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Kevin C. Whelan

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January 31, 2023

Are consultants glorified cheerleaders?

Someone the other day joked on Twitter with me that advising was more like being a cheerleader than a builder.

I chuckled and then disagreed.

Good advisors don’t just bring encouragement and access to your brain for advice. We do that, too, but that’s not all we do.

Good advisors typically have a long history of building. Of doing execution work for years—decades in some cases.

Eventually, they graduate from that part. They stop laying every brick by hand and start leading instead.

The good ones use their expertise to deliver templates, examples, resources, referral partners, and even an operating system for how things can get done the “right” way.

Like a therapist—you wouldn’t expect them to go out and solve your interpersonal challenges for you, right? That’s not their role.

Sure, it can feel like you’re showing up naked sometimes when you have nothing but your ideas. But even if that were the case and you didn’t have all the assets and materials, it doesn’t matter.

What matters is whether you can successfully transport your clients to the place they want to go.

The reality is, we’re in the transformation business. The only difference between advisors and “builders” is that our role in the building is not based on using our hands. Anyone can be hired to do the hands work if the blueprint is drawn out effectively.

Our job is to help our clients get a result in the best way we know how. That’s it.

(And sometimes, that might even include a little cheerleading if it’s required.)

—kw

P.S. If you’re looking for some website inspiration, my friend Tsavo updated his top 38 consultant websites list and included me on it. It is worth a look if you’re looking to improve areas of your website.

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