Running Head: CONSULTING SKILLS - INTEGRATION OF THEORY AND PRACTICE

Consulting Skills – Integration of Theory and Practice

Jonathan West

ADLT 610, Fall 2009

Consulting Skills

Virginia Commonwealth University

Dr. Terry Carter

Due: 3 Dec 2009

Running Head: CONSULTING SKILLS - INTEGRATION OF THEORY AND PRACTICE
CONSULTING SKILLS – INTEGRATION OF LEARNING 3

Introduction

Process consulting is a complex approach that uses interpersonal and technical skills. An

important aspect of process consulting is the consultant’s awareness of herself and everything she

brings into a situation. The ability to value and attend to the affective side of the relationship and to

express these feelings in a way that maintains respect of the client and does not overly increase

defensiveness is crucial for effective consulting. Block (2000) emphasizes the importance of

attending to the affective side equally as much as attending to the more substantive side of the

business problem the client is facing. While the five phases of the collaborative consulting process

that Block lays out are invaluable and will be an important source of guidance and reference as I

continue with my consulting in the future, I think the most valuable learning for me during my

ALDT 610 consulting skills experience has been to understand the importance attending to the

affective side of the consultant-client relationship. Schein (1999) provides insight into the

psychological and social process as he describes the helping relationship. Block presents the

practical illustrations of many of these situations as he explains his phases of collaborative

consulting. When I combine the theoretical knowledge of Schein and Block with the experiences I

have had in class and through the consulting project that Tim Arnette and I worked on together, I

feel I have gained greater insight and the ability to put into practice the principles and skills of

process consulting. This paper will illustrate selected principles and steps that I have found

important in my experiences with process consulting this semester.

The importance of relationship

One of the first key aspects of process consulting that strikes me is the importance of the

relationship with the client. Schein (1999) says that our first interactions or interventions set the

tone of the relationship. The process of inquiry is an important first step in developing the

relationship with the client. In pure inquiry the consultant simply encourages the client to tell his
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story. Schein suggests that one of the main functions of the inquiry process is to “create a set of

conditions in which the client will feel safe and will be able to reveal anxiety-provoking data” (p.

60). When we met with the clients at the contracting meeting, there was a fair bit of time in which

the clients told their story. This seemed important to get a picture of their organization and the

situations they faced as well as to begin establish a relationship. Schein proposes since there is

often a feeling of one-downness when someone asks for help, active inquiry helps to rebuild the

client’s self-esteem and equilibrate his status. In addition, active inquiry helps the consultant gain

information about the situation as well as involves the client in the process of diagnosis and action

planning. Block (2000) says the first goal of the consultant is to establish a collaborative

relationship. Active inquiry is a first step towards reaching this goal.

Being authentic

According to Block an essential aspect of consulting is the ability to be authentic in any

moment when working with a client while carrying out the business of the consulting phase that

we are in. To this degree it is important to be aware of observations, feelings, and intuition that

come from interaction with the client system as well as the values, beliefs, biases, and assumptions

that we bring with us into the relationship. Being authentic includes the ability to express what I

am experiencing but also in a way that does not make the client too defensive. Block (2000)

suggests that being authentic “has the advantage of being incredibly simple. It is to literally put

into words what you are experiencing” (p. 38). Although the examples that Block gives in his text

do make it seem simple and clear, I still find this quite a challenge. I think the challenging part is to

become aware of and suspend any biases or judgments that I might have when responding to a

client’s behavior or ideas.

For instance, when Tim and I had the discovery meeting with the program director and

were planning the data collection the program directors said she wanted to be at the focus group
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since she knew everyone. We acknowledged her interest in seeing that the mentors were taken care

of and asked if it would be OK if she were not present during the focus group. We shared that we

would like the mentors to be able to express themselves freely. She did acknowledge that she could

see that the mentors might feel uncomfortable about telling her some things for fear of burdening

her. It seemed like she understood and was OK that she would not be a part of the focus group.

However, on further reflection we could see that we did not actually confront her possible fear of

losing control. This was a missed opportunity for us to be fully authentic and actually seems to

have impacted the implementation of a possible recommendation later in the project.

During the discovery meeting we also learned that the program director was the only

person who served as mentor for the mentors (there are approximately 100 mentors in the

organization). When we first met with the board at what ended up being the second contracting

meeting, we asked the board if they had considered how they might use the experienced mentors to

support new mentors. It was clear they had not really considered this and saw some potential in the

idea. However, when we met for the data analysis and feedback meeting with the president and one

board member, the president said, “WWGG (the program director) is the mentor for the mentors”

in a rather matter of fact way and it did not seem like she was open for dialogue on this topic. This

seemed like it was the issue of losing control coming up again. And, once again, we did not

confront the president on this issue. I recall both times recognizing that something was off in the

way both the program director and the president spoke of this issue, but I could not catch that it

was a fear of losing control and I did not name the resistance. Therefore, the resistance did not go

away at the time and still remains. Now that I am clearer about what might have been going on in

both of these situations, I plan to address this issue when we give our final feedback to the board

when we meet with them in December.

