Spotlight: Becoming A Trusted Advisor

But, how do I get experience if no one will hire me if I don’t have experience? This is the classic question that is thrown around every APA and Midwinter Conference. Emerging Professionals and students consistently ask this question. And, consistently there are not many answers except, “Try and get some experience.” In this article we are going to try and offer some practical considerations for gaining experience in consulting and breaking into the field. Below we provide you with our stories, two that are being written right now. One of us just finished his PhD (RF) and the other is her last stages of the process of finishing her PsyD (RR). The both of us have been fortunate to gain consulting experience along the way. Therefore, we are confident that we can offer some practical considerations to help young professionals and students break into the field. With that being said, we thought it might be helpful to students to describe the paths we have taken thus far. We also talk to two psychologists, Natalie Monarch and Toral Desai who have recently broken into consulting.

Back to The Consulting Psychologist™

Richelle’s Journey: When I Grow Up, I Want to Be an Organizational Psychologist!

This is certainly not a profession that we mentally prepare for as children. It has taken me some time to find my passion for the field of consulting psychology, and is taking even longer to become a contributing, working professional in the field.

After a lot of reflection and getting involved in two important program evaluation projects while working on my masters in counseling, the decision to pursue a doctorate in organizational psychology at Rutgers University was an easy one. I have been trained in the tradition of Clayton Alderfer (my program chair) and in the theories of Wilfred Bion, Larry Hirschorn, A.K. Rice, David Berg, and Kenwyn Smith.

My program supplements in-class learning with applied experience. I have also tried to gain additional experience through various practica. Some of my work, thus far, includes: executive coaching and training with a large pharmaceutical company, executive coaching at a small non-profit, organizational diagnoses for a human service organization and health clinic, the revision of criteria and creation of a workshop for the Healthy Workplace Award, and career counseling with individual clients. In addition, I have learned a great deal from my volunteer work as the D13 Grad Student Co-rep to the Executive Board and as an Alumni Board Member at Carleton College.

I am in a unique position of not being bound by the “match process” for the pre-doc internship in my program. It seems that most people in my program accumulate hours through project work or find a job in the field that they will be able to count towards internship. And, so my journey continues; I am now working on my dissertation and looking for internship opportunities.

Eventually, I hope to soon be working in an external consulting firm. I look forward to the autonomy, variety, and continued learning—a life-long journey.

Rob's Journey: Relationships: If You Build Them, Consulting Opportunities Will Come!

I chose to use the term journey because it certainly has been a long adventure. There have been a series of pathways to choose from, a series of hills to climb, a series of valleys to rest upon, and a series of forks in the road where I asked directions. However, I would not change a thing. My journey has afforded me formal and informal training that I believe has put me in a place to be selective when I enter the traditional field of consulting.

I studied Athletic Counseling and Sport Psychology under Drs. Petitpas, VanRaalte and Brewer at Springfield College. When I was at Springfield I learned the art of creating and deepening professional relationships. These skills would prove to be essential as I continued my graduate career. I knew that I enjoyed consulting and had a strong interest in business consulting. I began to apply my sport psychology knowledge and experience to the workplace. At first, I contacted my friends who had jobs in the business world and asked them if they could arrange for me to come and speak about performance excellence, team building and or stress management at their office. Eventually, I got to a place where I began to charge for my workshops. However, the important part wasn’t making money, it was making the contacts and gaining confidence in my skills.

I then attended VCU in Richmond, where I studied Counseling Psychology with a subspecialty in consulting. I took courses in group dynamics, group therapy, leadership, and consulting. I also was fortunate to work for Workplace Initiatives, a consulting firm affiliated with VCU. Here I spent four years as a consultant and developed competencies in coaching, leadership development, program development, the 360 process and a whole lot more. I consistently pursued unique opportunities that would add to my resume. In my beginning years I often created and facilitated workshops for organizations and businesses that employed my friends and colleagues. This gave me a platform to gain confidence and experience so I could continue to develop as a performance consultant. I often relied on my experience in performance enhancement and applied sport psychology methods such as team building, goal setting, positive self-talk, imagery and visualization in the workplace.

My formal education was helpful, however, what seems to have really paid off was the genuine relationships. I made sure to attend every sport psychology conference and APA since I was in graduate school. I also began attending the Midwinter Conference where I was able to learn who was who in consulting and what consulting firms were out there. A key aspect for me was not to just attend the conferences, but find a way to present as many times as I could. By presenting I was able to meet many more people and build my own confidence.

