Any IT consultant here ?
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Hi, I am planning a switch from software development to IT consultant role once my MBA is finished. I still have 2 years to go and in a position where I need to select my electives for 3rd sem. I am now starting to do research, what all options are there for software developer to move into consulting. Will it be a difficult move and what all challenges I need to face and what electives will be useful. Any IT consultant here who can give bit of advise on this? Thanks
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Hi, I am planning a switch from software development to IT consultant role once my MBA is finished. I still have 2 years to go and in a position where I need to select my electives for 3rd sem. I am now starting to do research, what all options are there for software developer to move into consulting. Will it be a difficult move and what all challenges I need to face and what electives will be useful. Any IT consultant here who can give bit of advise on this? Thanks
How can you be a consultant if you haven't got any practical experience? To be a consultant you really should have a background of problems solved - without that, as a consultant, you're just a warm body occupying a seat.
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How can you be a consultant if you haven't got any practical experience? To be a consultant you really should have a background of problems solved - without that, as a consultant, you're just a warm body occupying a seat.
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How can you be a consultant if you haven't got any practical experience? To be a consultant you really should have a background of problems solved - without that, as a consultant, you're just a warm body occupying a seat.
Indeed consultancy should be based on experience with previous projects.
Simon Lee Shugar (Software Developer) www.simonshugar.co.uk "If something goes by a false name, would it mean that thing is fake? False by nature?" By Gilbert Durandil
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Pete O'Hanlon wrote:
a warm body occupying a seat
This must be the very definition of 90% of consultants-
~RaGE();
I think words like 'destiny' are a way of trying to find order where none exists. - Christian Graus Entropy isn't what it used to.
I dunno: if they are sitting down you can find the buggers - and then the lack of useful knowledge is exposed...
Those who fail to learn history are doomed to repeat it. --- George Santayana (December 16, 1863 – September 26, 1952) Those who fail to clear history are doomed to explain it. --- OriginalGriff (February 24, 1959 – ∞)
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How can you be a consultant if you haven't got any practical experience? To be a consultant you really should have a background of problems solved - without that, as a consultant, you're just a warm body occupying a seat.
Pete O'Hanlon wrote:
How can you be a consultant if you haven't got any practical experience?
I always thought the term consultant meant unemployed. I don't know about other countries but in the US that term is so generic it doesn't actually mean anything, at least in my experience.
There are only 10 types of people in the world, those who understand binary and those who don't.
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How can you be a consultant if you haven't got any practical experience? To be a consultant you really should have a background of problems solved - without that, as a consultant, you're just a warm body occupying a seat.
No mate, a consultant is a person who borrows your watch to tell you the time.
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Pete O'Hanlon wrote:
How can you be a consultant if you haven't got any practical experience?
I always thought the term consultant meant unemployed. I don't know about other countries but in the US that term is so generic it doesn't actually mean anything, at least in my experience.
There are only 10 types of people in the world, those who understand binary and those who don't.
RyanDev wrote:
I always thought the term consultant meant unemployed.
And still they take fatter paychecks... haha Well I always thought the same but as now am pursuing MBA, I can actually see the importance of consultant which we software engineers don't usually understand. For me at least, I want be out there instead of sitting in front of computer and coding day in day out.. Saying that, I will not get rid of programming so easily. I have plenty of my own projects that I can work on..
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How can you be a consultant if you haven't got any practical experience? To be a consultant you really should have a background of problems solved - without that, as a consultant, you're just a warm body occupying a seat.
Pete O'Hanlon wrote:
How can you be a consultant if you haven't got any practical experience?
And how will you get that experience ? You have to start somewhere. I am working as a software developer but at my free time I have offered my companY to help them solve Business/Finance/IT related issues. And also pursuing MBA from one of the top business school helps. I think if I plan properly I can get enough experience to land into top 4 consulting company after I graduate. But still not sure what roles can I look for as a I don't want to leave IT and want to use both (Software Egineering & MBA) degree in my next role.
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Pete O'Hanlon wrote:
How can you be a consultant if you haven't got any practical experience?
And how will you get that experience ? You have to start somewhere. I am working as a software developer but at my free time I have offered my companY to help them solve Business/Finance/IT related issues. And also pursuing MBA from one of the top business school helps. I think if I plan properly I can get enough experience to land into top 4 consulting company after I graduate. But still not sure what roles can I look for as a I don't want to leave IT and want to use both (Software Egineering & MBA) degree in my next role.
