Alan’s Books

The Million Dollar Consulting™ Toolkit: Step-by-Step Guidance, Checklists, Templates, and Samples from “The Million Dollar Consultant” This is a compendium for beginner or veteran covering what to consider, possess, or create for a successful practice, with specific examples and templates to incorporate. There is also a web site established by the publisher to use for downloads of many of the forms, exclusively for book purchasers. From travel to invoicing, and from life balance to sales calls, this incredibly rich resource will never leave your desk. Why reinvent the wheel when Alan has already test driven the car?	The SECOND Great Big Book of Process Visuals: or, “Son of Process Visuals”This book will be released in December.The book contains another 50 process visuals with description, rationale, and a CD appropriate for any platform which can be used to transfer the graphics to your own work.	Life Balance: How to Convert Professional Success Into Personal Happiness: The seventh and final book in The Ultimate Consultant series is a book for everyone, whether you’ve read the prior six or not, and whether you’re a consultant or not. This is Alan’s most definitive work on a subject he’s become passionate about: blending life, work, and relationships into a holistic, fulfilling existence. The book contains over 40 interviews submissions from the over 5,000 readers of his highly popular “Balancing Act” newsletter, and hundreds of techniques from Alan on Life, Work, Relationships, and achieving Synthesis. A rare book perhaps the only one in this depth on the subject.
Organizational Consulting: How to Be An Effective Internal Change Agent: Alan’s only book written expressly for internal change agents, human resource professionals, trainers, and others who want to become more effective in internal change initiatives. The book outlines strategies to overcome poor credibility and staff “stigma,” and to form effective, peer-level alliances with line clients. It includes methodologies, internal marketing, overcoming obstacles, and when and how to disengage successfully. A must for anyone choosing a career in organizational change.	Great Consulting Challenges And How to Surmount Them: This sixth book in “The Ultimate Consultant Series” provides the wisdom Alan has gleaned from his own practice–and from other veteran consultants–to help overcome both persistent problems and the challenges of reaching the next level of success. It is separated into the four major focus areas: Marketing, Sales, Delivery, and Practice Management. In each section the book provides specific techniques (40 in total) as well as case studies and contributions from successful practitioners to illustrate how to avoid being sidetracked, derailed, and impeded in your pursuit of excellence.	Process Consulting: How to Launch, Implement, and Conclude Successful Consulting Projects: This is the first and most likely the only book that Alan Weiss will ever write on the methodology and techniques of consulting. This fifth book in “The Ultimate Consultant Series” is crammed with the detailed approaches Alan uses in all major aspects of consulting, from executive coaching to strategy formulation.
How to Acquire Clients: The fourth book in “The Ultimate Consultant Series” from Jossey-Bass/Pfeiffer focuses on the acquisition of new business, of more concern for consultants today than ever before.In How to Acquire Clients, “Million Dollar Consultant” Alan Weiss takes you through each step of his highly successful – and accelerated – selling sequence. He discusses various types of buyers, the range of styles to expect, and how to adapt to each buyer’s needs.	Value-Based Fees: How to Charge-And Get-What You’re Worth: This is the third book in the seven-book “The Ultimate Consultant Series.” It contains everything Alan knows about value-based fees, a concept he pioneered over a decade ago. The book explains, step-by-step, how to create value based fees and how to present them to every new client (and how to convert existing clients). It includes 60 specific techniques for increasing fees, discusses the intricacies of retainers at length, and even enables you to create fee progression strategies. You simply can’t maximize your margins without the sage advice and pragmatic techniques in this unique book. There is no other like it.	How to Establish a Unique Brand in the Consulting Profession: Powerful Tecniques for the Successful Practitioner: This is the second book in the new “The Ultimate Consultant Series” by Alan Weiss, published by Jossey-Bass/Pfeiffer. It is intended for the solo practitioner, small firm owner, and partner in a larger firm.How to Establish a Unique Brand provides practical techniques and cost-effective approaches to create a unique position in the profession, to draw prospects to you, and to accelerate your ability to gain the credentials of, first, an authority and, second, a celebrity.
The Ultimate Consultant: Alan Weiss’s most sophisticated book on all aspects of consulting, The Ultimate Consultant is the first of a seven-book comprehensive series on consulting for the solo practitioner, small firm principal, and large firm consultant.The book includes detailed techniques in the areas of acquiring Fortune 1000 clients, marketing and publicity, passive income, joint ventures, international business, working with small clients and family owned businesses, managing time, life balance, and, of course, setting value-based fees.	How to Market, Establish A Brand, and Sell Service From Anonymity to Credibility to Celebrity: The total marketing book for any professional, entrepreneur, or independent business owner. This is the next in the series originated by the incredibly popular How to Write A Proposal That’s Accepted Every Time. In this work, Alan details in depth for the first time his “marketing gravity” concept, ranging from interviews, to networking, from the Internet to speaking, from pro bono work to products, and everything in between. This resource will increase your sales results while decreasing your marketing costs at the same time.	How to Sell New Business and Expand Existing Business in Professional Service Firms: This is the third book in the “Best Practices Series” (the first two were “How to Write A Proposal” and “How to Market, Establish A Brand and Sell Professional Services.” This final book focuses on the acquisition of new business and expansion of existing business for those selling professional services. The book covers high-leverage areas such as overcoming the basic resistance areas, maximizing initial sales, creating unique value propositions, using “turn-around” tactics, and establishing annuities.