Now I am in a place where I am interviewing at a number of consulting firms. We shall see how the journey continues, however, I have a good feeling by the time you are reading this I will be working with a firm.

Here are some tips I can offer that have allowed me to gain experiences in consulting while I was in graduate school:

Now that you have learned about the journey of two people who are in the “gaining entry” phase, we thought it would be helpful to learn a bit from two young and talented consultants who have already gained entry into a consulting firm. Dr. Natalie Monarch is a Consultant with Sommerville Partners and Dr. Toral Desai is a Consultant with Right Management in Philadelphia. We asked them a few questions that we felt were relevant to breaking into consulting. Below we provide you with some themes from their responses as well as some insights from others who have offered them.

What skills did you find were most helpful when you started out as a consultant?

Natalie: Two skills in particular were vital to me as a new consultant - listening and self-confidence. As I listened I realized that my clients were providing me with valuable insight into how I could be helpful to them, what they needed in terms of challenge and support, and what was truly important to them and their organization. In addition, once I realized that my years of education and clinical work were directly applicable to consulting, my confidence soared. That increased confidence was entirely apparent to my clients and allowed us both to focus more on the hard work at hand.

Toral: Having a clinical background, many of the interviewing and diagnostic skills that I learned in grad school transfer very well to the consulting world. Being able to realize that I had these skills allowed me to gain confidence quickly, and served as a building block on which I could develop other consulting skills. Another set of skills (which I feel are critical in any line of work) are the ability to work with a variety of people and personalities, and harness relationships with the people on your team.

Natalie: Persistence and humility - both can take you a long way in this field. When I decided that consulting was the right fit for me I pushed and prodded until I found someone willing to educate me about the field, someone willing to teach me the ways of the work. Humility helped me to gain experience with new and different clients. I was very candid about how little I knew, but persistent in my requests for opportunities to learn.

Toral: I would second persistence. Additionally, the ability to take initiative and create opportunities for learning in all possible arenas. Many people were helpful in giving me information about the field and letting me take part in small projects in a variety of ways – it was what I tried to learn from all those projects which helped me to gain experience in the skills I was building.

Natalie: I started off by speaking with a number of seasoned consultants - both independent consultants and those in firms. I then identified a firm that clearly fit with my interests, personal style, and values. After that, it took an investment of time and a commitment to persistence and creativity. I asked for a chance to gain any bit of exposure to the field and built on each opportunity thrown my way. I built relationships and followed up every experience - all of which I was grateful to receive!

Toral: I started to speak with independent consultants and firms during graduate school to understand what the field was like, and what was needed to gain entry. In talking with consultants, I began to realize the type of work I wanted to do, the work environment I wanted to be in, and the areas that I needed help in. I continued these conversations after graduate school until an opportunity came in which my needs fit with the company.

What advice do you have to offer to students and emerging professionals who are attempting to break into consulting?

Natalie: First, I would suggest doing a good deal of soul searching and be very clear about the reasons for you interest in this field. If, after that due diligence, it seems this is the type of work you most want to do then you need to share that with decision makers. I think consultants want to offer people who are deeply serious about transitioning into the field as much information as possible. Unfortunately, the number of opportunities is fairly limited. It is important to connect to decision makers or well-established consultants who have the ability to truly be advocates for you. This field really operates on an apprenticeship model so wise mentors are hugely valuable.

Toral: Get yourself connected and involved with as many consultants that you can to understand the type of work that is out there, the experience that you will need, and the type of people that you want to work with; the more you know about yourself and the field, the wiser you can be about seeking and creating particular opportunities.

We also thought that some of the following resources may be helpful as you begin or continue your journey as you break into consulting. Please keep in mind that we will be presenting this information as well as much more along with former Society President, Dr. Dick Diedrich at the Midwinter Conference.

Congratulations to some of the emerging professional members of the Society of Consulting Psychology who we are aware have broken into consulting with the last few years:

It is quite possible that other emerging professionals who are members of the Society have recently broken into consulting. Please be sure to let us know.

Thank you for reading and we hope that this provided you with some insights as well as motivation to take action and break into consulting. Please do not hesitate to contact us (Rob@holdthedoor.com or richellereyes@excite.com) with any comments, questions, or concerns.