During long consulting engagements, sometimes you suddenly find that you and your clients have become good friends.

The work is not difficult - you've done this same type of project several times before, and you're putting in a lot of billable hours, using up laptop and cell phone batteries like Christmas candy. You're flying out early with these guys and staying away a week or two and getting home late; you're eating early breakfasts and late dinners together in hotel coffee shops and four star restaurants. "Rudi" is a practical joker who plays a mean classical violin, while "Vlad" likes to shoot skeet and fish. Everybody on the client's team is bilingual but, in deference to you, they all speak English whenever you're present.

As you've been traveling with them, they've learned quite a bit about you too - your likes and dislikes, your family relationships, your house and car, your preferences in clothes. How you handle people. Whom you know. What you like to eat and drink.

And you and your family are really beginning to enjoy the regular arrival of those big checks in your post office box every Friday. You're getting comfortable - really comfortable - with this engagement and these great people.

So this is what "independent consulting" is all about, you think to yourself. Next month you'll be able to make the down payment on your boat?

Whoa! Hold it right there. Whenever you find yourself "getting comfortable" in a long-term engagement as an independent consultant, start growing eyeballs in the back of your head - because you're in trouble but don't yet know it.

Kenney's First Rule Of Independent Consulting: Always Expect The Client To Turn On You Like A Rattlesnake

~ Talk about your Jekyll and Hyde! I've come to work fat and happy only to find the client gone - replaced by an overnight coup d'etat by board members opposed to the project. Once I accidentally insulted a hard-of-hearing client's uncle who misunderstood something I said in passing and I was dropped with no opportunity to make amends. I was once replaced on a project by a young Saudi just out of Brown University with a BA in religion; as a member of the royal family, the client explained, he "needed project leadership experience." Expect it, prepare for it, keep your dignity - and also keep your passport under your control. Always carry enough cash to get home, and keep a return airline ticket in your wallet.

Most importantly, always expect that this month's invoice will go unpaid when you submit it - expect this until you actually get the check and it clears - and be prepared to get up and walk out if your money is not paid within 10 days. Make this philosophy part of your pricing formula.

Note that this obligates you to keep yourself emotionally uninvolved with the last invoice you submitted; i.e., don't ever really count on getting this money! In your mind's eye, plan on losing the last submitted invoice - don't ever allow yourself to crank it into your plans for the new boat until the check has cleared.

Don't be a fool and work weeks for free for a deadbeat client. Something went wrong with his financing - you will never know what happened back at home office in Transylvania, but for whatever reason, he's not going to be paying you anymore - and that's why your check hasn't arrived in three weeks! So don't be a sucker and continue to advise a deadbeat who was once a "friend" for free - no matter how charming he might be. You were looking for a client when you found this one; now go find yourself another.

Kenney's Second Rule Of Independent Consulting: Don't Be The Fall Guy!

As an independent consultant dealing with a brand-new client, you must always consider the possibility that you are being set up to take the rap for something shady. "Vice President In Charge Of Going to Jail," it's called in the trade. This scam has been going on forever. Don't let yourself become that "vice president."

~ Think it doesn't happen? You've been in the sheltered world of the Big Five for too long, my friend! This is the real world we're talking about - you're now an independent consultant working outside that protective Big Five umbrella - and now you find yourself personally invoicing and personally collecting tens of thousands of real dollars per week. Although you're putting in a lot of hours, you know in your heart that your input is not rocket science.

Is this dream engagement really "good luck"? Or might it be "too good to be true"? It's up to you to find out!

Kenney's Third Rule Of Independent Consulting: Never Let The Client Know That You Are Truly a "Singleton"

When you were a Big Five consultant, you didn't think much about the fact that your well-known firm, with worldwide offices prominently displayed on your stationery, had a bevy of top lawyers to sue if the client failed to pay your sacred monthly invoice. The client, however, was very aware of this big, established firm that you represented, and so there was never a problem with getting that Big Five invoice paid.

But now, as an independent consultant, you must create a sort of "shadow" firm of "advisors" and/or "silent investors" that are woven around you - all up-to-date on this engagement - lest you appear vulnerable and unable to protect yourself legally when the toast falls jelly-side down. Always mention your lawyer, your CPA, your partners, and your industry contacts, and communicate with them on a regular basis in the client's presence.

The Moral of the Story

As an independent consultant, always keep in mind that you are the most temporary person on any project. Whatever written or verbal arrangements you made with the client are only worth the paper they're printed on. When you hit this milestone, start training yourself to think of today as your last on this project, and handle your finances accordingly. More often than not, when you're actually dropped by the clients, it will be suddenly - in most cases you won't know the day, the what, or the why. After all, you have no ownership in this firm, nor any political clout within it, other than your minute-by-minute relationship with the client. In the mind of your client - however charming he may be to you at the present moment - you are destined to become history whenever his leading indicators start to point south. It's up to you to protect yourself and ensure that being an independent consultant doesn't mean being an unsuccessful one. ~

Formerly a Coopers & Lybrand MC manager, Doug is now an independent Consultant with 24 years experience in his own firm, "BANK DATA BANK." He advises financial firms on technology and operations, and serves as an expert witness in legal cases. Prior careers include: US Marine; RCA radio engineer; CIA project administrator; digital hardware designer; computer salesman; Citibank's VP of credit card systems; and thrift industry ATM executive. Doug's email is dkenney@ix.netcom.com.