GUIDE: An Introduction to the Consulting Business

So, you want to be a consultant, eh? It can be a highly competitive, extraordinarily difficult, and frustratingly challenging business to be involved with at times, but the level of freedom and amount of experience in many facets of the business universe are a very positive trade off for all the hard work. When handled correctly - and planned with care - a career as a consultant can yield much more financial and personal freedom for the professional. An experienced consultant can make several orders of magnitude more salary for a comparably educated and experienced "company employee", and can enjoy many other benefits, such as making your own schedule, working on challenging and interesting projects within a wide range of companies, getting responsibilities to match your experience and your technical know-how, guiding your own career development through obtaining multiple simultaneous experiences in diverse professional sectors, and increasing autonomy and responsibility along the entire scope of your career. Individuals who are attracted to the consultant, professional, styling are usually described with terms like "self starter" and "go-getter". Certainly this type of career decision will demand a certain level of sacrifice, particularly at the onset of your career. But through the steep experience curve and unavoidable initial difficulties, many professional have emerged with greatly satisfying, highly compensated, and most importantly.immensely rewarding careers in the field(s) of their choice.


How To Start Your Own Coaching/Consulting Business

Many times people are looking for a solution to a problem in their life. The problem may be a professional problem that is related to their job or career. Or the problem may be a personal one that is affecting the way they deal with the rest of their life. They may need to find a solution to a huge problem at work, or they may be feeling less than satisfied with the turn their life has taken. No matter why they need answers, or how they want to find those answers, there is a method and means for them to accomplish it. They simply need to decide how they want to tackle the problem. Consultants and coaches are available to help clients reach their fullest potential. The key to reaching that potential is to empower themselves with the strongest tool available. In some cases this will be a consultant and in other cases it will be a certain type of coach. The method that they choose will depend on their needs and in what direction they want to focus their energies. Sometimes asking for a little help while looking for a solution or trying to achieve a goal is difficult for some people. This is becoming less the case as more people and corporations are turning to coaches and consultants to help them find viable solutions to problems or help in manifesting their dreams. Consultants and coaches are trained to assist people by providing them with the best training and latest techniques available. Some coaches and consultants will work together in what is known as a "hybrid" mode. This simply means that clients get the best of both the consultant and the coach to help them create solutions. In other words, they get advice and experience to push them forward, motivation and brainstorming techniques when they're at a standstill, and insight and inspiration to push them to their highest potential in both their professional and personal life. This book will provide you with information for both the consulting and the coaching business and provide you with the information you need to start your own consulting or coaching business.

Things to Consider Before You Become a Consultant There are many items to consider before...

There are many items to consider before deciding to make the commitment of becoming a consultant. When one embarks on the mission to participate in this career choice one should be clear that they are taking on many responsibilities that employees within a larger organization may take for granted.

Starting a consultancy is starting YOUR OWN BUSINESS. Although it is common for consultants to function under the umbrella of a larger corporation, such participation is typically in a freelance capacity and consultants don't always enjoy many of the perks that their colleagues within the corporate hierarchy do. This is not to say that a career in consultancy does not have its own set of desirable characteristics, but simply that it is good to be aware that there exist profound differences at a fundamental level regarding the disciplines necessary to be successful at a consultancy as opposed to achieving while inside the comparatively rigid corporate structure. Among the characteristics that are particular to this type of career choice is a level a freedom, both personal and professional, which demands a certain level of discipline to successfully work within. In many ways someone who has decided to become a consultant has made a decision to allow their work to become intertwined into their life to a degree that "personal life" and "professional life" become indistinguishably fused.

Unlike working at a "9 to 5" job, the consultant must be prepared to work around others schedules and must have the capacity to fit into numerous and varied work paradigms.

What You Should Consider BEFORE Starting Your Consulting Business

Below is a list of some items to consider before taking the plunge into a professional consulting career.

• Is becoming a consultant the right choice for me? The first thing you want to do is take a sober look at the lifestyle and career paradigm of a consultant business. Like we noted above, you should be prepared to make some sacrifices (particularly at the onset of your career) in both your personal and professional life.

• Considerations for education and/or certifications: Depending on which particular realm of the consulting world you are considering joining some specific certifications may be necessary to practice in your chosen field. A certain degree of certified competency is expected in certain consulting jobs, such as computer consultants. For example, it is extremely recommended for someone interested in being successful as a computer hardware consultant to have an A+ Certification. Someone interested in embarking on a career as Microsoft Windows consultant will want to secure MCSE (Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer) certification. Although in some cases certification is recommended, there are others where certification is mandatory and is legally regulated. Be sure to execute all necessary due diligence and research potential legal requirements well ahead of time.

• Are you comfortable being in control of and responsible for running all aspects of a business?

Is This The Right Business For You?

When you get involved in the consulting business you will be in the captain's chair of the entire enterprise, as well as simultaneously being your own secretary (at least in the beginning). Are you prepared to write your own schedule? Do you have the desire and the means to be responsible for your own time management? Are you prepared to market yourself and network within the professional community to secure contracts for your blooming business? Are you prepared to do whatever it takes, be it a 12 hour day of cold calls when business is slow or putting in the extra time to seek out individual clients on a one-to-one basis? If you can answer yes to all these questions, then you are might be just the type who will greatly succeed in the type of business model.

How to Get Started Once you decided that a career in consulting is right for you

There are a few things you can take care of from the get go to ensure a smooth transition into the world of professional consultancy. Like we mentioned earlier, organization plays a key role in all phases of a consultant's career. From the early stages of planning the business structure and types consulting you wish to engage in, to the execution of daily workflow, to the discipline required to keep legally sound income and tax records, being a consultant can mean being efficient and thorough in the areas of organization and planning. Whenever possible, it is recommended to plan as far ahead as possible for matters that can be planned ahead for.

3 Basic Ways You Can Set Up Your Business From A Legal Standpoint

Establish your businesses' legal/fiscal foundation. It is in your best interest to formalize and solidify your business structure right from the onset. This is in the interest of having a well thought out plan both legally and for tax purposes. In a nutshell, the three basic ways you can set up your business from a legal standpoint are:

1. Sole proprietorship: This is the easiest to accomplish from a legal point and requires the least investment of time and funds to do. However, it should be noted, that sole proprietors accept all business related liabilities at a personal level. To put this in another way, in the eyes of the law, the individual and the business are for all intents and purposes the same entity. So, for example, if in the course of your business dealings you come under legal scrutiny for any reason (being sued by a client, for instance), resulting litigation may be able to hold your personal finances and assets as damages to the plaintiff in the case. To put it bluntly, you are putting your butt on the line when you engage in a sole proprietorship.

2. Partnership: This approach is similar to sole proprietorship, but involves two individuals who share legal and fiscal responsibility for the business together. This partnership can be instituted in a variety of ways and typically involves the interested parties negotiating a contract that elaborates legally on the particulars of the partnership "deal". For example, there are "silent" partnerships, which involve certain parties within the contract holding all legal obligations but not participating in the actual running of the business.

3. Corporation: A corporation is the most legally and fiscally complicated method of starting a business, but has its benefits as well. When a business is incorporated it becomes a legal entity of its own. Incorporation allows for businesses to take greater strategic risks than sole proprietorships and partnerships because they provide for a legal and fiscal layer between the corporate entity and the individuals involved in the business. Under normal circumstances, someone starting out in the consulting world will not have the need or the resources to incorporate, but it is common for consulting firms (such as Booz-Allen-Hamilton, for example) to establish their business in this manner.