You get that experience by doing the pre-consultancy jobs. I have seen many companies that have flown in these "fresh out of university" graduates and I have yet to see one who has had the experience to back things up when it all goes pear shaped. The best consultants I've ever worked with have all had extensive business exposure beforehand.
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You get that experience by doing the pre-consultancy jobs. I have seen many companies that have flown in these "fresh out of university" graduates and I have yet to see one who has had the experience to back things up when it all goes pear shaped. The best consultants I've ever worked with have all had extensive business exposure beforehand.
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I think you are right. May be I need to look for per-consultancy jobs after graduation and then move into proper consultancy role. It's bit complicated than I thought. :doh:
That sounds like a good plan to me.
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Hi, I am planning a switch from software development to IT consultant role once my MBA is finished. I still have 2 years to go and in a position where I need to select my electives for 3rd sem. I am now starting to do research, what all options are there for software developer to move into consulting. Will it be a difficult move and what all challenges I need to face and what electives will be useful. Any IT consultant here who can give bit of advise on this? Thanks
"Consultant" is so vague a term, and may actually be understood very differently depending on whom you are talking to. In our company, IT consultants = people who answer the hotline when I have a problem with Excel. I doubt this is what you are planning to do as a job. So first piece of advice : know what you want to do exactly. Evaluate how much time you would like to code, how much time you would like to do meetings with people, how much time you would like to try and find new contracts. This will then define what type of consultants you want to be. I was being sarcastic in my other post about consultants being useless meat, but good consultants are precious - I use them here sometimes to introduce organizational changes, just because the ideas are taken more seriously when coming from someone with a tie who is not from the same company. But I digress, good consultants can really be helpful if they bring a lot of experience with them. I'd never hire someone with <10 years business experience if I want to get support on a project organisation. I might hire someone with 5 to 10 years experience if I, for instance, only want technical help. Second piece of advice : be prepared to sometimes do the wrong thing. Consulting is a business, and you should prepare for the case where the customer decides against your idea and you have to implement what he wants.
~RaGE();
I think words like 'destiny' are a way of trying to find order where none exists. - Christian Graus Entropy isn't what it used to.
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How can you be a consultant if you haven't got any practical experience? To be a consultant you really should have a background of problems solved - without that, as a consultant, you're just a warm body occupying a seat.
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Hi, I am planning a switch from software development to IT consultant role once my MBA is finished. I still have 2 years to go and in a position where I need to select my electives for 3rd sem. I am now starting to do research, what all options are there for software developer to move into consulting. Will it be a difficult move and what all challenges I need to face and what electives will be useful. Any IT consultant here who can give bit of advise on this? Thanks
If you can convince companies to hire you as an IT consultant straight out of an MBA, you're in the wrong profession. You should go into politics or be a used car salesman.
CQ de W5ALT
Walt Fair, Jr., P. E. Comport Computing Specializing in Technical Engineering Software
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No mate, a consultant is a person who borrows your watch to tell you the time.
And then keeps your watch as his fee!
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Hi, I am planning a switch from software development to IT consultant role once my MBA is finished. I still have 2 years to go and in a position where I need to select my electives for 3rd sem. I am now starting to do research, what all options are there for software developer to move into consulting. Will it be a difficult move and what all challenges I need to face and what electives will be useful. Any IT consultant here who can give bit of advise on this? Thanks
AndyInUK wrote:
what all challenges I need to face
Consultancy isn't about technical skill, it is about business skill. Can you talk to people? Can you respond politely even when someone (customer) is bordering on being abusive? Can you sell yourself? Can you create a plan that allows you to make money? Do you know how to structure contracts to insure that you will be protected from legal actions. Etc... You will not succeed unless you succeed at the business skills. But, even if your technical skills are lacking you can still succeed if your business skills are good. As for the other comments that seem to suggest you don't have enough experience, even if that were true, there are many small businesses that need a bit of help and can't afford a highly skilled person.
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Hi, I am planning a switch from software development to IT consultant role once my MBA is finished. I still have 2 years to go and in a position where I need to select my electives for 3rd sem. I am now starting to do research, what all options are there for software developer to move into consulting. Will it be a difficult move and what all challenges I need to face and what electives will be useful. Any IT consultant here who can give bit of advise on this? Thanks
I think says it all :) Consulting[^]
