Often when working with organizations in the process of change, I encounter what I like to call “a bucking horse.”  This is a person or group that seems to resist change loudly and forcefully and generally makes life difficult for those who are tasked to lead it.  For me it was a union that was convinced that the plan and process I suggested would result in their jobs being outsourced.

Resistance to change is a reality that challenges every leader and consultant at some point in their tenure. There are typical ways to deal with this, ranging from strong-arming the other party to rolling over and giving up, which are all about power and control. There is another way, though – more effective but hard to do – which is “staying close to the bucking horse.”   It takes patience and courage, and the willingness to make oneself vulnerable.  I personally experienced challenges to my reputation, many sleepless nights, and intense bursts of anger, self-doubt and hopelessness — unlike the cool, collected facilitator that I always wanted to portray.

Now What?

My client wanted her off the planning team, and my “loser self” was kicking in – really angry and wanting to teach Mona a lesson.  It would be so easy to do!  But I knew if that happened, we would be playing directly into her hand:  she wanted to prove that this was not an open and collaborative effort, that there was an underlying agenda, and that her union was not respected or accepted as full partners in the process. There were two things I decided to do:

• I convinced the members of the leadership team to double their effort in communicating with all staff to provide regular in-person updates, so that everyone (including Mona’s union members) would have the opportunity to hear directly from leaders and judge for themselves about the facts, the realities, leader motivations, and the emerging plans.
• I decided to get some help for Mona had figured out how to get to me.  I knew that I could compromise the entire project if I dealt with her poorly.  I realized that I could use some help to avoid getting personally enmeshed with this client.

With the help of a coach I hired for myself during this process, I began to see that I was confused in my interpretation of my role as a facilitator.  Usually, I saw my role as remaining neutral while working with often differing parties to forge solutions, which usually worked when all parties were faithfully engaged in the process.  However, in the face of active resistance and manipulation, staying purely neutral was not only unhelpful in this situation, but was also against my personal and professional values to let dysfunction go unchecked.  I realized I had to take an objective stance – that is, stating facts and realities, and pointing out patterns as they emerge, even if this information was not well received.

My coach helped me to detach my ego from the work that I was doing with this client, and to recognize when and how I needed to speak up.  This preserved my mental health over the next several months as the planning team started to shape the new organizational design.

The Crisis Comes

The defining moment came as I worked with the planning team to do a one-day “test drive” of the new organizational model with all staff and representative stakeholders – over 125 people.  The goal was to provide everyone with a sense of what a redesigned organization might look like, especially one that had a new and strengthened relationship with the community.   We wanted to get feedback on what processes needed to change.

I was told the night before that Mona was planning to stage a “walk out” to protest the changes.   I was completely disheartened.  There was nothing more I could do.  I braced myself for the confrontation. All morning I waited for something to happen as we walked through the various design elements and tested them out.   After lunch I noticed a buzzing in the hallway, as Mona and several other union leaders gathered.   Here it comes, I thought.

What happened – or better put, what did not happen – was amazing.  People were so engaged in the process that when Mona tried to stage the “walk out,” no one joined.   Even more surprising, Mona and the rest of her union leaders eventually came back into the room and began to engage in the process.

Two days later, the planning team gathered once again to adjust the new organizational model based on the results of the “test drive.”   We were stunned when Mona announced that although some people were “resistant” to change, she herself was fully supportive of the new direction.  Whether she fully embraced the change or simply recognized that her leadership was in jeopardy, it was not clear.   However, her whole demeanor had changed, and she was helpful and collaborative for the remainder of the workshop.  The “bucking horse” had stopped.

The Results

The next few years provided remarkable progress as the organization, the school district, and the community banded together to support children’s health.   Local clinics offered free immunizations to children at the start of school.  The school welcome center and the medical community worked together to get children connected to regular health care.  The school district received a sizable grant from the Centers for Disease Control to implement a new approach to dealing with chronic illnesses.   Within five years, the health of these school children was better than it ever was before, and no jobs had been lost.

When I think back on my time on this project and with Mona, I realize that in another life, I too could have made one hell of a union president.  She and I are both smart, driven, and passionate – she about her cause, me about my work – and I can be as bull-headed as she about what is important to me.  By the time we finished working together we had a grudging respect for one another.

The Moral of the Story

“Sticking close to the bucking horse” means recognizing that today’s opponent might be tomorrow’s ally.  It takes patience and courage, and the willingness to make yourself vulnerable in the process of change as well.

