Consultations

A comic strip about Joe Consultant's life and other commonly experienced joys of the consulting world.

Monday, April 03, 2006

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Movie Time


Artist's Notes:

I thought of the idea for this cartoon while talking to one of my cousins who also travels often for work. He complained that while he always wanted to use the On-Demand features of his hotel televisions, he never would. This was because no matter what movie you select it would always come up as a generic movie line item on your hotel bill. This line item could then be interpreted as being a selection of porn by whoever was administering your expenses regardless if you paid for the movie yourself. And you know, he is right. Which really stinks because they have some good movies playing on those things. And no I am not talking about those of the triple X variety.

At some hotels they have motivational speakers On-Demand. I would often watch those after a long day at work with nothing to do in a strange city. That was before the conversation with my cousins.

Yeah, that's it, motivational speakers... Just kidding Mom.

So, in case you didn't understand the piece. Joe is on the phone with his significant other while watching some sappy movie, obviously of her choosing. This sweet and tender moment is then completely tainted by the perception that Joe is viewing pornography in his hotel room by the administrators of his expense report.


Sunday, March 26, 2006

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Process Rich

Artist's Notes:
Oh Man! You have got to love the process and procedures corporate America has come up with.

SEI, CMM, Six Sigma, ISO 9000, and all other types of procedural policy to help us with our planning to plan. It is amazing how if you are the creator of a process in a company you love it. But, if you are a user of the process created you hate it. And somehow creators never seem to be the users.

As a consultant I get to have a very objective view of the whole thing and while I can see that some process is good and some process is bad it doesn't really matter. Because all process, even the bad process, equals dollars. Every extra hour of work that I do ... Cha-ching. If you really think about it this process is probably a huge contributor to why companies even bother to hire consultants. I mean think about it. How often do people actually get promoted or any recognition for just following the process?

Good process may lead to savings that people are recognized for but it is the savings that matters not the process to get there. So if you do what you are told and spend all of your time following a process it isn't necessarily going to get you anywhere. What do you do? Hire a consultant, let him deal with the process, and take the credit for any good that comes of it so that you can maybe get a percent or two above cost of living in your annual merit increase.

Fine by me, keep it coming Corporate America

Saturday, January 07, 2006

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Home Sweet Home

Artist's Notes:
It is true that an extended contract at a company can make you feel like one of their team after a while. But, come on! How could they possibly think you will miss spending another day with them and another night in some hotel instead of being at home in with friends and loved ones and having a good night sleep in your own bed! My clients surely understand this but never the less I always get the, "Are you going to miss us" goodbye on a regular basis. You just keep on being funny.

Wednesday, January 04, 2006

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Then / Now... Or Vice-versa





Artist's Notes:
Oh how naive we must be to complain about the state of our world today. The truth is that none of these problems in our lives are new. They are just portraying themselves in different ways. Sometimes we need to remind ourselves that no matter what the issue is it all stems from the fact that we are not willing to accept our current situations and will either enact or wish to enact change. It is our frustration that keeps us strong and enables us to better ourselves. Embrace it, conquer it and move forward.
-M

Tuesday, January 03, 2006

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Joe's Bed

Artist's Notes:

In case you haven't figured this out yet, I travel a lot. Last year I only spent seven days in a row in my home city four times. It gets exhausting and can pose some real challenges when it comes to sleep. For years I have noticed hotels advertising how comfortable their beds are and always thought that bed comfort seemed like such a small part of the overall hotel experience and wondered why they would pick that to display. But now I know. Also, because you are traveling all the time you feel as though you are working all the time. A nine to five day while you are on the road doesn't exist. However, the one place where I can completely be at peace is in an airplane. God bless the FAA and its rules on cell phone use. That combined with my burned out laptop battery that only lasts a half hour I have no excuse to do work. That's right, flight time is my time. It is great. My inability to work combined with some poor air quality and lack of oxygen puts me out cold every time. To my sister Jen: "Thanks again for the flight pillow."


Thursday, December 29, 2005

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A Telecommuter's Transit Strike

Artist's Notes:

I drew this during the transit strike in New York this December. Being a consultant I typically either take a car to the airport and am out of town or work from my home so while witnessing the strike first hand I really wasn't impacted to severely as others were. But, living in New York people would constantly ask me how I was affected by the transit strike and I would jokingly respond that a transit strike for me was not being able to find my slippers in the morning. Unfortunately my lack of artistic ability in the case of this comic didn't make that part of the joke apparent so after much criticism of this post I will explain the comic in a few words: Laying in Bed, Alarm Clock, Cold, Only One Slipper, Back to Sleep, and Transit Strike!


