SEI has embraced collaboration and set the standard for consulting excellence. With a career spanning almost 15 years, much of it in consulting, I’ve worked for a few different employers that have leveraged different consulting models to deliver their own version of delivery excellence. In my experience, none of the consulting models have emphasized collaboration as strongly as SEI’s EPIC Model. EPIC is an acronym that stands for Excellence, Participation, Integrity and Collaboration. Plainly stated, it’s the engine that drives SEI to achieve high standards of client and consultant satisfaction. In collaboration with my SEI colleagues, we orchestrated a plan for rapid onboarding to my first client at SEI. Such collaboration would later yield accelerated discovery, strategy, and relationship building in the following ways:
- Excellence through Collaboration: Excellence started with preparing for my day one arrival. A colleague already onsite provided the ‘lay of the land’; an outline of the company’s culture, products and services. I was briefed on the scope and mission of the assignment and was introduced to stakeholders. We quickly conducted discovery activities by researching project artifacts and conducting one-on-one meetings with the team. Pain points were identified and incorporated into our plan. Pain points deemed not in scope were placed in a parking lot and later discussed with the business as opportunities for the future.
- Performance through Collaboration: After demonstrating an in-depth understanding of the organization, the business objective and culture, I have extended my role to meet a broader range of client needs including those more technical in nature. My SEI colleagues shared their knowledge and offered templates and tools developed to make tasks easier.
- Integrity through Collaboration: SEI consultants demonstrate integrity in our company wide established standards and practices. A high level of trust is shared amongst our consultants and clients. We demonstrate trust by providing transparency and visibility to deliverables at the outset of the project, and continue to provide transparency and status throughout the engagement.
SEI’s most valuable resource is its people. This firm has the most skilled consultants, strongest collaborative culture and the best collection of enterprise tools and company standards I’ve encountered in my career. SEI’s EPIC Model affords clients and consultants alike the benefit of a network of consultants spanning across 9 locations. It’s this network of consultants, enterprise tools and companywide standards that made my onboarding as a new hire onto my client as expedient as possible providing me with the tools necessary to make an immediate performance impact and to continue quality delivery through the duration of my engagement.
What are some tools and models you’ve used throughout your career to help make an impact at a new client?
