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pamela anderson forbes rocks Rip-Off consultants
Friday, July 1, 2005 5:00 PM PDT
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Forbes, Fri, 01 Jul 2005 1:52 PM PDT
Paradigm for a Fleecing http://www.forbes.com/ceonetwork/2005/07/01/ripoff-book-review-cx_ts_0701bookreview.html?partner=rss
An author and our reviewer expose ugly truths about highly paid business consultants.

San Francisco Chronicle, Fri, 01 Jul 2005 2:51 PM PDT
'Idol' Bo Bice marries in Alabama; Brooke Shields slams Cruise comments; Pink pops the question http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/g/a/2005/07/01/ddish.DTL&feed=rss.dailydish
'IDOL' HUNK WEDS Bo Bice didn't win the fourth season of "American Idol," but he did win his girlfriend's hand in marriage -- and the No. 1 spot on next week's Billboard hot singles sales chart. The "American Idol" runner-up wed Caroline...

the futon critic, Fri, 01 Jul 2005 1:02 PM PDT
Development Update: June 30-July 1 http://www.thefutoncritic.com/cgi/newswire.cgi?id=6937
Looking to keep track of all the various projects in development? Click here to visit our newly revamped "Series in Development" charts. Visitors can now filter our listings by network, genre and even development stage (ordered to pilot, cast-contingent, script, etc.). It's updated every day!

About.com, Fri, 01 Jul 2005 2:13 PM PDT
I See Your Search Ranking and I'll Raise You One Blue Thingy http://websearch.about.com/b/a/182102.htm
I know nothing about the game of poker, other than what I've seen on such acclaimed films as "Honeymoon in Vegas." That is the extent of my poker knowledge. This from Online Poker News: "Lycos, Inc. announced that poker clocked...

Kilgore News Herald, Fri, 01 Jul 2005 1:48 PM PDT
Front Page http://www.kilgorenewsherald.com/news/2005/0701/Front_Page/037.html
WE THOUGHT would never get here. But it will be here Monday: Independence Day, July 4th or whatever you call it. IT’S NOT one of those holidays you mess around with, celebrating most of them on a convenient Monday. If the calendar says it will be Monday, July 4, that's the way it will be.

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Book Review
Paradigm For A Fleecing
Tatiana Serafin, 07.01.05, 2:59 PM ET



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NEW YORK - Doctors, lawyers, firemen, public school teachers and even reporters have all graced the small screen with politicking, scandal and drama allowing viewers a voyeuristic peek at what allegedly goes on behind closed doors. I propose management consultants be added to the roster. Just read an insider's self-published soap-opera, Rip-Off!: The scandalous inside story of the management consulting money machine, and you will see the need for a series called "Conniving Consultants."

"It's like robbing a bank, but it's legal," writes author Neil Glass (using the pseudonym David Craig). Consultants snake money out of companies to the point where getting a consultant's opinion becomes an addiction. The addiction gets worse over time until the dealer doesn't even have to deliver a quality product. The scale of the obsession drives a $100 billion a year business--just about the same size as the global legal casino gambling industry.

Glass spent 20 years in consulting before writing his tell-all. It falls slightly short, because it never reveals the consultancy or client names. We can only infer one culprit, Cap Gemini, Glass's most recent employer.

Despite the lack of explicit finger pointing, Glass doesn't hold back when describing the consulting "money machine." He is most taken aback by the "incredible amounts of money our clients would pay us." A straight out of university neophyte, with no business background, could be billed out to clients for more than $10,000 a week according to Glass. Unbelievable? I can back Glass up on that one.

An international politics major, whose business training was as a retail clerk at Express, I joined a consulting firm two weeks after graduation. I had no idea what revenue meant, what EBIDTA stood for or whether growing margins was a good thing. And yet, I sat before executives at Pfizer (nyse: PFE - news - people ), Martin Marietta, which is now Lockheed Martin (nyse: LMT - news - people ) and Lucent ( nyse LU) dispensing management advice. My benchmark rate: $10,000 a week. Though I didn't walk home with the cash, my firm's top brass enjoyed it.

Glass details other financial shenanigans (note to Eliot Spitzer: here is your next target before you run for office) such as travel rebates, where consultants bill clients full fare while actually getting discount rates, expensing overhead for services such as copying or faxing, or charging a flat rate for expenses, typically 10% of the total project fee and never refunding the client if the 10% threshold isn't met. My firm used some of Glass's "seven deadly scams." They came in handy, especially when a client was unhappy with a project--we would sometimes deduct these "additional fees" as a sign of our good faith in the relationship.

Buying consulting projects continues, according to Glass, because managers feel they need backup for tough decisions--consultants are a crutch. Consultants know this, and, once they win some influence, set to work "creating client dependency." Because consultant fees can be hidden in the balance sheet, companies never have to disclose the depth of this addiction. This secrecy also means that when consultants fail to deliver, companies brush it under the rug to avoid costly lawsuits and countersuits. Glass, without naming the offended client, even admits to wasting tens of millions of his client's dollars when an IT systems implementation went colossally wrong.

When they're not bilking their clients, consultants spend their time slitting each other's throats. Glass talks about the "up or out!" policy his firm (presumably Cap Gemini) adopted to get rid of consultants if they weren't promoted in a predetermined time period, and folks were often fired in the middle of projects, leaving their clients bewildered. In an interview, Glass reminded me that a consulting firm is just like any other business trying to make revenue and profit targets. But what it sounds like in the book, and what I came to see it as, is an anything-goes gypsy bazaar.

Now all we need is a little bit of sex: To our assorted schemers, we need to perhaps cast Pamela Anderson (after she is finished playing her most recent role as a librarian) and add Jenna Jameson, who is trying to clean up her reputation. And then we have the makings of a hit series.

Rip-Off is not yet available in U.S. retail stores. You can order it on amazon.com, which lists a four-to six-week delivery time.