Successful Independent Consulting: Turn Your Career Experience Into a Consulting Business

by Douglas Florzak

Overview

Presents a clear road map for starting and maintaining a successful consulting business. Whether you are already a consultant or thinking about becoming one, this guide has everything you need. This book shows you how to: - Create a business plan - Set your rate - Select the legal form of your business - Set up retirement funding - Choose appropriate insurance - Market on the Internet - Understand basic record keeping Also included is a recommended resource list and sample worksheets to help you start and maintain your consulting business. If you are an experienced professional at a crossroads in your career, this book can point you in the right direction.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780967156545
Publisher:	New Year Publishing LLC
Publication date:	09/19/1999
Series:	Successful Independent Series
Pages:	224
Product dimensions:	6.20(w) x 9.12(h) x 0.53(d)
Age Range:	18 Years

Table of Contents

1. Overview of Consulting

2. Consulting in Your Field

3. Drawing From Your Strengths

4. Creating a Business Plan

5. Setting Your Rate Structure

6. The Legal Form of Your Business

7. Insurance

8. Retirement Funding-The Hidden Benefit

9. Tips for Setting Up Your Home Office

10. Marketing Strategies

11. Interface Materials

12. Marketing on the Web

13. Marketing to Agencies

14. Creating a Marketing Plan

15. Basic Record-Keeping

16. Proposals and Contracts

17. Delivering Your Service

18. Final Thoughts

Bibliography

Recommended Resources

Sample Worksheets

Index

Editorial Reviews

The great American dream for many people is to own their own business. Successful Independent Consulting provides a simple, yet detailed outline for developing a business in one of the fastest growing, lucrative markets for skilled professionals: consulting. Florzak does a good job of addressing the most intricate details for developing a consulting business. He also offers his personal experience of becoming self-employed as a consultant and providing well-researched information that is applicable to the process.
Florzak is realistic: "the decision to voluntarily leave a paying job and start a consulting or other business is the most difficult career decision you can make." He then goes on to share his process of moving from a corporate employed computer programmer to a self-employed, technical writing consultant.
Successful Independent Consulting is divided into eighteen informative chapters. Paragraph headings, bold print, italicized points make this book quick reading and easily referenced. The author, additionally, provides many full-page examples of "creating a business plan" from mission statements to assets; "marketing strategies" and other suggested materials and formatted worksheets. There are even chapters that cover difficult legal and financial issues of taxes, health/life insurance and retirement funding. This book does a thorough job of discussing the unknown aspects of starting a consulting business thereby removing much of the fear of moving forward into self-employment.
Making a new business profitable is of utmost importance. One of the most important components of successful consulting is getting the "word out" about one's business. Florzak states, "marketing skills are the most important skills you need to succeed as an independent consultant." Five chapters in Successful Independent Consulting are devoted to strategies of marketing. Marketing is divided into two categories: passive and active techniques. Passive techniques are marketing strategies that do not require personal interaction such as listings in Yellow Pages, web pages, membership directories, etc.; active techniques require interaction such as cold calling, networking, public presentations and other hands-on processes.
Successful Independent Consulting is not a book bogged down with legal terms or financial script, but communicates necessary information in a refreshingly quick and to-the-point manner.
—Foreword (December, 1999)

McDonald