Consultant thinking: Advanced consulting skills for experienced consultants

Advanced Consulting Skills (ACS) is a new course that meets an important requirement, so far unmet, for skills development among experienced consultants.

Newcomers to the profession usually get training in what it means to be a consultant - as on our ever-popular Core Consultancy Skills course - plus other training when needed for specifics such as presentation skills.

Eventually the best consultants get promoted to a senior role as "Managing Consultant" or similar and, suddenly, being very good at consulting is not enough. They need new perspectives and ways to exploit the potential of leverage: how to deliver through others as well as their own efforts; how to contribute to product development for the whole business; and how to manage client relationships. Leading more complex projects also calls for superior diagnostic skills to decide how best to approach a client's challenges, not just apply a standard solution.

When consultancy leaders look around, there is not much training available specifically for Managing Consultants. Certainly at Elevation Learning we are frequently asked how we can help. And that is why we have launched this new course.     

At this level, the challenge is to ask different questions: How can I make a personal impact in the market - using "Brand Me" to become a known expert? What about techniques like learning sets to develop myself and the team?

Another need is familiarity with more advanced tools, for example Case Conferences to understand and prescribe for a client's situation.

Becoming a product champion means appreciating the hard financial ratios that apply to any consulting business and possibly running into internal politics!

Many consultants are good at selling but seniors may manage the whole sales process - where to put the team effort. Client handling moves up to communication at "C-level" and includes dealing with those tricky situations.

Senior consultants have a disproportionate impact on business results; this course provides the skills needed to enable them to perform well at this level.

Philip Taylor, Principal Consultant, Elevation Learning