Consulting life

This section describes a week that one of our consultants, Daniel Goodacre, experienced while working on a performance improvement project at an international manufacturing company.

Monday

The week begins at 8 am at Euston station, where I meet my Project Manager to catch the train to Blackburn. We're visiting one of our client's manufacturing sites, to meet the UK Managing Director and to assess the site performance. In the previous weeks we have visited their seven other facilities across the UK. We first spend an hour updating the Managing Director on the project progress, then take a tour around the site to get first hand experience of the equipment and people working there. Upon returning to London, we discuss where improvements could be made to the site.

Tuesday

I meet my Project Manager at Canary Wharf to travel out to the client's offices. Tomorrow I will be facilitating a workshop to generate new revenue stream ideas for the UK business so I am spending today preparing for this. Preparation involves a number of tasks: analysing competitor products, calling the client's product development managers in other countries to see what products are in the pipeline and preparing a presentation as the basis for the workshop. When my work is completed, I check into the local Marriott, have dinner with my Project Manager and catch up on some of the football at the hotel bar.

Wednesday

After breakfast in the hotel, I head to the client's office to everything is ready for the workshop. Though the workshop takes most of the day, many useful ideas are generated and it's my responsibility to ensure that they are all well documented, while also maintaining a smooth flow through the agenda. Once the workshop finishes, my Project Manager heads off to the airport. I will be joining him tomorrow, but this evening I have a project dinner with my past project team to celebrate the successful conclusion of our previous project. Here I catch up with my colleagues from that project over a fantastic dinner.

Thursday

With a strong cup of coffee to start the morning, I am at City airport by 7:00 to take the first flight out to the Netherlands. There I meet up with my Project Manager and my Dutch colleagues, who have also been working on the project, in our Amsterdam office. We have a Steering Committee meeting tomorrow, so today is predominately spent preparing for it. However, I also have to make a couple of calls. One is to the UK Manufacturing Director, to discuss the feasibility of the ideas that were generated at the workshop, and the other to one of our client's customers, to get an external perspective on the business. With all of this to be done, it's a hard day in the office and we don't get the final documents printed until well into the evening.

Friday

Holding the meeting in our boardroom, we host the client's management from both the UK and the Dutch parent company. I field a couple of questions on the new revenue streams and by lunchtime the presentation is complete. The afternoon is spent documenting the meeting outcome and planning our actions for the next week. At 18:00, it's time to join my Dutch colleagues for their office drinks. This is a great opportunity to meet all of the different people in the office before heading to the airport to catch the last flight back to London.