Most Buyers Ask Three Questions. Twelve Others Matter More.
The three everyone asks: what does it cost, how long does it take, and who else have you worked with. All reasonable. None of them predict whether the engagement works. The questions that predict it are about who personally performs the work, what you physically hold at the end, whether the consultant carries insurance, whether your communications are protected, and whether they can name a time they turned business away. Below are all fifteen, with the answers that should make you keep looking.
Buying consulting is strange, and it is worth naming why before you sit down across from anybody.
With almost everything else a business purchases, you can inspect the thing before you own it. You can test drive the truck. You can look at the software. You can walk the building. With consulting, the product is judgment, it does not exist until after you have paid for it, and by the time you can evaluate the quality you have already acted on it.
So you cannot inspect the product. What you can inspect is the person and the terms. That is what these fifteen questions do.
- Most buyers ask about price, timeline, and references. None of those three predict whether the engagement works.
- Ask who personally performs the work and what share of the hours are theirs, then put that name in the contract.
- Communications with a consultant are generally not privileged. For high-risk matters, have your attorney engage the consultant.
- Ask for the certificate of professional liability insurance rather than a verbal assurance that coverage exists.
- The strongest single question is when they last told a client they did not need the engagement.
Municipal buyers have a procurement layer on top of all this — which path applies, whether Form 1295 is triggered, the Chapter 176 conflict questionnaire, and what the Public Information Act does to a consultant's report. That is covered separately in how to choose an HR consultant for a Texas city. Read that one, then come back for questions 7 through 10, which apply to you too.
Who Is Actually Doing This
1. Who personally performs the work, and what percentage of the hours are theirs?
The oldest problem in professional services is that the person who sells is not the person who delivers. A principal presents, a junior executes. Sometimes that is fine and correctly priced. Often it is neither, and nobody told you.
Worrying answer: "Our team handles that." Follow up until you have a name, and then put the name in the contract with a substitution clause.
2. What is your certification, and what is the number so I can verify it?
SPHR, SHRM-SCP, PHR, SHRM-CP are the credentials that mean something. They are verifiable through HRCI and SHRM. Almost nobody checks, and that is exactly why you should.
Worrying answer: Hesitation, or a credential you cannot find in the issuing body's registry. Also worth noticing: "certified HR consultant" is not a credential. It is a phrase.
3. How many organizations my size, in my industry, in Texas have you done this specific work for?
Three qualifiers, and consultants will try to satisfy the question by hitting one. A firm that has done sixty engagements, all of them for 900-person hospital systems, is not experienced in your 40-person nonprofit. Different arithmetic entirely.
Worrying answer: Numbers without specificity, or "the principles are the same at any size." The principles are. The constraints are not.
Scope, Price, and Whether the Meter Runs
4. What is the number, and what specifically changes it?
Not a range. A number, plus a named list of the conditions that would move it. Every consultant knows what drives their own pricing — headcount, locations, document condition, urgency — and can tell you.
Worrying answer: A range that widens after you sign, or "we'll scope it as we go." That is not a proposal, it is an option on your budget.
5. What do I physically hold when this is over?
An artifact. A written audit report with ranked findings. A rebuilt handbook. A documented investigation with conclusions. Something you can hand to your successor.
Worrying answer: "Ongoing advisory support." That may be a legitimate retainer, but it is not a deliverable, and you should know which one you are buying.
6. If I call you with a quick question, does the meter run?
This one is more consequential than it sounds. If every call costs money, your people stop calling, and they stop calling precisely on the small questions that are cheap to answer and expensive to get wrong. A pricing structure that discourages early contact is a pricing structure that manufactures late problems.
Worrying answer: Six-minute billing increments on a relationship you expect to be ongoing.
The Four Nobody Asks: What Happens When It Goes Wrong
Here is the section I actually wrote this article for.
Buyers ask about qualifications and price because those are the questions you ask when you assume things will go well. Nobody asks what happens if the advice turns out to be wrong, or if the employee sues anyway, or if the consultant's notes end up as an exhibit. Those are the questions that separate a consultant who has been through it from one who has not.
7. Do you carry professional liability insurance, and what are the limits? Send me the certificate.
Errors and omissions coverage at $1 million per occurrence and $2 million aggregate is a common contractual requirement for consultants. Ask for the certificate of insurance, not a verbal yes.
The limit matters less than the existence. A consultant who advises on terminations without professional liability coverage has looked at the risk of their own work and declined to insure it — while asking you to absorb it.
Worrying answer: "I've never needed it." Neither has anybody, right up until they have.
8. Are our communications privileged?
The correct answer is no, and you want a consultant who says so without flinching.
Attorney-client privilege protects communications with your lawyer. It does not automatically extend to your consultant. Courts have held that an HR consultant's report is discoverable where the primary purpose of the work was helping the employer make a business decision rather than helping counsel render legal advice. There is an "agent of the attorney" doctrine that can extend protection when a consultant is engaged by counsel to assist in giving legal advice, but courts apply it narrowly and it is not something to assume.
