Note: For years I’ve been the most widely read columnist in ManagementConsultingNews.com. When I turned in this column, from the high seas no less, the editor told me that he doesn’t allow people in the news to be used in columns, even when non-partisan, as this one. He said I could skip this month or write a new one. (I have been doing him a favor, of course, writing for free all this time.) I told him there was another option, and that was that I’d simply end the column. You’ll find below a non-partisan lesson for consultants from watching Ms. Palin. I hardly think that intelligent consultants would find this inappropriate, and I see no need to “protect them” from contemporary examples. So such articles will now go on the blog, where I happen to know the editor quite well.

Why Sarah Palin Holds Lessons for Consultants

I don’t care what your politics are—I’m an independent and don’t know for whom I’ll vote yet in November—the Republican vice presidential candidate has a great deal to offer to consultants as a role model.

Whoa, you’re awfully confident!

The most important aspect of her presence is that she exudes confidence. She was on the greatest stage of her life with a minimum of preparation (or even notification) time, and she conducted herself as though she had been doing this weekly, for years. (At times, her TelePrompTer failed to provide the top two lines of a passage, and she simply extemporized them to lead into her point.)
Picture the consultant in the formidable office, in front of the dominant personality, without much opportunity to prepare. I’ve seen meetings and read follow-ups from too many consultants who profusely thank the prospect as though they had been granted an audience with a medieval emperor, bowing and scraping and happy to have escaped, instead of eager to go back.
Ms. Palin wasn’t intimidated. Failure on her part (and some people would claim she’d failed no matter how well she did, as though if she walked on water they’d merely point out that she can’t swim) would be severe for others, yet she didn’t succumb to what could have been crushing pressure.
Why? Well, she has terrific language skills. She has a close and loving family and a clearly wonderful support system. She has a track record of success in lesser venues which she could extend to this grander one. And she didn’t let the inevitable microscopic scrutiny of her life and family put her on the defensive.
Can you create that?

How do you do all that?

Moreover, she has a diverse life. She has interests and hobbies. She shares some interests with her husband, but not others. She has elected to raise a family. She decided to be a maverick—a contrarian—in her political positions.
She’s very threatening because, in a time when some claim that a woman can’t have it all, she is making a mighty fine argument that you can.
She eliminates excuses and just gets things done.
I would suggest to you, again, irrespective of politics, that consultants could do a lot worse than develop and adopt these traits. You can’t be intimidated, can’t be a sycophant, can’t be obsequious; you need a diverse life and multifaceted support system; must develop superb communications skills, and the ability to extemporize; extend prior successes to current and future environments; and not be afraid to fail.
The prospect is not your superior. Your failure to engage in a relationship will not endanger the fate of the civilized world. Your time is a valuable as the buyer’s. You are not “taking,” you are giving. You are involved in a collaborative act, not an adversarial one. No one can make you fail except you. It doesn’t matter what the inevitable critics say, all that matters is that you tried your best.

And so….

Could you have performed as well as she under those conditions? If not, you need to arrive at a point where you could. Is that unreasonable? Ms. Palin is from a small town, with a lot of demands on her time. She’s “everyperson.”
Top consultants have been in pressurized environments with powerful people and critical audiences. That’s when they perform best, when the chips are on the table and the deadlines draw near. Adrenaline flows and a sense of urgency prevails.
Don’t simply watch the performance of people in the spotlight and assume they are better than you, or better supported, or more carefully prepared. Put yourself in their shoes. Could you perform? Could you pull it together?
Most of the Hollywood stars I’ve heard speak are functionally inarticulate, in that they are accustomed to scripts and directors and simply reshooting errors. They are completely unaccustomed to performing “live.” You and I perform “live” all the time, just like the politicians. That’s not going to change, so we might as well get good at it.
Oh, yeah. Ms. Palin has an 85% approval rating among her constituents. Do you?

© Alan Weiss 2008. All rights reserved.