Stewardship: 3 Ways to Leave Things Better Than You Found Them
I have a confession to make.
I have always had an odd fascination with the word stewardship. It all started during my first day at one of the Big 4 consultancies. While sitting through the customary company core values presentation — much of which sounded like any adult voice in a Peanuts cartoon — this word I had never heard before piqued my interest. What initially struck me about stewardship, and I realize that I am totally dating myself, is that it sounded like something straight out of The Love Boat. Each time the presenter uttered it, I half expected Captain Stubing or Gopher to appear from behind the curtain. So much about the word’s meaning intrigued me.
For me, the real essence of stewardship is the idea of “leaving things in better shape than when you first got there.” Over time, I have adopted it as my personal credo and a way of life. From our families, to our communities, to our environment, there are myriad ways we can be good stewards. And as consultants, even though we may not be able to claim total responsibility for the things entrusted to us by our clients, the same guiding principle holds true.
There are ample opportunities to practice stewardship. Consider stewardship within your personal life: from volunteering to clean up a local park, to coaching a youth sports team, to helping out a neighbor in need, each of these acts can go a long way towards making things better for those around us. Within our professional life, similar kinds of opportunities abound. From volunteering at a local non-profit to help them develop their strategic plan, to coaching your client team to achieve organizational effectiveness, to being a good “consulting citizen” and lending a hand when your client counterpart needs it. There are plenty of ways we can be good stewards.
At face value, being a good steward shouldn’t seem that daunting. After all, your project work should (hopefully) improve things and enable a better future for your client. If you are like me, you want to ensure that your positive impact is felt well beyond your roll-off date. Fortunately, there are proactive steps that you can take to help ensure this happens.
Start with the End in Mind. Since most consulting projects turn out to be a mad dash from start to finish, it’s important to build in transition time from the onset. If you know that your project will be a 12-week endeavor, make a plan to begin the transition during week 10. This ensures you don’t lose sight of the transition altogether and that your client has enough time to retain the knowledge critical to keeping things going. For implementation work, I have always found it beneficial to establish sustainability metrics — like making sure that all users are trained on the new system, assigning accountabilities for all key tasks, or performing new processes without incident for a pre-established period of time. These kinds of “guideposts” can help your client monitor key factors necessary for your initiative’s long-term success.
Get Yourself Fired. As I’ve mentioned in previous musings, true consultants understand that their time with the client is limited. Beyond adopting a “get shit done” mentality, they acknowledge that, in order to leave things in a better place, they need to build their client’s ability to carry things forward. In other words, it’s important to build in time for client capability building. Employing tactics like engaging them in critical design sessions, providing thorough briefings during your check-ins, and having them present project updates can help ensure that your client keeps some skin in the game and retains necessary knowledge.
Transition Thoughtfully. When closing out your project, go above and beyond handing over a thumb drive full of deliverables. Instead, take time to catalogue things in a way that your client or anyone else who comes after you can easily understand. Moreover, if time permits, develop a “closure report” highlighting not only what you did, but also detailing recommendations on other improvement effort opportunities.
Everyone knows that first impressions are important. They can go a long way to establish credibility with your client and set the tone for your engagement. But really, the last impressions you leave with a client are the most important. By adopting an ethos of stewardship — of leaving things better than they were when you got them — your last impressions are sure to shine.