7 Reasons (and a Joke) to Hire an Environmental Consultant

I remember with nostalgia my first steps in environmental consulting, there were many of those first environmental training courses in the late 90s. I especially remember one, about waste and air pollution, where a licensed Valencian consultant told us the consultant's famous joke, and which I now share with you:

“The shepherd was guarding his flock of sheep in the fields of La Mancha, when suddenly a pristine 4×4, the latest full equipment model, appears on the dusty road. From the 4×4, a young man of no more than 30 years old wearing a Ralph Laurent polo shirt, tight jeans and Converse sneakers descends. He approaches the shepherd and says: “Sir, if I can guess how many sheep you have in your flock without counting them, will you give me one?” The pastor responds with some amazement: “Yes, of course!”

The young man gets into his 4×4, opens his latest model Mac, connects to the network network and accesses NASA data in real time and then, using a satellite and GPS, to identify the exact area of the flock, calculates the historical average size of a “La Mancha” sheep and using a dynamic table in Excel and with the execution of some personalized macros in Visual Basic, after three hours of work he answers the shepherd: “You have 987 sheep and 2 may be pregnant”.

The surprised shepherd nodded and told him that this was indeed the case, and that he should therefore take a sheep.

The young man took a sheep and loaded it in the 4×4, but when he was about to leave the old man stopped him and asked him: “Excuse me young man, if I guess your profession, will you return my sheep to me?” The young man smilingly said to him: “Sure, man.” The pastor said, “You're a consultant.” The young man, surprised, exclaimed: “Exactly!” and while returning the sheep he had caught, he asked: “But how did you notice?”

And the pastor answered: “For three reasons. FIRST, you came without me calling you. SECOND, he charged me a sheep for telling me something I already knew. THIRD, you can tell he doesn't know my business because he was taking the dog.”

This joke was the excuse to make us see that we should provide added value to our clients, that we must be the missing piece by providing an external value that the client does not have, so for example, what if the young man had told the pastor that there are subsidies for his Manchego race and that he managed them? What if I had proposed a more sustainable management plan? these are just examples, but it is the vocation that every environmental consultant (or not) should have towards their client.

In this infographic, we present seven points that justify (in our opinion) the hiring of an environmental consultant or an environmental company.