Question 1

The hiring of consultants has been to assist organisations at a time when additional
resources or specialist are needed. Explain the situations requiring consultancy skills.

Management and organization

If there is no one on the team with the necessary level of experience or depth of knowledge for a
particular role or project, it’s time to bring on a consultant. For instance, if you were trying to
assess the value of your company and no one on your team has done that before, consider
bringing on a valuation expert for this particular project. For example, if you want to change
your marketing strategy, an experienced person could give you the consulting advice you need.

Planning

A consultant has the right expertise. This is where it pays not only to be really good in your
chosen field, but also to have a track record that speaks for itself. For example, Riddle says he
knows that every client who hired him did so partly on the basis of his track
record. A consultant provides much-needed objectivity. Who else is more qualified to identify a
problem than a consultant? A good consultant provides an objective, fresh viewpoint without
worrying about what people in the organization might think about the results
and how they were achieved.

Development and implementation

A consultant can act as a catalyst for change. No one likes change, especially corporate America.
But sometimes change is needed, and a consultant may be brought in to implement the changes.
A benefit to the company is that the consultant can do things without worrying about the
corporate culture, employee morale, or other issues that get in the way when an organization is
trying to institute
change.

Operation/performance

A consultant can supplement the staff. Sometimes a business discovers it can save thousands of
dollars a week by hiring consultants when they are needed rather than hiring full-time
employees. They also can save additional money because they don't have to pay benefits to the
consultants they hire. Even though a consultant's fees are generally higher than an employee's
salary, over the long haul it makes good economic sense to hire a consultant. Another challenge
faced by small business is limited resources. You can make good use of the little resources you
have to grow your venture. A consultant will come up with a master plan that will see you make
good use of the little you have and establish a successful business empire. You should seek
consultancy services if you want to see improvements in your new venture.

Reviews

It can be difficult for a business to identify specific problems in their processes as they may not
be objective enough to look at themselves through a highly critical lens. Businesses need
consultancy services in order to obtain an external analysis of how their operations are working,
and where specific problems lie that can be fixed in order to maximize the organization's
productivity. Through consulting the board of company can make sure that the decision that are
being taken in the company are correct and that the performance by employees are on track and
up to the mark. Through a consulting body this job can be done. It is a way of assuring the board
that the work done has been double checked. A consultant may be hired to identify problems.
Sometimes employees are too close to a problem inside an organization to identify it.That's when
a consultant rides in on his or her white horse to save the day.

Independent audits

A consultant provides much-needed objectivity. Who else is more qualified to identify a problem
than a consultant? A good consultant provides an objective, fresh viewpoint without worrying
about what people in the organization might think about the results and how they were
achieved.Offices are often torn in politics and arriving at one decision may become difficult. An
outsider like a consulting individual or firm will give an unbiased decision on the issue which
can be accepted by other unanimously, at least most of the times. Often the companies go for an
outside help because they are not well equipped with labor force within the organization for a
particular area of expertise. Often the area of expertise is not required on a daily basis. It is not
cost effective for the organization to have a full time employee for matters that are not dealt with
on a daily basis.

Validation

Need for validation is important especially when it is coming from industry experts. We often
ask our elders if the decision we are taking in life is correct. Same way the offices try to connect
with the consulting agency to find out of the steps they have taken is going to be fruitful for the
growth and development of the organization or solve a particular problem as expected. Hiring
consultants has always been beneficial for the organization and that is why this industry has
grown so big today. If the service provided by consultants was anything that organization could
create on their own, then the industry would have ceased to exist. But that is not the case. There
is a benefit attached to hiring verified business consultants that is well appreciated by the
managements throughout the world.

Question 2
Critically analyse the four-step plan for developing consultancy services.

Establish client needs

Identifying customer needs is mission-critical for businesses looking to create a product that
truly speaks to their customers’ problems. Not to mention, the easiest way to position your brand
smartly in the market is to unite your internal teams behind the specific needs of your customers.

