Items Description of Module

Subject Name Management

Paper Name Organisational Change and Development
Module Title Issues in Consultant-Client Relationships
Module Id Module No.- 37
Pre- Requisites Basic Knowledge of Management
Objectives To Study Various Issues in Consultant-Client Relationships
Keywords Client, Issues, Members, OD Consultant, Organisation,
 QUADRANT-I

Module 37: Issues in Consultant-Client Relationships

1. Learning Outcome
2. Meaning
3. Common Issues in Consultant- Client Relationships
4. Recommendations for Better Consultant- Client Relationships
5. Summary

1. Learning Outcome:
After completing this module, the students will be able to:
 Understand various issues that arise in consultant- client relationships
 Describe ethical issues in consultant- client relationships
 Discuss the nature of consultant’s role
 Suggest ways to improve consultant-client relationships

2. Meaning
OD consultant is a professional in OD field and establishes a collaborative relationship of
relative equality with the key client and organisation members as they together identify
organisational problems and opportunities and take action. While taking the services of external
party (consultant), a number of confusing situations may arise and will require proper attention.
These situations lead to problems or conflicts which require to be resolved. Thus, issues in
consultant- client relationships are the focus areas that need consideration. These areas should
be managed properly to avoid adverse effects.

3. Common Issues in Consultant-Client Relationships

Issues in consultant-client relationship may relate to entry and contracting, defining client,
mutual trust, nature of consultant’s role, selection of appropriate intervention, determining
depth of intervention, consultant as role model, action research, client dependency, terminating
the relationship and ethics. These areas and related issues have been discussed as follows:

3.1 Entry and Contracting

Various issues relate to entry and contracting in OD consulting. OD consulting contract is
finalized after a long discussion and agreement over certain conditions between client and
consultant (who in the whole discussion has been considered a single person, however,
consultants also work as a team).
First of all, the executive or manager who has some concerns about his or her
organisation usually contacts the consultant (who is supposed to be expert and who could
help) over telephone and briefly describes the problem. Then, a face to face meeting takes
place. The client presents the problem and consultant explores some of the deeper aspects
 of the current problem. The consultant fixes the nature of problem. During this course,
many interrelated problems surface and these need to be focused.
Next, the consultant and client decide about group which would be starting point for OD
intervention. For example, it may be top management team of 8-9 people. It is important
to decide prudently the persons to be specifically included or excluded in first
intervention. However, the exclusion of key people can prove to be a serious mistake.
The consultant describes the way he or she will proceed i.e. the activities which will be
undertaken and their duration. Next, during the first meeting, apart from deciding that
who should attend workshop (if it is to be part of OD intervention), decisions are required
to be taken regarding when and where workshop could be held, extent of confidentiality
of data needed, whether top management is to be given brief description of interview
themes prior to the workshop and so on.
Various aspects related to compensation for OD consultant’s services are important and
should be clarified. There can be one agreed price for the particular project or there can
be an arrangement for daily fee or hourly fee with no charge for telephonic discussion and
first exploration. So, the compensation issue should be settled.
Thus, after agreeing upon various terms and conditions and deciding the framework
within which consultant will work, OD consultant enters into a contract with client.
However, in some cases, the contract may be subject to certain changes in future. It is
important at this stage to discuss everything in detail to avoid future conflict.

3.2 Defining the Client

It is also an important issue to decide who the client is. In the initial stages, client is
usually the executive or manager (i.e. who makes the initial contact) or initial client may
be management team. However, the perfect model is one in which manager is the initial
client and key client. As the trust and confidence develop between consultant and client,
consultant starts viewing manager and his or her subordinate team as client and then the
whole organisation as client. Thus, the consultant ultimately deals with the client group or
client system.

3.3 Mutual Trust

It is important to develop a relationship of mutual trust during the early contacts between
client and consultant. Only then, both the parties can contribute towards the success of
OD efforts. In the initial stages, the key client may have certain fears like (i) things will
not remain under his or her control due to an outsider’s interference in the system, (ii)
people will start criticizing their superiors unnecessarily, (iii) petty issues will be
highlighted and organisation will be flooded with petty complaints.

