The Trusted Advisor

Very interesting read for me. I hadn’t really learned much about the skills a consultants needs to cultivate. What I discovered is a lot of what I do as a product manager/ analyst are the same skills that consultants use. I need to be able to cultivate trust from my various stakeholders such as users, and leadership, in order to provide the best possible solutions, even if those solutions are outside what the user things they want.

I used to describe what being an analyst is like this.

“First I talk to users of a piece of software or functionality they want to update and ask them what they want. THEN I take those requirements, throw them out and determine what they NEED” This is of course overblown for comedic value, but least favorite phrase in the English language is “Because we’ve always done it that way”. But the only way to convince people that a better was is possible is by gaining their trust, that you hear their concerns, understand what they need, and truly want to help them succeed.