SECRET TRADECRAFT OF ELITE ADVISORS

An experienced consultant shares the fruits of his experience in this guide.

“The consulting life is a constant challenge,” Baker asserts in his book’s introduction. “You’re standing naked in front of people who’ve tried their best to figure it out but are stuck.” While readers will hope that naked is figurative, the author elaborates: “You are with them, but you are pushing them upstream into uncomfortable places.” In his many books, Baker has sought to zero in on the best advice he can give his readers to help them avoid some of the mistakes he has made. Here, he writes to his target audience of consultants and consultant wannabes, characterizing the types of individuals who’ll get the most out of his latest volume—they’ll have a quality about them “that makes people want to listen”; they’ll love money not for what it can buy but for the freedom it represents; and they’re terrified of irrelevance and thus always trying to reinvent themselves. Having been sufficiently flattered (are there any readers perusing this guide who won’t think all the traits Baker lists apply to them?), the audience is then acquainted with the four pillars of the author’s methodology: insight, objectivity, courage, and empathy. These and other concepts in the manual are so obvious as to be almost banal. Baker compensates for this not only with striking charts and Mills’ eye-catching illustrations, but also with a conversational, highly readable prose style that always feels blunt yet sympathetic. “Whether you warm to my suggested stages or not, I want you to recognize that you should change your practices over time,” he writes at one point about not getting frozen in old patterns. “If you don’t do that, you won’t step into the role that is waiting for you to claim.” He’s confident enough in the counsel he’s passing along to refrain from overselling it, and that’s quite refreshing.

A frank and clearheaded soup-to-nuts plan for better consulting.