The Big Book Project

A small business management consultancy with knowledge benefits:

Our business management consulting services - what we do:

• 1-to-1 business management consulting (remote)
• Business Strategy
• Business Planning
• Project Planning
• Project Report
• Market Research
• Price Discovery (RFQ/RFP)
• Business Budgeting
• Marketing Management

Hire a business management consultant - what you get:

Your first step to hiring a business management consultant with The Big Book Project is to:

1. Schedule a (free) no-obligation discovery call with our lead consultant.
2. Receive written recommendations by email and a proposal, if viable.
3. Via an online collaboration tool & WhatsApp/Skype, take a step by step approach to achieve your milestones as planned.
4. Commission planned deliverables as business assets along the way.
5. Keep close tabs of key performance indicators like profitability - with periodic reports

Our business management consultancy fees:

Your business project with us will carry an overall fee, comprising of:

• A flat fee retainer, paid quarterly
• Deliverable commission fees

...nothing else.

Do we offer just business management consulting advisory?

We offer free consulting advice as a one off. Feel free.

Want to view our consulting company profile?

Visit our LinkedIn page.

How Can We Help You?

How did we start this consulting business? Our start-up story...

As the lead management consultant for the business, I got qualified in 2003 with a postgraduate business management degree from a Top 100 Global Business School.

It was a sound theoretical grounding in business and really opened up my appreciation for the fundamentals behind business.

Case studies were particularly of interest. I could spend hours picking apart the detail and pulling together solutions. I still remember the intense group strategy simulations using Markstrat market simulation software, where as peers we'd go to-and-fro over executive decision making.

We learned so much about practical management collaboration...especially cultural etiquette.

Leaving the classroom behind, I got my first job as a temp marketing administrator with a nationwide distributor of scientific equipment.

I think it was their first graduate appointment. My duties included preparing marketing collateral for mailing. As a mature market distributor they had a very traditional approach to marketing. I saw this as opportunity to get some experience in implementing new business strategies. They were willing to give my ideas time of day.

I went for it. A turning point in this role was helping their senior sales personnel introduce a relatively new e-learning DVD to their clientbase.

The product was largely underrated by my employers and they neglected to invest in its marketing.

However...

Having spoken with one of the sales territory managers about the product in-depth on one day - we came up with the idea that I would support his field efforts by filling in empty slots in his appointment diary with meetings with existing client who have interest in the new e-learning DVD.

I hit the phones and began investigating interest in the product.

The response was unanimous...and Adrian had a blocked out sale diary for weeks in advance!

Interestingly enough, the clients were delighted to hear from me - and w'ere impressed that the company had invested in showing them what was new and upcoming.

They appreciated the gesture and our sales team began using my phone appointment setting resource to get them in front of clients who they had not seen in a while.

The result - a general increase in sales, albeit not many adopted the new e-learning tool.

Although, I didn't necessarily score in the way I had intended...

I learned an important business lesson:

...a little bit of unexpected care goes a long way with people.

This stuck with me.

So did my interest in business development.

Interestingly, my next career move didn't venture further into commerce, but took a diversion into public sector IT project management.

It was a entry level position on paper, but one with offered plenty exposure to strategic change management.

The task?

Implement a multi-million pound digital image capture service built upon a connectivity infrastructure backed by state of the art, modern server architecture, complete with contingency failsafes.

It took three years to get it done.

I came on leaps and bounds in management maturity during this project...

Meeting hundreds of service stakeholders clocking up masses of mileage across the region daily as I oversaw the implementation process.

What did I walk away with?

The project had zero knowledgebase and although there was a legal framework, it had no practical reference points.

The fruit of the project had key strategic importance.

I was 360 innovation - new staff structuring, new technologies, training, new operation workflows...etc.

My project duties were multidisciplinary, involving: commissioning, tendering & procurement, public relations, contractual management, IT network scoping & planning, specialist training delivery and more...

I learned to get things done with excellence, you need to:

To take the time to really relate to people beyond the role and...

The most important ingredient for building anything from scratch for the long term takes total commitment.

Giving way beyond what it says on the contract and being determined to see it through to the end.

Having completed my tenure there, I sought after a swift transition back to commerce.

I interestingly enough, I found my way into the financial services industry.

