Now you have a contract. The tasks have been defined, and consultants are assigned and eager to begin work. What’s next?

Several things need to be addressed. The most important one is: who is in charge of the consultants? The consulting team needs to be clear about who gives direction, makes decisions, and resolves conflicts. If there are many masters, there will be problems.

Here are some others (not an all-inclusive list):

• Who are the consultants to work with to determine company approach, obtain information, get access to information technology resources (if appropriate), and so on? This might be a client-side project manager or an overall executive sponsor for the procurement.
• Will the consultants work on or off-site, and if on-site, how do they gain access?
• Will there be regular status meetings or checkpoints? (The answer should be yes!)
• What are the due dates?
• What tools should the consultants use?