Why Every Consultant Should Offer a Gap Analysis Proposition

Whether you own a $1m consulting firm, a $10m firm, or operate as a solo practitioner, your initial approach to a typical client engagement is probably some kind of gap analysis, done to identify the performance improvement potential for your client and to enable the delivery of change. However, are you delivering it in a structured, well packaged, easily repeatable, high value, low risk way to win more sales and grow your firm?

The fact that you do a gap analysis is probably true in whatever field of consulting you work; strategy, HR, change, programme, operations, financial, economic and environmental, marketing, BPR, risk, IT consulting, engineering consulting, or tax and audit consulting, or almost any kind of consulting. For the purpose of this article, Gap Analysis is a catch-all term, you may not recognise it so substitute it with any of these, or a term of your own that best describes your method of grabbing the attention of a prospect …

Health check.
Assessment.
Diagnostic.
Best Practice Benchmark.
Excellence Model.
Audit.
Discovery Methodology.
Capability and Maturity Model.

If it is not true and your first intervention is not some form of gap analysis to identify performance improvement potential for the client, then it may be that you are one of the few examples where this does not apply, or perhaps it does but you have not thought about the sale of your service in this way! Perhaps you try and get your prospect to 'eat an elephant' to your service in one go. If you do then consider the idea that a high value but keenly priced entry level gap analysis method could win you more clients faster.

How a gap analysis and performance improvement service helps you to sell more easily and increase fee rates, break through glass ceilings and scale your consulting business faster …

A gap analysis and performance improvement proposition can transform your sales because clients have an insatiable appetite to know how well they are performing against perceived best practice. They want to know where their gaps are and to have a clear set of priorities to improve. So if in your domain of expertise you can differentiate your business with a proposition of this kind, then you will stand out in the crowd and win more clients.

Also, only by addressing the issue of scalability can sustainable growth be achieved. Most consulting businesses get started through the 'expert knowledge' of one, or two consultants and their relationships with a small number of key customers. While this may be lucrative on a small scale, growth can only be achieved with more experts and more connections. This is exhausting and unsustainable. Whilst an 'expert' can walk into a new prospect or client and instinctively know where to look for problems, what the solutions might be and the benefits that will derive from working with you, less experienced consultants (though knowledgeable of the industry) may not be as capable. Once the 'expert' has worked successfully with the client, the business can find it difficult to maintain a dialogue and sell on more services without the expert's deep involvement.

Well structured, packaged and delivered, a gap analysis and performance improvement proposition can:

1. Grab attention, get more leads and close sales quickly because clients see it as a low risk taster of what you are capable of.

2. Increase the clients' appetite to extend your engagement because they can visualise and measure the value created over time.

3. Help you price on value not time, because clients get a high return for a small investment.

4. House the expert's knowledge, locking Intellectual Property (IP) into the business so that your reliance on one expert is reduced.

5. Provide the basis for ongoing work with clients, as they re-measure their performance to track progress towards their goals.

6. Create a focal point for your community, sharing best practice and positioning your business as the thought leader in your niche.

In summary, a well structured gap analysis assessment can dramatically transform your ability to stand out in the crowd and get more sales. By using this approach you can pack an enormous amount of value into a very short period of time, thus enabling your client to feel the depth of your expertise without risking too much up front in terms of time and money.


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Tony Rice is a partner at Equiteq LLP, a consulting sector mergers and acquisitions (M&A) firm, specializing in helping consulting firm owners to succeed. Visit http://www.gapanalysistool.com and http://www.equiteq.co.uk for more information.