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There are times where the honed and precise business skills of management consultants are exactly what is needed to maximize your business to its fullest potential. While running a company on your own has inherent challenges, no one says that you have to run the gauntlet alone. Business services offered by a superior company would be just the ticket to iron out any difficulties you may be having, and to identify areas you could improve on for the overall operating picture.

Finding a management consultant with the right business skills to match yours, one that you are able to get along with and that mirrors your ambition and drive to achieve isn’t always an easy thing to do. Searching online for one is sometimes even harder, however, it is definitely something that may be done, providing you use an abundance of caution prior to selecting a company offering business services. Since you are the CEO of your company, there is no doubt you will be able to source business services consultants that meet your needs.

The idea behind hiring a consultant that offers business services is that you will be able to take advantage of their specialised knowledge and abilities to boost your firm’s performance. The creation of various fresh strategies and the implementation of different ways to operate your business is the key to the continued success of your organisation. Management consultants have special talents when it comes to providing you with business services that analyze problems you may be having and in assisting you to craft an expert solution to the problem.

While you may just wish to use a management consultant in one area of your business, this isn’t to say that you don’t also have the option to utilize them in other areas. Business services may encompass financial matters, staffing, e-business, supply-chain management and human resources. They greater the adaptability and flexibility of your management consultant, the more benefits you will derive from their services.

Look for management consultants who pride themselves on their ability to research. In any critical situation that requires instant solutions in today’s business arena, consultants need to be able to quickly access other resources for answers. This needs to be part and parcel of the business services they offer you to handle the changes you want to make with your company.

You may certainly wish to have your management consultant come in to deal with certain glitches. However, part of their package is to (on a daily basis) analyze problems, hold workshops and make certain you have solutions at the end of the day. They are ideally, to be on your work site to provide leadership, help prepare business presentations and yes, even interview clients.

The profession of consultancy services is one area where in one can find all kinds of people. There are many fraudulent people involved in the business who fake as being authorized personnel and an expert in their domain. This has led to a negative impact on the industry making an image of being fraudulent in the minds of the customers.

The situation is similar when it comes to the immigration industry. So, in order to prevent yourself from being a prey to a fraud immigration consultant, you must ensure the following:

Authorization – Find out if your consultant is an authorized one or not. Ask him if he is a practicing lawyer or only a registered consultant or both. In case, he is not registered; question him on how he would deal with the critical aspects pertaining to the case or represent your application with the relevant Government agencies.
Professional Experience – Get to know about his background and his track record. He should have had a successful track record specifically with reference to cases similar to yours. Check and question him on the same.
Refusals – Find out about the numbers of applications that have been rejected. Clarify on the reasons for the same.
Fee and other charges – Clarify the monetary aspects in advance itself to avoid any hassles. Ask for the details of the payment and how does he expect it to be paid. If there are any extra charges that you are to pay, you should be informed of it in advance.
Testimonials – Ask for testimonials along with the contact details of his previous clients. If he provides you with the relevant details, it proves his credibility as a consultant. However, make sure that you contact the referred people provided by the consultant to verify that the consultant is genuine.
All in all, a consultant is the one who is always updated with regards to the visa and immigration processes. So, he plays a very important role ensuring that you obtain your visa without any hassles. Therefore, it is of key importance that your representative is right!

Ajay Sharma is an immigration expert who provides his valuable advice to people seeking immigration in countries like Canada, Denmark, USA, Australia and many others. With years of experience under his belt, he is the principal immigration consultant of ABHINAV.com, which is in business since 1994. Over the years, Abhinav has continually stood the test of time and has helped its clients in accomplishing their relocation dreams to foreign lands, successfully and smoothly.

Do you know that CEO’s will test you? Do you know what those tests are? Did you even know these tests exist? They always come.

The tests will come, they always do and you have to be ready for them and anticipate them and pass them.
The tests come in many forms, but always get at the heart of the question in the CEO’s mind…”can this person help me with my challenges and can I trust them to keep my best interests in mind?”

