Part One of a
Two-Part Series
by Phil Phillips, PhD
Contributing Editor
phillips@chemarkconsulting.net
Owning and operating a consulting company for the last 27 years keeps us always focused on improvements
and... even threats to our status quo. A recent
“Harvard Business Review” column caught my
eye in terms of the question... “how can consul-
tants become more client-sensitive.”
I’m going to paraphrase to make some
points and directly quote to make others, but
fully credit HBR in the process.
Let’s start with the HBR conclusions
they’ve reached after several years of research
into professional services: “We have come
to the conclusion that the same forces that
disrupted so many businesses, from steel to
publishing, are starting to reshape the world
of consulting.”
What does this conclusion mean to users of
consultative services . . . the clients?
The impact is significant on both the consul-
tants as well as the clients:
•New consultant competitors with new
business models arrive
•Incumbents choose to ignore the
new players or flee to higher-margin
activities
• A disrupter whose product was once bare-
ly good enough achieves a level of qual-
ity acceptable to the broad middle of the
market
• This undermines the position of longtime
leaders
•Causes the “flip” to a new basis of
competition.
It is true there are early signs of more
sophisticated consulting competitors with
unconventional models that are gaining acceptance. They are not nearly as large as the
brand-name consultancies . . . . McKinsey,
Bain, Boston Consulting Group but the incumbents appear to be vulnerable.
Disruptions... Consultants Have Them Too
