ASSIGNMENT 8 REFLECT

Consultant’s Role as a Change Agent

Student’s Name

Institution

1. How would you differentiate between the roles of an expert, a pair-of-hands, and a collaborator?

There are three major consultant roles that show how the internal consultants perform their duties in the organizations. They include the roles of an expert, a pair of hands and a collaborator. The expert role depends upon the expertise of the consultant. This occurs when the client is not interested in dealing with an issue and therefore, finds it necessary to outsource the consulting services from a third service provider having the expertise in that particular area to solve the problem. Another consultant role is that of a pair-of-hands consultant where the client scopes both the issue and the solution and uses the skills of the consultant to solve the problem. Lastly is the collaborative role which is also known as the process consultant. Here, both the client and the consultant work collaboratively in identifying problems and coming up with solutions to mitigate them (Jamieson & Armstrong, 2010).

2. What do you perceive to be the accountability issues associated with each role?

Internal consultants should be accountable for the results their services provide since they are entrusted by their clients. The expert role should be held accountable in case the consulting services provided to the client fails to produce the desired outcomes and more especially when the client has implemented everything recommended by the expert role. Under the pair of hands, the internal consultant should not be held liable since the client is the one who may wrongly apply the skills of the consultant in solving the problem. Under the collaborator role, the consultant is held accountable for failure to clearly come up with solutions to mitigate the identified problems.

3. Which role would best help you become a successful change agent? Which role do you think you are best equipped to play? Give reasons for your choice.

The role of a collaborator will help play a significant role in preparing me to become a successful change agent in an organization since it will allow me to work collaboratively with all the team members in bringing change in the organization. This is because the role will enable me to identify the problems with the team and come up with strategies for mitigating those issues. The problems will easily be diagnosed and this will strengthen the relationships with all the members of the organization. The collaborator role will ensure that the organizational vision is well articulated to bring about successful organizational change.

4. Assuming a consultant should be prepared to take up all the roles depending on a client's needs, explain what you can do to improve your performance in the other roles.

In order to improve the performance of other roles, a consultant should practice a “Safe pair of hands”. This means that the consultant should do exactly what he or she already planned. This will help in making the clients build some trust and credibility in you as a consultant. A consultant should also have a natural attention to detail so as to improve on the performance. The consultant should also be in a position of knowing how to think before doing anything thus improving its performance. For improved performance, the consultant should have adequate resources that will help in solving problems that may seem new to the consultant and more especially when you are in a new environment (Lunenburg, 2010).

References

Jamieson, D. W., & Armstrong, T. (2010). Consulting for change: Creating value through client-consultant engagement. Consultation for organizational change, 3-13.

Lunenburg, F. C. (2010). Managing change: The role of the change agent. International Journal of Management, Business and Administration, 13(1), 1-6.