- ISBN13: 9780471120292
- Condition: USED – VERY GOOD
- Notes:
Product Description
Build a thriving business while holding down a full-time job. Do you yearn to strike out on your own, take charge of your destiny, and create a better, more independent lifestyle for yourself? Read this book and learn how to start your consulting business while you still have the security of a regular job. Consulting on the Side is for the professional who longs for independence but can’t simply walk away from a steady paycheck and company health benefits…. More >>
#1 by Max H. Sherman on April 11, 2010 - 5:27 am
Although it covers general principles, the book is too dated to be at all useful in a practical sense. I am sorry I bought it. There are no URLs only phone numbers and addresses. The closest this comes to the modern age is a recommendation to get a modem on your computer.
Rating: 1 / 5
#2 by luiskano@hotmail.com on April 11, 2010 - 6:08 am
This book tell you some ideas and some advices about wath do you need. On the other hand this book need be actually with internet address for its recomendations.
Rating: 3 / 5
#3 by Robert Neville on April 11, 2010 - 8:07 am
Despite some of the negative reviews, I figured that the price was low enough that surely there was something to be gained from the book, even if it was terribly dated. The problem with this book is that in the author’s own words, she really never had to deal with this issue. In the first chapter she talks about how she planned to work and consult at the same time, but that she was laid-off right at the moment she was ready to start her consulting practice….uh OK, so the rest of the advice seems very suspect from Chapter 1.
And the rest of that “advice”? Let me sum it up – be careful about legal and ethical conflicts with your current employer and make sure you’ve got a plan for dealing with working two jobs. That’s about it (well, duh!!).
Waste of my time.
Rating: 1 / 5
#4 by Manny Hernandez on April 11, 2010 - 9:25 am
Considering this book was published in 1996, back when the Web was barely a buzzword, it could be worse, but the reality is that this book’s most important flaw has to do with its sheer age. Due to that, it misses on some very useful pieces of information and resources the writer could have offered, if a more recent edition were available.
Now that I wrote about the negative (I normally don’t do things in this order, but it just came to me), on to the good things:
-The book addresses to a sufficient extent many of the issues (time and stress-wise, in terms of ethical conflicts, etc.) that stem out of starting a consulting practice beside your full-time job. This is where the CORE STRENGTH of the book lies. I’ve not been able to find any other titles that go into this topic so effectively… in fact, I’ve not found any other books on the topic at all. Most of the other consulting books I’ve checked out simply deal with consulting, considering it full-time dedication deal.
-The author -the President of her own HR Consultancy- also volunteers some good (though far from unique or comprehensive) advice on putting together a pricing scheme for your services, finding sources of financing for your outlet, starting your office at home, marketing your services, and even heads up into critical tax/legal considerations to take into account.
Other than the outdated material in a few parts where references are cited, and the lack of online information to support the book, I liked her book. All in all, it is not a recipe book, but a reference and a rather good one, most specifically useful to those in the process of considering a consulting business on the side, and even for those who are already doing it, in order to assist with setting things up that you might not have thought of up to this point.
Note: unless she went out of business or did a poor job at marketing her services online, it’s impossible to find any other reference to her in Google besides this book, whatever that implies… :
Rating: 4 / 5
#5 by Anonymous on April 11, 2010 - 12:15 pm
This book is a great resource. She covers everyhing from small details such as arranging your home office to larger issues such as ethical questions about consulting in the same area as your employer and practical questions such as how to register your business name and inexpensive ideas for marketing. This book is also a good resource for people wanting to start ANY home-based consulting business, not just a part-time one. Since the book was published in 1996, there are not as many references to the web as their might be if it were published today, but the author was obviously in-tuned to various technicological benefits that existed in 1996, and she still gives solid advice that is still valid today (the Internet doesn’t solve everything and changes all the time anyway!).
Rating: 5 / 5