Do you feel the number of repeat buyers is low? To turn that around and grow your business,
you need to learn what your customers value most. In other words, discover what makes the
loyal customers loyal. Customer-centric companies are 60% more profitable(opens in a new
tab) than companies that don’t focus on customers.
While your business provides a solution to a need or problem, think about a typical customer’s
needs from an emotional perspective. Grow your business by better understanding the audience.

4 key elements to include in a customer-first strategy:

1. Identify what the customers want

66% of customers(opens in a new tab) expect companies to understand their needs and

2. Distribute feedback throughout your organization

Once you’ve collected data, build insights about your customers and share findings about them
with your teams. Use those insights to identify opportunities for improving your products or
services—and/or improving the way you describe them on your website—that make the
conversion path as easy as possible.

Conducting this type of research effort and sharing results regularly with your team will lead to
more proactive, strategic, and data-oriented marketing efforts, hopefully replacing more reactive
ones.

3. Create product/service features based on customer feedback

Suggestions and feedback from customers can make your products and services even better than
they already are, creating loyal customers who refer their friends to your brand.

Take Groove, for example. Groove is a SaaS help desk product that had an onboarding
problem(opens in a new tab) in the early going. Too many people churned after signing up for a
free trial because the process was confusing.

The team applied customer feedback to their onboarding process. In their first onboarding email,
customers were asked a simple question: “Why did you sign up for Groove?”
The email’s response rate improved by more than 300%, and the feedback from customers
helped Groove uncover features that customers wanted.

4. Collect further customer feedback on changes you’ve made based

Want to turn customers into advocates for your brand? After you’ve made improvements based
on customer feedback, it’s time to return to the first step to collect further feedback on the
changes you just rolled out. The customer knows best—there could be more areas for
improvement or a feature that didn’t quite hit the mark. Continue meeting their needs so they feel
valued.

(b) Clarify services

Clarification is important in many situations especially when what is being communicated is

A listener can ask for clarification when they cannot make sense of the speaker's
responses. Sometimes, the messages that a speaker is attempting to send can be highly complex,
involving many different people, issues, places and/or times. Clarifying helps you to sort these
out and also to check the speaker's priorities.

Through clarification it is possible for the speaker and the listener to make sense of these often
confused and complex issues. Clarifying involves genuineness on the listener's part and it shows
speakers that the listener is interested in them and in what they have to say.

ere are five reasons and examples as to why we need to be prepared to clarify when we are asked
to do something:
1 To avoid conflict in the workplace.

One of the causes of conflict in the workplace is agreeing to something you’re not sure about,
which, most of the time, results in misunderstandings. When accepting projects or tasks, it is
crucial that each party understands the impact of their involvement and how their actions affect
other people’s tasks and what is required of them.

2 To prevent being overworked or underworked.

The more immersed you get into your role, the more tasks and projects are entrusted to you.
When your immediate manager, supervisor or team leader gives you something to do in addition
to your current workload, always remember to clarify. Make a task audit and set priorities.

If you feel adding another task would compromise your work at hand, ask to move the timelines.
If it is urgent and needs to be completed as soon as possible, ask permission to delay your current
tasks until later. Otherwise, ask if somebody else to do it or delegate some of your workloads to
others.

3 To ensure everyone in the team are on the same page.

When meeting for a team project, the most important part is sharing ideas and asking questions.
Asking questions and clarifying expectations assist the team in gaining a shared understands of
their role in the project or task at hand. Clarifying makes sure that everyone in the team is on the
same page and sets the right expectations.

4 To prevent assumptions that may result in poor performance.

When people make decisions out of assumptions or execute tasks without clear direction, it often
results in inefficiency and project failure. Before accepting any projects or tasks, knowing what’s
expected of you is important and reduces your risk of mistakes.

