That was surely a great article. It hits the bulls eye in explaining the basics of consulting and makes the reader sure enough of whether to go for it or not!!!
I am a fresher who has just joined a firm as an IT consultant, and wanted to know what an IT consultant is, so for this purpose, I found your article to be enlightening. Thanks a lot!!!!!!
Readers, Thank you for all your comments. My intention of writing the article is to cover the aspects of consulting as a career as a cohessive whole Sure, there are various way to look at. Consulting for a so called body shopprt and big 5 consulting firms. In both cases there are advatages and disadvantges. Humans and talented folks that we are, we have to deal based on the situation and create a condusive atmosphere for all parties. Again, I am always aganist body shoppers taking undue advantage of its consultants. I have heard and read a lot about that.. So much so that I can write another article on Good bad and ugly of Consulting. One day, I will.
MBA completing and choosing a consulting careers will open a window of opportunities in big consulting firms. Joinging a smaller ownes might not be that lucrative and might have to do lot of dog work. Pretty much in body shopping companies, there is nothing like selling.. Keep sending resumes to job posting or internal websites of organizations where the company has registered and close the deal... Pretty much the standard. I can discuss at length if interested..
Please email me @ sudhendra.b.seshachala@hp.com or
You have to become a partner(and do lots of selling) to really make it big in consulting. I left consulting and joined a product company after getting an MBA and lots of consulting folks try to switch to product company after the travel and constant whining of customer and billability issues gets to them. Product company hires more qualified people than consulting and you have option of making more money through options or bonuses(in sales) at various levels. If you are a specialist then working on hourly rate or opening a small company and getting an 8(a) status or gettng subcontracts from large consulting companies for minorities is the way to go to make a decent living. Scalability in consulting depends upon hiring people and that poses a problem because many people will leave in case someone else offers slightly better rate. Also, meeting payroll in consulting is a huge challange for small operators. My 2 cents
Great article sir, very insightful. Very beneficial , from a very personal angle ! LOL ! As, I am myself about to start a consultancy firm in Hyderabad ( for recruitment and training), after 18 years of sales & marketing experience, I picked up many valuable tips and quips from this article. Thanks a lot ! CVR +91.98855.74112.
I am 61years and I retired in 9/2003 after 33 years of service in power sector in varios positions(Asst Engineer to Suptd Engineer) and fields-errection,commisioning,repairs of Genarators,Power transformers etc,and was also part of sector reform group.To my surprise, after retirement, found that I was still in demand and now I am activly invoved in power sector as a consulting Engineer.This has given me an opportunity to meet young Engineers and exchange views and to spend my time meaningfully.
Hi Sudhi, That was a very informative article on consulting as a career. After having worked as an IT pro for two years, I'm currently pursuing an MBA. Given my IT background I have a high probability of becoming an ERP consultant after Bschool. What exactly does an ERP consultant do? How technical is his role? Does he have to implement the solution? Does he have to do coding and bug fixing?
I believe there is serious confusion about what is meant by consulting. We need a clear definition of consulting and their relationship with vendor(s) and customer.
This article is generic and applied to any job profile
