WHAT IS OR WHO IS A
CONSULTANT
A consultant (from Latin: consultare "to discuss") is a professional who provides professional or expert
advice[1] in a particular area such as
security (electronic or physical),management, accountancy, law, human resources, marketing (and public relations), finance, engineering, science or any of many other specialized
fields.
A
consultant is usually an expert or a professional in a specific field and has a
wide knowledge of the subject matter. The role of consultant outside the
medical sphere (where the term is used specifically for a grade of doctor) can
fall under one of two general categories:
·
Internal
consultant - someone who operates within an organization but is
available to be consulted on areas of specialism by other departments or
individuals (acting as clients); or
·
External
consultant - someone who is employed externally (either by a firm or
some other agency) whose expertise is provided on a temporary basis, usually
for a fee. As such this type of consultant generally engages with multiple and
changing clients.
The
overall impact of a consultant is that clients have access to deeper levels of
expertise than would be feasible for them to retain in-house, and may purchase
only as much service from the outside consultant as desired.
Ways
of work
The
range of areas of expertise covered by the term consultant is extremely wide.
One of the more general attributions is as a Management
Consultant but this is not an exclusive term. Consulting and the means
by which the (external) consultant is engaged vary according to industry and
local practice. However the principal difference between a consultant and
a temp is
generally one of direction. A consultant is engaged to fulfill a brief in terms
of helping to find solutions to specific issues but the ways in which that is
to be done generally falls to the consultant to decide, within constraints such
as budget and resources agreed with the client. (A temp on the
other hand is normally fulfilling a role that usually exists within the
organization and is helping to bridge a gap caused by staffing shortages for
whatever reason. They fall under the direction of the normal management
structure of the organization.)
There
is however a hybrid form where a consultant may be hired as an Interim Manager or Executive,
bringing a combination of specialist expertise to bear on a role that is
temporarily vacant (usually at a senior level).
Some
consultants are employed indirectly by the client via a consultancy staffing
company, a company that provides consultants on an agency basis. (The staffing company itself does not usually have
consulting expertise but works rather like an employment agency.) This
form of working is particularly common in the ICT sector.
Such consultants are often called contractors since they are usually providing
technical services (such as programming or systems analysis) that could be performed
in-house were it not easier for the employer to operate a flexible system of
only hiring such technologists at times of peak workload rather than
permanently.
Common
types
In
the business, and as of recently the private sphere, the most commonly found
consultants are:
·
Engineering
consultants provide engineering-related services such as design,
supervision, execution, repair, operation, maintenance, technology, creation of
drawings and specifications, and make recommendations to public, companies,
firms and industries.
·
Strategy
consultants (AKA management consultants) working on the development of
and improvements to organizational strategy alongside senior management in many industries.
·
Human-resources (HR)
consultants who provide expertise around employment practice and people
management.
·
Internet
consultants who are specialists in business use of the internet and keep
themselves up-to-date with new and changed capabilities offered by the web.
Ideally internet consultants also have practical experience and expertise in
management skills such as strategic planning, change, projects, processes,
training, team-working and customer satisfaction.
·
Process
consultants who are specialists in the design or improvement of
operational processes and can be specific to the industry or sector.
·
Public-relations
(PR) consultants dealing specifically with public relations matters external to the client
organization and often engaged on a semi-permanent basis by larger
organizations to provide input and guidance.
·
Performance
consultants who focus on the execution of an initiative or overall
performance of their client.
·
Immigration
consultant who helps through legal procedure of immigration from one
country to other country.
·
Information-technology
(IT) consultants in many disciplines such as computer hardware, software engineering, or networks.
·
Marketing
consultants who are generally called upon to advise around areas of
product development and related marketing matters.
·
Interim
managers as mentioned above may be independent consultants who act as
interim executives with decision-making power under corporate policies or
statutes. They may sit on specially constituted boards or committees.
·
3D Consultants who
are specialists in the field of 3D scanning, printing, modeling, designing,
engineering, building, and everything that has to do with the three dimensions.
Place of work
Though most of the
back-office research and analysis occurs at the consultants' offices,
consultants typically work at the site of the client for at least some of the
time. The governing factor tends to be the amount of interaction required with
other employees of the client.
Qualifications
Consultant Peter Block defines a consultant as "someone
who has influence over an individual, group, or organization, but who has no
direct authority to implement changes." He contrasts this with a surrogate manager who is a person who "acts on
behalf of, or in place of, a manager." The key difference is that a
consultant never makes decisions for the individual or group, whereas a
surrogate manager does make decisions.
Accredited Associates
are bound by a Code of Ethics that requires the consultant to only
provide “practical advice that works” — by “Analyzing as a Generalist and
Solving as a Specialist” — using the skills and experience of a sub-contracted
fellow Associate, thus at all times providing the client with the best
available advice and support.
There is no single
qualification to be a consultant other than those laid down in relation to
medical & engineering personnel who have attained this level-degree in it.
Internationally the
accreditation of Management Consultants is overseen by higher education
training and accreditation organizations.
The International Council of Management
Consulting Institutes (ICMCI)
was founded in 1987 and has around 50 member institutes covering the globe. The
award of Certified
Management Consultant (CMC) status
is its internationally recognised accreditation (in some countries like the US,
conforms to ISO/IEC 17024:2003 standards) that is not specific to the technical
content of the consultant's practice. For instance this could be held equally
by a Human Resources (HR) expert or a Chemical Engineer operating as management consultants in
their field(s) of expertise. There are about 10,000 CMCs worldwide.
Chartered Institute
of Management Consultants (CIMC) is a
not-for-profit professional body chartered federally under Letters Patent
granted by the Government of Canada. CIMC is also chartered under the Laws of
the State of Delaware, USA. CIMC is also registered with the National
Certification Commission, USA. The CIMC award Chartered Management Consultant
Ch.MC designation as a global management credential.
International Federation of Consulting Engineers (FIDIC) is a Federation whose members
are national associations of Consulting Engineers.
|
Related concepts
·
Adviser
|
Types of consultant
|
Types of consultant (more)
|
No comments:
Post a Comment