Presented at the Scandinavian IBM graduate conference. On how to become a trusted advisor, defining professional services and how to build your professional eminence.

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How consulting becomes artKim Escherch | @kescherich | @danmark50

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How to become a sublime consultant
• What happens in professional services?
• How to become a resilient problem solver?
• How to build your personal external eminence?

3. DISCLAIMER
I will partly use my own story as case.
I am JTI personality type INTP.
I am an introvert, socially handicapped,
hypersensitive, gifted thinker that builds
extremely complex logic models
of the world in my mind. From time to
time, the model is not in sync with the
world. It can be hard.
But…, what I can do, you can do.
Find your own personality type at www.16personalities.com

4. Kim Escherich
Executive Innovation Architect
IBM
• Internet of Things
• Artificial intelligence
• Smarter Cities
• Traceability
• Emerging technologies
• Big data
• Analytics
• Supply chain
• Food systems
• Agriculture
• Innovation
• Food activism (Foodpeace.org)
• Food startups
• Food photographer
@kescherich | @danmark50
/in/escherich
www.internetofthings.dk
Traceability and anti-
counterfeitsolutions for the
European flower industry
Global postal
monitoring using
active RFID
Traceability in supply
chain processes in
construction
Blueprint for
traceability in the
Swedish fishing
industry

5. When I’m not @ IBM
5
www.danmark50.dk
@danmark50
www.fremvirke.dk
@fremvirke
www.nordicbildung.org
@nordicbildung

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Once upon a time…
Consultants analysed,
concluded and reported
back on important
issues, where the
clients often did not
have the courage.
Today we implement.

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Five trends that
have changed the
professional
services* industry
within the last 10
years
* Anything that delivers customised solutions,
including technology

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10. PRODUCT PLATFORM
OPTIMISE
TRANSFORM

11. IBM Design :: IBM Confidential :: ©2014 IBM CorporationIBM Design :: IBM Confidential ::©2013 IBM CorporationIBM Design :: IBM Confidential :: ©2013 IBM Corporation 11
4. Design Thinking

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HOW TO
NAVIGATE?

14. Do you remember this? …or this?
Picking up your car from the repair shop

15. 15TRUST

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18. What is consulting?
§ The service is highly customized
§ You are selling yourself
§ Clients buy our personal characteristics as
much as our technical skills
§ Sales approach differs across business
systems
§ People don’t primarily trust institutional
entities, they trust other people
§ Buyers act differently across systems
Levelofrelation
CONSULTING
BUSINESS
SYSTEMS
Procedure
Grey hair
Brains
Level of customisation

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• I’m taking a personal risk
• I’m insecure
• I’m sceptical
• I’m concerned
• I’m exposed
HOW IT
FEELS
TO BE A
BUYER

20. T=
Level of trust
S
Self-orientation refers to you
and your level of egocentrism
1-S = Customer Orientation
C
Credibility has to do with
the words we speak and the
background and history we
bring into the relation
Reliability is about
what we do, our ability
to listen and react
+R
Intimacy refers to the safety
we feel when entrusting
somebody with something
+I

21. Clues about
excessive self-orientation
§ A tendency to relate their stories to ourselves
§ A need to too-quickly finish their sentences for them
§ A need to fill empty spaces in conversations
§ A need to appear clever, bright, witty, etc.
§ Inability to provide answers to a direct questions
§ An unwillingness to say we don’t know
§ Name-dropping of other clients
§ A recitation of qualifications
§ A tendency to give answers too quickly
§ A tendency to want to have the last word

22. The trust creation process is about listening with jumping
too quickly to the final conclusion, action, step, …
Engage Listen Frame Envision Commit
Engage the client in
an open discussion
about issues that are
key to the client
Listen to what is
important and real to
the client; earn the
right to offer
solutions
Frame the true root issue, without
the language of blame, via caveats,
problem statements and
hypotheses; take personal risks to
explore sensitive issues—articulate
a point of view; create by giving
away
Envision an alternate reality, including
win-win specific descriptions of
outcomes and results, including
emotional and political states; clarify
benefits—make clear what’s at stake;
be tangible about future states;
Commit to actionable
next steps that imply
significant commitment
and movement on the
part of each party

23. Expert vs. advisor: Difference is partly explaned by trust
EXPERT ADVISOR
Goal is to be right Goal is to help
Provides Answers Provides Understanding, Reasoning,
Insight
Solves Problem Helps Clients Make Own Decisions
In Charge / In Control An Aide to the Principal
Deals with Logic Deals with Logic and Clients’ Emotions and
Psychology
Decides Proposes
Works out of contact with client
(except at beginning and end)
Teams with Client throughout process

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Level of
Self-confidence
Level of competency
High
Low
Low High
Fireball
High performer
Pragmatist
Wage-earner
Under performer
Dunning-Kryger
Syndrome
Impostor Syndrome

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EMINENCE

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1. Know yourself
2. Know your stuff
(get to 10K hours asap)
3. Understand your passion
4. Have an opinion
5. Share your stuff
6. Never be lazy
7. Do innovative things
8. Be bold

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kim@internetofthings.dk

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Kim Escherich
escherich@dk.ibm.com
+45 2880 4733
internetofthings.dk
@kescherich
/in/escherich