I am planning for several assignments from November to January. They will be in
It is amazing how at the end of every year you get a rush of assignments that the client wants done before the end of the year. You also see a similar pattern in March as well. The same can also be said regarding requests for training.
The assignments are over and I am on my way home. The drive from Chilakaluripet to
On reaching my guest house I packed all my bags and turned in for the night as I had to get up at
The next morning I was ready by 4.20 and SMSed the driver; then came 4.30 still no driver. I got a bit concerned since we had not planned for any delays. So I went to the security post of the compound and hailed the security. As usual the security guard was huddled up in a corner of the security hut fast asleep. I woke him up and found that he did not speak a word of English. So using sign language and my broken Hindi/Urdu managed to convey the situation to him; finally he got on his bike (Literally) and went and woke the driver who slept in the other corner of this large compound.
I left for the airport around
Wow what an assignment! I must say that I have experienced similar assignments in the past in other sectors. However for this sector (development sector) it was a first. As a consultant you have to be on guard all the time when doing an Organization Capacity Assessment (Very similar to a “Due Diligence” in the private sector); if the client wants to mislead you, it can be done quite easily. In my case I was confronted with just that.
Things that should look out for are:
These things must be handled very diplomatically otherwise you will not be able to complete the assignment. Do not have a “knee jerk” reaction, observe very well and collect enough specific examples so that you have a basis for doubting what is presented to you. At the same time you must see if this deception is systematic or simply put up for this occasion.
If it is systemic you now have a real problem; you will not be able to decipher what is “genuine” and what is “false.” My recommendation is at this point you should seek clarifications from the person who hired you as well as speaking to the decision makers of your client. A temporary halt to the assessment will be in order to do this discretely. Suggest you take prudent steps based on your clients feedback.
However if you feel it is a put up for this particular assessment then your task is easier and it should be handled with the management of the organization that you are assessing. (Don’t forget you still need to advice your client regarding this unexpected turn of events) As this would be difficult situation for some consultants to handle; I suggest a cautious but a very direct approach. This will reduce the space for excuses by the staff. Since it will come as a surprise to them the staff of the organization you are assessing will also not be able to gang up on you to defend themselves. Make sure that you do not engage in a long dragged out discussion, be short and to the point. If handled properly it should bring about normalcy to the process.
If however you do not feel comfortable to take a direct approach you must then document both versions of the process i.e.
This however will not be very useful in the end; as it will not provide the right results to take decisions the assessment was supposed to deliver in the first place. In some rare cases you may need to repeat the assessment to get the right results.
In my case it was the latter and I did confront the staff and the management regarding it. There was an attempt to defend the position but it was not successful; things returned to an acceptable level of normalcy and I was able to complete the assignment.
Again it was a day of travel for me. The flight from
After landing I had to get to Chilakaluript (2 hours by road) to reach the client. I am at there guest house preparing for tomorrow.
The organization assessment went as anticipated without major issues. However an old issue popped up on the last day (3rd Day). This is; including new people mid way through a process.
When facilitating a group on any matter you need to facilitate at a sophistication level which is understood by everybody. I must say that some consultants call it sophistication level while others call it abstraction level yet others call it conceptualization, complexity etc. The point is when doing a self assessment we assume that the participants have the same understanding of the terms and concepts used in the assessment tool as well as they have the background knowledge to quickly fill in the blanks and understand new things. However this is never the case (That’s why we need a facilitator) and the facilitator needs to facilitate using language and terms, which is commonly understood by all. This was the case for the first 2 days. On the last day it was decided to increase the number of participants to have a wider input to the process. Even though my gut instinct and experience told me that this would not be such a good idea, I held my thoughts as there were other “buy in” issues to consider.
This meant that we brought in people
a) who were of a lower level in the organization; thereby inevitably with a lower sophistication level.
b) who had no idea regarding what has happened in the past 2 days; or a pissed off at being left out
c) who needed a lot of time to grasp what is going on; or who do not have a high degree of commitment to the process
At the same time what happens with the people who were there from the beginning is that
a) they tend to get board quickly
b) they become impatient and overwhelm the new comers
As a result you loose the momentum of the process and you have to deal with new group dynamics which is invariably unpredictable.
