Gate Street Partners, Inc.

From a recent column in The Conference Board Review............

In The World Is Flat, that book I was trying to finish some time ago in Aruba, Tom Friedman related a conversation with philanthropist Bill Gates:  “Thirty years ago, he said if you had a chance between being born a genius on the outskirts of Bombay or Shanghai or being born an average person in Poughkeepsie, you would take Poughkeepsie, because your chances of thriving and living a decent life there, even with average talent, were much greater.  But as the world has gone flat, Gates said, and so many people can plug and play from anywhere, natural talent has started to trump geography. “Now,” he said, “I would rather be a genius born in China than an average guy born in Poughkeepsie.” 

I am an average guy born in Poughkeepsie (no kidding), and by the time you are reading this, I will be in China, not too far from Shanghai, with smart young people born in China.  Given the numbers, I may encounter a genius or two.

To make my adventure happen I will be depending entirely on technology and all the other things that let talent finally trump geography.  Times have changed.

When I was a kid, during the Eisenhower administration, there was a big dust-up between China and China, the one recognized by the United States at the time and the one that occupied all of China except for some off-shore islands and Taiwan.  Among the islands were Quemoy and Matsu almost in the harbor of Xiamen, a city of a million and a half people on the Chinese coast.  The US Joint Chiefs of Staff wanted to nuke the real China to defend the other China’s claim to the islands, but cooler heads prevailed.  Nevertheless, both sides resorted to conventional artillery bombardment while the US 7^th Fleet sailed around suggesting US intervention if things got out-of-hand.  Thankfully, the whole drama died down and now Taiwan and China have a practical, if awkward relationship.  It’s a good thing because I will be in Xiamen for a spell and the residuals from nuclear blasts can be persistent.

 It’s also a good thing for other reasons.   

In preparation for my trip, I figured I’d futz around with my laptop, an IBM/Lenovo Thinkpad and add more memory.  I ordered the little memory card on Lenovo’s website, paid electronically, received confirmation and an order number and then watched the progress of my order on the UPS website as the memory transited from Shenzhen, China to Guangzhou, China, to Anchorage, Alaska, on to Louisville, Kentucky and to Richmond and Fishersville in Virginia and finally to me.  When I opened the box, the seal on the small package holding the memory had a bunch of bar codes and the note “Made in Taiwan.” 

My memory was manufactured on July 10^th, 2007, ordered on August 9^th, shipped on August 13^th from China and got to me on the 20^th.  For five days, the memory was held up for paperwork or something between the customs broker and US Customs – a ridge or two on an otherwise flat earth.  Turns out I needed the cooperation of Taiwan and China and a lot of other places to make things work. 

I also had a couple of computer anomalies I figured it would be better to fix now rather than later and got on to a chat session (like a regular chat room, but dedicated to a business) with technicians from Symantec, the virus protection people  I was getting funny error messages from them even though my license was current.  This was not a happy experience and my sessions kept getting “hung” which means everything on my laptop stopped working, and I had to reestablish the chat session and repeat all my information again, which included preliminary ”who are you” fields on a template and introductory “why am I here” information for the technician when he or she came on line.  They all, by the way, had names you were unlikely to see on Mayflower passenger lists. 

Anyway, I finally quit trying with chat and called them, despite a warning that phone calls were fee-based and would cost me money.  I reached a guy in Mumbai, which used to be called Bombay, named by the Portuguese who later leased and lost it to the British.  It was two in the morning, his time, but he was instantly linked to colleagues in the US and had all my licensing information and chat records.  After a few minutes, we figured we had a complicated problem so he took over at my laptop keyboard and rummaged around in my machine looking at and fixing things.  After a few minutes, all was right, no charge, we said our goodbyes and I moved on to my next chore.  Now he was in Mumbai and I was in Virginia, so getting to my keyboard was all virtual – part of this flat world business.  I downloaded a program at his request from a website which then gave him remote access to my machine like the PC remote software that lets you get to your computer when you are on the road and your computer is not.  It can let anyone else get to your computer too if you aren’t careful, so watch out when you use one of these. 

The last issue I had with my laptop was an odd feature where every time I hit the Fn key, the one you hold down when you need to use some function key on the keyboard, meaning to or not, my machine died.  Blue Screen Death they call it as opposed to Black Screen Death.  If your screen goes blue with some arcane message, it usually implies that there is some software or programming problem.  If it goes to black with or without an error message, that usually means a hardware problem. No diagnostics available to me or downloadable updates resolved the problem.   My machine is still on warrantee, so I called Lenovo which got me speaking to a former IBMer, now a contractor in Atlanta working for some servicing arrangement between IBM and Lenovo, the Chinese company.  I could have sent my machine to them in a box they’d have Fedex’d to me and have it fixed, but I was running out of time.  So I took the machine to a Lenovo-authorized guy who turned out to have retired and sold his business to another guy – less the Lenovo authorized part of it which they shut down and which IBM/Lenovo in Atlanta didn’t know.  Another bump in the flat world.  Nor did they have the area code change for telephone numbers in Charlottesville, Virginia.

