5 reasons why joining BlinkLane Consulting was the right decision

28 May 2019 Consultancy.eu

Daniela Resch recently joined BlinkLane Consulting as a consultant in the firm’s Amsterdam office. Looking back at her first five months, she feels she has made the right decision – “no day is the same and that’s what I absolutely love about end-to-end consulting.”

Having completed a Master of Science in International Management from Nyenrode Business University, Daniela Resch had a solid consultancy background long before joining BlinkLane Consulting in January 2019. Despite this, Resch told Consultancy.eu she was initially reluctant to commit to a career in the industry, thanks to concerns she would be unable to do the ‘cool stuff’ until she was a Senior Manager.

Fortunately, when she was first invited for an interview with Amsterdam-based consultancy BlinkLane, she immediately got the impression that “BlinkLane does things differently.” Since signing for the company earlier this year, she has been further convinced that “it was the best professional decision I could make,” and speaking to Consultancy.eu, she explained the five reasons why she feels BlinkLane remains the perfect fit for a new consultant.

Consulting beyond reports

“I remember having worked on consultancy projects in the past that consisted mostly of report writing and death by PowerPoint. After having handed off recommendations, there’s barely any touch point with the client and the execution side of things. For me, that was a bitter sweet moment. Working hard on a topic and diving deep into the context of a company instils a certain ownership and the wish to accompany the execution phase.5 reasons why joining BlinkLane Consulting was the right decision“In contrast, the way BlinkLane works is ‘end-to-end’ consulting – from strategy to execution. When supporting a client in a transformation, it all starts with setting the vision, the roadmap and the change coalition. Being in a room with the leaders and doing the bigger picture planning. Getting stakeholders on board and setting the transformation up for success. But that’s usually not where our involvement stops. The firm accompanies the transformation through setting up processes and facilitating them, coaching different roles across the company, giving trainings and evaluating the progress of the transformation.

“BlinkLane consultants are strategists, advisors, facilitators and coaches at the same time. It’s an incredibly rich variety of tasks which I personally find really energising. With my client I’ve found myself setting up a portfolio strategy, facilitating work prioritisation sessions, coaching leaders and organising events to stimulate collaboration. No day is the same and that’s what I absolutely love about end-to-end consulting.”

Trust by default

“Many companies say that when they hire an individual, they trust them – but when push comes to shove, essential tasks are distributed to the people that have been in the company for a while and proven themselves. I’ve worked in environments where I had to build credits before being entrusted with projects; and where my opinion was not taken into consideration due to me being new or being young. For me, this hampers a person’s learning curve and dampens the enthusiasm about a job. And it sets people up for low expectations. 

“Not so at BlinkLane. Across the board colleagues trust in new staff from the beginning. In my first week, I was asked to support two teams as part of their transformation. In my first month, I was asked to facilitate sessions with the client. In my second month, I worked on a model around Agile HR. At BlinkLane, consultants are given responsibility right from the start, without having their experience or knowledge questioned, and no fear of doing something ‘wrong’. 

“Partners and seniors are extremely good at empowering colleagues and giving them room to try new things and take the lead. Sometimes that can place new members outside of their comfort zone, but there is always a colleague who has their back along the way.”

Being part of a family

“One major hesitation for me to work full-time in consultancy was that I was missing the cohesive culture of a ‘non-consultancy’ company… BlinkLane surprised me with how much closeness as colleagues is valued. The moment I walked into the office for the first time it became clear that BlinkLane colleagues form a community. We are one team – even if we are all working on different projects. There is lots of working together going on, lots of supporting each other. 

“One situation in my first month particularly showed me that: together with another colleague, I was working on a Request for Proposal for a potential client. Time was ticking and we both were fairly new to the company. So, without hesitation everyone in the office started helping out and working on a slide deck. It was a beautiful moment of joined effort and it clearly shows the BlinkLane spirit of getting stuff done as one team!

“Every day is different at BlinkLane Consulting…. that’s what I absolutely love about end-to-end consulting.”

“Next to doing the work together, BlinkLane also makes a point for staff to meet outside of work. Be it the Friday evening ‘borrels’ [informal end-of-week drinks in the Netherlands], sports activities or the yearly company trip – most recently including a ski trip to Austria. The way the team interacts makes it possible to get to know each other on a personal level and a lot of effort is put in to enable an environment for that!”

Appreciating diversity

“Often, when attending consultancy job interviews, candidates almost get the feeling that they should fit into a certain box or be as blank of a page as possible so the company can imprint their way of doing things on them. Conforming to standards is often valued above individual talents and perspectives, however, that takes away authenticity and does not allow new staff to bring their ‘whole self’ to work.

“As BlinkLane consultants, uniformity is less important than being your own self. In fact, the firm appreciates different personalities and backgrounds. Every organisational transformation is different and requires a variety of approaches, perspectives and skills, but BlinkLane hires with that in mind. Someone more introverted or with a background outside of consultancy can be as good of a consultant as anyone else.

“When joining BlinkLane, candidates fill out a questionnaire, highlighting their strengths and weaknesses. A lot of effort goes into matching people with projects that fit with who they are and the direction they want to develop in. Matching an individual’s own purpose and strength with company goals makes this job very fulfilling!”

Knowledge and personal development 

“Consultancy can often feel like it is just buzzword bingo – throwing around fancy terms and selling ‘the dream’. Coming from a research background, going that one level deeper beyond the surface is particularly important to me – really developing new theory and practice is what makes a great consultancy company. In my second interview at BlinkLane, they proved that they were exactly that.

“The high-level conversations about Agile and the Future of Work, the whitepapers with each and every one of them surprising me with fresh insights drew me to BlinkLane from the beginning. The focus on knowledge development continues to give me energy on a daily basis, be it working on new theory and practice management on HR transformations or researching for a whitepaper on self-organised companies.

“BlinkLane gears its quarterly goals towards knowledge creation and sharing – the monthly Knowledge Sessions are a great example. They consist of colleagues presenting new concepts and client cases to each other. This is a manifestation of how high learning and becoming pioneer in topics is valued. BlinkLane is constantly evolving and sharpening its practice areas. The dynamics and growth that comes with that is inspiring.”

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