Do you know this consultant/manager?

They are great at planning and strategizing and planning and brainstorming but never execute on anything?

I’ve seen managers inside companies take multiple quarters or even years to put plans together. By the time it’s done everything’s changed and they have to start all over again.

Consultants are notorious for this. They can build beautiful PowerPoint decks and churn out reams of paper in reports and strategy docs without ever really telling you what to do and are gone long before you realize you’ve been screwed. (The latest flavor of this of course is the social media consultant.)

Neil Beam and I were ranting about this when he reminded me of this great video from the “good days” of SNL (not to be confused with the “good old days” of SNL).

The Change Bank.

But planning, brainstorming and creating strategies but they are absolutely worthless if no one can implement them.

If you’re trying to determine if a new hire or consultant is right don’t let them wow you with their client lists or strategery ask for examples of projects they’ve actually taken from planning to execution to measurement. (Hint: run away if they don’t have any metrics.)

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