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An additional aspect of being authentic is clearly stating the consultant’s wants or needs –

what the consultant wants from the client to make the project successful. Block (2000) considers

this one of the most critical skills in flawless consulting. While Block stresses that stating your

wants should happen in the contracting meeting, it seems equally important to be able to continue

to do this throughout a consulting project. The ability to recognize what my wants are and state

them clearly, whether they are affective or part of the business of consulting, is connected with my

being authentic.

Accessing my ignorance

Schein’s (1999) third principle of process consulting, “access your ignorance” is one which

I find very subtle. The challenge here is that I often notice things, but am not able to respond to

them in the present moment. It often takes some time away from a meeting with a client and some

reflection on the course of the intervention that I recognize what was going on. For instance, in our

feedback meeting, when considering a recommendation where experienced mentors would serve as

mentors for newer mentors, the president responded by saying, “CCTT (the program director) is

the mentor of the mentors.” Neither Tim nor I responded to this statement, but on reflection I see

that it was an expression of resistance and quite likely could have come back from the program

director (since this had been brought up earlier). It seems the president (or the program director,

through the president) likely had anxiety about losing control. However, neither Tim nor I

confronted the president with this possibility. I feel both parties lost opportunities for learning in

that moment. Hopefully we will have another opportunity at the board meeting which we will

attend in December. There were other instances where I noticed on reflection that I had a question

about something the client said, but did not actually confront the client and gain further insight and

possible contribute to the client’s learning. A couple of times the opportunity to confront the client

came at another meeting, so it was still possible apply this principle. However, I do see that this
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can be a difficult principle to put into practice at all times. It seems to require an awareness and

attunement, in a sense, to those little signals or flags that I often raise in a conversation, but do not

raise a question due to my own biases or assumptions, or perhaps my anxieties too. The process of

accessing my ignorance, suspending, and being authentic are what I consider my greatest

challenges of consulting.

The different roles of a consultant

According to Schein (1999), the first principle of process consultation is to always try to be

helpful. Schein and Block distinguish process consulting from two other forms of consulting: the

Purchase of Information or Selling or Telling model that Schein describes and Block (2004) calls

the “pair of hands” model; and the second model other than process consulting is what Schein calls

the “doctor-patient” model and Block calls the “expert” model. In these approaches the consultant

may not always be trying to help the client. Schein says that often during consulting one is moving

between these roles. However, he suggests that it is important to realize the underlying

assumptions of each and how these impact the client in ultimately implementing any recommended

actions.

I found that twice during the feedback meeting with our client, I unconsciously slipped into

the role of the expert. In this role I found myself feeling like I knew the best solution for the client

and was even making some attempts to convince the client of how my idea or solution ws the way

to go. This occurred while we were exploring recommendations and action plans. It’s interesting to

note that I slipped into an expert role when we were talking about areas in which I had quite a lot

of experience. I also noticed that when I was giving this expert advice without being asked by the

client, the client seemed to withdraw and shut down as if to say, “here’s one of are those know it all

consultants again who only wants to do what they want and not consider our situation…” I think

there could be a time when the client may be interested in my experience if I could offer it in the
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spirit of service and as a possible option they could consider, rather than thinking that I knew what

was best for them. I do not think I really was overly aggressive because I noticed that the client

was losing interest and not receptive to my ideas, so I backed off. But it was enough to change the

dynamic and receptivity to the recommendation we were discussing. I do plan to talk with the

client before we meet with the board and tell her I noticed her backing off and ask if she would

share what was going on for her. I would then like to apologize if I was too pushy but share the

enthusiasm and reasoning behind my thinking and leave it at that.

The client owns the problem and the solution

The client ‘who owns the problem and solution’ is Schein’s (1999) fifth principle of

process consulting. This connected again with many aspects of our consulting project. We really

tried in this regard to involve the client in a joint approach to both defining the problem, discovery

and data collection, data analysis, and recommendations. Several times during the course of the

project one of our clients would express that we should just do our thing and then let them know.

However, we would come back and explain that we wanted to do this project in a collaborative

way and would seek their input and suggestions. We could see that if we did not include the client

in the project, they would be less likely to own the problem and also less likely to take action on

any recommendations. This most often worked very well and we had several of the clients who

worked closely with us along the way. When the different members of the client organization were

working together with us to design the survey and conduct the focus group, it gave us an

opportunity to gain a much deeper insight into the organization and see how different factors

impacted the problem. I think I can say that we really received the most significant portion of our

data through the different times that we collaborated with the client on carrying out aspects of the

data collection – the discovery meeting, data collection as well as analysis.