Similarly, subordinates may have apprehension that they will not be benefited in any
respect rather they will be manipulated to achieve superiors’ goals. These fears or feelings
point out that consultant will need to establish trust first by ensuring the concerned parties
that OD efforts will improve their (client’s and subordinates’) effectiveness and will bring
noticeable recognition from superiors.
The consultant should try to understand the client’s motives and explore any that are
hidden. The implications of such motives for effective behaviour should be thoroughly
examined. Further, the client and his or her team should be convinced that a collaborative
 approach will be needed to solve the problems. This will help in enhancing trust between
the client and consultant.
It is also important on the part of consultant to maintain confidentiality to maintain trust.
Consultant needs to behave in a responsible manner and maintain secrecy. Even
unintentional errors can ruin the consultant-client relationship.

3.4 Defining Consultant’s Role

The OD consultant primarily needs to be an expert on OD process and not on the task. He
or she is expected to act as facilitator and educator. Consultant’s role is to create learning
situations in which various problems are identified and solutions are developed. But most
of the times, client tries to put the consultant in the role of content expert and asks him or
her to give substantive advice on matters like personnel policy or business strategy. In
such situations, the very purpose of hiring the OD consultant is defeated. Therefore, it is
essential for the consultant to clarify his or her role to the client by describing broadly
what the client might look for the successful OD efforts.

The OD consultant should be competent enough in the field of OD and should present a
range of options to the client for solving problems. The consultant should avoid acting as
content or task advisor due to the following reasons:
(i) Such a role creates dependency and reduces the chances of client’s internal skill
development whereas the main aim of OD consultant is to help client in learning
skills to solve problems.
(ii) Consultant as advisor or expert is required to defend his or her recommendations
which are against the collaborative approach required in OD to improve
organizational processes.
(iii) Making recommendations to the top management may cause distrust of the
consultant.
However, the consultant is required to give advice on the design of questionnaire or
design of workshop for facilitating learning process under OD efforts. But modifications
by members of client system in such advice should be allowed.
Similarly, by following a collaborative approach, the consultant is required to give advice
on OD strategy, advice on intervention like how and when a team building session should
be conducted, carry out process consultation or coaching on individual style or behaviour
when it is requested and provide data feedback to concerned parties from interviews or
questionnaires after diagnosing the situation.
Thus, OD consultant should play the role of facilitator cum educator rather than task
advisor.

3.5 Diagnosis and Appropriate Interventions

Another issue relates to determining appropriate interventions. Sometimes, the consultant
may be tempted to apply an intervention which he or she likes and has proved successful
in the past without diagnosing the current situation carefully. Such tried interventions
may not produce good results in the present situation. Therefore, the golden rule is to start
where the system is at present. A thorough diagnosis of the current situation should be
carried out. The data so collected should be properly analysed and discussed with the
 client team and then an appropriate intervention should be decided. The vast experience
and knowledge of the consultant will be helpful in this regard.

3.6 Determining Depth of Intervention

It is important to determine the depth of intervention. Roger Harrison suggested two
criteria for determining depth of intervention. First, intervention should be at a level not
deeper than that is required to produce solutions to current problems and second,
intervention should be at a level not deeper than that at which resources and energy of
client can be committed to problem solving or to change.
Thus, as per these criteria, consultant should proceed no deeper than the legitimation
provided by client system culture and its resources and he or she should stay at the level
of consciously felt needs.
So, by keeping in mind the consultant’s capabilities, limitations, client system’s
resources, constraints and the immediate necessity, the depth of intervention should be
determined. Further, the concepts of accessibility and individuality, as suggested by
Harrison, may be useful in assessing the depth of intervention.

3.7 Consultant as a Model

The consultant should act as a role model. He or she must be able to practise what is
preached by him or her. When the consultant advocates an open system in which
expression of feelings is considered important to solve problem effectively but suppresses
his or her own feelings about the working of client system, it points out that the
consultant is incompetent. There is a need to learn how to express feelings. In such
situation, T-group experience is recommended for OD consultants. Thus, client can be
helped in an effective way when open system is promoted and both client and consultant
openly discuss their ideas, feelings and work out possible interventions.

