ALL CHAPTERS
Chapter Eight
International Projects
“Can you meet me in Lima?
- Ray Epich
In earlier chapters our story tellers told us a few of the things they did for love, but in this chapter we learn a few of the things consultants do for their firms and global clients. Like sucking on oxygen bottles in the middle of the night, high up in the Andes on a mining company project, or spending the days passing frog-selling locals on the roadside who look suspiciously zonked on coca leaves. All the time, reminding each other, “Remember, we’re doing this for the firm.”
In today’s economy, international consulting grows more and more prevalent. It can be among the most diverse and rewarding of experiences in the consulting repertoire. It can also be trying or, on occasion, even harrowing. What we learn is that different rules apply. You’re dealing with different business cultures, different expectations, and different sets of problems. In some countries, for example, seeking outside consulting services might be looked upon as an admission of failure. Something must be going wrong with that company! Accordingly, a consultant might learn that selling a project by sharing what the firm did for a past client is considered inappropriate, and a sure way not to clinch the sale.
Elsewhere, the business culture might have weaker traditions of using consultants, being less inclined to believe any consultant knows more than they do. How to overcome such mindsets becomes a different kind of challenge. There can be other hurdles to leap, too. Like mandatory evenings spent together carousing and imbibing, as a right of passage to the client’s trust, if also the next morning’s regret.
Basically, different rules apply and you have to be prepared. From South Korea to Russia, Mexico, Uganda and beyond, here our contributors tell us how they did it.
Going Where the Money Is
Our firm got into overseas work by accident. A good friend of mine from Citibank went to Europe to run their Italian operation. While he was there he ran into a problem, so he asked me to come over for a couple of weeks to help out. That was the birth of our international practice, which is now close to 40 percent of our revenue.
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