Strategic planning

It's been widely reported that Volvo trucks suffered a potentially catastrophic fall in demand in the third quarter of 2008: from around 40,000 trucks a month, sales fell to around 100. Clearly, the owners of big fleets of trucks are trying to save money by running their vehicles for longer.

If the consulting "industry" is a collection of micro-markets, you'd expect any downturn to hit sectors and services at different times and with varying degrees of ferocity.  That would certainly be borne out by the experience of niche firms in recent years: 2002-04 saw some firms powering ahead while others gave up an unequal struggle.  Bigger firms see this, too, although their broader portfolio disguises the ups and downs of specific markets.

These slides attempt to show how a downturn rolls across the major sectors and services in consulting.

The question on every consultants' lips at the moment is just how badly will a recession affect their business.

The answer comes in three stages.