The practical implication is specific and useful: for genuinely high-risk matters, have your attorney engage the consultant rather than engaging them directly. Ask your lawyer whether that structure makes sense for the matter in front of you.
Worrying answer: "Yes, everything we discuss is confidential." Confidential and privileged are different words. A consultant who conflates them in a sales conversation will conflate them in a deposition.
9. If I am sued over a decision you advised on, what happens to your notes — and will you sit for a deposition?
Absent privilege, a consultant's emails, drafts, interview notes, and text messages are generally discoverable. A consultant who conducted your investigation can be deposed about it.
So ask how they document. Do they keep drafts? Do they write interview notes assuming a plaintiff's attorney will read them? Have they been deposed before, and how did it go?
Worrying answer: Surprise. A consultant who has never thought about this has not done work where it came up, which tells you something about the work.
10. Where is the line between HR advice and legal advice, and what do you do when a question crosses it?
In Texas, the practice of law includes services rendered out of court — including giving advice that requires legal skill or knowledge — and only a Texas-licensed attorney may do it. The Unauthorized Practice of Law Committee, appointed by the Texas Supreme Court, exists to enforce that.
A consultant who tells you a specific termination is "legally fine" has crossed the line, and the exposure runs to you as well as to them. You have relied on an opinion that carries no privilege, no malpractice coverage for legal advice, and no professional accountability to a licensing body.
What a good consultant does instead is describe the risk, describe the pattern, tell you what the documentation supports, and then say plainly: this one is a legal question, call your employment attorney, and here is exactly what to ask them.
Worrying answer: Confident legal conclusions from a non-lawyer. Confidence is not competence, and in this specific case it is a liability transfer aimed at you.
Conflicts and Confidentiality
11. Who else do you work for that could create a conflict?
Competitors, your major vendors, your industry association, a company currently recruiting your people. A consultant working across a region will accumulate adjacent relationships; that is normal. Refusing to disclose them is not.
Worrying answer: "That's confidential." The existence of a relationship is a conflict-screening fact. Its contents are confidential. Those are different.
12. Will you sign my confidentiality agreement, and will you agree not to recruit my employees?
The second half surprises people. A consultant embedded in your organization learns exactly who your strongest performers are and how satisfied they are. A non-solicitation clause covering your employees for the term plus a reasonable period afterward is a normal ask, and a professional will not blink at it.
Worrying answer: Reluctance on either. Also ask how they handle your data — where employee information is stored, who else can see it, and what happens to it when the engagement ends.
Two Questions About Honesty
13. Tell me about a time you told a client they did not need you.
If I could only ask one, this is the one.
Everyone who has practiced for a while has turned work away — because the problem was smaller than the client feared, because it belonged to a lawyer, because the timing was wrong, because they were not the right firm for it. A consultant who cannot produce that example is either genuinely new or is optimizing for the sale rather than your outcome.
Worrying answer: A pause, then a story that is really about how they solved it anyway.
14. Tell me about an engagement that did not work, and what you would do differently.
Same instinct, harder version. You are testing for two things: whether they have enough volume to have failed, and whether they process failure as information or as someone else's fault.
Worrying answer: A failure story where the client was entirely to blame. Sometimes clients are the problem. Never once, across an entire career, is not a real distribution.
And One About Leaving
15. How do I end this, what do I get on the way out, and does it renew automatically?
Termination for convenience with reasonable notice. All work product and data delivered in a usable, non-proprietary format. No automatic renewal.
That last one matters more than it looks. A retainer that renews silently every year is a retainer nobody re-evaluates, and an engagement nobody re-evaluates has stopped being a decision and become a line item.
Worrying answer: Long notice periods, auto-renewal, or templates you lose access to when you leave.
The Red-Flag Answer Key
All fifteen in one place. Print it, take it to the meeting, write in the margins.
The Red-Flag Answer Key. Faulkner HR Solutions. Original framework, 2026. Cite as: Faulkner, T.W. (2026). The Red-Flag Answer Key. Faulkner HR Solutions.
