StatGuy2000 said:
To the OP: I concur with everything that chiro has stated above -- it's important to gain some experience working for someone else to give you the know-how when/if you decide to start your own business.
To chiro: Suppose you wish to start up your own consultancy in the area of your expertise (e.g. a statistician wanting to provide consulting services to local businesses). Are there any additional considerations I should take into account above and beyond what you have posted?
Due to the nature of consultancy work, my recommendations in terms of what to focus on would be the projects you have worked on, and the network of people that you know and will be useful for getting work.
It's a different kind of sales-person than say one that operates out of a store-front or in a closed building since the brand involved is the individual and not an organization or team.
If you are doing some sort of consulting I think you should get very familiar with public speaking, learning how to pitch yourself, and how to sell yourself as a brand to those who hire you.
Also find out where the decision makers and the influential people are who make the decision to hire consultants (for whatever organization) since they are calling the shots instead of focusing only on meeting other technically minded people that don't.
Also a big part of your business and getting hired is going to be who vouches for you (which is related to the above): if someone is vouching for you then they are putting themselves on the line in a way.
Getting vouched for can depend on many things: you may have worked with the person or someone who knows someone who knows someone that worked with you. You may have worked on a significant project known in the industry or with a company that everyone knows and/or respects.
Also don't be afraid to put yourself out there: some people think that talking about themselves and what they have done is arrogant and self-centred but you're selling yourself, your skillset, and ultimately your value to someone who may want to make use of you. This is not saying you should lie, exaggerate things, or intentional mislead someone: but it is important to have genuine confidence because people buy confidence when it comes to trusting individuals especially when the nature of the work is difficult and fraught with potential problems.
I'd also recommend that you learn typically where things go wrong. Let me explain.
When you are a business person you typically start out having too much of an optimistic viewpoint when dealing with clients or customers. What tends to happen over time is that what you anticipated is not actually happens. For example you may start off by allowing clients to pay later only to find out that one bad client doesn't actually have the money at all, or the money that was agreed to. Such things cause a lot of headaches.
Part of being professional is knowing these things, when they occur, how they occur, and how to deal with them: especially in a preventable manner. Other outsiders may look at these practices and say they are too uptight, but there is a reason why those uptight things exist (and its also the reason why a lot of those employee contracts are the way they are).
Also like any business-person, go to networks, conferences, functions, etc and take particular attention to what your potential clients value.
Academics value things like specific awards, citations in papers, and all of these other "prestigious" (personally I hate the word) things. The people that ultimately influence and hire you will value other things. I have mentioned completely projects as one, but this is not the only thing they value.
You can get a sense of what they value by understanding what is important to them. Is technology and statistical knowledge important, or is increasing sales, getting into new markets, understanding consumer behavior, detecting fraud, or increasing their stock price important?
One final thing: If you do end consulting and you put a lot of work into getting a final report and presentation and find that they don't want to use it, then don't take it personally. There are a variety of reasons why clients won't take the advice, especially if it impacts their own comfortable position in the company. They pay you to give advice, and even if your advice is ultimately the best advice that you can give, they can still dismiss it, your results, and your hard work entirely.
If the above happens learn to distinguish between poor work, and a choice from your client to ignore advice based on their own perception, intuition, and incentives.
