Strategic planning

By Fiona Czerniawska.

One of the big questions in consulting at the moment is where the industry starts and ends.

Digital transformation, big data & analytics, and cybersecurity—the three biggest sources of growth for consulting firms right now—all challenge the boundaries of what we’ve conventionally called consulting. Software specialists, data scientists, and even close circuit TV companies all have a role to play in consulting if recent acquisitions by consulting firms are anything to go by. But all of this activity—I’d argue—has been aimed at assimilating new services into the consulting model, not at changing it. The largest consulting firms are creating ecosystems in which they decide who’s in and who’s out based on their vision of the market, as they see it evolving from a consulting-centric viewpoint.