Strategic Advisory vs Guru Consultancy

There is a classic zen koan that goes something like “If you are on the road and come across the buddha, you must kill him.” 

Or her. Or whatever you think the buddha is - which is sort of the point. A zen koan is like a little riddle meant to be meditated upon. They have been thought about and discussed for thousands of years, and they still haven’t come up with the right answer. The koan of the buddha on the road contradicts just about everything one might imagine about a Buddhist by suggesting violence and death. 

Clients aren’t typically shy with their accolades, especially after they complete the Big BAM Process. Recently, someone referred to me as a “brand guru.” Sometimes when I’m invited to speak about branding, the host likes to tack on “expert” to my qualifications. I let the titles pass. While I understand there are very real and legitimate “gurus” throughout the world, the modern bastardization of the term bothers me - especially when it is self-applied. 

Rarely does the person who calls themselves a “guru” have the experience needed to earn the title. I feel the same way about the “coaches” and “consultants” out there - all you need to do is add the word to your LinkedIn Profile, and you’re off to the races. They charge outrageous amounts for whatever is on their mind - they have no products beyond whatever idea they’ve come up with this week, or else just recycle old content in their courses. Stay in this business long enough, and the coaches all start to look alike - clones bouncing around the industry spouting mantras to an echo chamber. They focus on what they want to teach instead of listening to the voices who need help. 

Another saying, another koan: when the student is ready, the master will appear. But in a world where billions of dollars of targeted advertising are transacted daily to grab your attention so you can buy into something, I’m not sure how true this is. 

I would never call myself a guru. No one should ever refer to themselves as such. 

If you meet the Buddha on the road, kill them. 

Or, we need to re-establish what these definitions mean so we can move forward with how we advise our students and clients. Ahead, I want to discuss the following: 

1. Defining terms: advisor and guru 

2. Where the mystique of the modern guru falls short

3. Introducing the strategic advisor

Dusting off the old dictionary for the core definitions: 

Whereas an advisor: 

Two things of note:
One who is an acknowledged leader or chief proponent. The quality of being an “acknowledged leader” requires the opinion of other people. Consider when Marty Neumeier says “a brand isn’t what you say it is; it’s what they say it is.” Sure, you could be a guru, but only if others grant you the title. This goes hand in hand with the idea of “chief proponent,” which implies there is no one doing it better than you or at your level of experience. 

Again, something likely decided by an audience of your nonpeers.

Beware the people who call themselves the “gurus” or the “coaches” or “consultants” of the world - kill the Buddhas as you see them.

Terms like “teacher,” “guide,” and “advisor” are words often used by people who want to grow, change, and learn something about themselves. But this also makes them vulnerable - committing yourself to a life of learning means having to admit your ignorance rather than pretend you know something for the sake of celebrity.

Advisors, likewise, may have gained their knowledge from the classroom and technical expertise, but it is their real world experience that is valued. Their perspective is shaped by years of hands-on in-the-field experience, but successes and failures alike - and this is why we pay for their advice. 

The modern “professional” guru is driven by their ego. They are usually little more than inflated personas drenched with insecurity trying to force their way into the spotlight so they can feel valuable.Their overinflated sense of confidence is there to hide the fact that their products and services have no value. 

You know who I’m talking about. These are the people who set up Facebook groups as an “exclusive community” that is little more than another way to sell their crap to people they deceived. Their advice is general and formulaic. Most of what they sell is a cookie-cutter program they adopted from the guru above them. Their entire model is based on getting you to believe that if you buy enough of the right programs and “commit to the process” then you, too, could share in their success. 

But their insecure need for praise results in these gurus preying on their communities financially and emotionally, and creating a life-draining community of people who are after the same praise. The BAM team has turned away a few of these types of clients - partly because they didn’t want to commit to our message, partly because…ick. 

The guru falls short if they aren’t catering to your needs and helping you solve your problems. If your challenges aren’t the center of their focus, if the only thing that matters to them is what you purchase, then they don’t have your best interests in mind. You never needed their answers - what you need is a strategy. Advisor, guru, coach, whatever they want to call themselves - they are worthless if they can’t approach your condition with a strategic mindset. 

The modern guru is passive. They put their general ideas into a passive product and then set it on autopilot. Passive gurus, passive students, passive results - nothing changes. Strategic advisory is not passive. It is very active. It is like herding cats with how many variables we need to handle. The level of work involved would make a guru call out sick for the week.

Strategic advisory requires all hands on deck. It involves work. It involves - get this - the advisor bringing their expertise to a completely unprecedented problem. The individual's feelings are put to the side, and the needs of the collective are considered. 

As a strategic advisor, it is your responsibility to be as objective and unbiased as possible.Your goal is to guide your clients forward to the best outcome based on what you know. You don’t need to know everything - in fact, you probably shouldn’t - but your confidence should provide the environment needed for the “right” answers to come to the surface.

This is the exact approach our strategists take at BAM. Sitting down with a new client for their one-on-one Big BAM Process, we have no idea where things are going to end up. We have no pre-packaged solutions, we have no direction we would rather things go. Often, we even have limited knowledge of the client’s business or background or any of the infinite number of variables that are tied to a business. But the outcomes are wildly different. 

And the outcomes are just that: wild. Watching the eye-opening realizations and shifts in mindsets about turning their business into a brand is incredible. To watch a business owner find clarity in what they do and who they do it for is worth it every time. As the strategic advisor, once our sessions are done, there isn’t much more for us to gain from the clients - but we love watching what they do with their newfound alignment with their brand. 

We don’t sell enlightenment, we can only show you the path that might lead you to it - but you may have to kill a Buddha or two along the way.