Jokes About Consultants
Why are there so many jokes about consultants and how can you use them to your advantage? Actually, it's an important issue and will help you understand how clients and prospects see you and how you can build trust and rapport better.
Most of the jokes about consultants that I use in my seminars to make a point involve definition of consultants. An old one that illustrates the ambivalence your prospects and clients have about you defines consultants as someone who when you ask them what time it is borrows your watch, tell you the time, sends you a bill...and keeps your watch! You can stop that joke anywhere and still insult consultants. This is a very old joke, but the fact that it relates to understanding client/prospect ambivalence today is illustrated by a cover story in the June, 2010 CFO magazine. On the cover itself the story is signaled by the teaser "Hiring Consultants: How to Hang On To Your Watch (And More of Your Money)." A related joke defines a consultant as someone with a briefcase more than 50 miles from home. Again, it demeans consultants. But it has some truth: People accept experts from afar more easily -- and I've used that to get jobs myself.
Jokes tend to tell you what clients/prospects think about you. I've been teaching seminars for consultants and consulting with them individually for 25+ years, and done consulting myself for 40 years. I thought by now that everyone -- clients and new consultants alike -- understood what consultants did. But just this year I had an MBA student from a top-10 school tell me that "Consultants only advise, they don't implement." And a budding consultant tell me in a more pithy way "I just though consultants buzzed in, gave advice, and then left. They don't take any responsibility." We even received a recent article by consultants that talks about consultants in a negative way. [link here]
While it is possible for consultants to just analyze problems, or do anything else of value to clients, the best consultants tend to act as objective sources of information (see Consultative Selling by Mack Hanan) and often help implement solutions over the long term. But the many jokes remind us that your prospects and clients may not see you the way you think they do.
Fully understanding why there are so many negative jokes about consultants is important to how you sell your services and how you relate to clients. Click here to see an article on this, available to members, or register today if you're not a member.
Light Bulb Jokes
Q. How many consultants does it take to change a light bulb?
A. Let me think... what's your budget again?
Q. How many consultants does it take to change a light bulb?
A. One to change the bulb and two to write the strategy and tell him what he did wrong.
Q. How many consultants does it take to change a light bulb?
A. One to change the bulb and four to tell him how much better they could have done it.
Light bulb jokes designed for computer consultants — taken from the HubSpot Inbound Internet Marketing blog.
Q. How many SEO consultants does it take to change a light bulb?
A. One. All she needs to do is first migrate the bulb to WordPress, install some SEO-optimizing widgets, and the rest is easy.
Q. How many real SEO consultants does it take to change a light bulb?
A. Two. One to change the light bulb and another to conduct a controlled experiment that shows that although rookie SEOs think the light bulb has changed, in reality there are over 200 factors that go into determining the state of the light bulb and we can't really know for sure that the light bulb has indeed changed.
Q. How many black hat SEOs does it take to change a light bulb?
A. None. Black hat SEOs don't change the light bulb. They just redirect people to a different room where there is no light.
Q. How many digg users does it take to change a light bulb?
A. 431. One power user and another 427 of their "closest" friends to help them. It is widely known that it is impossible to change the light bulb without asking/begging for a bunch of friends to help you change it. And finally, 11 users to leave comments on why if you had just switched to Apple you wouldn't have to change the light bulb.
Q. How many Social Media consultants does it take to change a light bulb?
A. None. "Look, if all you're thinking about is changing the light bulb, you're missing the point. The idea is to first lurk around in the room and watch other people changing light bulbs. Then, start providing commentary and encouragement to those who are changing light bulbs. Then, build relationships with these people in the lighting community. Then -- and only then -- should you even think about trying to change the light bulb.
Q. How many StumbleUpon users does it take to change a light bulb?
A. One to change the light bulb while 11 others thumb them up and cheer them on.
Q. How many link baiters does it to change a light bulb?
A. None. All you have to do is get a bunch of high-powered people to point to the light bulb and Google will take care of the rest.
Q. How many PPC (Pay Per Click) experts does it take to change a light bulb?
A. One. But she's smart enough to know that you can't just focus on "light bulb." You also need "change light bulb," "replace light bulb," "fix light bulb," and "new light bulb." But, not of course, "light bulb" as that's way too pricey and drives a bunch of unqualified people that are not really interested in changing light bulbs.
Post your favorite joke about consultants (or clients) in the forum and the good ones will be added here.
Fully understanding why there are so many negative jokes about consultants is important to how you sell your services and how you relate to clients. Click here to see an article on this available to members, or register today if you're not a member.