It was funny for me to watch this happening as I went through the day. Some of the participants from the crowd that was there from the first day were even using hand gestures asking the new lot to hold back; while other voiced their opinion even when others showed impatience or dismissive gestures.
What was indeed tough was to establish the new sophistication level of the new group. In fact I don’t think I was able to settle at any level for any length of time on the 3rd day. The group was now so diverse that when discussing one issue they seem to get it very quickly but with others it was completely different some would get it but the others simply could not comprehend. Therefore there was this constant shifting of the level of sophistication required to understand a concept
The end result was that what was planned for half a day now took one whole day. This is acceptable as this meant that a similar level of quality was maintained right through out the assessment process. The danger is that some consultants may be tempted to rush through which might compromise the quality as well as alienate the participants.
So all in all it was an interesting assignment with some learning’s and reinforcement of some do’s and don’ts.
The day of leisurely travel to
There were of course no issues in getting to the Airport or getting checked in. At the checking counter I asked the Jet Airways staff if there were any restrictions of taking a bottle of liquor to
Things went smoothly from there; got through Immigration, went and bought 500ML bottle of Black Label, went through security, boarded and arrived in Chennai on time. Jet airways must be congratulated for on time flights between
Things turned in to a big process when I got to Chennai. First I had to go through Immigration, it was smooth, then through Customs, also no issue, then physically had to come out of the International Terminal and go in to the Domestic Terminal. I was told that Jet Airways staff would be there to guide the transfer passengers, however there were no staff and there were no sings to direct. I asked for instructions and got to the Jet Airways counter without any trouble. Yes I did change some money as well. At which point I was told that I need to put my luggage through the security scanner again so had to Drag my bag to the end of the terminal and re-put the bag through the security scanner (X-Ray) then had to come back and join the line to check the bag in for a second time. Luckily there weren’t many passengers in line. While I was doing this I was also carrying the Duty Free Bag with the bottle of liquor inside it and in plain sight of the Jet Airways staff.
So I checked in the bag and went to the Taj Restaurant to quench my thirst; well things really went wrong there, apparently for some Gandhi commemoration the bar was closed. I thought I was back in
When it was time for me to go through the security to board the domestic flight I had to put all my hand luggage again through the security… nothing new I guess. Then came the surprise they said “Sir you cant take wine in the plane, you have to put it into the main luggage” I promptly pointed out to the security guy that I am connecting from a International flight and that I did bring the bottle on board as hand luggage and I was told that it was allowed by the airline staff the time of boarding. “No sir it is not allowed in domestic flights” came the answer right back at me. Knowing not to argue with them went back to the counter. Then the fun started….. apparently the process was that they had to get my checked in luggage out of the cargo container put the bottle back in to the check in luggage then re scan the luggage through the X-Ray machine and so on. No drink can be worth all that trouble. They also agreed with me that the bottle might break in the luggage and I will have to wear a whiskey perfume during my stay in
So I was on the verge of throwing the bottle down the drain when one of the assistants who help with the luggage suggested to the girl at the counter to check the bottle in as a separate piece of luggage. That was funny; I had a grin in my face because it sounded ridiculous. But guess what, he got a small box put the bottle in, taped it up, put fragile stickers on it, and got the girl to weigh it. Guess what, the scale returned a value of zero kilograms. I thought now they are going to make a fuss again, but to my surprise no they checked in a weight of 2 KG the minimum weight of a check in luggage (Good to know I thought) and gave me a baggage tag. So I thought this is all going to be a waste as the bottle is surly going to break. So deciding to ignore a package with a streak of whiskey behind it at the
Then came the next surprise, the flight was delayed for two and a half hours. Man now I know why they don’t allow liquor in the domestic flights as they are apparently always delayed and they don’t want disgruntled customers having a few to get over their frustrations of having to wait for an eternity. Well that is the consensus of the few guys I got chatting to.
Finally the plan did arrive and I made it to
Today I am leaving to Hyderabad for the assignment. Funny, there seems to be a lot of things that we do when doing an overseas consulting assignment but don’t really talk about it. The stuff we do for preparation has two parts
Things considered as part of consulting process
Marketing, prospecting and selling
Proposal, budget & contract
Invoicing and receiving advance payment
Preparation / Intake
