Kamyar Shah is a senior business consultant with a remarkable successful career spanning over 14 years. He owns his own consulting business and has served a great number of satisfied customers. His deep management understanding and experience have made him a true professional, in helping rapid growth organizations as well as distressed organizations. Growth management, stuck growth and organizational people issues are some of his many specialized areas. His clients have given great feedback on how he has helped them in closing great deals and in solving different profitability and cost issues across organizations.

TaskQue: Your marketing experience does not need any brief introduction but we would really like to know how did you start your career? What was the source of your inspiration?.

Kamyar: Actually it was by accident. I was in grad school and needed to supplement my income. One thing led to another.

TaskQue: Marketing is getting very advanced day by day. In your opinion, what are the best practices for doing efficient marketing in 2017? What tools would you recommend to new marketing professionals to manage their work in an efficient way?

Kamyar: Marketing is increasingly involving technology, however the human creativity and decision making are by no means forgone  conclusions. Essentially the tools are just an extension of the user and are only as effective as the user of the tool.

Yes there are tools that everyone have/should use including analytical tools, data collection and examination tools. Most of those are very similar in nature and deliver comparable results.

I would highly encourage the end users to not only find the tools that match their current mission but also spend a good deal of time learning the tools to an expert level. A tool is only as good as the end user.

TaskQue: You have been a business consultant for a very long time and have started your own freelance services. What are key areas on which you always put focus with clients?

Kamyar: I have found that the most important factors in achieving organizational goals are thorough planning and the ability to adapt a flexible approach.

The planning of any project has to be scientific and thorough. In my opinion, this is the phase that should be the most resource and time intensive of the project; while avoiding “analysis paralysis”.

After the initial planning, the execution should be mostly data driven in a flexible and adaptive environment. This sort of agility will enable quick adaptation and adjustments that will ultimately maximize the outcome.

TaskQue: Your academic background as well as professional experience are very diversified. You did your Bachelor in Science, Master’s in Art and then another Master’s in Business Administration. According to you, is diversification or specialization, more helpful in the long run?

Kamyar: I have seen both work. I think it is more a question of the environment and the particular field.

My personal experience however has been more along the lines of diversification: Over the years I have noticed that my general skills sets are a lot more frequently used than my specific specializations. I have also noticed that clients from different countries appreciate different sets of skills.