Multi-Faceted Professional

Basically, a project consultant holds a general position with such a vast scope of work across so many industries and fields. His work is essentially providing his expertise on a project their employer or clients wanted them to help in achieving the company’s business goals.

Project consultants can work for a consulting firm or they can be self-employed. Their range of expertise encompasses such a wide swath of fields and across and almost any sector of the industries. 

Diverse fields 

Their skills are included in such diverse fields as aerospace, architecture, computer, construction, education, government services, health care services, hospitality, information technology and software development. Also included is interior design, marketing, non-profit services, oil and gas, science, telecommunications, and various other fields in the production, design and service industries.

Expertise

Their projects are typically operational, strategic, or maybe technical in nature. Also, typically, the people in many industries look up to these experts in their chosen fields. 

These highly regarded consultants are those who have proven successes in consultation in their chosen fields. The position is so broad that project consultants can find vacancies to fill up in virtually any industry. Some Fortune 500 companies have in their stable a staff of several house project consultants. However, most of them work with a consulting firm and some are on their own as consultants.

Job nature 

Consultants have project-based positions, so the number of hours that they work in a week is dependent on the project load. As a whole, their work is considered as mid0level white collar jobs. Junior project consultants may answer to lead or by some senior project consultant if they work together for a firm or company. However, they are on their own if they work as freelancers. Project Consultants are mid-level, white collar workers. Junior project consultants may answer to lead or senior project consultants if they work for a firm or company, but they are their own boss if they work as a freelancer. 

Necessary skills

Project consultants need to be experts in the principles of project management. They need it in defining the scope and tasks of each project. Another technical skill needed by the consultant is performing basic cost calculations and analysis. They would also need to have the required skills to succeed in the job. They would need such skills as inter viewing clients to determine their specific project needs.

Further, they need to analyze specific project strengths and weaknesses using SWOT analysis. They need to create the specific project plans based on the principle of project management. On the job, they have to know how to delegate tasks to employees using project management software (Asana/Trello).

Duties 

Their role is broad enough that these would involve many duties and responsibilities. These would vary depending on the industry they are being employed. Some general duties they do for their clients include such actions as recommending policies, processes and procedural improvements, testing newly developed solutions, and basically lending expert knowledge to a client’s project. 

Their core relevant duties are as follows:

Project parameters evaluation

Regardless of the industry they are in, all project consultants evaluate their project parameters. This task involves interviewing clients and actively listening to their answers.

If they can do this well, the next duties will be easier to complete.

Project strength analysis

The consultants will utilize their understanding of the client’s overall goals. They will use this to analyze their current progress for strengths and areas that need improvement. Their progress level here varies with every client. Their job sometimes involves tweaks and adjustments to an existing plan. At other times, it can involve creating a different new plan from the ground up. They also use some variations of SWOT analysis (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats). 

Devising project plans 

After they thoroughly understand their client’s goals and objective and there is the availability of resources, they create a project plan. This is an outline of how the resources will be used to achieve the project parameters. They will define these parameters to the other units participating in the projerct. The project plans develop will include cost estimates.

Delegate project tasks 

The consultants who are working in-house in a company are responsible in delegating project tasks to every employee in order to get the project done as efficiently as possible.

Those consultants who work on their own for a consulting firm will coach and direct the decision makers through this process.

Tests and tweaks 

They are responsible for the tests and tweaks on project solutions until it is perfected. The tweaks are based on feedbacks. They are also responsible for testing the effectiveness of the project solution.

Plan presentation 

Finally, they spend some amount of time in the presentation of their plans and the final results to project stakeholders. This need good communication and negotiation skills .

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Education 

When they hire consultants, employers and clients usually seek those with proven abilities or educated perspectives that can be used to solve, ofr help solve, specific problems within their organizations. Wanting to gain employment as consultant, one would generally need a degree in a related subject to one’s own chosen industry or field. This is alongside with extensive applied work experience and demonstrated knowledge of such an industry.

Degrees and others

Typically, project consultants need a bachelor’s degree in business administration, project management, or some other related field. The coursework covers the principles of business, economics, project management, and organizational communication. If one has a graduate-level education, the amount of applied work experience needed to demonstrate one’s expertise will be reduced.

Considerations 

There is actually no specific degree or subject requirement needed in becoming a project consultant since the field wherein one might work can vary widely. There is no specific degree or subject for becoming a project consultant. Every field of study is applicable, so long as one is going to be consulting in that field. However, regardless of the field where one will work later, a degree or even just a supplemental course work in Business Administration or project management would help.

Career advancements

If you belong to a consulting firm, advancement might be in the form of moving into senior-level roles, supervising teams on more complex projects. You can also become a partner in your consultancy and focus on attracting new clients and bring in the revenues for you and the consultancy company.

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Created on Sep 30th 2021 04:04. Viewed 217 times.

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