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The below is quite a negative list so I will preface this with: this is a very stimulating and engaging job. What I like about it is that it is a bit difficult. You need to think and you need to stay sharp. Your brain and skills won’t languish. Having said that, experienced hires have a bit of a bumpy landing sometimes as it is a weird job. But you’ll get the hang of it. Be confident in your skills. You have actual skills rather than just consulting technique. You may feel like you are behind but that is just the BS and PowerPoint fooling you. Have faith in your skillset. Most consultants have never done anything else. All they know is pretending to be experts. You will get the hang of the rest.
When you start it may feel like you have a job but also don’t: you may not be staffed yet. Culture differs per firm but you typically should be supporting business development when you are ‘on the bench’. As an SM you will take more of a leading role.
You’ll need to prepare for a lot of vagueness and uncertainty. Nobody has a fixed role, we are all typically in a pool of resources. As an SM you will probably not have a permanent team, just the people on your current project and anyone you get to know in your practice.
We work with a lot of hypotheticals and assumptions which often cannot be made any more clear: we just have to convince the client with good presentations and solid preparation. I have found some experienced hires get very concerned by how little is ‘nailed down’ and 100% clear. My response is usually ‘if it were confirmed, we would not be necessary. We are 60% confident but we have a strong team who will just have to handle the 40% chance of it being something different 🤷♂️’
Your PowerPoint skills will need to get better, yes even at SM. And you’ll need to hold others to a high standard. Perhaps use this to your advantage: you can be critical of content and leave the formatting to the person doing all the edits.
We tend to need to be very proactive (due to the vagueness). ‘Nobody told me’ is not usually a great excuse (apart from, perhaps, when you are brand new). If, for example, a contract has not been signed, don’t just wait for commercial to call you. Chase them and lean in if they seem to be slacking. Never accept ‘I’ll let you know’.
If you have kids be very clear on your availability from the start. People can work around kids, it’s fine. Just don’t suffer in silence, set an expectation, then change it later. If we have a childcare clash I often just bail for a morning and catch up later. It’s fine.
Find the partners, directors etc who hired you and work out where you fit in. At SM they probably have a plan for you and your skills. Find those people and get aligned on what they want you pushing (probably selling a certain thing or delivering a project). If they are clear on what your are focussing on, and happy about it, you should be ok.
Try to attend some social events to meet the rest of the team including at more junior levels.
Everything is a bit last minute. We all work very quickly so we therefore often don’t ask for things that far in advance. Probably something you just need to get used to.
Understand what your key metrics of success are, and how they work. Usually a utilization target, a Sales target and maybe a managed revenue target. Understand how these are calculated when considering vacation days, holidays, multiple people contributing to a sale, etc.
Understand how much runway you have. As an SM, you are likely expected to sell a certain amount in year 1, and you could get fired if you dont hit that figure. This may not be the full target because theyvknow you are new, but clarify in writing. Alternatively, if you're hired as an SME, be sure to align on what that means.
I would also say to learn how consulting works and be willing to learn from people with less yoe and expertise than you, but more consulting expertise. I'm not sure how to go about this as a newbie at the SM level. One idea. Maybe attend training for senior consultants and managers. The SC training will help you understand expectations for SCs, and same for managers, and this should inform your expectations from them as an SM.
Good advice. At the SM level I don’t know how much “consulting” skill is required as you probably won’t be doing a tonne of delivery. But knowing what good looks like would probably be useful…experience on the other side of the table and being an SME may be useful. Probably more about project management and client relationships at SM I would think