IT consulting: cog in the machine or spanner in the works?

All our recent research points to growth in technology consulting, while more traditional management consulting services look solid rather than stellar.  Even procurement people, the subject of our latest report and always the most cautious when it comes to future trends, agree: nine out of ten say that the proportion of consulting projects with a technology component or driven by technology will stay the same or increase over the next 12 months.  In North America we can see signs that the growth in demand may outstrip supply, as the CIO of one major US corporation put it: “There’s plenty of technology investments which have been on hold for the last few years while we waited for the economy to turn around.  We’ve now reached a point where we feel confident enough to make those investments – the only problem is that our competitors feel the same way and there won’t be enough consultants to go round.”

Yet, talking to many technology firms, we don’t get the sense that they think the world is moving their way.  Why the long faces?  Partly, I suspect, it’s a question of timing: much of what we’re picking up in our research is about future expenditure and these firms’ recent performance has been somewhere between mixed and poor.  But the other, perhaps bigger, problem lies inside the firms themselves.

Most IT services firms have bought their way into IT consulting: with brands that placed them in the hardware, software and/or commodity outsourcing space, these companies have used acquisitions to build or bolster their consulting credentials.  Fine in theory, but the reality is that too many such purchases have failed to find purchase in the buying organisation.  Instead of being a new cog which makes the host machine run faster and further, the structure, culture and style of consulting work often sits uncomfortably alongside IT services.  The people at the top, almost invariably from the non-consulting side, struggle with how to integrate the two sides of their business effectively and productively.  Is consulting a bona fide practice or simply the door-opener to other work?  Is its role internal (providing support to systems integration projects, for example) or external (able to sell and deliver its own projects)?  Is it one brand or many?

Such questions absorb a disproportionate amount of management angst: what should be a slick part of an efficient machine morphs into a spanner in the works.  The future may be bright for technology consulting: whether it’s bright for technology consulting firms is another question altogether.