At the end of this week the DMA’s 2012 Nonprofit Washington Conference will get underway. As consultants and suppliers prepare to entertain and enthrall clients, and as clients sharpen their behind-the-back complaints about consultants, what better time to agitate for a little insight into this strangely symbiotic world of Client & Consultant.

In today’s post I’ll summarize What Clients Think of Consultants.  Tomorrow, Tom’s taking the other side to sum up What Consultants Really Think About Clients.

At the end of each post there’s a brief and anonymous Punch Bowl Survey, which we hope you’ll complete. Consultants and Clients will be directed to their own questions. Then, on Friday, as the DMA gets underway, we’ll summarize the survey findings in that day’s post.

The idea for all this springs from Tom’s post last week on The Red-Headed Stepchild  featuring the anonymous insights and complaints of a clearly agitated online fundraiser.

Tom and I figured that having run that anonymous piece, we might as well make one more exception to our ‘no anonymity’ rule by organizing and distilling the anonymous emails we’ve received over the past few months through the lens of ‘Consultant’ and ‘Client’, and seek your anonymous opinion and that of other Agitator readers. Then present them in time for the festive gathering of Consultants and Clients around the DMA at week’s end.

After 45 years as a fundraising consultant I’ve suffered plenty of slings and arrows from clients (and fellow consultants). So it’s with pleasure that I offer this short summary from the Agitator e-mailbag focusing on what clients might euphemistically call “improvement opportunities” for consultants.

• On Innovation.  “Change is good. We advise letting others go first.”

• On Consistency.  “The only thing two fundraising consultants can agree on is what the third consultant is doing wrong.”

• On Qualifications. “Wow, I guess anyone can become a consultant.”

• On Expectations. “On closer examination of your data, we really can’t improve much over your previous consultant.”

• On Experience. “Aren’t you the guy dating my daughter?”

• On Surprises. “Did we mention you need to throw out your current database software … web platform … testing bible?”

• On Things You’ll Never Hear from a Consultant.  “You’re right: we’re billing way too much.”….”Bet I can go a week without saying ‘integrated multichannel marketing’  … ’synergy’ … or ‘value added’.”

• On Fees.  “We charge on volume mailed. It’s against ‘the code’ to be paid on the success of the program.”

• On Value.  “Our consultant saved us almost enough to pay their fees.”

• On Timeliness.  “Late is a relative term.  Super-late is only relatively later than late.”

• On Competition.  “We want all good ideas at the table for our client, provided it’s a very short table, with seat assignments only for our company.”

What do you think of consultants?  Simply complete our brief (and fun) Punch Bowl Survey and we’ll report back on Friday.

Roger