Your Most Important Step to Build Client-Consultant Partnerships

By Elaine Biech and Halelly Azulay, creators of the Building Your Successful Consulting Business online course.

The relationship you begin to establish during the first meeting lays the groundwork for a solid client-consultant partnership, one in which both the client and the consultant are equal, contributing counterparts in an effort to accomplish a mutual goal.

The 4 Steps of Client Relationship Development

Building a partnership with your client may be similar to building a friendship or a team and occurs in four steps.

Step 1: Find the right match and decide whether you and the client can work together. Even though you and your client may already be discussing the project, a final decision about how to move forward has probably not been made. This step may be as short as ten minutes or as long as a couple of months.

Step 2: Get to know one another. At this point a commitment exists to move the project to the next level. The relationship is moving forward as well. Both parties are learning everything they can about each other and how to work together effectively.

Step 3: Grow the partnership through productive progress. As you and your client are productive, the project is in full swing. If you and your client have worked on the relationship, your partnership is in full swing as well.

Step 4: Help your client become independent. The project is ending. By focusing on the client’s independence, you ensure that the organization continues to be successful. Equally as important, you ensure that your relationship continues to be healthy.

The Most Important Step

Step 1 is the most critical and focuses on two areas: obtaining information and setting expectations. Both lead to a final decision about whether to move forward with the project.

Gather Information

Prior to meeting potential clients, obtain the best information available about their organizations. How? Ask people. Visit their websites or the library. Check industry journals. Obtain a copy of the companies’ most recent annual report.

If you are not familiar with the client’s industry, read industry journals to familiarize yourself with the industry jargon.

This is also the time to define the scope of the project’s effort. Your client may not be able to answer all your questions at this time, but it is important that you clarify the scope as much as possible. You may find that the project is larger than you want to take on.

We’ve found it valuable to discuss past projects for which the client used consultants. Answers to simple questions such as, “What went well?” and “What would you do differently?” provide insights about how the client likes to work.

Your client will be seeking information from you, too. Be prepared to provide references and encourage the client to call them. Speaking with your former clients gives a potential client confidence in your abilities. Last, discuss your consulting fee and how you invoice.

Set Expectations

Establishing expectations between you and your client lays a solid foundation for the relationship. The process is often referred to as “contracting.”

Contracting is the process by which you and your client identify, clarify, and agree on both of your needs, wants, and expectations. Contracting is critical in the first step, because it is here that you and your client will begin to build your partnership, clarify the project, and understand and appreciate one another’s principles, styles, and values.

In his best-selling classic Flawless Consulting, Peter Block (2011), explains contracting as the process to reach “an explicit agreement of what the consultant and client expect from each other and how they are going to work together.” Your contracting discussion should enable you to explore and come to agreement on such factors as:

• Your role, the client’s role, and how they are related.
• The project’s time frame.
• The expected outcome of the project.
• The support, resources, and information you will need from the client.
• How this project fits into the larger organizational picture and the organization’s vision.

As a result of this discussion, you should have a better idea of the client’s ability to support the effort; some of the values that you share and where you differ; the client’s vision for the project; the organization’s support for the project; and your desire to complete the project.

In addition, you should have determined who your primary client is. The primary client is most often the individual who hired you for the project. However, on a few rare occasions another department, like human resources for example, may actually bring you in and provide the budget for work you conduct in another department.

You will also have secondary clients and stakeholders. They are the individuals who are affected by your work but are not directing it.

Don’t skip steps as you develop your client relationships. All four steps contribute to a healthy and productive partnership. Pay particular attention to the first step, as we’ve found it to be the most important one of all.

In our next article, we’ll provide you with a Contracting Checklist of suggested questions to ask as you prepare for that crucial contracting meeting as well as to review your success once it’s finished.

About the Authors

Elaine Biech and Halelly Azulay are successful consultants with a combined 50 years of experience. Both are leaders in the talent development field, volunteers for ATD, and mentors and coaches for new consultants. They are the creators of the online course: Building Your Successful Consulting Business. Elaine, ATD’s 2020 Distinguished Contribution recipient, has published 85 books, including two classics for consultants: The New Business of Consulting and The New Consultant’s Quick Start Guide. Halelly produces and hosts The TalentGrow Show podcast where she interviews legends such as Daniel Pink, Beverly Kaye, Jim Kouzes, Dorie Clark, and others.

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