I got lucky with Google and stumbled into the people the guy was selling his business too.

 Gene Bumgartner, the fellow who bought the business, but not the Lenovo authorized warrantee support part was very sharp.  Between me, he and IBM/Lenovo in Atlanta, after swapping out the keyboard and the system board –all sent from somewhere, overnight; we discovered that an undocumented upgrade to “firmware” (which is actually computer programming that the hardware people use, not the “software” as we usually understand it and the kind of stuff that comes from places like Microsoft), fixed the problem and I picked up my machine in time to leave for Xiamen where I should be now.   There was no reason why the fix had to be physically hands-on – another ridge in the landscape. 

For part of my time in China, I will be teaching young Chinese people.  No, I am not teaching English as a second language.  It’s business policy, which in a US school is usually called the capstone course in business.  And I’m teaching it in English – thank God, though I expect with immersion and language-learning software I ought to be picking up some Mandarin pretty quick.  China knows of the flat world.  Think of how many US college business majors would take their capstone course in Mandarin……….. 

I fully expect to learn much more than I will be teaching. 

Exploiting flatness, I found the opportunity on the web, never laid eyes on any of the people I worked with through the process from inception to being met at the airport in Xiamen with the exception of getting my Visa which still takes a personal trip to a Chinese Embassy or Consulate – another flat world ridge.  Everything else was by e-mail, scanned documents or fax and a single phone call to a program rep in the US.  And I am totally dependent on a flat world to maintain my business and other interests here (or by the time you reads this, “there”) from there (or here).  There is no Wall Street Journal every day except for online; taxes are a little tricky as tax authorities – local and otherwise – steer away from e-mail and I can’t “see” tax bills online.  Snail or paper mail forwarding doesn’t work; suspending my US cell-phone service for the duration (so I can keep my number and not pay $1.49 a minute in China) was a little tricky.  I sold my car on Ebay to a guy in Queens rather than take a year’s depreciation; he wired the money, I Fedex’d the title and bill-of-sale and he showed up with New York plates. 

 If I could get a remote lawn mover, leaf-raker, thermostat changer and air handler filter changer, which in a few years there will probably be, I wouldn’t need the services of kind neighbors, relatives and friends who are going to hold down my fort while I am away.   I’m pretty sure everything else is covered.  I have not seen the internet connections where I am going, I have not visited any banks where I am going, I have not met the cell phone people from whom I wilI be getting service and a phone and have not seen the classrooms where I will be teaching, nor have I seen where I will be living.  I am assuming that the features of the flat world are going to be there and built my plan on that basis. 

 You can too.  If you don’t, in fact, you may be standing there in someone else’s dust. And I’m just an average guy from Poughkeepsie.

(Another of our pieces from Across the Board)

So you want to be a consultant? 

I once got an e-mail from a fellow who wanted to be a CIO.  CIO’s are the people with short career spans, who get called when anything with computers goes awry. And they’re the ones who spend tons of money redoing what their predecessors were finishing up before moving to greener pastures when their agenda interfered with the business.  

 I was a CIO at the time.  I recall saying lots about the practical realities of survival, doing well and making a contribution none of which had much to do with acronyms or mnemonics.   

I get notes like that often these days.  People do desperate things in search of jobs.  This past week, I got an e-mail from a young woman wanting to “break into” consulting where “business development coalesces with management consulting.”  She’s been out of school just a couple of years.  Given the number of people looking for work these days, my reply might be helpful.  Lots of people who figure finding regular work is hopeless, decide to be consultants.  Here’s my reply to Elizabeth, e-mail of course: 

Hi Elizabeth, 

You asked me what I do and how you might get started.

I generally take my experience, pitfalls and things learned in schools and apply it to situations clients let me see. My business leans toward managing technology -- which means helping people work with other people to get things done with stuff that’s hard to understand.  I don't do "work" per se.  Some “consultants” in technology actually code, design, hard-core engineer and things like that.  It’s too hard and I’ve got a short attention span.  You might think of them more as part-time workers.  For me, usually something isn’t happening the way a client wants it to or something big needs to happen and the client wants insurance.   Occasionally a client wants window dressing or credentials-by-association, but that’s pretty rare. There are times when I just get to say what I see.  Fresh eyes can help people too close to what’s going on.  I tell them, they say, “Oh yea, you’re right, thanks.” and I send them a bill.  When you get to coach, it’s the most rewarding and fun.  It’s a special experience when you get to recite your mistakes for a fee.  

