How does charging the client work in the event you finish early? Recently joined consulting. From my understanding, as a Consultant, a metric they judge us on is utilization. If you are booked on projects totaling 40 hours (100%) but do not have enough work to fill in the time or you finish early, do you book less time? My assumption is that would hurt utilization but also does not seem ethical
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This is the answer. Some weeks I work 5 hours and others 50. I always bill 40-45 hours depending on the project's requirements.
You bill the number of hours regardless of the time you spend usually. Definitely not ethical, but usually it’s the other way around: you bill 40 when you worked 70. So don’t overthink it.
Yeah I get that. Normally, that would be the case but in the time I've been here, I'm yet to have a project where the number of hours budgeted meet the number of hours worked (the latter being less). The deliverables have had good reviews too so it isn't like I'm doing shoddy work. I'm trying to hunt for a promotion so I'm concerned that my utilization will affect the calibration meetings end of year.
Ultimately it depends on the fee structure. Some engagements are time and materials and some are fixed fee or not to exceed. With fixed fee, the client pays either way, with not to exceed, you charge actuals and can’t charge the client more than the upper end. But this is something to discuss with the manager on your project.
I’d say in that situation, if you completed the work and the client is expecting to pay for your 40 hours then charge the 40. This gets trickier if the project gets behind because they aren’t keeping you busy but the work isn’t completed.
Part of your job means excelling in it. You finished your task in 5 hours this week, great invest the time in learnings, plan how to generate impact beyond your basic tasks and understanding what would require to be promoted. Usually it’s a very high time invest in the skills of the next level before you become professional - it’s your decision what to do with the time but asking more for grunt work or just standing up and saying you are finished is not a viable long term strategy
Honestly consulting is stupid and this is what you do. I am quite efficient and normally only work 4 but find a way to extend it to 8. I've been here for 10 months and am looking for a new job, can't f-ing stand it
I get that. When you say you extend it, what tactics do you use?
Deloitte is 45hr/week
Yep 9 hours a day x 5 or else my Utilization drops
Most of the things you do can probably be considered billable even if you think it only took you 40 hours.
Research, team meetings, brainstorming,etc.
to echo an above point, most likely it’s fixed fee and some weeks you’ll work more and some less. If you’re really only working 30 hours a week and want more work, raise your hand for your project or work on internal initiatives.