague and I were discussing a growing trend in larger organisations to hire external consultants at a massive fee to investigate and describe the organisation's woes and propose a new business agenda.
These consultants seemed to appear overnight and, in a surreal whirlwind of confusion, they would identify key business processes and underlying IT support systems that needed to change or be replaced.
My colleague and I noticed that the recommended solutions were often suspiciously in favour of the expert's consultancy. For example, one Big Eight consulting team recommended replacing a functional system with one supplied by a different vendor. We found it odd that the new system had all the same functional components as the one that was replaced--until we learned that the consulting group had a partnership with the new vendor.
On another occasion, a consultant recommended a thorough analysis of the organisation's business processes, with the goal of identifying candidates for reengineering. The recommendation identified many core systems that could benefit from redesign; this extensive effort could be led by a team of SMEs from the expert's consulting group.
No wonder many IT managers view management consulting groups as a parasite on corporate information systems. Many companies enter into such consulting engagements to get an honest evaluation. Unfortunately, there are a growing number of engagements that are little more than a pretext for the consultancy's own fortunes.
Judging consultants
The trick is being able to distinguish between the two kinds of consultancies. For starters, if you witness the following actions from a consultant, then you may want to rethink the business relationship:
* The consulting group is selling the most recent technology hype without informing you of the downsides.
* The consulting group quotes industry analysts but offers little or no examples of practical implementations.
* The consulting group presents recommendations that directly or indirectly benefits the consultancy's bottom line.
This means that it's imperative for you to do your research, particularly determining whether the consulting group has industry experience and, if so, finding out if their clients were pleased with the consultant's recommendations; also, be sure to do a background evaluation of key SMEs.
As an application development manager, it's your responsibility to ensure that your system(s) support the business and that business processes meet or exceed requirements. You should inform senior management if a consulting arrangement appears to be only minimally beneficial to your organisation or even contrary to its goals. After all, it's money that should be used for the benefit of the organisation (or, as my team would say, for good not for evil).
A word of caution: In many cases, alerting management about questions you have about the consultants is deemed a political action. Many bright, hard-working application development managers have been reassigned for pushing the no-consultant button without the proper support. The best way to approach this topic with management is to identify, document, and communicate your thoughts about the consultants. Then, it's up to senior management to decide what course of action to take.
Scott Withrow has more than 20 years of IT experience, including IT management, Web development management, and internal consulting application analysis.
# posted by MiDBA @ 11/17/2004 06:35:00 PM 