To do this kind of stuff, you need experience and a client who either thinks you know enough or who knows you well enough to think you might be helpful. This is especially true if what you bring to the table is you rather than a bunch of new MBA’s or others steeped only in a methodology.  Methodologies are fine, but they’re sort of like shoes.  Forcing your business into one that looks good, but doesn’t really fit can hurt you.

Unless you make up good stories like Garrison Keeler or wake in the middle of the night with accurate premonitions, you need to have seen enough and done enough to be credible – and helpful.  Some consultants repeat what they’ve read or what they learned from other clients.  I think lessons learned in person are the better lessons.   

Management consulting is not "business development."  Business development means finding customers to pay money for what somebody is selling.  I don't do that.  Marketing consultants do that . So do famous people who can make introductions and leave the impression that following up will keep you in their good graces.  I never liked marketing.  Having the same car dealer feature the donut spare tire the year after he disparaged it didn’t improve my opinion.

To be successful as a management consultant you need to be credible and you need a “shtick.”  If you and your capability aren’t already known, it can be very hard to describe what you do.  Anyone can claim everything. Most do.  Once it’s a buzzword, there ain’t a company out there that won’t feature “it” in their promotional material.  Sub-second, re-engineering, critical success factors, right-sizing, alignment, supply chain, mission critical, six sigma, WWW, ASP,CRM, SAP, MGM, LSMFT…….  I think selling buzzwords is unfair. 

Credibility comes from being old, having a beard, inventing a new name for an idea everybody knows but forgot; being published, speaking at events,  wrapping yourself in academic trappings, or by saying thoughtful things that nobody else ever heard of and may not quite understand.  Myths and legends help too.  Try to get some good myths or legends going.

You’re not old yet and are sort of starting out, so you may need "cover" until you pick up credentials.  That usually means being a worker bee for a management consulting company -- say like McKinsey.  They hire very, very selectively, but they train well.  Having McKinsey tattooed on your forehead is a credential (as opposed to Anderson emblazoned on your bicep). 

Your customer usually is a senior (high-level) manager or is someone with a big ego and lots of money.  Occasionally a person buried in a large company will retain a management consultant, but this is pretty rare. Of course they may be “given” a consultant by their boss, which can be good and bad.  You need to be considered a peer of the person hiring you.  That brings us back to being old, gray, old and gray, or having a nice set of unassailable credentials that create the illusion that you are smart and can be helpful (until proven otherwise). 

I think the shortest path to being a consultant is with a book.  If it's a good book, people will get to know you.  Oprah has given up books, but she never had too many consultant books anyway, except for losing weight or gaining a boyfriend.  Once you do a good book, someone will invite you to speak at an event which introduces you to potential customers.  Once they've read your book and heard you spout all sorts of wisdom, they may ask you to drop by to explain what you said.  Then you can bill them and be a consultant.  I’m thinking of writing a book.  Unfortunately, it has nothing do with technology or consulting.

I think that unless you work for a large consulting company or you've written a book, all your engagements (jobs) will come from knowing people.  Someone half in the bag in a bar or trying to find their ball on a golf course will be lamenting about work and someone who knows you might say: "Hey, I know somebody who knows all about that stuff and helped me out of a tough spot........let me see if I've got her name here somewhere; you should call her........."  Like that.  There are also companies that farm out consultants and do the marketing, but people in their stables are already credentialed pretty much and lack only the networks of contacts.

You won’t get gigs by ads in the paper, by direct mail or by spamming.  (Well, maybe YOU can if you are really, really cute and like to wear skimpy outfits.)  The exception is if you have a specific skill and rent yourself as a hired gun: “Java developer and SAP installer will work for food.”

I see by your GPA that you are smart.  That's a terrific start.  You may see things and know things quicker than other people.  Being smart can be a curse.  If you are too smart and too quick, you will be scary. People will not want your help because your being around makes them feel stupid.  Smart quick people need to package what they know in a palatable way.  Otherwise you will be idle for long periods and short of money.

Getting to the answer quickly is only a small part of being effective.  The more difficult part is getting THEM to the answer at a comfortable pace.  Develop that skill while staying smart and your future will be bright. 

Before you go start being a consultant, fix your budget and your bank account.  Not getting a regular check takes some adjusting to.  Getting really big checks all at once is like getting a bonus.  It can be nice, because you can buy things without having to save up.  But you’ve got to figure for taxes and you’ve got to figure that the next check may be a while.  You don’t want a lot of fixed expenses.  Pay cash. 

I could add more stories, examples and advice, but then I'd have to charge you.  That's another characteristic to develop.  Learn to titillate.  It's kind of like being a stripper.  Take off a few things each song so you get your whole set to collect tips.  If they get all you've got too soon, they'll stop paying.

Good luck,
 

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 A favorite column from Across the Board©..........

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Last modified: November 24, 2007