How To Write A Proposal That’s Accepted Every Time The Practitioner’s Guide To Great Proposals: For the consultant, speaker, trainer, coach facilitator or owner of any professional services firm, this is the most comprehensive book on proposal writing available. It does not include boilerplate or legal contracts. It focuses on establishing a proposal based on value in collaboration with the buyer, so that proposals are summations, not explorations. Includes sample proposals, self-assessments, step-by-step methodology and more based on the large proposal acceptance success of Alan Weiss.	The Great Big Book of Process Visuals Or, Give Me A Double Axis Chart and I Can Rule the World: Written as the result of hundreds of requests to obtain the unique graphics that Alan Weiss has termed “process visuals,” this is a collection of 50 of his most potent visuals and graphics. The visual appears on a single page, and on the opposite page are details of its origins, rationale, application, and room for notes. There is also a CD ROM included, compatible with any platform, which enables the reader to directly insert the graphics into notes, reports, and various slide presentations. This is an invaluable asset to provide interest, humor, diagnosis, and fascination to speeches, presentations, sales situations, meetings, facilitation, and all related interactions with an audience, large or small, formal or informal.	Getting Started in Consulting: The comprehensive guide to beginning a consulting practice the right way, whether you have experience in the field or none at all. Includes information on home offices and conventional offices, initial funding, immediate marketing needs, avoiding “workaholism,” and a great deal more that even veterans claim would have made a huge difference if they had begun with an approach geared toward more rapid success. This book is an ideal reference work to test your planning and is also a classic Alan Weiss “cut to the chase and damn the torpedoes” kind of read. It’s also an outstanding gift for any friend considering the lures of entrepreneurialism. Save time and money and start the business the right way.
The Unofficial Guide to Power Management: An MBA in one book: a specific, detailed comprehensive work on the secrets of outstanding management within organizations, covering everything from the problem solving and decision making to conflict resolution and difficult employees. Destined to be the primary reference book of a new generation of managers. The is Alan Weiss’s only book on in-the-trenches, front-line management skills. Written for those who want to excel at management and for those who want to be expert coaches and counselors to management.		Million Dollar Consulting: The Professional’s Guide to Growing A Practice: This consulting classic and best-seller is now in its amazing tenth year, and is represented by a brand new Third Edition (2002). It remains the definitive work on dramatically growing a consulting business. For the single practitioner, small firm principal, or aspiring consultant. The section on fee-setting alone is worth the price of the book. Originally a main selection of the Fortune and Business Week Book Clubs. Specially requested by McGraw-Hill. Anyone serious about the profession must read this seminal book.
Money Talks: How To Make A Million As A Speaker: How to make it in the speaking business, one of the most dramatically growing professions in the world. The advice – on marketing, content, and platform skills – is equally valuable for the newcomer or platform veteran. The only comprehensive book of its kind on the speaking profession. Requested by McGraw-Hill.	Best Laid Plans: Turning Strategy Into Action Throughout Your Organization: How to implement strategy for any size organization, public or private, based upon the author’s actual strategy work. Most strategy does not fail in its formulation, it fails in its implementation. This book addresses that failing.	Managing for Peak Performance: A Guide to the Power (and Pitfalls) of Personal Style: Techniques for understanding and influencing others, including self-tests, instruments, guidelines, and checklists for assessing style. Translated into German. Useful for stress reduction, selection, decision making, and negotiating.
The Innovation Formula How Organizations Turn Change Into Opportunity: The classic book on the process of innovation, for the individual as well as the organization. Translated into German and Italian. Provides tangible, measurable means to identify, evaluate and implement innovative ideas, including the assessment of risk.	Our Emperors Have No Clothes: Incredibly stupid things corporate executives have done while reengineering, restructuring, downsizing, TQM’ing, team-building, and empowering…in order to cover their ifs, ands, or ‘buts.’A subject which has received little attention but deserves great analysis: for the last 20 years, American workers have been downsized, laid off, penalized, and otherwise battered, due mainly to mistakes made in the executive suite. Here are the procedural, pragmatic steps any organization can apply to assess how well it’s run from the top, and any employee can apply to learn about the competence of those in charge.	Breaking Through Writer’s Block: “Breaking Through Writer’s Block: Every Business Letter and Template You’ll Ever Need for A Thriving Professional Services Practice.” It comes with an accompanying CD for $75 plus shipping. The book and CD contain samples of proposals, letters of agreement, overdue collection notices, cold call letters, press kit contents, web page best practices, referral letters, etc. Over 70 examples, including “101 Questions for Every Sales Situation.”

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