Go with the flow

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One of the Schein’s (1999) ten principles of process consulting is “to go with the flow” (p.

60). I found this to be necessary almost every time we met with or had some interaction with the

client. The changing situation was frustrating at times, but we did not really take it negatively

because it did not appear that the client was intentionally trying to put us off or delay things.

Rather it was just a sign of the nature of life in a complex world in which we live. We just needed

to figure out how to adapt to the situation and continue on. For instance, after having our

contracting meeting with the president and program director the president asked that we draft a

contract memo and send it to her. We felt we had a go ahead and expected to be informed of when

we could schedule the next meeting for discover and to plan the data collection. Instead the

president came back and said that she had sent the memo to the board and one of the board

members had some concerns so we could not go forward until we met with the board. At this

meeting we ended up renegotiating the contract and finally received approval. It was interesting in

that the meeting with the board really seemed to give authority and energy to move forward on the

project. This was the highest level of power in the organization and when we received their

support, things started happening. Block says, “Renegotiating the agreement is a ceaseless

process” (Block, p. 114).

Resistance

While I am beginning to recognize resistance the biggest issue for me is confronting it. It is

interesting the two faced aspect of the helping relationship and how we want help on one side and

we resist it on the other. “When we ask for help, we want both a solution to the problem and

confirmation that everything we have done has been perfect.” (Block, p. 156) Resistance is not

rational or intellectual. It’s an emotional process. So, clients want a solution as well as support that

they have been doing a good job. Two opposite feelings can co-exist at the same time in the world

of emotions and be genuine. “Clients want to solve problems and at the same time they want
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support and appreciation. Resistance is the avoidance. Block says that behind the avoidance is the

approach” (p. 156). When resistance gets expressed, it goes down and then client is willing and

ready to be influenced and learn. A key to flawlessly handling resistance is understanding and

accepting the two-toned nature of the position of the client.

According to Block dealing with resistance is the most significant part of consulting. Some

forms of resistance are subtle and it is not always easy to detect it, at least for me at this point.

Although Block (2000) has described in detail the main forms of resistance, it will take some

study, practice, and reflection to be able to recognize and name its forms on the spot. I’ve shared

earlier some of the different experiences of dealing with resistance I had during the consulting

project. I also learned very much about recognizing resistance during the class when the various

project teams shared the experiences they were having. While am learning how to recognize

resistance, I would say I am not yet adept at confronting it.

Valid information

One of the assumptions Block bases his idea of collaborative consulting is valid data. In

our project very few members of the organization said anything negative about any person or thing

that the organization does. There was very little constructive criticism in the survey’s and the

interviews we conducted by phone. It may be that this was because we did not have an opportunity

to really make a connection and build enough trust that people felt they could share openly. For me

this shows some of the limitations of surveys and confirms the recommendations of Block and

Schein to have as much personal contact as possible with people in the client organization. This

can be in the form of personal interviews or group discussion. Schein stresses the importance of

group discussion. Most of our data came from the meetings we had with the clients regarding the

contracting, discover and data collection, and data analysis and feedback where we had much more

extensive interaction with the clients.

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Conclusion

For me, it was very helpful to have a partner throughout the consulting project. I think this

accelerated my learning because if one of us was speaking, then the other had a chance to observe

and take in valuable data. It was also quite valuable to be able to debrief following a meeting with

the client, share our observations, and analyze what happened and how we did. Similarly, it was

also very valuable to listen to the experiences of other teams in class and relate what was going on

to Schein and Block. It was usually through the exchanges Tim and I had following a meeting or

the sharing or dialogue/discussion we had in class that I received deeper insight into the principles

and practice of process/collaborative consulting.

There are many concepts, ideas, practical knowledge that the combined study of the texts

of Schein and Block and hands on experience of the consulting project have given to me to help

me have further insight into process consulting. When I began this class I really wondered just

what consulting was. I too had a sense that often consultants might just be making up work for

financial gain. However, I also had an idea that consulting could be something else, where one

could really possibly help a person or an organization in need. Now, through the study and practice

of Schein and Block’s works on process consulting I have a foundation on which to build my

consulting knowledge and skills.

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References

Block, P. 2000. Flawless Consulting – A guide to getting your expertise used. San Francisco, CA:

John Wiley and Sons.

Schein, E. 1999. Process Consulting Revisited – Building the helping relationship. Reading, MA:

Addison-Wesley.