Summa

As a newbie to the field of IT consulting, I am constantly observing my more seasoned colleagues. In my observation, a characteristic common among “good IT consultants” is that they are technology savvy. They are IT geeks and have a thirst to learn new technologies. They desire to be a part of the next big IT movement and spend their spare time - evenings, weekends, holidays acquainting themselves with new technologies, and creating mini projects to work on and learn.

Most of the “good IT consultants” I have met know what’s coming next in IT and what was not as successful as it was purported to be. They jump at every minor opportunity to debate on what’s hot in technology and what’s not, as if their life depended on it.

It is well known that the IT industry measures expertise via certifications. True to this IT spirit, many consultants live and breathe by their collection of certifications, and go out of their way to get certified. While certifications are a mark of a solid good old IT developer, just being technology savvy and certified does not make for that certain  “OOmph factor”, that makes a client seek and re-engage an IT consultant time and again.

That OOmph is clearly visible during the first couple of days of the engagement or re-engagement as the case may be. OOmph IT consultants give the highest of priorities to learning the business - the what’s, the why’s, business conditions, and rules such as - why X groups of type A can be a part of Group Y, and why X sub-groups of type A with feature C cannot. Their primary focus is the business, and they spend their time assimilating business knowledge, such as, objectives, requirements, conditions, rules, and all.
Within the first week, such business rules and requirements are clearly established and well-understood. With the technology previously under the belt and the business knowledge clarified, the OOmph is well established and our OOmph IT consultant is ready to provide more than a 100% business value to the client.

Clear understanding of the business and expertise in technology enables the OOmph consultant to have better insight into the client’s vision and requirements, allowing them to recommend improvements and advancements to the clients business needs. Recommendations can range from using different technology, developing more efficient use cases, speeding up the development process via different approaches, and much, much more. Such recommendations can only be provided by a consultant who not only knows the technology, but also has the OOmph to make the client’s business the sole focus and understand its in’s and out’s - thus bringing value, within a few days of starting the project and confirming once again that the client was ‘super’ correct in engaging or re-engaging them as the case may be.

In the first “Summa managed project” I worked on, the Summa team was re-engaged by the client to further extend an existing application that Summa had worked on previously. I was given a boarding document, detailing the history of the application, such as: why it was needed; how it was used; who used it; its business impact; why it was being extended; technologies used; and so on. I had the opportunity to acquaint myself with client’s business history and vision even before I started the engagement.

My first day on the engagement, I was given other documents (compiled by my senior Summa colleagues already onboard), with a glossary of business requirements, business rules and conditions explaining that X means that Y must be done, and so on. Having the business rules and processes clarified and the vision clear on day one, I could focus on what needs to be done and do it.

Our team at Summa works consistently to keep the OOmph factor going by following a number of best practices to keep our business knowledge updated. During the length of the engagement, our team keeps the business knowledge document current as these rules tend to change. This document is shared with the rest of the team and editable when rules change.  This document may be shared with the rest of the team by placing it on a shared drive accessible to all team members, sharing via your corporate accounts, or creating a wiki page to hold this information as permitted by your client. Other practices we follow at Summa include maintaining a glossary of most commonly used terms and abbreviations. During my first week on the engagement, I posted this list on my cube and constantly referred to it. I was soon familiar with the terms.  A couple of times during the first weeks, eat lunch with your team and discuss the business rules so people who don’t understand have a forum to ask clarify their doubts. It will also give you a chance to bond as a team.

These are some ideas to keep the business knowledge updated and foster team spirit, and these are indeed some of the practices at Summa that gives us the OOmph factor with a 90% re-engage track record, and that helps us stay true to the our motto of  “technology + business”.