Consulting Skills Learning Group Experience to Consult

Consulting Skills Learning Group Experience

To consult with someone means to be able to offer them your professional help by giving them the best professional advice considering the person's circumstances, however, there is more to being a consultant than just giving someone expert advice on how to handle their dilemmas. The Business Dictionary (2011) states that a consultant is someone who is experienced that gives expert information (usually through a company or service) that delivers his or her efforts in a counseling aptitude, yet they are not the ones that are reliable for the outcome of the results. Consultant jobs are highly considered when people and organizations need to come together and make changes in their company and how to eliminate problems. The Harvard Business School alone has a consulting commerce of over $100 billion in yearly profits in the United States and can range from consulting services in communications, business, human resources, marketing, small business, planning, computer technology, and other businesses that can require their services (Become a Business Consultant, 2011). However, I realized there is more to the job of a consultant than what people who are interested in this career may realize, and having an extensive training classes with others over an extended period of time made me realize how important it is to my career and to be more effective. After having the consultant training, I realized there was a lot more to it than just trying to problem-solve because there are three main roles in consulting and how important each person was, the class had a role-playing activity that helped me see a situation from each person's perspective,, and the learning group helped me recognize that there were other eye opening key components and mistakes that I made in training that I needed to understand to become an effective helper.

After having a span of eight weeks in three different sessions of the consulting skills learning group, I was able to learn what it meant to be more effective as a consultant because I was able to play the part of the observer, consultant, and the client even though I enjoyed the observing role. I was able to connect to each role by completely focusing mentally and physically to the scenario because the group was asked to share a personal experience with the other team members, and I was able to document and pay close attention to me and other group members body languages and tones, as well. Within the sessions, I had become a better listener and was able to carry out my ideas in an organized behavior that presented me with specific guidelines to give positive ending results with my classmates. In the class we recorded our activities, emotions, and thoughts and later analyzed how I responded and why, and it gave me time to look over my teammates reactions and why they would react with certain behaviors, and the feedback that each group received from the training was done by debriefing each meeting with a particular topic to consider.

In our consulting group we had a theme about help and resistance that was really helpful in helping look at how I was as I acted as the observer, consultant, and the client and helped me to alter my thinking on the three roles that I participated in. I considered how open I was to request help and how would the conflict to a specific subject that we talked about with my team member's aide me in the future and why and what others' resistances were to specific problems. I was able to form an opinion on the conflict communicated from myself to other members and looked at myself as the client and how clearly I could lead the consultant in the right direction, and I asked myself would I be able to give a problem in an intricate or more straightforward form like I understand an issue. I also contemplated on whether I would be prejudice about the team member who played the consultant who analyzed and gave me solutions to what information I gave them. Furthermore, I had to think about the solutions that were given to me as a client and ask were they reliable and multiple results or were they only a small amount of resolutions to help me resolve my dilemmas. Thinking about help and resistance and looking at this from the client's standpoint, I thought about the help I would want to receive such as a doctor, expert, process consulting or a combination. Taking these questions in to consideration as a client, I did not want to make any one in the class feel uncomfortable because I was worried about myself and the fear of being put in the same situation during the meetings we had, therefore, I did answer in a mono syllabus until I pushed further by the person acting as the consultant (Grosnick, 2001).

Having the opportunity to act as the observer and consultant, I was able to make some definite notes on playing in these two roles which were different than what I had originally perceived from the start of the eight weeks. I did realize that when there was a possibility of getting close to asking questions that could be hard for others in the group that the advice I gave did turn in a specific direction to where I knew and could begin to see the real issues and problems from the client. My consulting abilities were not expert material like I thought and needed some work; however I did not feel that I failed my client because I was able to give my client an issue to ponder. In not being able to fulfill my role as a consultant, I apprehended that as my role as a consultant I may not be able to provide all the answers to my client at first, yet if I can give some course it would assist the client in some fashion to analyze the concern in a different light. I thought to myself, in this role, could I offer the preeminent explanation for the problem, how I would begin to solve the problem, and the conflict illustrated by the client be tolerate? As an observer, it was an easier task and gave me a stronger belief as we tend to learn more and analyze a situation in a better way. I noticed some of the bigger resistances from the client came cross using different forms of resistance using silence, changing their tone, shifting their body, as well as changes in their emotions.

These three roles taught me to be a more effective helper as a consultant, observer, and client and then there is more to being a consultant like being a bridge builder between the issue and the solution. It takes one who would help lead the client to consider numerous ways and opportunities at tackling issues, and if not choose from a variety of options for the problems and concerns rather than forcing the client to choose to allowing the consultant to figure out what seems to be the best resolution. As an observer, I am able to look at the situation from a different point-of-view and can help both the client and consultant by looking at both sides unbiased and help them decide by thoroughly listening to everything that has been brought to the table. I can look at the body language and understand a client and consultants true emotions. As the client, I know that I can direct the consultant, as much as they can direct me, and that I need to be willing to use critical thinking know how I need help and my resistance.

