Camber Consulting LLC

People don’t like to be managed.  They want to feel like their bosses, peers and subordinates trust them and understand that they know better than others what must be done and the best way to do it. 

People don’t like when their bosses, peers and subordinates aren’t being managed.  They are frustrated by the political churn and lack of meaningful accomplishments by the unit they work in.

It’s one thing to perform the technical process of conducting an operational audit.  You can come into a work center and diligently capture the tasks that are being performed, workflow, frequency of each task and the resources expended (time and materials) to build the case for a BPR effort.  The data you collect will never be accurate.  The reality is that people fill their workday.  If there isn’t enough mission-related work, they will create new requirements.  They will feel very busy – and might even ask you for additional resources.  I’ve had the experience of going in to an organization that was being outsourced (and everyone knew it).  I understand how to socialize the change and focus employees to get the correct data.  The secret sauce is in the approach; respect, understanding the environment, communication, appealing to their best qualities and respect (did I mention respect?).

This is only one example.  We can talk about applying the concept of K_WACC - but the point is that I can help bridge the gap between your financial department’s concerns wrt Net Present Value/Internal Rate of Return, etc and your understanding of opportunity cost and ROI in critical investments.  We can talk about DCAA’s process for approving labor category billing components - but the point is that I can work with your contracts manager and accounting department to ensure that you are paying a fair rate for your contracted labor.  We can talk about the process for computing risk exposure - but the point is that I don’t see risk reporting as a method to cover a manager’s behind if the project runs off course, but as a disciplined approach to ensuring success.  We can talk about various approaches to change control - but the point is that your stakeholders often have significantly different visions of what constitutes project success.  The list goes on…..

What makes me different?  I understand the program/project environment.  I have drunk the Kool Aide on the international recognized methodologies and am disciplined enough to use them correctly.  I believe fundamentally that communication can avoid/solve almost any problem.  I am not interested in running the next “Big Five” consulting firm, but get my kicks from turning a troubled project around.  When I don’t know something – I ask, or take a class to learn more about the area (there’s so much more to learn!).  I cost less, do more and can be trusted.