Strategic Partners for Consultants

Collaborating with other experts is a smart thing to do. Getting the right partners on board will improve the speed and quality of your service and most importantly, enable you to focus on your greatest strength, i.e. providing HR expertise.

Accountant

While an accounting software helps you record accounting transactions such as expenses and revenues and prepare a set of accounts, an Accountant provides strategic advice by ensuring your business is compliant with  tax legislations and can offer advice on optimal tax planning. It also gives you peace of mind that an expert is taking care of your taxes.   

If you don’t have an accountant, get a referral from your peers or someone you trust.

Employment Lawyer

You’re not an employment lawyer, but many of your responsibilities and tasks as an HR consultant are related to employment law. Determining when to bring an employment lawyer into a discussion with your client or to review legally sensitive documents you produce can be tricky. Our advice is to include language in your independent contractor agreement that clearly states that you’re not an employment lawyer and certain work produced by you will require review by an employment lawyer or you can’t be held responsible for the consequences. 

Partnering with a good employment lawyers with reasonable fees is important. You want to establish an ongoing relationship with someone you know so that when your client doesn’t have an employment lawyer, you can recommend them. It will also accelerate outcomes since your employment lawyer will already know you, your documents, and the way you work.

As with any professional partnership, if you don’t have a regular employment lawyer, ask around for a referral.

Associates | Contractors

Who to partner can be determined by your weaknesses in HR For example, if your specialty is in recruiting and compensation, you might want to develop a relationship with an HR consultant who specializes in safety or benefits. Ensure that you never have to turn down a client because you’re concerned about a lack of knowledge in one area or another— partnerships fill in knowledge gaps and allow you as an HR consultant to take on challenges you might otherwise have declined

Don’t get stuck in a situation where you can’t take a business consulting engagement as the result of one of your partners not being available. It’s a good idea to have a minimum of three partners in each of the categories that you require frequent help in.

Administrative Support

As you grow your business, getting administrative support is inevitable. Are there tasks that you don’t like doing or you just don’t have the skill to do it well? When you feel small tasks such as booking travels or scheduling appointments are taking away your focus on growing the business, it’s time to look into getting administrative support.

Having reliable and efficient administrative support will allow you to concentrate on more strategic tasks that will help build your business. If you’re worried about the additional cost of an added resource, you can start out by getting part time help to gauge the cost/benefit of this new arrangement.