| # | Ask | Good answer sounds like | Red flag |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Who personally does the work? | A name, a percentage, and willingness to put both in the contract | "Our team" |
| 2 | Certification and number? | SPHR / SHRM-SCP with a verifiable number | Unverifiable titles; "certified HR consultant" |
| 3 | My size, my industry, in Texas? | Specific comparable engagements | "The principles are the same at any size" |
| 4 | What is the number? | A fixed fee and a named list of what changes it | Open hourly, no cap, scope "as we go" |
| 5 | What do I hold at the end? | A named artifact with an acceptance step | "Ongoing advisory support" sold as a project |
| 6 | Does the meter run on calls? | Retainer includes access; early calls encouraged | Six-minute increments on an ongoing relationship |
| 7 | E&O insurance and limits? | Certificate provided; commonly $1M / $2M | "I've never needed it" |
| 8 | Are we privileged? | "No. For high-risk matters, have your attorney engage me." | "Everything we discuss is confidential" offered as the same thing |
| 9 | Your notes in litigation? Deposition? | Documents as if a plaintiff's lawyer will read it; has been deposed | Surprise at the question |
| 10 | HR advice vs. legal advice? | Names the line and routes you to counsel with specific questions | Confident legal conclusions from a non-lawyer |
| 11 | Conflicts? | Discloses adjacent relationships proactively | "That's confidential" |
| 12 | NDA and non-solicitation? | Signs both without friction; clear data handling | Reluctance on either |
| 13 | Told a client they didn't need you? | A specific, recent, unflattering-to-revenue example | No example, or a humblebrag |
| 14 | An engagement that failed? | Owns a share of it and names the change made | Client blamed entirely |
| 15 | How do I leave? | Termination for convenience, data returned, no auto-renewal | Auto-renewal and proprietary lock-in |
Answering My Own Fifteen
It would be cheap to write a rubric and not sit for it, so here are our answers, including the ones that are not flattering.
Where we score well. One named practitioner performs the work, and it is the person whose name is on the door. Credentials are SPHR and Lean Six Sigma Black Belt, both verifiable. Fees are published on the website before you ever call. Retainers include access specifically so people call early. Deliverables are defined artifacts. Work product belongs to the client. And on question 13, I turn work away regularly enough that I have written a whole article telling Texas cities to use free resources they already fund before hiring anyone.
Where a competitor may beat us. On question 3, a larger firm with a deeper bench will have more comparable engagements in some industries than a boutique practice will. On question 1, that same bench means they can absorb a scheduling conflict or an illness in a way a single practitioner cannot — and you should weigh that honestly, because it is a real limitation of working with a small firm, ours included.
The one I want you to press hardest. Question 8. If your matter is genuinely high-risk — a complaint against an executive, a termination you expect to be litigated — the right structure is often for your employment attorney to engage me rather than for you to engage me directly. That arrangement costs you slightly more and earns me the same. I raise it because the alternative is you discovering in discovery that a conversation you thought was protected was not.
This is the same argument I make about documentation and discipline files. The paperwork is never the point. The paperwork is evidence that a system existed and that somebody thought about the failure mode before it happened. Choosing a consultant is no different.
Frequently Asked Questions
Generally no. Attorney-client privilege protects communications with your lawyer, not your consultant. Courts have held that an HR consultant's report is discoverable where the primary purpose was to help the employer make a business decision rather than to help counsel render legal advice. For high-risk matters, have your attorney engage the consultant — and even then the protection is applied narrowly, so ask your lawyer before assuming it.
Yes, and ask for the certificate rather than a verbal assurance. Errors and omissions coverage of $1 million per occurrence and $2 million aggregate is a common contractual requirement for consultants. The specific limit matters less than whether coverage exists at all — a consultant advising on terminations without professional liability coverage is asking you to absorb a risk they declined to insure.
No. In Texas the practice of law includes services rendered out of court, including giving advice that requires legal skill or knowledge, and only a Texas-licensed attorney may do it. A consultant who tells you a specific termination is legally safe has crossed a line — and that exposes you, because you have relied on an opinion carrying no privilege, no professional accountability, and no malpractice coverage for legal advice.
Ask for a fixed number before work begins. We publish retainers priced per active W-2 employee per month with a published minimum, from $20 per employee with a $1,000 minimum to $110 per employee with a $4,500 minimum. Projects are quoted as fixed fees after scoping. Whatever firm you choose, an open hourly arrangement with no cap on a project with no defined deliverable is the arrangement most likely to end badly.
At minimum: the named individual who performs the work and a limit on substitution, a defined deliverable with an acceptance process, a fixed fee and what changes it, ownership of work product by you, a confidentiality obligation, a non-solicitation clause covering your employees, a certificate of professional liability insurance, and a termination-for-convenience provision with no automatic renewal.
Possibly. A consultant who conducted an investigation or advised on a decision can be deposed, and their notes, drafts, and emails are generally discoverable absent privilege. Ask directly how they document their work, whether they keep drafts, and whether they have been deposed before. A consultant who has never considered the question has not been doing high-stakes work.
An inability to describe a time they told a client they did not need the engagement. Everyone who has practiced for a while has turned work away, and a consultant who cannot produce that example is either very new or is optimizing for the sale rather than the outcome. A close second is a proposal where the person presenting is not the person performing.
A necessary note. I am an HR and organizational consultant, not an attorney, and this article is general information rather than legal advice. Questions about privilege, discoverability, insurance requirements, and contract terms are legal questions specific to your situation and jurisdiction — your employment counsel is the right person to answer them, and question 10 exists precisely to make that boundary explicit. Insurance limits cited reflect common contractual requirements rather than a legal standard.