What do IT consultants do?

jlocohustler

Weaksauce
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Jan 25, 2012
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I'm currently unemployed and teaching myself computer science most of the time and I know a lot of Windows, Linux and general IT related stuff like cloud, virtualization and so on. I thought I could make some money selling consulting services to companies but I don't really know what most of them look for.

I could really use some money right now but it's not like I'm looking for something to do just to make some cash, that is, even if money is what I'm trying to get, I won't let my qos suffer one bit-i'm really trying to provide something genuine here.

I tried googling a little but most of the articles I've read are some marketing crap trying to sell some consulting training or something like that.

So, suppose you were looking for an IT consultant, why would you look for one in the first place and what would be the requirements? What would you need me to do and stuff...Be precise if possible.
 
So, suppose you were looking for an IT consultant, why would you look for one in the first place and what would be the requirements? What would you need me to do and stuff...Be precise if possible.
The "why" could be as simple as I don't know how or don't have time to do the work.

But there's a limit to how precise you can get with the answer you want, as neither the hypothetical situation hasn't been detailed nor your skills set has been qualified. I'm also going to lump "contractor" and "consulting firm" in the same concept -- so if you see one below, I'm referring to both.

Some general things to looks for would include:

1. Past history with the company. Reputable?
2. Are they giving good technical matches? Are they experienced, quick learners, and able to ask questions at the right time?
3. How much "hand-holding" is needed? (This obviously depends on you, the hiring/managing person.)
4. What about their soft skills? One thing I look for are people able to translate business rules into technical reality, and not everyone has this mindset to analyze and evaluate against what they'd be working with.
5. Do my peers and colleagues have any experience working with the firm or the staffed individual(s)? What were their experiences?
6. What are their post-development deliverables? Technical documentation, end-user training, knowledge transfer, code review, etc.?
7. Any warranty on their work? Changes can happen over time, but making sure that they support the product delivered in the environment(s) it was set for for a period of time after the final sign-off is important.

(This is just a rough stab, and is certainly not a complete list.)
 
Near as I can figure, they sit around, browse porn and fiddle with mission critical servers until they fall over. Then they leave.

Granted, my work experience might have made me slightly jaded to the whole idea of consultants.
 
Last I heard consultants were people you hired if you didn't know how to do your job correctly.

For example, a company with staffed IT people should NEVER have to hire an IT consultant.

A consultant is basically to help guide people to a solution when the person who has hired the consultant has no idea and doesn't want to take the time to find out how to do something.
 
Near as I can figure, they sit around, browse porn and fiddle with mission critical servers until they fall over. Then they leave.

Granted, my work experience might have made me slightly jaded to the whole idea of consultants.

IT Consultant = Unemployed IT person making a buck by pretending his opinion is more valuable than the opinions of those who already work for the company which have said many of the same things previously.
 
Last I heard consultants were people you hired if you didn't know how to do your job correctly.

For example, a company with staffed IT people should NEVER have to hire an IT consultant.

A consultant is basically to help guide people to a solution when the person who has hired the consultant has no idea and doesn't want to take the time to find out how to do something.

not always true, and some do.

Things like high end network security.....unless you are huge, you can't afford an experienced security professional, but many are willing to moonlight and do audits ETC



IT Consultant = Unemployed IT person making a buck by pretending his opinion is more valuable than the opinions of those who already work for the company which have said many of the same things previously.

wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong.

I don't much anymore because I don't have time, and migrated most of my clients to other places.

But I used to consult for a few SMB's and small gov't offices that didnt have the budget for real full time IT staff.


Near as I can figure, they sit around, browse porn and fiddle with mission critical servers until they fall over. Then they leave.

Granted, my work experience might have made me slightly jaded to the whole idea of consultants.


LOL dont give away my secrets!

but seriously, alot of them are nothing more than hyenias preying on the injured and weak, but alot of us take time off work, or work late or weekends to help smaller businesses ETC get ahead or stay afloat.
 
Looking at the replies, sounds like I'll be working with companies with little or no in-house IT expertise. Sounds good to me.

I'm not trying to be a rip-off to the companies, just trying to make the best out of my skills. I mean seriously, I'm sitting at home learning right now and really could use some money-I believe it's perfectly legitimate to market my skills to those who need it.

Thanks for the replies people, I have a better idea now and will definitely go for it soon ;)
 
For example, a company with staffed IT people should NEVER have to hire an IT consultant.

A consultant is basically to help guide people to a solution when the person who has hired the consultant has no idea and doesn't want to take the time to find out how to do something.

consultant are cheaper than hiring full time employees. TONS of business utilize consultants to work with their full time employees on projects to get them done quicker.

Fuck, I would LOVE to have a consultant working on the project I am on right now, even if it was some person with little experience. I might actually be able to get it done on time since I am the only person working on it.
 
whoa hold on :)
becoming some lonewolf consultant isnt easy. Companies are not going to just blindly hire you because you claim you are a "consultant". You will need to be highly experienced and reputable and most likely have a solid network where someone else referenced you to them.
Also keep in mind most Consultants will be highly specialized, you will not find many looking for general IT jockeys with a little knowledge of "computer science".
 
There's plenty of steps that have been left out - identifying leads, agreeing to terms and scope of the work, agreeing to (and collecting) compensation for the work, etc. If you can't control your scope and get mutual agreement on progress, you'll drown.

There's also risk from the liability perspective - a limited liability entity would be a good idea if you have other assets you want to protect, along with some E&O insurance (as companies that have any sort of vendor management process will likely require a few million bucks worth of coverage).

