BUSI4AW15: Consultants, Consultancies and Ethics

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• To provide students with an in-depth understanding, at an advanced level, of the consulting profession, the consulting role and the way consultancies are organized and take responsibility for their employees as well as for their clients and society more broadly.
• The course also aims at providing the basis for making an informed choice to start a career as management consultant.

• The course will cover topics such as:
• History of consultancy as sector and current trends
• Consultants, digitalization and new business models
• Consultant-client relationships
• Consultants legitimizer and devil's advocate roles
• Consultant rhetoric and writing
• Consultants and their entrepreneurship
• Consultancies as professional service firms
• Sustainability and work-life balance at consultancies
• Consultant ethics and client ethics
• Consultant ideas, fads and fashions

Subject-specific Knowledge:

• By the end of the module students should:
• Have a critical understanding of consultancies, the sector and relevant developments.
• Have a critical understanding of consultants management ideas, their rhetoric, and their various expert roles.
• Have a critical understanding of internal and external consultant-client relations, work practices at consultancies, as well as the ethical and professional impact of consultancies more widely.

Subject-specific Skills:

• By the end of the module students should:
• Have the ability to apply Mintos pyramid principle when writing or presenting in a consultant role.
• Can take a stance in a blog on an ethical issue or trend related to consulting.

Key Skills:

• Ability to discuss academic articles on consultants critically in own academic essay writing.
• Analytical skills of using academic articles on the consultancy sector, to learn from them about the sector, and to find out what position as consultant might best fit as a first career step.
• Ability to do an interview with a consultant on one of the topics discussed in the course.
• Ability to think creatively about critical issues in the sector and ways to address them.
• Skills to present findings or views to different stakeholders such as academics or practitioners in ways that best fit the audience.
• Planning, organisational and time management skills.
• Skills of effective self-management including motivation, self-starting, individual initiative and enterprise.

• The workshops will introduce key articles on the various debated topics in the literature on consultants that prepare for the summative essay assignment. The workshops also focus on "learning by doing", with various writing exercises based on the genres relevant to consultants such as reports, blogs and presentations.

Feedback will be given in the workshops. The workshops will make use of Barbara Minto's ideas on writing as developed for McKinsey consultants. There will also be preparation of blog writing (formative assignment) and of academic writing as expected in the final essay (summative assignment), based on peer feedback and in-class discussion.

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