10 Skills You Need to Be a Consultant ✔️

Hi, I'm KChoi. Welcome back to my channel. If this is your first time here, I am a consultant. I work in change management and have been for about the past year and a half. Before I was a consultant, I used to work in PR and I have a few videos about what that was like and how I switched into consulting, so I will be sure to link those in the description box for you so you can have a bit more context. Through the past year and a half of working as a consultant, I've learned that there are some skills that will really help you to succeed, and this actually doesn't even just apply to consulting. It kind of applies to any job, so hopefully this can be helpful to a lot of people, not just those who are interested in consulting. Before I get into that list, if you'd like to see more videos about consulting, travel, career, education, anything in that realm, please do hit the subscribe button and the notification bell to get notified when I post a new video. The first one, which is pretty basic, is time management, and I think of it in two different ways. So there's time management that is more short-term, so daily, weekly, making sure you're managing all your tasks and things that need to get done. For me, I work on several projects at a time, so I have to be sure I'm paying the appropriate amount of attention to all of those projects. There's also long-term time management, which goes into more overall project management, so being sure you know when those long-term deadlines are. A project might not end for five months, six months, so you need to be able to work backwards from whatever that final deadline is, so that you're giving yourself and your team enough time to get everything done without being crunched and rushed and stressed at the end of the project. So work back schedules are your best friend, you know, going from whatever the deadline is and working back from there, making sure you include enough time for all the different handoffs and steps that need to happen in between. Number two is being quick on your feet and being flexible. Things change all the time, client needs can change, and that's because throughout the course of the project, different things come up, different priorities happen, so you need to be able to be flexible. So that's a bit more long-term flexibility within a project. You also need to be flexible in the moment, you know, if you're on a phone call and somebody asks a question or has an issue, you need to be able to respond quickly, even if it's just, you know what, let me look into that for you and get you an answer later today. Number three is communication skills, whether that's written or verbal. That includes everything from emails, making sure those are clear and concise, maybe speaker notes in a presentation, and even talking on the phone. I have so many meetings that are over Webex or just on the phone, so it's really important to be able to communicate clearly and well, especially when you don't have that face-to-face contact. One of the most important things to communicate are the expectations of the project, of the meeting, whatever the interaction is. Going back to that long-term time management and project management, it's really important to communicate clearly with your team so everyone is on the same page and you're not handing something off to someone and they're like, I didn't know this was happening. Next is basic business knowledge and commercial awareness. I work with companies in all different sorts of industries, whether it's retail or healthcare or whatever, and I'm not an expert in those fields. That's what the client is, the client is the expert, but you still need to have an understanding of how businesses work, because there are a lot of things that apply to all companies, regardless of the industry. Of course, you still do need that basic understanding of the industry, of the company you're working with, and then hopefully you'll deepen that understanding as you continue to work with that client. Number five is being analytical, which includes both the quantitative side and the qualitative side. A lot of times you'll be looking at data, whether it's general trends of the industry that the client is in or actual specific reports within the company. On the qualitative side, you might be looking at interview responses or customer survey or employee survey responses. Whether you're looking at numbers or words, you need to be able to interpret the data, pick out common themes, and understand the significance. Next is organization. I'm not saying you need to organize your emails or your files in a certain way, necessarily, but it's about being consistent with the ultimate goal of being efficient and productive. So find a way that works for you when it comes to organizing your emails or documents or your calendar. Basically, you don't want to be wasting time and fishing around for things or interpreting your calendar because it's a mess, because that's just precious time wasted. To be a consultant, you need to be a team player. I work on multidisciplinary teams with other consultants, graphic designers, artists, filmmakers. The consultancy I work at is a bit more on the creative side, so other consulting firms might not have that exact mix of roles, but either way, you're working on a team and need to be able to work together well. And of course, it's very important to make sure the client's needs are met and looked after. You also want to make sure you're thinking about your team's needs. So going back to the communication and the project management, make sure you are keeping your team members' needs in mind and not just your own. Number eight, social skills. Consulting is a client-facing job, so an important part of that job is making sure you're building relationships with your clients. It's not that you are supposed to have a certain type of personality, but just finding how you can connect with your clients, with even your co-workers in an authentic way. And the reason having social skills is so important is it's just going to make your job easier. When you're able to make those connections with the client, with your team, everything is more enjoyable. Number nine is creative thinking. When you're doing the same job or activity repeatedly for an extended period of time, it can be easy to stop thinking outside the box. But if you really want to provide good value for your clients, you want to always be asking yourself, how can I do this better or how can I make this better? You want to have a mindset of always improving and thinking creatively can help you do that. So anytime you see something and you're like, I've done this before, I've seen this before, you want to think about how you can make it even better. And of course this is something that also applies to your personal life and not just to work. And the last one is self-care. I don't think people normally think of self-care as a skill, but I think it is because it's something so many of us neglect to do and it really does take practice to get good at it. Self-care might look different for different people, but when you're in a demanding job like consulting, you need to be able to replenish yourself, take care of yourself, so you can continue to give a good effort at work. For some people, it means when they go on vacation, they unplug completely and they make sure to communicate that and set those boundaries with their team. It might mean something like making sure not to skip meals, which sounds like something very simple, but I've had many days where I've just worked through lunch and that's not good. Whatever self-care looks like for you, it's important to keep investing in it because it's really easy to forget about it, especially if you're focusing on the demands of work. That's it for this video. I hope it was helpful. Maybe if you're working on a resume or cover letter or preparing for an interview, you can think about how to make those skills come through. Please let me know if you have any questions in the comments below, and I'll do my best to answer them there or in a future video. As always, thank you for watching, and I will see you in the next one. Bye!