Course 2011-2012 a.y.

Go to class group/s: 31

CLEAM (6 credits - II sem. - OP  |  SECS-P/10) - CLEF (6 credits - II sem. - OP  |  SECS-P/10) - CLEACC (6 credits - II sem. - OP  |  SECS-P/10) - BESS-CLES (6 credits - II sem. - OP  |  SECS-P/10) - BIEMF (6 credits - II sem. - OP  |  SECS-P/10)

Course Director:
FERDINANDO PENNAROLA

Course Objectives

Management consulting has been acknowledged as one of the new and successful professions emerging in the past century. The course highlights three different aspects of the management consulting profession. First, the industry, its players, their services and the way to compete and to approach customers. The course also takes a look at the history of the profession in Italy and abroad as a starting point to picture the present situation of the industry. Second, the consulting process and professional assistance to clients: how consultants market their services, how the preliminary offer is made, what the key factors are in the development of the client-consultant relationship, how the implementation phase is seeked and carried out by consultants. Third, the individual skills and aptitudes required for professional development in the management consulting sector.
The course does not emphasize management models and tools developed in other courses such as business policy, marketing, organization, accounting. The main learning objective of the course is to underline the process side of the consulting business. The course uses a variety of pedagogical approaches: case studies and role plays are frequently used in many sessions. The course also gives the floor to prominent guest speakers from the management consulting profession.

Course Content Summary

• Characteristics of the MC industry today as a result of the historical development over the past 40 years.
• Professional profile and skills/attributes of management consultants.
• The management consulting process: understanding the client needs and preparing the preliminary proposal.
• Marketing of professional services.
• How consultants use Internet resources to establish their presence in the online business and to innovate client service.
• Conducting effective consulting processes: acquiring data, delivering presentations, managing the delicate politics of change in the client organization.
• Human resource management and organizational structures in management consulting firms.
• Consulting is an ethical business: resolving ethical dilemmas that you cannot avoid.
• Consulting to small and medium businesses.
• Economics of MC firms.

Detailed Description of Assessment Methods

Attending students
Students attending the course have the opportunity to work during the course with Lotus Notes groupware technologies, like major MC firms do in the real business. Attending students are evaluated on their active participation during the course, on their content and process ability to work in team and conduct a simulated consulting project, on a written individual final exam.

Non-attending students
Students not attending the course take an oral exam based on the textbooks above.

Textbooks

Attending students
that regularly access on-line resources, prepare:

• Readings and cases available online through Web Learning.

Non attending students

• P. McKenna, D. Maister, First among equals: how to manage a group of professionals, The Free Press, NY, 2002.
• L. Greiner, I. Poulfelt, Management Consulting Today and Tomorrow: Perspectives and Advice from 27 Leading World Experts [Paperback], Routledge, 2009

Suggested readings:

• P. Forsyth, Marketing professional services, Kogan Page, 1999.

Exam textbooks & Online Articles (check availability at the Library)

Last change 15/04/2011 11:05