Consulting for Business Sustainability by Galea Chris;

Author:Galea, Chris;
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Taylor & Francis Group

Selling an attractive product to interested clients is still the key challenge

The experience with PREMA® in more than 30 countries has shown that, wherever PREMA® could be applied, it worked well, as shown by an evaluation of nearly 300 companies, and led to clear benefits from the point of view of economics, environment, organisation and workplace health and safety.14 However, the PREMA® approach still does not ‘sell’ easily by itself or by the mere dissemination of case studies, documentary films (Karpe 2003; GTZ 2007b, 2008), development cooperation agencies or marketing events. This phenomenon is not specific to PREMA®. To our knowledge, other sustainable business consultancy products with similar objectives, but different approaches, all face the same problem.15

Some of the reasons for the difficulties faced, which we have experienced in the field, include the following:

The attraction of labels such as the ISO 9000 and 14001 sets of standards is very high, even for SMEs, as they are, on the one hand, demanded by customers who seem to be satisfied with the existence of a certified management system even though no minimum performance is required to receive it: for example, in the form of the implementation of Good Housekeeping measures in the company. On the other hand, many companies prefer not to have to immediately raise their performance but to get a manual produced mostly by external consultancy and postpone measures until the implementation of an (environmental or quality) programme has to be shown to a review team. The analysis of companies certified by well-renowned certifying companies, for example in Vietnam and Tunisia, illustrates the need for an ISO-plus approach where the establishment of the ISO management system would include the compulsory implementation of basic Good Housekeeping improvements

In markets where development cooperation donors are financing programmes with completely free-of-charge training and consultancy (e.g. mise à niveau in Maghreb countries), even the ‘guaranteed’ profitability through PREMA® is not easily sold. Why should companies pay for a (even superior) product, if there is a free lunch financed by ‘other people’s money’?

The proliferation of products or, worse, mere product differentiation (every year, ‘old content’ appears with minor innovation in the consultancy market with appealing new labels)—caused by various incentives in the development cooperation system—has a confusing impact on potential clients; some even jump from one training to another without ever implementing anything

‘Selling cheap’ has proved that ‘cheap’ products raise suspicions about their value. When consultants reduce training costs by cutting down on preparation days and working hours, using more standardised materials and less interactive, less tailored materials, this lowers the quality of the results achieved and downgrades the product—which gives the false impression that other approaches, which are more standardised and less systemic, are more valuable

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.