We want to thank the many organizations who have allowed us to provide consulting services. Consulting is a principal activity in the ROI Institute, and we are fortunate to provide our services to some of the most admired and most impressive organizations in the world. From the business side, we have been fortunate to work with over half of the Fortune 500 List of Companies. We work with 25 different national governments, hundreds of nongovernmental organizations, including the United Nations, countless nonprofit organizations, colleges and universities, charitable trusts and foundations, and healthcare organizations, providing a rich background of experiences for this book.

We are fortunate to have contact with literally thousands of individuals as we provide consulting services. These clients have allowed us to assist them and, in many cases, we learned with them. So the dedication of this book is to those clients who have embraced our processes, added to our experience base, and helped to generate hundreds of published case studies.

We are very pleased to work with Bill Trotter on this important work. Bill has an outstanding reputation and keen insight into the internal consulting world. As executive director of AIMC, Bill knows this field, and knows the value that consulting can deliver. We are pleased and honored to be connected with him and this important contribution to consulting, both internal and external.

Closer to home, we want to thank the ROI Institute team for their efforts as they support us in our publishing endeavors. We particularly appreciate Hope Nicholas, director of publications, who provided editorial coordination and management support for this book. Hope is an important and valuable member of our organization, as she has done an outstanding job of editing, coordinating, and delivering this manuscript. We appreciate her efforts and we enjoy working with her.

—Jack and Patti Phillips

I would like to thank the many members of the Association of Internal Management Consultants (AIMC) for their contribution in helping to develop the extensive body of knowledge on internal consulting best practices and their partnering arrangements with the numerous external consultants with whom they work.

Over the past 40 years, this association has led the way in developing operational models, competency frameworks, performance measurement programs and other methodologies, tools and techniques to establish and enhance professional-level internal groups and maximize the effectiveness of their total consulting spend.

The AIMC's continual knowledge sharing process through its international network of local chapters, periodic Affinity Group calls, annual conference and various publications has provided great input into both this publication and its predecessor, Internal Consulting Excellence,¹ which included a benchmarking study of more than 1,000 organizations.

In addition, our joint benchmarking studies with other associations on the emerging need for internal consulting skills in a variety of functional areas across the enterprise has also contributed to our continuing research. This includes collaboration on research regarding the need for internal consulting skills for the future quality professional and on the evolving business partner role in human resources.

Considerable input has also been gathered from the AIMC's board of directors and executive advisory board.

Finally, I have been fortunate to learn a lot from the numerous clients for whom I have provided consulting services to help them establish or further develop their internal consulting practices across a broad spectrum of industries and consulting practice areas.

—Bill Trotter