Chapter 11: Consulting in the Fast Lane

Management and organization consulting isn’t what it used to be. As consultants, we no longer have the luxury of time. Helpful consulting takes time—to establish rapport with the client, to get the lay of the land (what we used to call diagnosis), to achieve some understanding of the organization’s culture, the informal system, and the nature of politics in the organization. But clients want immediate action; they want to see some positive differences from consultation now! if not yesterday. In these times, it’s as if most clients have some form of attention deficit disorder.

Core consultative activities such as meeting facilitation, process consultation, and team building, cornerstone interventions in the field of organization development (OD), are not passé, but now are apparently less common. If true, why might this be so? These activities take time, of course, and often are perceived as “soft.” In other words, it is not clear just how these consultative interventions contribute to the bottom line, that all-important performance goal in today’s business enterprises.