Funny, but in my experience, under-developed problem statement like “fixing a broken project” is the main reason why companies do not (cannot) offer competitive compensation for this kind of work.
What is the monetary value of “fixing a broken project”? Nobody knows, because the root cause is not known - and if they knew the root cause, the problem would have been defined differently from the start.
So what happens is company tries to hire someone to diagnose the root causes. But diagnostics brings no inherit value to the org until problems are actually fixed. Which means nobody is willing to invest into diagnostics. Which means they try to fill in some flat rate position for these diagnostic purposes, position which fits the project budget, with compensation unrelated to the scale of actual problems at hand.
Another issue is that “fixing a broken project” engagements are usually launched by middle management responsible for success of these (already launched) projects. Proper way to approach this as an external consultant would be to go one level up, take a look at the actual company strategy and this project’s goals, and rework the way whole project is launched. At many times the easier way around is to re-setup, re-steer, or kill this project altogether - but this requires a different level of involvement.
In the end you are stuck on an underfunded engagement where actual proper solution likely lies outside of your area of responsibility (you are being hired by middle management, so you cannot effectively go above their head and reach the actual solution).
What is the monetary value of “fixing a broken project”? Nobody knows, because the root cause is not known - and if they knew the root cause, the problem would have been defined differently from the start.
So what happens is company tries to hire someone to diagnose the root causes. But diagnostics brings no inherit value to the org until problems are actually fixed. Which means nobody is willing to invest into diagnostics. Which means they try to fill in some flat rate position for these diagnostic purposes, position which fits the project budget, with compensation unrelated to the scale of actual problems at hand.
Another issue is that “fixing a broken project” engagements are usually launched by middle management responsible for success of these (already launched) projects. Proper way to approach this as an external consultant would be to go one level up, take a look at the actual company strategy and this project’s goals, and rework the way whole project is launched. At many times the easier way around is to re-setup, re-steer, or kill this project altogether - but this requires a different level of involvement.
In the end you are stuck on an underfunded engagement where actual proper solution likely lies outside of your area of responsibility (you are being hired by middle management, so you cannot effectively go above their head and reach the actual solution).