Amabile Consulting

“I am Winston Wolf. I solve problems.”

This iconic exposition from Tarantino’s 1993 cult classic is a reflection of everything that brings relief to a person in jeopardy. In the case of Mimi Amabile, the president of Amabile Consulting and a problem solver, her career started as a vendor, transitioning from an account executive to a technical consultant. She subsequently found herself in the HRIS department as a team lead, for a large client organization with over 100,000 employees. This further led her to a career at a consulting firm, where she learned about the consulting end of the businesses. Working as both client and vendor, Mimi was a consultant who had stepped outside the boundaries of her past roles, developing an understanding of issues that may arise from both clients and vendors alike. Backed by her own experience gathered over the years, she created her human capital consulting firm Amabile Consulting. Her aim was to fill the void in the marketplace, which demanded an easier way to solve clients’ problems—to know all the right questions to ask vendors and the ones to be asked to clients as well.

During project implementations, clients experience additional workloads and must contribute an equal amount of time to the implementation of the project in addition to their scheduled job. Additionally, they too are learning about new systems and processes, with the fear of change and the unknown. During this phase, they look for support from an external agent to ease the process and streamline it. “Amabile Consulting is a service-centric organization that works in close association with clients to let them know that we are always there for them, handholding them through the project, every step of the way,” adds Mimi.

With vendors, the limitation lies in their ability to align themselves with the needs of customers as most of them have multiple clients expecting the same amount of attention from them. Consultants—brought onto the projects from the outside— are often are specialized in one area or function. They are commonly knowledgeable in their own given area of expertise with little understanding of the big picture, which can result in additional meetings and increased project hours. This is precisely where Amabile Consulting’s expertise and experience shines through.

Amabile Consulting is a service-centric organization that works, intricately with clients, providing handholding, to walk them through the project, through every step of the way

Amabile provides superlative consulting as project managers, technical leads, and trainers for any kind of project while its technical capabilities address the implementation, upgrade, interface design, and development-related needs. In the case of one prominent healthcare system, the client had acquired new divisions and was looking to bring those into existing payroll systems. They had a consultant from a larger firm working as their project manager and a technical resource from Amabile.

Based on the capability showcased during the extent of the project, the client soon extended Amabile’s role from merely providing assistance to handling both its technical and functional areas as testing manager and interface developer. Amabile then proceeded to assist the project manager, who was not familiar with some of the systems that were involved in the implementation. As phase two was rolled out, the Amabile resource was the sole consultant asked to return.

“Size makes you forget about the actual service part of the consulting business. Working for the client, taking the problems away from them, that’s what is important,” remarks Mimi. As the company keeps its size to service ratio taut, Amabile’s roadmap is to continue to service clients in these areas, without getting too big or losing their signature personal touch.