Further, OD consultant is required to give clear messages. For this, there should be
congruence between consultant’s body language and spoken words. The consultant is also
required to provide a wide range of options to solve problems, to provide a spirit of
enquiry, to give constructive feedback and to accept feedback. Thus, it is necessary on the
part of consultant to develop and continuously practise the effective behaviour which he
or she wishes to install in the client system. It will help in maximising consultant’s
effectiveness.

3.8 The Issue of Dependency and Terminating the Relationship

The termination of consultant-client relationship is directly related to the dependency
relationship between the client and consultant. The more dependency of client on
consultant will make termination of consultant-client relationship difficult. If the
consultant is enhancing the client system’s abilities in problem solving, then consultant is
not creating a long dependency relationship rather assisting the client to internalize skills
and insights. In such cases, termination is not an issue. Consultant’s role as facilitator
creates less dependency and more growth of client.
The relationship between consultant and client depends on consultant’s competence,
clients’ resourcefulness and organizational factors like internal power struggle, crisis etc.
The longer the consultant is able to provide innovative and productive contribution by
continuously developing his or her skills, the longer the relationship will be. Similarly,
the more is increase in client’s resourcefulness, the less will be need of consultant. In
 large organisation, where more consultants are appointed, one or more key consultants
may be retained in an ongoing relationship but their services will be less frequently used.
OD efforts need to be reduced or suspended if powerful person or group in the
organisation distorts information just to retain power which may be lost due to OD
intervention or in case of externally imposed crisis.
Thus, the OD consultant’s involvement may be reduced, suspended or terminated
depending upon the particular case and agreement made by parties i.e. client and
consultant.

3.9 Action Research and Feedback

Action research is based on participative model and involves diagnosing, taking actions,
re-diagnosing and taking new actions. So, feedback is an important issue in OD efforts. It
must relate to various interventions and stages in the OD process. It is important to
evaluate the results of actions taken by the client group. It provides new knowledge and
client group learns what works and what does not work. It also helps consultant and client
in making OD interventions more effective.
Getting feedback need not to be complicated. Simple questionnaires or interviews can be
helpful for this purpose.

3.10 Ethical Issues

Values underlying ethical OD practices include openness, honesty, confidentiality,
professional expertise and voluntarism. Thus, it is important in consultant-client
relationship that both parties behave ethically. The consultant should not misrepresent
information relating to his or her skills, training, background, competencies or
experience. The intervention that may be harmful or has low probability of being helpful
should not be used or suggested by the consultant. It will be unethical if consultant uses
an intervention about which he or she has no knowledge or experience.
Confidentiality is important in OD efforts. So, proper secrecy should be maintained. The
client or consultant should not misuse data to punish or harm persons. For example, it
would be unethical on the part of consultant to disclose to the general manager the names
of employees who in good faith provided information to consultant about their general
manager’s dysfunctional behaviour. Similarly, disclosing information of one department
without permission to the head of other department would be unethical behaviour of
consultant. It is also important that there should be no distortion of data. Overstating,
understating or overemphasizing some aspects lead to distortion of data. There can be no
true feedback of data in such situation and intervention would also not be appropriate.
Consultant should not force organizational members to disclose information about
themselves, their colleagues or their unit if they are not willing. They cannot be forced to
attend any problem-solving workshop. However, counselling can be initiated to develop
their positive attitude. Even if some of the members resist, the manager and group can try
to reach consensus on action plans without their involvement, if possible.
It is important for OD consultant not to make false or unrealistic promises with the client
just to obtain a contract. The consequences will reduce the credibility of consultant and
also of key client within the organisation.
The consultant or client should not deceive anyone. It will destroy trust. The consultant
should be open with the client about the implications of OD efforts. Similarly, client
 and/or management should be open with the employees about implications of OD efforts.
For example, if employees were assured of job security after a major reengineering effort
(one form of OD efforts) and their co-operation was secured in these operations but later
on a major part of the workforce was laid off, it was deception and unethical. The OD
consultant’s ethical course of action would be to press management to look at probable
consequences, possible solutions and to be open with employees about consequences and
also help management in mitigating the adverse impact on the lives of individual
employees.