Fizz! How to Succeed as an Independent Consultant author Cathy Perme also wrote Confucius in My Cubicle: Practical Wisdom for the Leader in All of Us, released by Wisdom Editions.

These are such scary times, both personally and professionally,  that the easiest thing to do would be to crawl into a shell and stay there until everything sorts itself out. 

Unfortunately, life goes on and so must we, as we maneuver through this pandemic and try to come out whole on the other side of it.

Luckily, I’ve learned a few things over my 30 years of being in business, about how to weather economic realities that are beyond my control.  I’ve successfully survived the impact of the first Gulf war in 1991 (just a year after starting my business;) the Tech bust in 1998; 9/11 in 2001; and the Great Recession in 2009-12.  Here is what I am putting into my own playbook now to get through this unprecedented time;  I offer these “lessons learned” to you as well.

• Focus – on the Future
  • Prepare for a very different future
  • Consider the consequences of decisions for both short and long term to balance the needs of both
  • Continually scan to see what patterns are emerging in business/industry; think about what opportunities these patterns might present for you
• Invest – “plow the ground for the Future”
  • Now is the time to invest in marketing, building new skills, developing capacity, and expanding networks to be ready for a different future.
  • Get better at what seems to be looming in the future (technology?)
  • Don’t have a lot of money? You can still invest by volunteering time and effort in ways that provide new learning opportunities, community visibility, and expanded networks.
• Team up – and care for the people around you
  • Care for the people (customers, employees, community, vendors, etc.) that make your business a success. Now is the time to be generous with others.
  • Reach out to clients to maintain the relationship; find out what is becoming important to them
  • Now more than ever, it is also important to build partnerships and teamwork across businesses and industries to identify and shape new opportunities for the future.
• Stay Positive – and take care of yourself
  • Take care of your own mental health
  • Don’t be shy to apply for benefits and loans of which you may be eligible – it is not a personal failure!
  • Everyone wants to work with a winner – your attitude is your strength.

Invariably, there will be those who prosper in the year ahead.  Remember the Chinese saying, “The times produce their heroes.”   Best to you, and good luck to us all!

Fizz! How to Succeed as an Independent Consultant author Cathy Perme also wrote Confucius in My Cubicle: Practical Wisdom for the Leader in All of Us, released by Wisdom Editions.

When my publisher, Wisdom Editions, asked me to consider recording the audiobook for my recently published book, FIZZ! How to Succeed as an Independent Consultant, I thought, sure!  How hard could it be? I know how to read!

As it turns out, it was much harder than I thought – and I learned a lot along the way.   Here are my big insights:

• Diction is key! I learned how sloppily I pronounced words and how often I slurred endings. (Examples: “…in” instead of “…ing” and “ta” instead of “to.”) When talking face to face it is not as big a deal because we anticipate and read between the lines when conversing. However in an audiobook, proper pronunciation is important to get the message out correctly.
• Slow down! Again, this is different than talking to each other face to face, in which we have an advantage in interpreting meaning. Listening to a recording in which the speaker is talking too fast is like getting a firehose of information that is hard to digest quickly.
• Don’t breathe during recording. Okay, this one was hard to figure out, because I do need to breathe to talk! However, it turns out that listening to someone’s breathing on an audiobook is distracting. (Again, in real life we tune this out.) So, I had to learn how to breathe deeply before recording a section, and then pause recording to catch my breath again. Otherwise the producer needs to edit out the breathing and might inadvertently edit out other things as well.
• The microphone is very sensitive. At one point in my recording process, I was visualizing talking to another person and forgot that I also talk with my hands. Suffice to say the mic picked up the noise of little movements I was making with my hands as I went. Boo!
• It takes longer than you think! To record just one chapter of 5-7 pages would often take me at least 1-2 hours.  And with 36 chapters in five sections, it was a lot of recording effort. Also, I could not sit and vocalize for 8 hours a day and still keep my voice so this had to be spread out over time.  (I had planned three weeks in July, and really did not finish until Labor Day.)

I am happy to report that FIZZ! How to Succeed as an Independent Consultant, is now available on Amazon at http://smarturl.it/FIZZag and I am pleased with the result. It also comes with a PDF of illustrations that were described in the audio book, for visual reference.

This was such a great learning experience that I am planning to record my first book, Confucius in My Cubicle: Practical Wisdom for the Leader in All of Us sometime next year. Stay tuned!

Fizz! How to Succeed as an Independent Consultant author Cathy Perme also wrote Confucius in My Cubicle: Practical Wisdom for the Leader in All of Us, released by Wisdom Editions.

