Commandments for Consultants (Part 3 of 3), Silverlight Courseware, 44 Ideas for Managing in Turbulent Times, Hot Courseware

Commandments for Consultants (Part 3 of 3), Silverlight Courseware, Managing in Turbulent Times, Hot Courseware

Wow, What a Month.

To help you manage through the current times, we have some good content, as well as a special money saving offer. In this issue, we have:

• The final installment of a three part article on how to work with customers when delivering training and consulting
• Silverlight Courseware--Our featured courseware title
• An article by Tom Peters on Managing in Turbulent Times
• A list of the top-selling and new courseware titles

In addition, to help you and your business, we have free shipping on orders of over $500. To find out more or to place your order, call me at 800-866-9884 +23.


Dan McCabe
Director of Training Sales
Intertech

Commandments for Consultants (Part 3 of 3)

Commandment 3: Create a risk plan.

Even with a clear upfront assessment, unexpected problems and project creep can occur. One way to minimize these risks is to anticipate and write down all the things that might go wrong in advance. This written document becomes your risk plan.

It allows both consultant and client to calmly discuss — before the heat of pressing deadlines or overextended budgets are bearing down — how unforeseen circumstances will be handled.

The risk plan should specifically describe to the best of the consultants’ ability what the time and budget implications will be if the deliverables get expanded due to one or more of the risk scenarios coming true.

Commandment 4: Provide frequent deliverables.

Consultants should not expect clients to enter the murky “trust me” cave. That cave is dark and leaves a client feeling worried and insecure about the wisdom of its consulting investment.

It’s much better to provide updates or deliverables within short cycles. This iterative approach really shines a light on the health of a consulting project and encourages greater accountability on the part of the consultant.

Skip the heartburn Commandment 5: Don’t over-promise.

Bet yet, under-promise and over-deliver. As a consultant, I understand the subtle pressure to make unrealistic promises to a potential client. You want their business. You want to impress them by making your consulting services sound more appealing. But there’s a problem with this: You have to deliver.

If you can’t, you’ll eventually lose that client anyway. It’s a much sounder business practice to only promise what is realistic and to build a client’s trust over time.

My company once lost a lucrative software development project to a consultant who promised to deliver the moon on a silver platter — all for the cost of a hamburger on a paper plate.

Needless to say, that vendor didn’t deliver and the client was left with heartburn. We ended up being their second choice but that relationship started off on an honest footing and continues to this day.



Silverlight Courseware

Silverlight 2.0 is a web-based GUI toolkit based on the WPF programming model. Intertech’s Complete Silverlight 2.0 will examine this new API beginning with the topics of XAML, code files and Silverlight 2.0 development tools. Attendees will learn about the Silverlight 2.0 programming model, control templates, data binding, graphical rendering services, the ASP.NET Silverlight controls and browser interactions.

Learning Objectives

• Understand the Silverlight 2.0 programming model and XAML
• Learn to build custom user controls
• Work with data binding
• Work with animation and graphical rendering

Full Silverlight Courseware Information...

44 Ideas for Managing in Turbulent Times

I have prepared a decidedly un-profound set of “tactical rules” for weathering the storm—and maybe coming out ahead. Named after Nassim Nicholas Taleb’s profoundly important book, The Black Swan (the highly unexpected nasty event), this list is presented below, and, along with a discussion of “the eternal basics,”...

Download the article...

The Hot List

The top-selling courses purchased by training firms throughout North America and Europe.


Hot Releases
1. WCF Courseware
2. WPF Courseware
3. LINQ Courseware



Upcoming Releases

• Spring Courseware


• Hibernate Courseware

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