 Hello everyone. My name is Daria and I'm a student of Aluminium Unix School of Management. During my studies, I collected various work experience, including consulting one. I personally believe that consulting field is very interesting, where you can learn a lot. But before I explain to you what you can learn from consulting and what specifics does this field has, let me address the question who the consultant is and what job does she do. Well, consultant basically a person from any background who works mainly with clients and clients in this case can be any entity. It can be corporate, which means companies of any size. It can be government or non-for-profit organizations. But in all these cases, the main goal that consultant has is is basically to find a solution to the complex client's problem and to persuade the client that this solution is the best one. Sounds pretty easy and obvious, right? However, when we add here the setting in which consultants have to work, it doesn't seem easy anymore. First of all, consultants work under really strict time constraints. So imagine when the company goes bankrupt, they don't have many months of time for you to save their problem. That's why consultants have to be really efficient. Secondly, the problem under which consultant works are usually novel. What does it mean? Imagine that a company wants to go into different markets, Asia or the US and they have no idea how to enter this market. That's why a consultant team will be the first one who will address this problem and find a solution. But not only does they have to find a solution, they bear the responsibility for their decision. Like in the case or in the project of the cost cutting. When the company has to fire lots of people, it is the consultant who has to find the methods how to save these workspaces. That's why imagine the situation from the daily life of a consultant. You're standing in front of the clients with a team where people have a mini-year experience in the field and you feel like this dog from the meme staying pretty calm but being in the house this which is on the fire saying Well, this is fine. We will solve this. No worries, but inside you feel that It is pretty difficult. You work under really time constraints and under really tough pressure of the environment. So at least we can learn something from these people and to know what tactics they use when we solve such complex problems. And that's exactly what I want to tell you today. I want to compare it to the daily approach. How would some random person or like say a client try to solve the problem and how it is compared to the consulting approach? First of all, when we say about problem-solving, let's mention the client. So the client would probably start with a known fact that he has in his hat. He worked at the company many years and of course, he knows how it functions pretty good. Then he bases the analysis already on the known facts about the company and apparently jumped to conclusion of what is happening and what can be the potential problem. Such approach has however some disadvantages and I will illustrate it on the example of a friend. Imagine you have a friend Max. We all may have a friend Max who has no idea what to do with his life. In this case, Max decided to make a master degree, but he's not sure whether that's a good idea. So he collected some random facts that master of degrees, pretty prestigious. He knows already pretty good universities like Teomanic or LMU and also all of his friends already did master. So why not me? And he did some analysis further with the forums and also talked to friends, go to the university event and think that he is pretty well informed, jumped to the conclusion that yes, I should do the master now. However, such approach has several disadvantages. Well, first of all, you may have some missing information. You can't take just random facts or the known facts, even though they can be right and put it as the solution and as the argumentation for your solution. Secondly, there is no structure or links in this case, which means you may have some reasoning problems when you go by such methods. That's why consulting developed a different or used a different approach, which usually helped to avoid such issues. It is called the top-down approach. They basically go right from the top study from the problem statement. It's on the top of the pyramid, let's say. So this is the problem statement. This is the problem, but the client has and afterwards, consultant based the hypothesis. This is probably a potential solution that can help to tackle the issue. Important here that the consultant don't start the analysis immediately. They do the structure first. They put exactly main elements that you should go through and only after that you start the analysis itself. Let's put it again in the environment of Max, how the consultant would then go into the problem-solving approach. First of all, we have the problem statement, should Max do a master degree. Secondly, we hypothesize that master degree, it is useful. Why it is useful? What aspects we should consider here? It is the knowledge. So we know Max pretty well. It is important for him to develop some new skills when doing a master degree. Secondly, it is a social. You can meet new people and make the friends. And finally, it is the financial so that he will earn more after he has a further degree. And after we set such fixed structure, we go into the analysis again. Just asking friends, reading poems and so on. Why this approach works pretty good at consulting and why it is preferable? First of all, it is fast. Because you have the main structure, you know what to do. Secondly, you have a big picture or external global picture. You have no missing elements. You know exactly how to go and where to start. And this, of course, is possible because of the clear structure. So all the main elements are already in the structure of your analysis. Did you notice how many times I said structure? Because the structure here is the main element that helps consultant to work. And the structure is also not random. It is done by the specific principle. In consulting, it is called MISI. MISI is basically the abbreviation. It stands for mutually exclusive and collectively exhaustive. Let's look at these two blocks separately. What does it mean to be mutually exclusive? It means that you have two ideas or two categories that never collide. So they cover completely different fields. In the example of MACS, not exclusive version would be if we analyze such things as making friends and meeting new people as a different ideas. However, they are not. You see that they are about the social aspect. That's why the right idea would be if we take financial and social ideas, they are completely different, which means it is exclusive. The second part calls exhaustive. And it means that in your structure, you have all main categories that are important to prove your hypothesis. There are no other missing categories that can help you to answer the main question. In the example of MACS, the missing element will be here, the skills. So it is important for MACS to analyze whether he will develop new skills. And if such element is not in the structure, it will be not exhaustive. Why MISI, however, works also pretty good in consulting and why they always refer to this principle. First of all, it helps to break down a complex problem into simple blocks. You have a pretty nice categories. You know exactly where to go and these categories never overlap. Secondly, it