Price Your Consulting Services Properly And Win New Clients

The most important rule of pricing computer consulting services doesn't under price. Many practitioners under price to generate business while others simply have no idea what to charge for the services rendered. To avoid this pitfall, practitioners must use a structured approach to develop a pricing strategy for consulting services. They must consider the factors that affect charges and develop a reasonable and competitive pricing structure.

The pricing structure should be combined with a time projection to formulate a pricing estimate. Finally, the firm must choose an appropriate pricing method. Options range from fixed pricing to time and materials to monthly retainers. The degree of comfort is often a function of the relationship between the consultant and client.

Exploitation of Database and Expert Consulting System for Environmental Tests of Aeronautical Materials

A database system for environment tests of aeronautical materials and expert consulting has been realized with PowerBuilder 5.0, the latest fast development tool. The system comprises five modules: metal, coatings, nonmetal, atmospheric environment, and knowledge base. The database collects plenty of original data for environmental testing. It has the following functions: auto-computing, storage of corrosion photo, forecasting life of metal, printing many kinds of forms. The process of environment testing of aeronautical materials and expert consultation is described.

Consulting Engineering for Power Projects

The different roles of manufacturers, supply authorities and consultants in the British electrical-supply industry date from the very start of electrical power engineering at the end of the 19th century. The paper traces the role of the consulting -engineering profession in the development of the home supply industry through the men who founded practices at that time leading to the development of today's British consulting engineering firms which serve the power industry of the world. The development of these firms is shown throughout the years to have depended on engineering, economic and political factors.

Consulting -engineering work is illustrated with reference to two projects: an unusual power station project in Mexico and the topical Hong Kong mass-transit system. The changing problems of the consulting -engineering profession are considered in the light of current economic pressures, energy patterns and the increase of nationalism overseas, and it is shown why the services of British consulting engineers have never been in greater demand throughout the world than at the present time.

Computer-Assisted Management of Consulting Projects-A Rule-Based Approach

The state of the art in computer-assisted project management is based on the assumption that it is possible to isolate knowledge concerning project management from competence concerning the subject of the project. There are various software tools to support project management functions. However, investigating some consulting projects a particular type of project, reveals that this limitation hinders its application.

Thus, the authors subdivide project management knowledge into three classes: universal project management knowledge, knowledge about the organization which performs the project, and knowledge about the project class of which the actual project is a member. Based on these abstractions, three layer architecture of project management support software is developed. Rule-based systems are advantageous to maintain knowledge which changes frequently over time.
That is, the knowledge about the organization and furthermore, the knowledge about the project class. However, these components are not applicable universally. So, the development costs of project management support software increase with the number of organizations and the number of project classes. A prototype of these concepts has been implemented for a consulting company.

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