If you think the instructions are vague or need more details from anyone on the team, don’t
hesitate to ask and clarify.
 Miscommunication in the workplace is one of the significant causes of project mistakes. When
people fail to clarify, be it about some project details such as timelines, design, language,
contracts, pricing, client instructions, etc., it can lead to additional costs or, worse, loss of the
project. Clarifying is about accountability. By clarifying everyone’s expectations and roles,
you’ll help build greater trust and increased productivity among the team. Practice clarifying at
work and encourage your co-workers to do the same. Ask, verify, and clarify because
unanswered questions are a hindrance to growth

(c) Formalise internal arrangements

In practice what processes should the Chief Internal Auditor (CIA) have in place to reasonably
ensure and demonstrate that threats to the team’s independence are suitably managed and its
work undertaken with suitable objectivity? The following are some ideas:

 Ensure that internal audit is suitably positioned within the organisational hierarchy; with direct
functional responsibility to the Board and administrative reporting line, ideally, to the Chief
Executive or other Executive team member which instils and promotes the audit team’s ability to
perform their duties without hinderance.
 Reflecting responsibility to Board; the Board itself should be engaged in the recruitment,
selection, performance development review, remuneration and removal of the CIA.
 Establish and formalise the terms of reference for internal audit, through the development of the
Internal Audit Charter; including purpose, positioning, responsibilities and authorities. The
Charter should be presented to Board (or typically delegated to Audit Committee) and approved
at least annually.
 The CIA should have the ability to make direct contact with the Chair of the Board (or Audit
Committee); through the sharing of direct contact details.
 The CIA should not have any other current management responsibilities within the organisation;
consideration should also be given to whether any recent past responsibility may pose a threat to
objectivity due to conflict, familiarity, bias or influence.
 Ensure that Audit Committee Terms of Reference include clear responsibilities and delegated
powers in respect of audit, risk and assurance back to Board.
(d) Awareness campaign.

Determine the awareness campaign’s focus. Awareness campaigns are either standalone projects
or hosted as part of national awareness days, months, or weeks. Gather insights on what would
motivate loyal consumers or donors. Create the right questions to gather insights to shape the
strategies and goals of an awareness campaign.  Enough time should be permitted for the team to
implement the chosen strategies for the campaign. The campaign’s timeframe should allow
momentum to build throughout the entire process. If a campaign coincides with an existing
national awareness day, week, or month, it is important to build the timeline around that date.
Consider the chosen audience and scale of the desired goals for standalone campaigns when
planning the timeframe. Starting or concluding the timeframe with an impactful event will help
capitalize on the chosen audience’s energy and help keep consumers engaged through the
entirety of the campaign. 

To design the most effective campaign, aim to create excitement and awareness with the chosen
audience. Choose one aspect of the mission to focus on to give the campaign a more engaging
level of specificity. This gives consumers a specific issue or topic to focus on, which reduces the
confusion that is often accompanied when using the entire mission. Eventually, as the
relationship with consumers grows, the broader mission can be connected to the initial focus.

Multichannel reach is essential for promotion and marketing plans during awareness campaigns.
Utilizing multiple channels to reach all chosen audiences helps drive more engagement to the
core campaign web page. The research will allow the campaign team to know where and how
chosen audiences want to engage with the campaign content. Specific audiences may prefer text
messages, calls, or direct social media messages. Regardless of the best reach method, it is
important to redirect the audience back to the central location website. 

When crafting the message for the chosen audience, the overall message must be clear and
defined. A mistake that can be made is giving the audience vague directions, as that quickly loses
their focus and attention. While awareness campaigns are useful for reaching broader audiences
and growing contact lists, it is easy to overload the audience with too many directions. This type
of campaign should focus on encouraging customers to learn more, not advertising for donations
or purchases. Those goals can be achieved later once the relationship between the business and
potential customers has grown.

Another common mistake is forgetting to actively measure the campaign progress during the
campaign. By the end, it becomes difficult to accurately measure the success of the campaign
without concrete benchmarks and key performance indicators determined in advance and
measured from the beginning. If the benchmark goal for a set date is not met, this will allow for
an adjustment to occur before the campaign is finished, which will help the overall success of the
project.