Life as a Consultant...(Part 2)

Well, I did get some time to continue my part 2.... :-)

I was thinking of comparing the good, bad & ugly side of a Consultant... (Hope no one will be offensive & jump on me!!!)

As I shared my view in part 1 - from the outer world A consultant is always a great guy - because he/she is deemed to be the most-known person of a specific technology.
Ideally, this person can solve the problem or at least toss some idea for remedy/alternative/options. "Apparently - in many occasion the former happens least than the second"

So, the "Good-side"
- mostly manages his day to day job in a self-organized way (So, a person with poor self-management will suffer!!! having a bad timing discipline will further suffer too!!!)
- he will be more known than his institution (company) "ambassador"
- go-to person for many reasons!!
- dynamic lifestyle : sometimes always on-the-go, WFH, customer or even will be running errands daytine while settling his work @ different time zone "night"
- among the most people in the company - he/she has the most touch-points with outside world "within an organization (Biz & technology space) = deep + breadth" 

The "Bad side"
- Based on my experience & talking to a lot of consultants - typically they work more than 8hrs/365 days :-(.
- Expectation bar is always high... especially when another "good consultant" set or raised the bar previously
- pressures will mount from all direction -customer-partner-internal-biz-others "sometime all at a same time"
- often one cannot be always objective [subjective in most cases]....
- A consultant is always famous for his word of "It DEPENDS..!!!" - Some of the actual reason behind being

1. One can't actually comment anything from his own perspective because of "ambassadorships" - Any comments being made will be treated as his company's view/comment?!?!? [which is true!!]
2. He/she needs to comply to the company's rules & regulation or Policy making any statement

3. Often their comments or suggestions are treated "right & correct" + taken for granted..!!!
4. Most importantly - often, any solutions or offering can have more than 1 best practise or recommendations; hence the comments will/can be "mis-treated/mis-assumed" + every environment aare ssociated with huge differences of infra / apps / operations etc. So it's heavily subjective!!

The "ugly side"
- firstly to gain respect or reputation is slower while losing is faster..!!! (really unfair right)
- Out in the field [battle ground] - facing customer/partner who has massive influence from other technology providers
- Consultants are treated alive 24x7...gets meeting request anytime in a day - especially when working in a large - multinational - corporation
- almost always pre-occupied with something as you're working on few project at a time :-(
- to some extent - the person is expected to know everything within his organization facing an external person (in real case - the company could fabricate 100's of product)

Well, this is not the whole laundry list.... however, I believe covering the most essensial parts...

So, looking at all the angles ->IMHO, a Consultant is not what he works for - rather how he tunes himself to the role.... otherwise will suffer greatly with an huge demand & expectation

"Consultant - Your references are your reputation in the consulting world ..!!!"

Thanks for reading my "sharing"...