Welcome to the world of 24/7/365 – where the average leader and professional are constantly available via their smart phones, the piles of work are higher than ever before, and everyone is judged on how well they accomplish it on a timely basis.

As I write this, I am behind on deadlines for my audiobook, which I had agreed to finish recording by the end of the month (but had underestimated how long it would take!)  In the meantime, my calendar filled up with meetings and new things are coming up daily that need my time and attention.  I am feeling stressed and panicky wondering if I will be able to get everything done well and on time!

These feelings of stress and panic are normal.  They also make it hard to decide where to focus your attention, because everything seems to need your time and attention, right now!  So how do you handle it, if crawling into a box is not the answer?

Here are six practices that have worked for me:

1. Breathe!
   Take time to calm yourself.  If you can give yourself at least 10 minutes to breath and calm down, you will think more clearly.   Sometimes I have felt so panicked that I must force myself to do this by putting a timer on for 10 minutes, which seems to give me permission to take a break to calm down.  (Weird, I know.)
2. Evaluate the importance and urgency of your tasks.
   Stephen Covey in his book The 7 Habits of Effective Leaders talked about clearly evaluating a task by identifying how important it is, and then how urgent it is.   He then suggested a course of action, which I have used over and over to help me focus.  Using his model, I can sort out what is important and urgent (like client issues that must be addressed quickly) and set aside sacred time for the important but not urgent (like my audiobook).  In addition, I have learned to let go of things that are not important or urgent (by putting off “nice-to-do’s”) and/or looping in someone else to handle what is urgent but not important to me.
3. Reschedule or cancel meetings.
   Meetings are an incredible drain on time – not only do you need to show up for them, but often you need to prepare for them and follow-up afterward.   Take a look at the meetings you have committed to and see if you can free up some time to deal with the more important work on which you need to focus.  Here are some ideas:
   • Is it a meeting that you can temporarily post-pone? — i.e. important but not urgent.
   • Is it a face-to-face meeting that you can make into a conference call or virtual meeting? I’ve found that I can often cover the same content in a virtual meeting and save myself 1-2 hours – in both transit time and social time, since we get down to business faster in a virtual meeting.
   • Is it a meeting that one of your staff could attend instead of you? This might be a great way to offer development opportunities for junior staff.
   • Is it a routine meeting that you can possibly skip this week, or get out of altogether?
4. Determine the leadership style you need.
   Be careful about what leadership style you slip into when you are stressed and panicked.  Most leaders I have seen (and I often have this knee-jerk reaction myself) believe that they need to take control of the situation immediately!  Not so, especially if you have done the evaluative work above.

   If you move too quickly into a tell/control-oriented style much of the time, you will foster dependency and lack of accountability within the organization.   And if you constantly usurp your staff’s work with “this needs to get done today” demands, you will create an organization that reels from crisis to crisis and causes “burn out” and disengagement with staff.

   So, it behooves you to think carefully about what kind of leadership style you need to use to address an urgent and important situation without always taking control.  Who can assist with this issue?  Take the time to fully brief and discuss the situation with your associate or direct report, get some opinions, and clearly identify roles, responsibilities, and a plan to move forward.  Yes, this may take a little more time than just directing someone to do something.  And it may be one of the wisest investments of time and effort that you make.

5. Say “no” when you need to, and mean it.
   We all hate to disappoint others and go back on our commitments, but sometimes we may need to do so.   I recently told my audiobook producer that I wasn’t going to make my month-end deadline, and needed to negotiate a new one.   It is more realistic and honest than promising something that I cannot deliver.

   When it is clear that something is no longer workable, you need to find a way to extract yourself from it.  Talk to the other person and see if there is another way for the work to be accomplished without you.   Do take responsibility for your part, but do not take on guilt for doing this.  Almost everyone understands that life happens and most of the time we are not in control of it.

6. Schedule like a doctor.
   Although this is my last piece of advice, it perhaps should have come first.   Even if you are a busy executive, you need to carve out unscheduled time in your calendar to deal with the unexpected.  Much like a doctor who schedules routine exams months out but leaves time to deal with urgent needs and emergencies, you need to block out some unscheduled time in your calendar each week.

   If you have an administrative assistant, give that person instructions about how much to fill your calendar each week.  If you calendar your own time, set up calendar blocks that no one else can fill without your permission.

   Then stick to it!  If for some reason you have some free time to yourself, you can work on your “important but not urgent” tasks.