4. Recommendations for Better Consultant-Client Relationships

Consultant and client together make efforts for improving organizational effectiveness. But
problems may arise in their relationship usually due to various non-technical reasons like lack
of effective communication, underestimation of project complexity, failing to understand
client’s requirements, setting improper expectations and so on. The following recommendations
aim at better consultant-client relationships and consequently enhanced organizational
effectiveness:
 Both the parties should keep transparency in dealings.
 Consultant should not hesitate to tell client that he or she has a difference of opinion.
 Consultant should try to complete all the activities in the decided time framework.
 It would be better if consultant follows the principle ‘under commit-over deliver’.
 Consultant needs to diagnose the situation properly and collect data as much as possible
to avoid underestimation of project complexity or scope.
 Both the parties should maintain ethical standards like honesty, integrity, confidentiality
etc.
 Consultant should offer knowledge transfer in the form of mentoring and coaching.
 Consultant should not promise unrealistic outcomes.
 In the initial stages, frequent meetings should be arranged and both parties should
communicate effectively so as to enable consultant to understand client’s requirements
properly.
 Consultants working as a team should not have conflicts among themselves.

5. Summary
Issues in consultant- client relationships are the focus areas and need adequate consideration.
These issues may relate to entry and contracting, defining client, mutual trust, nature of
consultant’s role, selection of appropriate intervention, determining depth of intervention,
consultant as role model, action research, client dependency, terminating the relationship and
ethics. These issues need to be addressed and managed as these have significant implications for
OD practitioner, top management and the whole organisation.

At the stage of entry and contracting, it is important to discuss everything in detail to avoid
future conflict. The discussion may relate to various terms and conditions, framework within
which consultant will work, compensation, activities to be undertaken and their duration. The
consultant should not misrepresent information relating to his or her skills, training,
background, competencies or experience. Another important issue is to determine the client. In
the initial stages, client is usually the executive or manager (i.e. who makes the initial contact)
or initial client may be management team. But, the consultant ultimately deals with the client
group or client system. It is important to develop a relationship of mutual trust during the early
 contacts between client and consultant. OD consultant should play the role of facilitator cum
educator rather than task advisor.
The depth of intervention should be determined by keeping in mind the consultant’s
capabilities, limitations, client system’s resources, constraints and the immediate necessity. It is
necessary on the part of consultant to develop and continuously practise the effective behaviour
which he or she wishes to install in the client system.
The termination of consultant-client relationship is directly related to the dependency
relationship between the client and consultant. The more dependency of client on consultant
will make termination of consultant-client relationship difficult. Consultant’s role as facilitator
creates less dependency and more growth of client.
Feedback is an important issue in OD efforts. It must relate to various interventions and stages
in the OD process. It is important to evaluate the results of actions taken by the client group.
This helps consultant and client in making OD interventions more effective. Confidentiality is
also important in OD efforts. So, proper secrecy should be maintained. Consultant should
diagnose the situation properly and collect data as much as possible to avoid underestimation of
project complexity or scope. In the initial stages, frequent meetings should be arranged and
both parties should communicate effectively so as to enable consultant to understand client’s
requirements properly.
References

1. Diane McKinney Kellogg, ‘‘Contrasting Successful and Unsuccessful OD Consultation Relationships,’’ Group and
Organisation Studies, 9 (June, 1984).
2. Louis P. White and Kevin C. Wooen, ‘‘Ethical Dilemmas in Various Stages of Organisational Development,’’
Academy of Management Review, 8 (Oct. 1983).
3. Marvin Weisbord, ‘‘The Organisation Development Contract,’’ Organisation Development Practitioner, 5, (1973).
4. Roger Harrison, ‘‘Choosing the Depth of Organisational Intervention,’’ Journal of Applied Behavioural Science, 6,
(April-June, 1970).
5. Wendell L. French, Cecil H. Bell, Jr., Veena Vohra, Organisation Development, Pearson Education, Sixth
Edition.
6. William J. Rothwell, Roland Sullivan, and Gary N. McLean, Practicing Organisation Development: A Guide for
Consultants, Jossey-Bass/Pfeiffer, (1995).