The Good Consultant · Part I: Before the Contract · Early draft
Why They Called You
The First Conversation
It usually starts with an ordinary sentence. Can we have a chat? Somebody has decided that a conversation with you might be worth having, and that decision already contains more information than the problem they're about to describe.
The invitation is information
Before trying to understand the client's problem, it's worth being curious about the invitation itself. Why did they call? Why now, rather than six months ago, or six months from now? And why you, specifically, rather than someone else who could plausibly do the same job?
None of those questions are about ego. They're about context. A client might describe the problem as modernising a platform, adopting AI, reorganising a team, or improving delivery. That's the stated problem. It rarely explains why you're the one sitting in the room.
The person behind the problem
Organisations don't really start conversations. People do. Whoever is sitting opposite you has their own version of what's going on — something they're trying to achieve, something they're worried about, something that's already happened, people they need to bring with them, and consequences if things don't improve.
Understanding that isn't manipulation. It's just paying attention. The person's context is part of the problem, not separate from it.
Borrowed trust
If somebody referred you, they've effectively lent you a small amount of their own credibility. That's often what gets you into the room in the first place. It isn't the same as having earned the client's trust yourself.
A referral gives you borrowed trust. The first conversation determines whether you leave with trust of your own.
The temptation to perform
Every consultant knows, somewhere in the back of their mind, that they're being evaluated in that first conversation. That knowledge creates a pull towards demonstrating expertise — mentioning relevant experience, recognising the pattern a little too quickly, offering a solution before anyone has actually asked for one.
The pull tends to get stronger with experience, not weaker, because the toolbox gets bigger. Resisting it isn't about false modesty. It's about having enough confidence to listen, ask questions, and hold a hypothesis loosely rather than reach for premature certainty — a habit that turns out to matter far beyond the first conversation, and one this book comes back to later.
Three things worth noticing
Without turning it into a framework, it's usually worth holding three things in mind during a first conversation: the stated need, what they're actually asking for; the underlying need, what might really be going on; and the invitation itself, why they thought you, specifically, might help.
The gaps between those three are often more interesting than whatever's on the agenda.
What the conversation is actually for
The purpose of a first conversation isn't necessarily to win the work. Sometimes the most useful outcome is a shared realisation that the problem isn't ready to be solved yet, that somebody else would be a better fit, that more needs to be understood first, or that doing nothing is currently the responsible choice.
A good first conversation creates more clarity for both sides. It answers "should we keep exploring this together?" — which matters more than whether anything got sold.
Once you understand why you were invited into the room, a different question starts to matter more than the one they asked. Not what have they told me, but what's actually going on. That's where the next chapter begins.
Questions to leave with
- Why did they call me, specifically?
- Am I listening to understand the invitation, or waiting for a chance to demonstrate expertise?
- What might sit behind the problem they've described?
- Did this conversation create more clarity for both of us?