Part 2: How To Become A Consultant
Welcome back for part 2 on how to become a consultant. As a brief recap in the last post we talked about two ways to get into consulting. One way was to work for a company that does consulting and the other way was part-time. Today I’ll give you a good tip on part-time work and also tips for starting your own consulting business.
When you are first starting out it can be hard to get some good references for your work if you have done little consulting. If you are doing part-time consulting and want some easy work on the weekends then volunteer.
By volunteering your services to local charities, not only will you get some practice as a consultant but you can now ask them to be your reference when you are applying for projects which helps a lot when you are first starting out.
Full Time Consulting
As a general rule when you first start out as a consultant you should give yourself 6 months to find a client if you are starting from a dead stop. Ideally you would want to start prospecting before you leave your old full time job.
Also you should try and save 6 months of expenses, so you are not forced to make decisions based on desperation.
By having as much of a cushion as possible you and allow yourself to not take just any job that will come along, but when you are first starting out sometimes anything will do.
I took the first job that came along and it was a mistake. It took too many hours, did not pay enough, and due to the fact of it being a time sink, I had a lot of trouble prospecting for other projects.
Treat your first 6 months as a consultant as gold. Work hard everyday trying to find new projects. Make new contacts and get your name out there, this is how you become a consultant.
