This story from the RAMAYANA teaches you ONE-KEY SKILL as a CONSULTANT
Ramayana is among the major Sanskrit epics considered an important text for Hinduism. The text narrates the life of the legendary prince of Ayodhya city, Rama. It follows his story of exile to the forest, his travels across the Indian subcontinent with his wife Sita and brother Lakshmana, as well as the war with Ravana, king of Lanka who had kidnapped his wife, Sita.
The following story is in the context of the war that Rama was fighting against Ravana.
Lord Rama was in a battle against Ravana. It was during this battle that Ravana’s son Meghanada hurled a deadly weapon at Lakshmana, Rama’s beloved brother. He was severely injured and in a critical stage where he could face death.
This resulted in Rama calling for the Vaidya(traditional physician), Sushena to heal his brother. Looking at the case, the Vaidya ordered Rama’s main attendant, Hanuman who is a divine vanara(monkey) to find a key plant. Hanuman is a dedicated devotee of Rama.
Hanuman is ordered by the Vaidya, Sushena to fly to the Himalayas and bring the Sanjivani plant that would help to revive Lakshmana.
Sushena told Hanuman that the plant grows in the Drongiri range of the Himalayas, and gives off a strange light, enabling it to be spotted in the dark.
It took a long time to find the fabled Medicine Mountain. Hanuman found it at last -covered with herbs, but he didn’t know which was the magic healing herb. Since time was running out for Lakhshmana, he wrapped his arms around the whole mountain, pulled it out of the ground, and lifted it onto the palms of his hand.
Hanuman did reach the aid of Lakshmana in time and he was healed and filled with energy again.
People might have different takeaways from this story but I was seeing this story from the perspective of a consultant.
As a consultant, the Vaidya, Sushena had one key skill which was missing in Hanuman.
Sushena was able to pinpoint the Sanjivani plant from the medicine mountain that Hanuman bought. On the other hand, Hanuman not knowing which is the Sanjivani ended up bringing the entire mountain.
The key skill that the Vaidya had was to pinpoint only what is needed.
As a consultant, we are hired to provide specific insights from the research & analysis done. It’s about making sure that most of the work is already done and the client can simply go over the insights.
However, a lot of times, Consultants tend to ignore this key skill and don’t synthesize the information as much as it would be possible.
This diamond diagram helps to understand what needs to be done. A client usually provides a problem statement which the consultant is meant to work on.
Based on the problem statement, the consultant should now start the research process and analyze all the information they have gathered through different sources.
The client is paying the consultant for this final Synthesized Insight and thus that should always be the key focus while providing the deliverables to a client. This should then be backed up with supporting arguments and evidence generated through the research and analysis process.
One framework to use is the Minto Pyramid Principle which I came to learn while taking a virtual work experience program from The Forage. This could be one way to present your synthesized insights as a consultant to clients.
