[Music]
thank you all for joining us today um my
name is Leah
Lofton this evening we're going to talk
about things not to do in
Consulting
first I'd like to tell you just a little
bit about
myself I graduated in 2002 from Jones
County junior college in Mississippi
with an associates degree
in
information sorry in Information Systems
Technology uh in 2004 I graduated from
University of Southern Mississippi with
a bachelor's degree in computer
engineering with a major in software
engineering I uh studied Java
C++ Visual Basic to include just a few I
also studied RPG on the
as400 I also studied object oriented uh
which was uh not my favorite at
all um I also studied several other
languages and uh if you'd like to know
more about those feel free to talk to me
about
that uh I've worked as a consultant for
around 20
years so this is kind of a subject that
I'm pretty well versed
in um my hobbies include traveling uh on
about every
imaginable mode that you can imagine I I
like boats planes bikes um I also like
uh camping hiking
cooking especially creative baking I
like to uh tempt my team with uh all
kinds of cakes and goodies so uh that's
one of my Joys also I like smoking on my
Green Mountain smoker um that's another
one of my
Joys so the the eight critical things
that I've kind of come to learn over
time is um failing to listen to
clients making
assumptions over promising and underd
delivering and I apologize if this is a
little tiny on the print there and it's
hard to
see but uh we'll talk about all of it in
detail so you'll be well versed in it
but the next one is neglecting
communication ignoring security failing
to stay up to dat ignoring the big
picture
and failing to learn from our
mistakes so the first one I'd like to
talk about is failing to listen to
clients and it has been one that it
doesn't matter if it's civilian
military or what your client is it's
it's been one that has plagued my entire
career as as one of the overall big
picture items um so ignoring your client
can input can lead to miss opportunities
of innovation and
Improvement it can also not listening to
your clients can cause mistakes and
errors that could have been
avoided failure to understand the goals
and objectives can result in a mismatch
between the final product and what the
client wanted that's hugely
important not listening to clients can
also result in wasted effort as the
final product may not meet their needs
and require require significant re
revisions and again I apologize for
words sometimes words are hard so if you
uh catch me on a word where I Stumble
and I change it much like Porky Pig feel
free to laugh because my kids do all the
time second of all we
have making assumptions this is
something that I also do from time to
time it's human we all do from time to
time I'm quite sure uh but assuming can
also making assumptions can also
fail um Us
in listening to
clients um it can not listening to
clients can result in wasted time and
effort as the final product may not meet
their needs and require require
significant
revisions failing to listen to clients
can lead to misunderstanding their needs
and
requirements not listening to clients
can also cause mistakes and errors that
could have been completely
avoided um failure to listen to clients
goals and objectives can result in
mismatch between the final product and
what the client wanted all
along
um also not listening to the client can
result in a wasted time and
effort uh
um it's really crucial to listen to our
clients um in times we can be too eager
to offer our own advice and kind of
think you know it all versus what the
client may want what their ideal may be
and they may have one complete ideal and
what they we want for them may be
completely
different so and and in result I've seen
as an engineer we have this run and joke
uh we have this picture of what the
client thinks they're going to get what
we see for them and what the end result
is and in result we want a happy
client the next one is over promising
and underling
um working for the military as much as I
did we have a a thing where we we say
it's always better to under
promise and overd
deliver and for this particular
one and I apologize my notes got messed
up but for this particular
one the overpromise and UND delivering
it can leave to a negative word of mouth
it can leave lead to a not lot of
negative connotation with your client
with your customer and that is the last
thing you want you you don't want to
have your customer come to you and want
their money back because it leads to a
loss of trust it leads to a loss of
faith and it leads to a very angry
customer if you've ever dealt with a
angry upset customer they're not fun
it's the last place you want to be
um also making unrealistic promises is
not something that you ever want to have
to face it's it's never a position that
you want to be in it's never a position
you want to put your boss in as a
consultant I I I've never wanted to ever
have a place where you want to come have
your boss look at you and and say what
did uh what did you tell your
client so it's just never a good place
to be uh not understanding your client's
requirements and limitations um and then
having that inability to deliver um say
you have a report and you said um you
know I'll get you that report by the end
of the
week and you didn't that's not a good
feeling not a good place to be so
something we'd like to
avoid neglecting
communication um there was recently a
situation where it wasn't a neglecting
of communication but maybe not a good
communication I had this experience
myself um neglecting communication is is
an extreme point but we not only want to
be sure that we have good communication
and a lot of it but we also want to be
concise with our communication because
neglecting communication it results in
ineffective Solutions Mis calls errors
project failure not only that but again
a loss of trust it leads to um loss of
clients loss of Revenue your business is
going to
fail and the other thing is too um not
only is your business going to fail but
your Consultants are going to be
unhappy at the end of the day your
biggest Ally is your communication to
your customer you want to build on that
you want to build on hey how can I make
you happy what is your expectation what
is your
expectation of communication during this
project what can I do to make this
successful it also um leads to account
of uh lack of accountability
responsibility and it just makes it
difficult to appre achieve project
success and that's what we all want is a
very successful project a successful uh
outcome for the customer we want to make
them Happ happy CU not only do we want
them to keep coming back they we want
them to bring their
friends I know we're all it security
people I know um you're all thinking I'm
never going to ignore
security but when I say ignore security
I'm not saying ignore your basic
security that we all know what I'm
saying here is we want to address
security risk that they don't already
know about um we want
to maybe upsell them we want to address
things that they're not already aware of
um we want to implement appropriate
security measures that can result in a
failure of maybe their legal team their
