| | By Mick James
Recent readers of this
column will know that for
predictions and
prognostications for the
coming year they're
probably better off with
the horoscope section of
The Daily Mail. I'm in
a state of perpetual
confusion about the
economy, although I have
to say that the fact that
Gordon Brown is beginning
to sound like Jim
Callaghan in his "Moses"
period has begun to edge
me towards the camp of
the doom mongers. Could
2008 be the year of the
"perfect storm" in which
we are treated to a
replay of all the best
bits of the oil crisis of
1971, the Winter of
Discontent of 1978, the
1982 recession and the
1990s housing slump?
So I was intrigued to
be invited by the
University of Bristol to
take part in a survey
looking at what the
consulting industry will
be like in 2012. Speaking
as a man who in the year | |
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| | 2000 wrote a book called
Management Consultancy
2010, which I'm too
embarrassed to even open
these days (although I
might take a peek in two
years’ time), that's a
long time to look into
the future.
But I waded in anyway,
boldly describing myself
as an "industry
commentator" and
proceeding to reveal how
little I really know
about this industry of
ours. Hopefully, my
remarks will be suitably
weighted when the final
research appears this
autumn, which I look
forward to reading
(assuming all economic
activity hasn't ceased by
then).
Afterwards, my
thoughts ran on and I
realised that I'd
approached the survey in
a completely
cart-before-the-horse
way, thinking about
consultancy first and
clients second.
Consultancy is, after
all, a bit like one of | |
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| | those Rachel Whiteread
sculptures: look at it in
isolation and all you get
is the negative space
left behind by whatever
mysterious activities
clients have been up to.
To put it less
flatteringly, consultancy
is a cushion which bears
the imprint of the last
person who sat on it. If
we could look at the
industry in 2012 we'd see
traces of all the traumas
and upheavals that the
next four years will
bring.
This brings into focus
one of the great dilemmas
of consultancy, at least
from the point of view of
planning the future from
a skills point of view.
On the one hand, the
individuals you need must
be operating at the
highest possible levels
of performance and
expertise in their chosen
disciplines. But at the
same time they need to be
sufficiently flexible
that you can adapt your
offering and business
model to the caprice of | |
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| | client demand. The
closest analogy I can
think of is being a
silent film pianist,
trying to provide a
seamless melodic
accompaniment to a film
you've never seen and
which constantly veers
from tragedy to comedy.
So perhaps the
"challenge for
consultancy" should be
turned on its head. The
real challenge is for
clients, who so far have
largely failed to design
their businesses in a way
that acknowledges the
ongoing, if intermittent,
need for outside
assistance. Just as you
wouldn't design a
building without access
to your utilities, so any
major organisation should
have natural interfaces
for dealing with
consultants. At the
moment consultancy is
still associated with a
certain violence to the
organisation, which is
now being reciprocated by
the increasing pressure
from procurement | |
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| | professionals. One would
hope that after a few
more years of this
argy-bargy, things might
have settled down a bit
and that clients would
have not just a clearer
view of consultancy, but
would have established a
more explicit demarcation
between the various
levels of subcontracting
and outside advice and
assistance they employ.
Whether clients will
ever attain this level of
consciousness is
debatable. At the moment
the uncomfortable
situation for consultants
is that they work in an
industry which is being
constantly reshaped by
people who a) have no
expertise in the matter
and b) don't even know
they are doing it.
Remember that the next
time someone questions
your fee rates!
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