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Monday, 9 November 2009
Free waste consultancy for North East SMEs
If you're a small to medium sized business (<250 employees, not more than 25% owned by a bigger company) based in the North East of England and you'd like a couple of days free waste consultancy, then drop me a line in the next couple of weeks. There's a couple of forms to fill in, but that's all.Labels: environmental consultancy, terra infirma, waste
# posted by Gareth Kane : 09:27
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Wednesday, 10 December 2008
Five stupid questions I get asked about environmental consultancy
1. Why would a hard pressed business be bothered with the environment?I reviewed 26 environmental health checks I carried out over the last two years for companies whose activities range from catering to pharmaceuticals. The average financial saving identified from waste minimisation, water conservation and energy efficiency measures was £175 000 per annum. Next question.
2. Would your clients reduce waste if it didn't save them money?
Frankly, I don't care. My job is to improve my clients' business performance by addressing their waste, energy, raw material and water issues either for direct economic/legislative benefit or to improve their environmental reputation. I don't expect them to start hugging trees or wearing sandals.
3. Are you not rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic?
My priority as a consultant is to meet my clients' needs rather than save the planet, but from an environmental point of view, in my career I have diverted at least a half million tonnes of waste from landfill into further economic use. Energy/carbon-saving benefits have been delivered on a similar scale. And there are thousands of other environmental consultants out there…
4. Is this not just a fad?
No. Environmental legislation has been tightening since the Clean Air Acts of the 1950s. They said it was a fad in the 60s, the 70s, the 80s, the 90s and this decade too. It ain't going away.
5. Should you really be profiting from the environment?
Why not? I'd rather make profit from preventing damage to the environment than causing it.
Labels: energy, environmental consultancy, rant, waste
# posted by Gareth Kane : 07:30
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Thursday, 13 November 2008
Beware the old 'Bait & Switch'
I'm on the train back North having attended the Skillfair Consultants Conference in London - I go every year to learn from other boutique and solo consultants with a wide range of skills and services. One of the great grumbles at these sessions is the perception of the 'big name consultancies' as low risk compared to smaller operators, when the smaller operator will be cheaper, and, more importantly, you will always get the principal consultant working on your project.The old trick of buttering up a client with senior staff until signing the contract and then appointing naive beginners to deliver the project is known in the trade as 'bait and switch'. I recently heard a first hand account (from the frustrated client) of a case where the client wanted to compare the carbon footprints of their numerous but similar sites. The well known firm they employed dropped a different team of juniors into each site (thus maximising fees in a short timeframe) and, lo, each team measured the footprint of their designated site in a different way rendering the comparison useless. Would a one-man-band have done the same? Very unlikely - it would be very inefficient to invent multiple methods - and they wouldn't stay in business for long if they were so incompetent to do so.
The moral of the story is that big isn't always better. Choose carefully...
Labels: carbon emissions, environmental consultancy, environmental consultants, rant
# posted by Gareth Kane : 17:38
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Wednesday, 29 October 2008
A Game of Two Halves for Environmental Consultants
The ENDS Report has found that the Environmental Consultancy business is realigning itself to match the changing economic situation. Contaminated Land, traditionally the largest market in the sector, has tanked due to the slow down in the construction industry, but the cost cutting sector (energy, waste etc) is booming as industry tries to cut costs and the public sector continues with the sustainability agenda.Labels: environmental consultancy, environmental consultants
# posted by Gareth Kane : 08:06
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Wednesday, 1 October 2008
FreeIndex Business Advice Centre
FreeIndex.co.uk launch their Business Advice Centre today - you can ask any question on running a business and get advice from a panel of experts.Along with fellow environmental consultant Anthony Day, I've been appointed as the expert for green office queries.
Other topics include marketing, sales, web advice etc etc - there's a wealth of expertise waiting to answer your burning questions, so why not check it out?
Labels: environmental consultancy, expert, freeindex
# posted by Gareth Kane : 07:26
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Friday, 15 February 2008
How not to employ an Environmental Consultant...
I recently requested tender documents from a large organisation who wanted a carbon footprint. They had a huge raft of different properties, a big fleet of vehicles and a complex supply chain. When I read the tender I was aghast. They wanted:- a "comprehensive report" on their carbon footprint.
- 3 ways they could reduce this by a stipulated amount.
- all this within 4 weeks (the same time they had given themselves to evaluate the tenders).
- the consultant to quote a daily rate.
I wrote back and told them this was unrealistic. I didn't explain why in detail, but here are the reasons:
- Daily rate: if you pay by the hour/day then frankly you are paying for the consultant to type slowly or hang around your premises chatting. It's the only way consultants can make any money out of selling their expertise by the hour, other than lying to you about the hours they've put in. The tight timeframe just encourages a larger team of consultants to work even more inefficiently - team meetings rack up those hours.
- Prescriptive methodology: if the person writing the tender has expertise in environmental consultancy, why don't they do it themselves? If not, and they need an expert, why not let that expert suggest their own methodology?
- 3 ways: what happens if it is 2 or 4 or 6?
- Comprehensive report: they must have some space on the dust collecting shelf to fill. Of course, given the daily rate, you'll make the slow typing consultant happy!
- 4 weeks: how does the client know how long a good piece of work will take? Will the client really be able to provide all the information in this timescale? Will all key staff be made available? Would a better study in 8 weeks not be, well, better? Given the complexity of the problem, it will take a reasonable amount of chronological time (as opposed to billable hours) to build an organisational model, collect data, interpret it, interview staff and develop solutions.
How about this as an alternative:
- Fixed fee: the incentive is for the consultant to work efficiently, not rack up billable hours.
- Flexible methodology: I like to engage the client's staff in solution development as a. they know much more about the business than I will learn in a few weeks, and, b. the recommendations are much more likely to be implemented if the staff have ownership. There was no scope for this in the Tender above as the client probably hasn't thought of it. I'm not expecting them to have either - I'm the one who's meant to know what I'm doing!
- Appropriate deliverables, discussed and agreed between consultant and client.
- Unless there is a very good reason for the tight timeframe, why not let the consultant suggest how much time they will need to deliver the project (the engagement strategy I mentioned above will take more time to organise).
This is not a rant against that one organisation - virtually every tender I look at has a similar approach. Which is one reason I've ditched tendering for work except in a few special circumstances. If I were buying consultancy I would ask consultants to send in a project proposal to address the highest level requirements (we want to cut our carbon footprint by X%) the way they think is best, shortlist and interview before appointing.
Labels: carbon footprint, environmental consultancy, sustainability consultancy
# posted by Gareth Kane : 06:50
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A highly accessible, practical guide to those who want to introduce sustainability into their business or organization quickly and effectively.