their um regulatory requirements um that
they can maybe result in in
like re fines and legal actions that
they're not aware of um there's things
that we're able to see that they are not
able to see and those are things that we
can point out to them as a
service and and sometimes we're held to
like a higher level because there's
things that we know about that the
client may not be able to you know may
not have that knowledge and it's our
responsibility to kind of Point these
things out to
them um also
neglecting security can lead to a lack
of
um accountability responsibility and
making it more difficult to achieve
project success and build long-term
relationships with
clients also failing to stay up to
date um I know we all like to stay up to
date sometimes not as much as others I
know sometimes we don't like to install
those updates patches and everything um
because we don't like to fix what's not
broken sometimes but
uh but uh not in the other part of this
is um we like to invest in training we
like to invest in professional
development it is important to all of us
that we do that that we stay up to date
not all
in um software Hardware but in ourselves
as well it's always important that we
invest in ourselves as much as our
Hardware software that's just as
important to stay up to
date any questions on
that y'all are
quiet also the other thing is ignoring
the big picture um sometimes when you're
in the weeds sometimes when you're in
the midst of testing or the day-to-day
it's kind of hard to see the big picture
and sometimes when you have a diffic
difficult client it's hard to see the
bigger picture but in this particular
one failing to understand the client's
industry market trends it can result in
solutions that are not competitive or
not effective ignoring the big picture
can result in solutions that don't
integrate well with the client's
existing systems or
processes um not considering the big
long-term effect of solutions can lead
to additional cost and inefficiencies
for the future uh I just had a project
where um the client bought one thing
they wanted something else in the end
and not ignoring the bigger picture
wound up leading to selling them three
additional projects where they wanted
something much bigger much more
effective it was listening to them
paying attention to what they wanted but
just looking at the bigger picture
listening to our client opening that
communication that's what they wanted
led to a much happier
customer this one is kind of difficult
for me
because failing to learn from our
mistakes um sometimes it's hard I get
it
we all we all make mistakes where human
is unavoidable completely
100% um I have discovered it is so
difficult a to ask for
help B to admit that you made one in the
first
place but I have also found that my team
unlike any other has freely admitted if
you make a mistake it is always best to
own
it you always will make a mistake no
matter how good you are you're going to
make one if you own
it walk into it ask for help which is my
number one hardest thing in the world to
do is ask for help but take
responsibility and for mistakes it can
lead to a lack of trust and credibility
with our clients if we don't we will
lose clients every time if you try to
sweep it under the rug it is our number
one it can be your number one biggest
problem if you let it be but I'm here to
tell you if you make a mistake own
it it can be your biggest Ally if you
just reach out but not prioritizing a
culture of continuous learning improving
it can hinder your cons the consultant's
ability to build long-term relationships
with clients and become a trusted
partner I have seen many
times in the military World civilian
world
where made a mistake if you walk into it
you like hey you know what happened I
made a mistake blah blah blah blah blah
happened this is it happened how can we
fix it how can we make it better how can
we work with you to make this better and
I've seen more services be sold better
outcomes come out of a mistake than what
it was originally so sometimes mistakes
can turn into something even better more
prosperous than what it was in the
beginning so who knows sometimes
learning from that
mistake works out to your benefit
so that's a that's a huge
one
questions yes
Eric
exle
[Laughter]
does it have to be the team now or could
it be a previous
team
okay
so as you know I worked for the military
for quite some time
um there was a not to give my age off
but there was a time when uh laptop went
from selling um laptops with floppy
drives to not selling laptops with
floppy drives there was a particular
piece of software that only use floppy
drives there was a particular
captain on this base and his nickname
was
ogre and um I was the lead at the time
and this particular Captain did not know
how to use a floppy Drive
our my technician he went and installed
this um laptop without explaining to the
captain how to
use this software and just left it he
just installed his new new um laptop for
the guy and
left and uh so I walked in the next day
completely
unaware Cath and ogre caught me in the
hallway and just go bu me
out I'm captain Oger you will have me a
laptop with a floppy drive at Z 1300 I
mean 1300 on my
desk they don't make them anymore I
don't know how to tell you I'm not going
to have you one
dude um
but it resulted in me helping
him use the new software and training
him how to use the new software
but then I got to pull my technician
aside and explain to him you can't just
but Captain ogre's whole team got to
hear him address
me it was a it was funny at the time I'm
sorry it didn't come out as funny but if
you could have seen me in my stilettos
and skirt and Captain ogre addressing me
I'm
like sir yes sir I'll get you that
floppy
it's not going to happen but yes
sir yes
sir that I didn't recover
from lots of
them um life gives you those
um they're I think they turn into
teachable moments
you you I think
you recover from
them but they just kind of become a
scar and it's like a scar um that skin
grows
thicker and it becomes tougher
and you become stronger for
it um I I can't think of one at the
moment but I know there has been
yes good consult your perspective in my
perspective um I would certainly say
good customer service good
communication open
honest
communication um just a good kind
human um asking for help when
needed and admitting that you don't know
everything yes
sir anyone
else
yes the biggest
mistake I would have to say big
mistake that is a difficult
one no it's it's I like a challenge um
but I would have to say the biggest
mistake as consultants would
again I think kind of getting wrapped up
in our own life sometimes and maybe not
taking care of
ourselves anyone
else yes
I'm so sorry I cannot hear
you uh we actually have that um quite
often that's a very good question too um
so we manage it in different ways if we
can allow a little bit of scope creep
for customer service sometimes we do if
it is too much scope creep um we send
sales and say hey let's let's buy
additional
services does that answer your
question okay thank you anyone
else I'm so sorry I think that's
all oh what's the best thing you on your
h that would have to be a rose a a a a
Boston
butt yes yeah absolutely fine but thank
you
[Applause]
all