Consulting

As a sole practitioner, I function as an advisor to the senior management of professional service firms, helping them solve (for themselves) their problems and management issues.

Working with internal client teams, I help to suggest analyses, provoke new thinking, explore hidden assumptions, generate new action options, and explore the pro’s, con’s, risks and costs of those options as the team works its way to a resolution of the issues the firm has chosen to address.

Among the managerial topic areas I work on are strategy, marketing, human resources and organization, profitability improvement, compensation and other reward systems.

Consulting Philosophy

As indicated by the ideas presented in my articles (such as Strategy and the Fat Smoker) it is my experience that firms usually know what to do, why they should do it and, often, how to do it. The biggest challenges in delivering results (and the area in which I try to help) lies in forging agreement and commitment to execute against plans, and this often requires investigation of whether or not there is, in fact, a sufficient degree of shared resolve and ambition to do the things that would bring about the desired future.

Similarly, it is my common experience that management of companies and firms have already arrived at eminently sensible strategies about what they want their organization to be good at. However, knowing one wants to lose weight is not the same as devising approaches that ensure that everyone gets on and sticks to the diet. I try to help firms discuss and decide which diets and exercise programs they are truly willing to live by in order to achieve their goals.

In addition to my counseling work, I make presentations at and facilitate meeting discussions, including retreats, workshops and (some) training sessions.

My Approach to Relationships

I give an unconditional client satisfaction guarantee: If when the work is done, the client does not feel that full value was received, then the client decides how much it was worth and how much to pay (if anything). Should the client choose to invoke the guarantee, I ask only that the clients call and discuss with me their feedback.

I practice total client confidentiality, and therefore do not disclose the name of clients I have worked for. I am a sole practitioner, so if you hire me, you get me. To discuss working together, contact me at david [at] david maister [dot] com.