In summary, to be personally effective, maintaining your focus is important.   To do so, you will need to monitor and adjust your own tendencies in the moment, and put structures in place that assist your effort.
I hope these ideas are helpful – let me know what works for you!

Fizz! How to Succeed as an Independent Consultant author Cathy Perme also wrote Confucius in My Cubicle: Practical Wisdom for the Leader in All of Us, released by Wisdom Editions in 2017.

Been out of the office a bit lately, getting a new left knee.  (See it above, side and front views — doesn’t it look bionic?)  Normally this would just be one of those things in life that you have to take care of, but when you are in business for yourself, taking time off for things like this takes on new meaning.  There is no “sick time” when you work for yourself, no vacation time you can tap.  There is just a hole in your calendar where you could be billing if you weren’t in so much pain! 

Thus, one of the biggest lessons in  running your own consulting business — saving money well, and having a backup plan!  I have been anticipating this knee replacement since last summer when I decided to do it.  I carefully orchestrated my surgery with my clients so that I was finishing up with several key projects before I went under the knife (or in reality, the saw!)   I also squirreled away money for several months of living in case business was slow when I returned.  

When my daughter was young  and my parents were ill, I had agreements with several other trusted consultants that I could call them at the last minute to sub for me.  Several times I even paid them to sit around and wait for my call if I was expecting something to happen but did now know exactly when.  I always informed my clients about the possibilities in those instances and got their agreement in advance.  Only once did I actually have to execute my back-up plans — and because we were all so well prepared,  it went very smoothly.  The client was still happy, my colleague got some extra work, and I was able to breathe easy knowing they were well-served. 

So my question for all of you is — who are your “go-to” people if an emergency would strike?  If you can’t answer that question quickly, start thinking about your own back-up plan.  After all, life doesn’t intrude — its just life! 

Fizz! How to Succeed as an Independent Consultant author Cathy Perme also wrote Confucius in My Cubicle: Practical Wisdom for the Leader in All of Us, released by Wisdom Editions in 2017.

One of the biggest taboos between consultants is sharing what we charge, so let’s break it open and talk pricing strategy. Later I’ll post a survey to gather data (anonymously) about how consultants price so we can all learn from it.

Pricing yourself is one of the biggest challenges, because do you base it on what you want to earn? How you want to position yourself? What the market will bear? The value of your service? What others charge by comparison? I suggest this is a combination of all the above factors – and each needs to be considered to come up with a pricing strategy that works for you.

I would suggest the first step is figuring out how much you would like to earn, and then adjust based on the other factors. A long time ago I learned a great little formula for calculating that, and here is how it goes.

Let’s assume, for purposes of this example, that you want to make $100,000 per year, that you work in the US, and that you can office out of your home or other low-cost location.

• PLANNED GROSS SALARY: $100,000

• ADD TAXES and BENEFITS: Let’s say 25%. $100,000 + 25% = $125,000
  These might include the employer portion of FICA taxes, a SEP/IRA contribution, health and disability insurance premiums, etc.

• ADD BUSINESS OVERHEAD: Let’s say 20%. $125,000/80% = $156,250
  This is your cost of being in business, which includes office space, supplies, technology, phone and internet services, books and professional training, marketing expenses, etc. My experience in tracking this for myself is that it runs about 17% to 22% of my gross depending on my investments in technology and training that year. The result is the amount you would need as gross profit to get the salary you want to make. 
   
• UNADJUSTED HOURLY RATE: $156,250 / 2000 hours = $78.13
  This would be the rate if you could bill every single hour of your day, which is nearly impossible as an external consultant. Let’s assume 2000 hours. (2080 weekday hours in a year less 80 hours for a two week vacation.) 
   
• ADJUSTED HOURLY RATE: $78.13/.33 = $237 per hour /about $1900 per day
  This is based on a realistic assessment of how many hours you could actually bill. If you are an independent consultant who sells their own services, marketing takes time that is not billable. You also have administrative time in running your business, unbillable class time for your own personal development, etc. To be conservative, let’s assume that you can bill about 1/3 of your time, or about 8 days per month.

Thus in this example, your starting rate for further tweaking would be $237 per hour. In my next blog, we’ll talk about ways to adjust that based on how you want to position yourself and what the market will bear, so stay tuned!

Fizz! How to Succeed as an Independent Consultant author Cathy Perme also wrote Confucius in My Cubicle: Practical Wisdom for the Leader in All of Us, released by Wisdom Editions in 2017.