Strategic planning

By Fiona Czerniawska.

“Transformation is big. Really big. You just won’t believe how vastly, hugely, mind-bogglingly big it is. I mean you may think strategy consulting is a big deal, but that’s just peanuts to transformation."

If Douglas Adams was alive and well today, and writing The Hitchhiker’s Guide to Consulting, he’d probably have said this. Indeed, one of Adams’ most brilliant ideas, the infinite improbability drive—a faster-than-light drive based on quantum theory—would almost certainly have been deployed whizzing consultants from one side of the transformation universe to another*.

We’ve written before on this blog about the dangers posed by the extent to which transformation, like the Ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal—another Adams invention—has been gobbling up traditional consulting services.

By Fiona Czerniawska.

Let’s face it: Consulting is a hit-and-run industry. You turn up, work out the best response (to a problem or an opportunity), steer your client through the tricky decision-making process, and—if you’re lucky and very good at what you do—play a short-term role in implementation. But at some point the client takes over—unless you can, as some firms are trying to do, manage the even trickier transition into a managed service or some other type of long-term relationship. Conventional consulting is very start-and-stop: Every few months you’re going to a new client, and starting the whole process over again. It’s also very fragmented: Unlike the technology sector, where successful software packages act as a magnet to clients and create a more homogeneous environment, consulting work is diverse and fast-changing. Specialist skills burn like phosphorous: Brightly, but briefly.