The House That Management Consulting Built
Read More From SIOP’s New Blog Team on the SIOP Exchange!
House of Lies, a comedy series which premiered on Showtime January 8, follows a group of management consultants who stop at nothing to get business deals done. According to Paul Thoresen, a contributing blogger for the SIOP Exchange, the new series portrays several behaviors and tactics of which he believes consultants should steer clear.
Thoresen discusses the series and how it relates to I-O management consultants this week in his first blog post for a continuing series on the topic of measurement/ methods, motivation/attitude, organization development, and training.
“On the premiere episode of House of Lies (a Showtime original series) 'management consultants' are painted as soulless opportunists," Thoresen says. "With the tagline 'Survival of the Slickest,' this should not be very surprising to most. The show’s first episode portrays the main protagonist (played by Don Cheadle) attempting to win over clients with flattery, meaningless jargon, and several other less than productive tactics. Is this the general impression that the public holds for those who consult to management? It seems the show gives a laundry list of what not to do with clients as a management consultants.”
Thoresen goes on to discuss some of the activities depicted in the show that he believes management consultants should not participate in:
- Excessive billing of expenses to the client
- Very unprofessional behavior (“adult situations,” violence, etc.)
- Purposeful extensions of billable hours to milk the client
Continue reading the entire first SIOP blogger post by Paul Thoresen here and post your reactions and comments to the Exchange today.
| Check back to the Exchange in the coming weeks for new posts from SIOP’s bloggers! |
About SIOP’s Bloggers
SIOP’s bloggers began posting earlier this month and will contribute regular posts on their specific topics of interest. This group of SIOP members serves as opinion leaders and conversation starters. They will contribute regularly to the content of the Exchange on various topics related to the field of I-O psychology. The bloggers will discuss topics as diverse as innovation in organizations, employee well-being, leadership development/careers and legal issues, education and training of undergraduate and graduate students, groups and teams, I-O and sustainability, selection/assessment, legal issues, entrepreneurs/entrepreneurship, and women in the workplace.
The SIOP blogger crew is also a diverse one, with Members, Student Affiliates, and Associates from science and practice, working in organizations such as Northern Illinois University, Denton Consulting Group, University of Baltimore, Select International, Inc., SAWA Consulting, and as organizational consultants. For a complete list of SIOP bloggers, visit the blogger profile page on the SIOP Exchange here.
If you have any questions about the SIOP Exchange, please contact the SIOP Electronic Communications Committee Chair Chris Rotolo at christopher.rotolo@pepsico.com. For technical questions, contact Stephany Schings Below at sbelow@siop.org. For more information about contributor guidelines, view the Exchange post policy here.