Dejan KosuticOne of a consultant’s biggest fears in the early months is this: What if a client asks for something I don’t have? Many beginners imagine they need to invent everything from scratch — every policy, every procedure, every training deck, every project plan.
The reality is far more encouraging. Successful consultants don’t start with a blank page — they start with templates, tools, and practical know‑how. Once you understand what’s available and how to use it, your service offering becomes clearer, more professional, and much easier to deliver.
New consultants should build their services around three core assets: ready made templates for their chosen framework, collaboration and operational tools that streamline delivery, and practical know how gained through resources like courses, books, and webinars.
Why are these three assets important?
Before defining your packages or pricing, you need a realistic understanding of what you can deliver — and that depends on the assets you have at your disposal.
Templates determine how quickly you can produce policies, procedures, and other documentation; tools determine how efficiently you can collaborate and execute; and know-how determines whether you can guide your client through a project with confidence.
When these three elements are in place, you stop improvising and start operating like a professional.
1) Templates: A powerful way to start
Templates are the easiest asset to acquire, and they also provide the basis of consulting work — especially in governance-heavy frameworks like ISO 27001, NIS2, DORA, ISO 42001, and similar standards. These frameworks require extensive documentation, and clients expect you to produce it quickly and accurately. That’s where templates become indispensable.
You’ll need two broad categories of templates. The first covers your business operations: proposals, contracts, reports, and invoices. These save you time and help you run your consultancy smoothly, but they’re not what wins you clients.
The second category includes framework-specific templates. An ISO 27001 consultant, for example, needs a Risk Assessment Methodology, a Statement of Applicability, an Information Security Policy, and a full set of cybersecurity policies such as access control, backup, and classification. Procedures like incident management and document control are also essential.
Creating all of this from scratch is possible, but it’s slow, prone to errors, and unnecessary. Most consultants either build their own libraries over many years or rely on specialized vendors who provide complete, professionally written template sets.
Here you’ll find a library of templates for various standards: Advisera toolkits.
The Consultant’s Asset Stack
| Category | Purpose | Examples |
| Templates | Speed & consistency | Various policies, procedures, plans, etc. |
| Tools | Collaboration & execution | MS Teams, Slack, SharePoint, GRC software, training platforms, AI-powered assistants |
| Know-how | Expertise & adaptability | Courses, webinars, books, 1-on-1 consultations |
2) Tools: Collaboration and execution made manageable
Tools also fall into two major categories: collaboration tools and operational tools. Both influence how you work with clients and how efficiently you deliver your services.
Collaboration tools help you manage projects, communicate, and share files — especially when working remotely. Platforms like Monday, Notion, and Asana help you track tasks and deadlines across multiple clients. SharePoint, Box, and Dropbox give you a secure and organized way to manage documents. For communication, Microsoft Teams and Slack are the professional standard; some consultants ask whether WhatsApp is acceptable — generally, it isn’t ideal for formal work, but it can be useful for large-scale exercises or informal Q&A groups where quick, lightweight communication is needed.
Operational tools are the systems that help you actually perform the consulting work. Governance, risk, and compliance (GRC) software supports risk assessments, definition of controls, policy management, evidence collection, and workflow automation. Training platforms allow you to deliver video-based courses, track attendance, test users, and upload your own materials — a major advantage if training is part of your service offering. You’ll also encounter auditing tools, as well as some other tools like Advisera’s Experta (an AI-powered compliance co-pilot).
Click here to learn more about Conformio, a GRC tool for ISO 27001, and Company Training Academy, a training platform for compliance with various standards.
3) Know‑how: What sets you apart
Templates and tools give you structure, but know-how gives you credibility. This is the knowledge of how to implement a framework, how to adapt a training program to a specific industry, and how to tailor documentation for different company sizes. It’s the difference between simply filling out templates and actually guiding a client through a successful project.
For example, a DORA training program for a small bank will look very different from one designed for a large brokerage house. An ISO 42001 implementation for a startup will not resemble the same project for a multinational enterprise. Understanding these nuances comes from experience, but also from structured learning.
You can build this know-how through courses, books, and webinars, but also through one-on-one consultations with a more knowledgeable expert and with hands-on practice.
Check out Advisera’s free courses for ISO 27001, 9001, 42001, DORA, GDPR, and other ISO standards and EU regulations.
Key takeaways
By building these three assets, you can kick off your career much more quickly — of course, you have to make sure that these assets are a good match for your market niche and your unique expertise.
If you match your expertise with the right templates, tools, and know-how, you’ll be able to deliver high-quality service to your clients. And happy clients mean that you’ll get many more clients.
Click here to explore our Consultants White Label Toolkits with professionally written, unbranded templates and a clear implementation structure, so you don’t have to build your documentation library from scratch for every ISO standard.