To pass these tests and answer the questions about you in the CEO’s mind, you will need to get into the heart, mind and soul of the CEO, in the space and place, where you are the trusted advisor, with peer level respect. You need to show them, the better part of themselves, in you!

If you don’t pass the tests, you won’t get consensus or agreement. If you are not aware of these tests and when it is happening, you can — unconsciously — fail them and be wondering why you didn’t get the engagement. Often, the CEO won’t even tell you the truth because they don’t want to embarrass you. Often they will give another reason for either not moving forward or another reason for why they selected another consultant.

Ultimately, they have to believe you and believe in you, that you are the obvious expert to solve their problems.

Another more subtle result of a consultant failing the test of a CEO is to get “dropped” down to speak to an Operational Manager, instead of continuing the relationship with the CEO. This is a signal, a sign, you are not making the right connections with the CEO and have in effect been determined by the CEO to not be the right person to be his or her trusted advisor in helping them through their issues and problems.

All the tests normally boil down to a few key things. The CEO will test you to find out if they can trust you to help them deliver upon results and keep THEIR best interests in mind. Passing these tests and getting into that space and place with them is crucial to being chosen to work together in the future.

John Butler is a noted author, public speaker, business advisor and consultant to consultants’, with over 25 years of experience.

It used to be very difficult being an Independent Computer Consultant. When you didn’t have enough clients, finding enough billable hours in a day could be a real challenge. And when you had “enough” clients, way too often you would be needed at two places at once. Either there’s too many emergencies going on, or you’re working on a decent project that could bring in a chunk of hours that prevents you from giving other clients the attention they demand. Make one client happy, another is getting angry at you.

But starting a computer consulting business today as an Independent Computer Consultant is one of the best career choices an IT Professional can make. All because you can now monitor and service your clients remotely. All the things that made running a consulting business difficult in the past (too many unexpected emergencies, can’t be in two places at once), are eliminated by using cheap or free utilities (I use GFI Max for server monitoring and inventory reporting and LogMeIn Free for remote desktop and server support).

Using these tools can help you to:

a) Catch problems early, minimize emergencies, downtime and unexpected problems.

b) Identify weak spots so that you can make recommendations for (profitable) improvement projects

c) Fix “little” problems (change passwords, find lost files, etc.) instantly, without having to go on-site.

d) Start addressing “MAJOR” problems instantly (address a complete email outage, start an AV scan on an infected machine) without making the client wait for you to arrive.

If you maintain your clients properly, they will have minimal problems and maximum productivity. This is EXACTLY what they want for you to provide as their consultant, and they’re happy to pay for it.

But if you’re billing by the hour, and they hardly need you on-site, how do you make an income?

You stop billing by the hour!

Charge your customers a flat rate for your monthly monitoring and remote support and you’ll know every month exactly how much you’ll be making even if you never have to leave the house. In the video link below, I give a clear breakdown of how a total of 4 small business clients can provide a steady income of about $66K, with you dedicating a total of about 10 hours of work per week. Once you obtain your initial client base, you’ll never again have to worry about another paycheck, lay-off or sending out a resume.

So the trick of course is to get those first few clients, and get them quickly. How? That’s a big topic (so big in fact that I have about 2 hours of video on my website dedicated to it).

In a nutshell, my top three methods for finding new clients are:

1. Getting Referrals

2. Business Networking

3. cold-calling (I prefer door-to-door with flyers).

You definitely don’t have to spend a lot on sales and marketing to do it effectively. All the methods I use are very inexpensive or free. The biggest challenge isn’t financial. It’s having the confidence and determination to go out and do it.

If you live near a metropolitan area, I can guarantee you that there are many small businesses out there right now who are open to finding a way to improve the reliability of their systems and/or lowering their current support costs. You, as an Independent Computer Consultant can provide this solution, and you can find these potential customers through networking, asking for referrals and knocking on doors (among several other ways).