It was a private client facing advisory role, selling regulated investment products.

I took the professional securities and investments based examinations and got qualified with my new employer.

Once fully qualified, I hit the market to put their sales training to the test.

Their model relied on making personal introductions and building your CRM from scratch from a home-based office.

I enjoyed early business development successes, but I really missed engaging with business/organisation clients.

Solving business model related commercial problems like I had in earlier experiences held a certain appeal with me.

I decided to make a move, yet still remaining in financial services...

& landed a corporate currency broker position.

It was high volume telesales to businesses selling foreign currency trading strategies.

I jumped straight in a found myself thriving, quite quickly.

It was here that I really got grounded in business to business consultative selling.

In other words, listening to businesses and the problems they experienced...

Then putting solutions together based on what was available to achieve the goal.

In the case of my clients in this field it was maintaining their heard earned profits when making foreign currency transactions.

I stuck with it...grew with it...until it was time to move on.

A little further down the line, I decided time had come that I should try my hand at freelance business consultancy.

But where would I start?

Business consultancy is a general theme with many niche disciplines. I had an important decision to make.

I thought long and hard and it came to mind that I wanted to learn the basis upon which a business was valued.

I researched business valuation and got acquainted with a local business broker.

We met one day shared a lot.

He was just starting out solitarily as a career change engineer and needed some business development back-up.

He decided to take me on as a commission only business development executive.

He had his own tried and tested systems for filling up the pipeline which got him his first few commissions, but welcomed any new approaches I might have.

He also entrusted me with drafting business prospectuses for new clients and performing some valuation bench-marking exercises.

Typical clients included: convenience stores, manufacturing firms, regional widow cleaning companies, software manufacturers - a wide range really.

I learned about valuation techniques, benchmarking exercises and how confidential approaches were made in this niche. Key insights which I have transferred to great advantage onwards on my business consulting journey.

Whilst my time there was short...

I picked up much of the trade very quickly and grew in understanding of business asset value and managerial processes & methodologies which made business transfers successful.

Take home gems:

The things business owners value, are not necessarily the things which make their businesses valuable!

...And well engineered commercial processes and systems are much more valuable in the long run than your profit margin.

Following this I met a local small business consultant whose business belonged unto a well known franchise brand.

He was at a cross roads of sorts with his investment in the enterprise and welcomed the help to turn around a slow slide in performance.

We assessed many options including firming up existing client agreements, culling unprofitable arrangements, extending services to increase cross and upsell opportunities...

But along the way it became more and more apparent that the value offered by the franchise which was all wrapped up in the use of their corporate website for lead generation...

Was highly overrated and overpriced.

After a meeting together to discuss his options, he decided to divest from the franchise management deal & go it alone.

Our arrangement came to a natural end and I was left thinking where to go and what to do next...

Important lessons learned:

Investments don't necessarily automatically mean profit. They always come at a cost.

Once invested it costs also to divest.

Hard graft within your means is worth many, many times more than investments.

Personal circumstances pressed me back into the corporate mould and I found myself working as an international business development agent for a leading corporate best practice firm in the city.

I was newly married and it seemed a smart move.

The division I belonged to specialised in producing bespoke leadership training workshops & seminars for corporations looking to upgrade their HR function business partners in general business management skills.

My job was to sell these training packages to heads of function of blue chip companies across international regions including: Scandinavia, South Africa and Central Europe.

Learned that such global corporate giants were becoming increasingly persuaded by the concept that for internal collaboration to return optimal profitability...

The high potential individuals at the interface between functions needed to posses a solid business acumen & well rounded array of general business management skills including:

• strategy
• problem solving
• facilitation
• project management
• analysis
• financial management & budgeting
• presentation skills & reporting

...the training program was aimed at bridging the gap.

It was a fairly new product and was well adopted.

More than that, the program itself taught me an important lesson:

...people in business (even at the top levels) generally need help to be become managers.

Better management = better profit.

This experience led me to take up the challenge to put my commercial experience and expertise to to the task of helping business people...

Use better business management techniques and principals to get better profits.

Enter The Big Book Project.

A global business management consultancy specialising in helping startups and business owners make more profitable choices for the long term.

We welcome you to get in touch and share your business problems with us.

Yours kindly,

Temi