Having the consulting skills learning group has really improved my skills to become a more effective helper because of the role playing the class did for the eight weeks, and it is an effect way for me to create effective consulting methods that can assist people and their endeavors. I noticed right off that in order to be effective in each of these roles I had to play the part in order to understand how to deliver the right methods of consulting, and that I needed to do more listening than anything. I noticed that the role playing made me look at my ability to pay attention to a person had improved from the previous lesson to the second activity, and if I am patient and wait to be spoken to and not speak while others are talking. I seen progress in my aptitude to share in my experience and if people were more open to what they were concerned about the solutions could be resolved more appropriately and being more comfortable in the group was the result.

In role playing, I seen I was more comfortable as the observer which I can apply effective methods of consulting by being a good listener and focusing on every detail that has been front of me to help me to assist others. I also knew that being in the other two perspectives would get better through experience yet the insights of the sessions really helped me prepare. Role playing scenarios were there for the class to get a full real life like demonstration of what consulting teams are like and how people act in the three positions and what we seen how these individuals have different personalities, thoughts, and emotions toward these situations. Some people are more functional in playing in certain roles than others because they have strengths in these areas that can make them a more effective helper. As a role player we see the different reactions between one another as a team, how the expressions from their faces, bodies, and other signs show what we are feeling toward the situation and one another. This was a great way for us to help one another through understanding the body language and non-verbal communication that was going on and it helped support how they felt to arrive at a resolution.

In carrying out the role of the consultant, I know that in the real world, I do not always have to talk to understand something and to help resolve an issue or look at a concern and I should allow the client to be able to have a lenient amount of time to express how they are feeling about their apprehensions. In trying to use consulting methods I would keep the client from straying away from the main problem and remember the value of the situation, and I should have an idea of the direction of the client before the first physical meeting to have an overview of the situation with enough time to do my own research of the situation. The idea to becoming more useful as a consultant I realized through being in this position because when the theme of Help was explained I thought, we are not as much as solution providers as we are a medium to help the client look in to their problems differently to provide options rather than solutions or advice (Gilmore & Krantz, 1985).

In being in these roles I came to see the effectiveness of how silence can sometimes be positive because it can give time for people in a scenario to have time to think about the situations to better help in the meeting. It is more effective to use silence as an observer to take note of ways the consultant can assist the client, and I seen how it was good to have an ice breaker by watching my classmates make small talk at the beginning of their sessions and give one another some time to get comfortable with one another. It was easier for the two of them to talk to one another when the situation was less stressful and the less pressure, and when the consultant asked the client to come up with the solutions for the issues the client they were more willing to discuss their situations. However, I did see that the consultant was under pressure and the calmness had left, and they spent their time focusing on a result as soon as possible but the body language the and tone were neutral and did not have any resistance to the open ended questioning.

In being a role player in this class, I was able to focus my attention on details of every person on the team and help pick up on communication that was broken between two team members I was studying or someone I was interacting with. I began to learn how to pick up on the changes in the directions of questions from these roles in order for people I were interacting with to become more comfortable in the situation. In being able to participate in this activity I was able to review each of the sessions, and the by the end of the sessions I was using greetings, become warmed up with other groups and members and not jump straight in to the problem. I understand that there can be a lot of emotion involved in these situations because some consultations will be more difficult than others depending on the situation and there must be some kind of resolution.

Being a consultant I realized after having this training and group sessions that there were a lot of things that went on that I never realized, I needed to make changes to the way I addressed situations, there were certain situations that were going to be more difficult, and what I could change to be an effective learner. Matter-of-fact, the class had some very different outcomes than what I had perceived, and I should have been listening more rather than taking notes because I know that I missed out on some pertinent information. I did not realize how much emotion I would put in to the class, but I did and learned a lot about myself and the way others feel diverse and similar about certain things such as ethics, beliefs, and resolutions. One eye opener for me was that I related back to my own past experiences as I listen to others talk about their own issues and that being quiet and coming up with my own ideas can help me assist others. From the start, I was taught not to be judgmental about any situation that came up, and I had a better understanding and familiarity about the true scene and in an a consulting environment. I was able to focus on three different dimensions of consulting and to remain calm and open minded to the other two people I was in the group with.

One of the most important skills with any of the three roles were listening to others no matter what position I was in and how hard it could be to ask for help and how people showed resistance and help the group up from getting a clients conflicts resolved and to quickly and effectively come up with solutions. As a consultant, I know there will be times when I need help even in that position, and I must be willing to ask for it from my client if they are being indecisive and unbending to the conversation. I discovered that as a consultant I build bridges between myself and the client and look to the observer for their opinion on a given situation, so we can all three come up with solutions for the client, however, from the clients' true feelings of what is the most effective ways to resolve his own issues.

When we have an active client, we have a chance of increasing the possibility for success because they can become excited about reaching their own goals in a better frame of mind which can affect everyone for the better. I see my qualities in assisting the client because their issues are what are at stake and that is going to be a main priority for me in the future, and by working on my communication and approaching the people I assist we can come up with a plan of action to help the client do what they need to get done. In looking at the feedback of the client role, I realize how in control the client can be in a group, and it is up to the consultant to help the client warm up to participating and feeling comfortable in their own skin so they will be open to discuss possibilities without resisting or holding back important information. I can use this group in my advantages in the future to help me when I am involved with these kind of conflicts in the future and remember to make some important notes recording my emotions, the problems, the reactions, how can I help, what is the client resisting, the opinion of the observer, and other past experiences to be more of helping in my career.