Once you get in front of these potential customers, you need to show them that as a professional Independent Computer Consultant, you’re their best possible solution. You do this by delivering a good sales pitch and by presenting yourself as a professional (seen through marketing materials – your business cards, website, newsletter and flyers if you use them).

Developing an effective sales pitch will take time and practice. But if you’re not currently using a scripted sales pitch and you prefer to “wing it” when talking to a potential customer, you need to evaluate how successful you’ve been with that approach. All successful sales people use a carefully scripted and practiced sales pitch (practiced to the point where it’s delivered very naturally). If you’ve never done any sales, I recommend reading “The Sales Bible” by Jeffrey Gitomer. It’s a fast and easy read and it should get you motivated to learn more.

As for the marketing materials, they need to look professional, but don’t need to be expensive to create. I recommend VistaPrint for business cards. You can create a very professional website using WordPress (free) and Artisteer ($50). Flyers can be done in MS Word using inexpensive graphics. Same with your newsletter.

While creating these materials and sales scripts don’t have to be expensive, they can be very time consuming if you try to create them on your own. And unless you have a background in sales, marketing and design, you also have to be realistic about how effective you expect them to be the first time you use them.

Of course, if you have the capital to invest, you can outsource the creation of these materials. But depending on who you outsource to, you may need a lot of capital, and be prepared to deal with missed delivery dates and “not-quite-what-you-were-expecting” results.

Or you can check the link at the end of this article for info on how to get all of these materials ready to use, right now.

However you go about obtaining your sales and marketing materials, you’re going to need them if you’re an Independent Computer Consultant looking to land new clients.

Fortunately, when you start a computer consulting business on the correct model of flat-fee, managed support, you need very few small business clients to create a significant and reliable income.

When people decide to start a business there is so much excitement. Perhaps it is the thought of being financially independent that drives them wild. But eventually when you go into the intricate details of forming and running a company you then realize that it’s no ordinary walk down Wall Street. Nevertheless this should not dissuade you because there is more benefits in starting your own business than working for someone else. Business process consulting is for people with a desire to start a business but do not exactly know what goes into it.

In the initial stages of business consulting the consultant will ask you what sort of business you propose to form. Using such information they will give you a wide range of options to choose from. Such options are related to the place of business; the prices you should peg as well as the capacity of operation when still starting out. Such information is very helpful because with their in-depth knowledge they should know about the potential for profit based on what they have observed in recent years.

Such information is important to have when you visit the consultant. The reason is that they can then give you advice on what you should do instead considering the nature of your business. There are some businesses that struggle to make profit not because they are terrible. Sometimes it is the area in which the company is based. Therefore consulting is important.

Registration of companies can be time consuming and expensive. Sometimes you have to travel to another city so as to finalize paperwork and get a few signatures. But when you work with a business process consultant you will be given advice on what to do.

Normally they give advice on which agents to use. Using company registration agents is generally cheaper than doing everything yourself. And they never go wrong by failing to have your company registered. Such consulting will recommend certain agents based on their efficiency and quality of services.

The moment the company has been formed such consultant will then give you tips on which business properties to use. These choices will be based on rental costs as well as the site for the business. Sometimes beginner business people are impulsive without really considering why they should find cheap rental in the beginning. Advice helps a great deal because it will put you in the light.

Minimizing costs is very important for any business. Without that you will not make as much money as you would have if you cut down on costs somewhere somehow. A business specialist can tell you how you can reduce costs and increase profits. This can be advice pertaining to cheaper wholesalers as well as discounts on bulk purchases offered by different wholesalers.

And there will always be difficult times. The past recession taught a lot of business people the importance of advice for making profits during hard times. Experts at business process facilitation will tell you what to do in order to make money during difficult economic times. That is why it is very important to visit a consultant.