is a structure. You know the consequences of categories you have to analyze. And finally, most important thing, you have the full information. So due to the principle of exhaustive, you know that you have exactly all categories that help you to answer the main question. However, doing the problem-solving process is just one side of the coin. After you did it, as you know the aim of consulting, you need to present it. And nowadays we have faced quite many problems when people are presenting. Like people may digress or people may miss some important ideas that are trying to communicate during their talks. Or they give the solution at the end, which is not that persuasive. Imagine how it would be when MACS comes to us and tries to explain what he did and what is his problem. He will probably start with the situation saying that, well, I don't have any money now. I don't have many friends. I'm not satisfied with my life. Then he will go to the analysis, what I already did. I looked from the forums. I meet some people. I talk to them, try to visit the events. However, I jump to the conclusion that I need to earn more. I need to meet people. I need to try to improve my life and to collect some new knowledge. That's why I'm thinking that the idea of doing the master is not bad. You may probably heard some same stories from your friends. And the problem with such approach is that you have the solution only at the end. And you don't see the whole argumentation how you came to that. You may lose even train of thought when you go the same way. That's why consulting also have the solution for the communication. Let's see now how it would be when consulting trying to present the results that they find out. So the principle called Minto. It is the pyramid. And it was named after Barbara Minto who invented such principle. So the difference is that you start with a solution. You give the client exactly what they want to hear first. And it is the answer. What is the answer to my problem? And that's what you give with the Minto pyramid. After you gave the solution, you may start with the supporting arguments. So why exactly this problem or why exactly this solution works? Here are the arguments. And you go here or you go further only if the client wants. And if he has time, you can also give some supporting arguments. So important here is that you start with the solution and then go into the supporting arguments. And only after that you go to some additional data insights. Why then Minto? Why such principle in consulting? You know when we have here the friend who is pretty desperate about the situation, he wants to know the answer. That's why you give this answer to Max. Max, you should do master degree. Why he may ask? Here are your free arguments. First of all, you will earn more money. Secondly, you will meet new friends. And thirdly, you will develop further skills. And as a result, Max, the master degree will be beneficial for you and you will be satisfied with your life. That's why once again, you have the clear answer when you go by the Minto pyramid. Secondly, you have the clear argumentation why the solution works. And of course it will be fast delivery. Because when you go by Minto, it is the clear message what you're trying to say to your listeners. That's why all in all what I wanted to tell you today with such consulting approach is that it has a really powerful problem solving tools as well as the communication tools. It is always fixed. You go always top down and prioritize the structure in the top down approach. You always use the MISI principle so you don't have any missing information within your analysis. And when you present the results, you always go by Minto pyramid starting from the solution on the top. So the consulting, such approach works pretty well in consulting in this setting that we discussed at the beginning. But it also inspires using such methods in the daily life or in any fields that you may consider. Thank you. Thank you for your talk. I just have one very important question. How many people in the audience's name is Max? Raise your hands. No one. Well, that leaves out opportunity for a couple of nice questions about their further education. Nevertheless, now we'll have five minutes for any questions to Dascha. So feel free to ask what's on your mind over there. Thank you very much. Actually, really nice presentation. I really enjoyed it. One question I have. When do you stop with your arguments being exhaustive? So how do you know that you covered all these facts? Do you stop at five or 10 or what's the way to go here? So the research showed that we have usually three, four main arguments because if you go further, it may be still distressing. Of course, you can go into details, but usually three blocks is exactly what suits here. You can always think about the global picture. It helps you to divide. For example, if you say financial and non-financial, it will be messy in this example. And such blocks are still possible to build. Maybe some abstracting from the details. Thank you. Any other brave, curious people? I see one question over there. Thanks for your presentation. I only have a very small question that can this kind of consulting approach go beyond the limitation of human backgrounds? Like sometimes you have some cultural backgrounds or education backgrounds and it would limit your analysis. Can this kind of method go beyond this kind of limitation? If I may shortly repeat and rephrase the question, correct me if I'm wrong. It was whether the consulting approach can serve any cultural or human background. Or is it specific only to certain cultural approaches? That was your question, right? Okay, I'll try to explain also generally. The thing is it was, of course, developed for the corporate field. So that is still like the problem. More or less has some financial reasons. Or if you work for an NGO, some strategic version. But if you have problems with the culture within the company, it still can be applied. Consulting approaches can be applied. So when consultant is hired, it is not only about saying the problem of the revenue. It can also be the culture which is the core that the company needs. And of course consulting approach can also be applied in this case. I suspect if your question has been deeper than that, used opportunity in the break to develop it further. We will have time for one more question on the consulting approach. I see one raised hand over there. The brave girl on the bench. Yeah, thank you very much for your presentation. Actually, I feel like I am max key in this audience. But anyway, yeah. So when you present your solution and your ideas to the client, what is the next step? Yeah, so usually in the ideal consulting project, you have several steps. When you first develop the strategy, when the company don't know what to do. So you develop the strategy, the new strategy, how they should now operate. And afterwards you have the implementation phase. So if the client wants, they hire the consulting for the whole transformation process. And the implementation part is also done by consultants. It is a little different. So in consulting, you have strategy consultant and also operations consultant. Who also mainly focus on this implementation part. So it's not that consultant simply leave the clients low. No, they go till the end. They also implement their solution. And as a result, they measure the results. And also can modify some KPIs, some changes. Do some changes, yeah. Thank you. So let's give her a warm welcome.