20 SEPTEMBER 1968, Page 30

How to select a consultant

BUSINESS VIEWPOINT JOHN GARRETT

John Garrett is a manager with Associated Industrial Consultants and specialises in large- scale organisation and planning studies in industry and public administration. He was the consultant assigned to the Management Consultancy Group from which the Fulton Committee took many of its recommendations.

It is increasingly common for managers in industry and senior officials in public adminis- tration to turn to management consultants for advice. As managerial problems become more complex and the techniques for solving them become more sophisticated, there is a greater awareness of the value of calling in an outside specialist with the skill and objectivity required to analyse the problem and to prescribe, and assist in the implementation of, the programme of work required to solve it. The idea of calling for an outside scrutiny of the working of an institution, whether by a consultant or not, has ' been given some impetus by the activities of the Fulton Committee, the Prices and Incomes . Board and other government agencies bent on changing Britain's industrial and administra- tive structure.

Firms of specialist management consultants - operating in this country range from the four big general consultancies each employing several hundred professional staff, through numerous smaller firms often specialising in the application of one technique, to one-man busi- nesses. Some firms of economic and planning consultants, advertising and design agencies, suppliers of office equipment and trade asso- ciations also provide advisory services.

If the potential client has no idea of the difference between one such firm and another and knows nobody who can recommend a firm of consultants capable of tackling the problem he has in mind, there are several sources of information to which he can turn. The British Institute of Management, in collaboration with the Confederation of British Industry, has a Management Consulting Service Information Bureau and this service utilises confidential reports by users on assignments they have com- missioned. A number of consulting firms belong to the Management Consultants' Association which lays down certain professional standards for its members. The bigger trade associations will have some information on the use of con- sultants by their members. In the field of public administration, Treasury Management Services provide a central advisory service on the use of management consultants by govern- ment departments and the Royal Institute of Public Administration provides a similar ser- vice for local authorities.

Before obtaining a short list of suitable con- sultants from these sources, the potential client should address his mind to what he really wants done. Lack of clarity in the terms of reference leads to more confusion, and even failures, in- assignments than any other cause. The best terms of reference are those which quantify or specify the objectives of the assignment or at least describe the situation which will obtain when the assignment has been successfully completed. The ideal is to specify what is wanted in sufficient detail so that all concerned can examine progress during the work and evaluate the results at the end of it, yet to leave enough room for the consultant to take the broad view, to note and report on consequen- tial developments and to enable the client to take the maximum advantage of the consul- tant's specialist knowledge while he is on the premises. One fundamental question that the client must ask himself is whether he really wants to face up to a change in procedure or organisation.

Occasionally, I come across the managing director who calls in consultants primarily to confirm his views of the company's present pro- cedures and future development and to con- found -his critics withiis the company. He is often unable to cope with organisational reforms if these become apparent during the consultants' inquiries and instead seizes upon minor procedural recommendations which he then implements out of context. In this situa- tion, the new procedures are unlikely to work and the managing director, satisfied of the im- possibility of improvement, can always point to a failed assignment by consultants as justi- fication for the status- quo. As a consultant, one learns to recognise this situation early in the investigation and to withdraw gracefully if it appears incapable of resolution.

The potential client may decide on a con- sultant solely on the basis of interviewing one or more from his short list and taking up the references they provide. He may ask the likely contenders to write a brief report on how they would tackle his problem and how much this would cost. Having decided upon the firm he is going to use, he should interview the indi- vidual consultant or team of- consultants who are going to work for him.

He should satisfy himself as to the qualifica- tion and experience of the consultant and his personal acceptability. He should ensure that the consultant has the training skills necessary to instruct his staff in working new procedures and painstakingly to explain new forms of organisation to them. Since consultants claim that a major benefit from using their services is that they can bring to bear on their client's problems the accumulated experience they have obtained in a variety of other situations, the client should be interested in the channel by which this experience can be introduced into his situation, not only by the consultant he has assigned to him, but by senior people in the consultancy organisation. Together, the client and the ' consultants should decide upon the frequency and form of reporting and the form of staff briefing and union consultation where this is required.- The client should also satisfy himself as to the procedure for replacing the consultant assigned to him if he should prove to be unsuitable, and that for rephasing, interrupting or even terminating the assignment altogether if unfore- seen difficulties crop up.

On a more intangible point, it seems to me important that the client should feel that he is hiring an outside specialist who, while thoroughly versed in every technical aspect of the system he is applying, is also a man of sensibility, capable of attuning himself to the distinctive management style of the client's organisation, the internal social conventions and practices, the attitudes and fears of those who work in it. Consultants are, of course, care- fully selected and are trained to be aware of the social as well as the technical implications of their work, but there is always a risk, vary- ing from one individual to another, that they become so orientated to solving problems that they are tempted to apply a formula.

I have in mind the understandable tendency of some operational research consultants to see all problems as capable of quantifiable solu- tions, of some production consultants to think exclusively in terms of incentive bonus schemes on the shop floor and of some of the consul- tants who take on organisation problems to prescribe the highly formalised relationships appropriate to military institutions which passed for organisation theory thirty years ago. A good consultancy firm is aware of the dangers of too narrowly specialised a staff and its managers are on the alert to develop the

findings -of the specialists into solutions ad- - justed to the ecology of the firm.

If the tone of this article seems somewhat guarded, it is because I have been at pains to put myself in the shoes of a manager who is dabbling with the idea of employing consul- tants and who is at best nervous and at worst suspicious of the whole idea. The growth in the use of management consultants and the fact that most clients are happy to provide references attest to the satisfactory outcome of the great majority of assignments.