Great Professionals have Substance, Style & Stories

The world is full of professionals across disciplines of education, work, and life. Starting from a professional counselor helping departing couples reunite, to scientific advisors advising space missions. The spectrum is broad, and the sky is full of these Stars who help institutions, companies, or families.

Before hiring a professional, organizations embark on an evaluation journey, and they typically go through the following:

• Web Research: Start searching the web with keyword searches like "list of the best compensation structuring professionals" or "Consultants who help to downsize humanely." You should find out what is your one-liner.

• Specifics: They narrow down a list of people who best meet their criteria of selection based on the searches. Then they prepare a shortlist.
  
  

• Reach out: There are various ways through which people try to reach out. Phones, emails, LinkedIn messages, or a warm introduction through a contact that knows a prospective professional.
  
  

• Interview: Interviewing a consultant is where the rubber meets the road. Companies spend hours carrying out assessments to find out who will be the best Professional/Consultant for a given engagement.

The challenge for independent professionals largely remains in their lack of visibility. Our research shows that the most significant revenue source for consultants is repeat business, followed by new engagements through word of mouth. While these are the best ways to survive, today's world demands higher visibility for Professionals to sustain. The world is looking for experts with substance and style, and it is crucial to understand these two things in a little more detail:

• Substance

  The key competitive advantage for any consultant or advisor lies in their profound knowledge of the subject. The more, the merrier. However, it is challenging to enumerate years of experience, and it becomes even more complicated when there are hundreds of case studies backing such experiences. Typically, people try to make very long resumes and profiles and pack in almost everything they know, assuming that a wide net will catch even the most insignificant prospects. That's not true. Being specific and focused on the areas where they have a competitive advantage, and throwing enough light on those areas is a better way to calculate substance. With decreasing attention spans of hiring managers for Consultants and Advisors, it becomes all the more important for Professionals to focus on the vital few than the trivial many.

• Style

  If the substance is the pantry, then style is the recipe. People engage with Consultants and Advisors because they like their style and approach. They understand their essence much later through a series of conversations and engagements. Style is not just the mannerism or articulation skills of a Professional; it means the whole nine yards of methods, processes they follow, the way they dive into details, their choice of examples, and how they build the narrative of their case studies. Our research shows that Consultants who use the right style for a given situation become far more effective than classical monologues of wisdom distributed through slide shows. Case study methods are the most popular and widely accepted techniques. These methods allow for appropriate engagement and participation. However, not all meetings require participation. Some require intense focus. Therefore, in such cases, a well-crafted script and narrative delivered with theatrical precision cut the ice. Inspiring speakers are great performing artists. They have a deep insight into their subject and a reasonable understanding of their audience. Styles become best when the right tools or methods build the connection between action and actors, between audience and narrative. A great style gets the message home better than profound content delivered with average style.

Now that we have the armory of Substance and Style, how do we get into the battlefield of Professional engagements? The answer is simple. Create your Storyland. You may like to name that storyland as your brand. These are simple steps that will help build your brand over the next few months and years:

1. Refresh your LinkedIn profile and highlight your experience with nuggets of capabilities that will serve as the arrowhead for your potential prospects.

2. Build your website. Even if it is a one-pager, do not hesitate or procrastinate. Don't attempt complete perfection on day one. Websites mature over time.

3. Create a short 2-3-minute video of your profile that will take you straight to prospective customers' shortlist. Focus on your key strengths and not your resume. Make this exciting and seek professional help.

4. Build customer stories of your engagements. They will stand as testimonies of your capability and will also serve as living endorsements.
   
   

Most Professionals aspire to become famous and successful. Revenues and engagements are not the only measures of that success. We have found that celebrating a milestone in one's life by creating their own storyland is a great way to start or restart for leaving behind an evergreen legacy of presence. You have the mastery of substance, and you have mastered your style, now it’s time to tell your Stories.