Wednesday, December 28, 2005

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When Conference Calls and Cubes Collide

Artist's Notes:

I apologize to all of you Joe fans for not drawing out the characters for this comic. It just came out too perfect in it's original form. When I first decided to start drawing these out I debated using the sprites instead of actual characters and practiced creating expressions on just a line. This really just involves showing an expression with little more than the use of eyebrows. It's fun, so don't be surprised if you see more of this in the future in this comic.

As for the scenario portrayed I recently ran into this at a client of mine and could not believe it. I was standing in a common area between cubes talking to a bunch of my customers when suddenly at the top of the hour they all ran in a panic to get to meetings they each had. I could then hear them in loud penetrating voices all get on the same conference call together for their meeting. In the cube worlds which I feel like I live these days, it is common for certain people to speak loud enough so that everyone around them can hear what they are saying when they are on the phone. I think they do it so that they can prove to the people around them that they are working. It seems like a subconscious obsessive behavior they have especially when you can hear the same people drop out of earshot when receiving a personal call at work. These people are nuts. But, they pay the bills so who am I to complain :-)


Tuesday, December 27, 2005

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Consultants Must Be Able to Embrace Change

Artist's Notes:

This comic is pretty sad. For those of you who travel on a regular basis to get to your projects you will understand what this means. For those of you that don't I hope you can empathize with the how crazy traveling every week can get. You literally forget where you are some days. Each city in this crazy country of ours starts to look the same after a while. I call them the cookie cutter cities. It is as if someone has taken a giant cookie cutter and punched out multiple versions of the same city all over our land. There are a few exceptions to this rule that I hope the chain stores and restaurants are never able to fully conquer and take away their identity. But for the most part I can go to a Maggianos or a Cheesecake factory within fifteen minutes of my client site no matter where it is and never once get the same server who will say, "The usual Mr. M." I sure do miss the good old mom and pops.


 

First Day on a New Contract

Oh, you are starting today?
Well, we will just put you here for now.
Make yourself at home.
Artist's Notes:
This was one of my first comics with Joe. It is certainly an experience most consultants have come against at one time or another. In my case it seems like just about every engagement has had this happen to some level. One thing to remember is that a company's inability to prepare is probably the reason you are there in the first place. So it is no real surprise that they are not only ill-prepared to perform their business objectives with their current work force but that they are also ill-prepared to have those problems solved. Corporate America, you gotta love it!

 

Meet Joe Consultant

Join him as he trudges through the
regular torments of an everyday
consultant in corporate America.
Artist's Notes:
Where does this come from?
I thought I would write a few lines to everyone tonight due to some scanner issues here at Consultations. If anyone knows of a good portable scanner please let me know. As much as I would like to quit my job and stay home to write this comic it probably isn’t a good idea at this time. Besides, where would I get new material for the strip? Here is a little about me. I am as you would have guessed a consultant and have been on and off for over 10 years. This has afforded me the opportunity to spend a lot of time working at many different companies on projects. These include IBM, Motorola, Bank of America, Cingular Wireless, The Home Depot, Computer Associates, and the toy company LeapFrog to name a few. I have also had the pleasure of working with fellow consultants on these project from companies like Deloitte & Touche, Pricewaterhouse Coopers, Ernst & Young, Accenture formerly Andersen Consulting, McKinsey & Company and several other Big Five consultancies. The companies I have worked for directly shall remain nameless for now in the interest of keeping the comic generic. My experiences, I am sure are shared by everyone in the consulting world who needs to put up with Corporate America on a daily basis as I do. Our constant battle to help organizations actually complete projects has destroyed our lives for the betterment of the corporations. Our wives have been replaced by laptops and blackberries and our home lives have been reduced to consisting of airports, airplanes and hotels. Our hats are hung daily at places like the Marriot, Residence Inn, Renaissance, Courtyard, Hilton, Embassy Suites, Omni, W, Sheraton, Hyatt, Westin, and of course all the beloved boutique hotels across the country. And while our efforts are recognized by some with benefits like airline frequent flier miles, rental car rewards, hotel points, expense accounts, and some flexible hours, these benefits are constantly waning. But, at the end of the day, there is something that keeps us dragging ourselves to client sights, keeps us in status meetings and dodging bullets like offshore outsourcing to India. Perhaps it is the humor of it all. I will do my best to keep this top of mind for all my readers so please visit often and hang in there. I mean, only one more year of this s@#t before I get a real job, right? Enjoy and hang in there.
-M

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