From what it describes what you're aiming to do, your pitch is bringing value and expertise to make it easier for them to do their jobs. For the businesses you're targeting, IT needs to simply work and you need to be responsive to their needs. I'd also suggest thinking about offering a support subscription model where they pay you a retainer fee monthly/quarterly/annually that covers your base level of services and discounts your incremental work.... lots of ways to pitch it...
 
For example, a company with staffed IT people should NEVER have to hire an IT consultant.

Uhhh... no. My employer's IT department is 200+ people strong. We have a whole section of our building devoted to consultants. We'll bring in consultants for any number of reasons; to help us get up and running with new software, to help with challenging or extensive software upgrades, to even just doing monotonous work that needs to get done but that we don't want to have a full-time employee doing.

Granted the line between consultant and contractor can get a bit fuzzy with that...


but seriously, alot of them are nothing more than hyenias preying on the injured and weak, but alot of us take time off work, or work late or weekends to help smaller businesses ETC get ahead or stay afloat.

Seriously, many of our consultants will work longer hours then the full-time employees. They're even more dedicated to completing projects on time and successfully. Their lively hood depends even more on doing great work. Compared to a salaried employee.

I'm not trying to be a rip-off to the companies, just trying to make the best out of my skills. I mean seriously, I'm sitting at home learning right now and really could use some money-I believe it's perfectly legitimate to market my skills to those who need it.;)

Instead of learning at home, why not go to an actual school? Get as many certificates as you can, then market the hell out of yourself. Honestly, no ones going to hire a consultant that has no certificates, and no specialization. Otherwise they'll just hire a temp contractor for even less then what they'll pay you.

whoa hold on :)
becoming some lonewolf consultant isnt easy. Companies are not going to just blindly hire you because you claim you are a "consultant". You will need to be highly experienced and reputable and most likely have a solid network where someone else referenced you to them.

Also keep in mind most Consultants will be highly specialized, you will not find many looking for general IT jockeys with a little knowledge of "computer science".

Exactly. A certain amount of specializing is necessary. Otherwise you'll just blend in with every other guy out there. Even after you have the specialization, you'll still have to really work on building your reputation.
 
Consultants are short term resources for a specific purpose.

I worked as a consultant for a small 20 person firm that focused exclusively on state government contracts. In-house IT is critical for the day to day operations of a company and consultants are not a replacement to IT staff, but rather a complimentary tool to them. Consultants offer some compelling advantages.

1. Specialized knowledge can be contracted for a specific project for much less than hireing FT employees or training existing staff. This specialized knowledge is generally only needed for a short period of time and it seldom makes financial sense for an organization to make a long term investment into it.
2. Consltants have experience implementing the same solutions accross many organizations and are generally very efficient at it and have a polished methodology that avoids many of the issues that tend to creep up.
3. Consultants are outside organizational politics. This alone is sometimes worth hireing a consultant for.
4. Consultants can often provide a fresh perspective on approaching/solving a problem. It's hard to get different results when you keep doing things the same way.
5. It's much easier to terminate a bad consultant than a bad employee.

There's more... but you get the gist of it.
 
Geez seems like people have had some bad experiences with IT consultants. Most of the time consultants are brought in for a specific short term project such as deploying a new SAP system or deploying a technology where it doesn't make sense to hire someone full time.

I would suspect that most every consulting company is going to be looking for employees with a college degree.

If I were in your shoes I would consider getting a degree in IT, your local community college might be a good place to start.
 
^ I was chatting to a buddy who works for the government. I asked if his department has been hit my the massive layoffs/ cuts, he said "they're sacked 100's of people and hired IBM". I can't say I was surprised to hear about the project was on flop when I was watching the news. :rolleyes:

So, suppose you were looking for an IT consultant, why would you look for one in the first place and what would be the requirements? What would you need me to do and stuff...Be precise if possible.
I hate to say it but you need experience with businesses a similar sector or size as the one's you want to offer consultancy. You haven't mention what field you are looking at.

The way I see it is that there are three ways into consulting:
  1. Excellent bullshitter (possibly so good that you even believe some of the shit coming out of your mouth yourself).
  2. Have expertise in a technology or business area that is highly sought after.
  3. Realised that your net worth is more valuable than your current wage packet so you leave and come back on consultant rates. ;)
 
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For those actually interested in thoughts from a good consultant, then Ted Neward's recent article on Code Magazine is a good read.
 
In larger markets, Staff Augmentation is what's going on, the in house IT staff if overwhelmed with day to day work and the company either laid off or is running a very lean staff.

They now need help to either keep things running or work on projects, etc... Accountants forget that the money they saved on letting all those salaries and benefits go is now coming back to hurt the company in lost revenue due to downtime, system failures, backups not working, networks down, upgrades missed, etc, etc...

So they've all tried the offshore disaster support and now they are hiring on shore contractors/consultants to "Augment" their team... also being referred to these days as Managed Services, either a small IT firm does all support for a small company or a large part of it.

********

To the OP - you need to have some experience and not that you practiced on home grown equipment/servers (off shore and paper MCSEs blew this out of reality).

You can probably find some entry level work to get that experience, check the local tech companies (managed service providers, IBM, etc... ) and see what they have. They are always looking for guys like you, willing you will take their low rates.

Good luck either way. If you do some solo work, remember you can be liable if you are not attached to a company and should think about protecting yourself in case of lawsuit. In these times small companies may do whatever they can to stay afloat, even suing the solo contractor that did a job for them... just to generate some cash flow.
 
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