The Future of the Firm: Recent Episodes
Source Global Research
In this episode of the Future of the Firm podcast, Ganesh Devarajan, Americas Cyber Risk Leader for EY, joins Emma Carroll, Head of Client Voice at Source, to explore why professional services firms must evolve their approach to cybersecurity services and discuss the implications of Anthropic's Claude Mythos.
We explore the following questions and more:
- What are the biggest changes taking place in the cyber environment today?
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How will the launch of Anthropic's Mythos impact the professional services market?
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Under the ever-present threat of cyber-attack, how do leaders design a "Minimum Viable Enterprise"—a business that can still function, serve customers, and survive under extreme conditions?
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In the era of AI, how do businesses need to change how they manage cyber risks?
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Why is it important for cyber professionals and developers to learn the language of business?
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Where are misallocating their cyber budgets, and where should they be spending instead?
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How important will partnerships and collaboration be, and what does a great ecosystem partnership look like in this context?
Want to strengthen your firm's cybersecurity and client advisory strategy? Get in touch with our experts today. Our research and experts are here to help your firm guide clients through their most complex cyber resilience challenges.
In this episode of the Future of the Firm podcast, Rob Fisher, Global Head of Advisory for KPMG International, joins Emma Carroll, Head of Client Voice at Source, to explore how adaptability is setting the best firms and clients apart from their competitors.
We explore the following questions and more:
- Why is incrementalism a recipe for failure in enterprise transformation?
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What is the "competitor blind spot" and how does it skew strategic planning?
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Why isn't the surge in AI-driven data translating into faster, clearer decisions?
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Are firms misusing alliances and ecosystems as a tactical band-aid?
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How can leaders address the psychological safety crisis to build an AI-fluent culture?
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For a global firm looking to remain adaptable in today's market, what's the biggest mistake they should avoid making?
If you enjoyed this conversation, don't miss our sister podcast, Business Leader's Voice. In the latest podcast episode, we spoke to Andrea Lattimore, Global Director – Compliance & Business Integrity at Vodafone, to explore how trust can be leveraged as a driver of growth and resilience in a global organisation.
In this episode of the Future of the Firm podcast, Elizabeth Bolshaw, Global Content Strategist at EY, joins Emma Carroll, Head of Client Voice at Source, to explore the impact of AI on professional services thought leadership.
In this episode, we explore the following questions and more:
- How is the democratisation of information changing the competitive landscape of thought leadership for firms?
- How can firms differentiate themselves in a competitive "sea of sameness"?
- With many CxOs expressing cynicism toward AI-generated thought leadership, how can firms maintain transparency and client trust?
- Does letting AI do all the heavy lifting risk making our critical thinking lazy? If so, what does this "cognitive atrophy" mean for thought leadership?
- How is generative engine optimisation (GEO) forcing firms to rethink gated content, and why are LLMs now considered an audience?
- How can smaller thought leadership teams use AI to overcome resource constraints, establish a niche, and compete with industry giants?
In this episode of the Future of the Firm podcast, Bhaskar Ghosh, former Chief Strategy and Innovation Officer at Accenture, joins Emma Carroll, Head of Client Voice at Source, to explore how AI is already transforming the consulting industry and the big mistakes firms must avoid making.
In this episode, we explore the following questions and more:
- Will AI shrink or grow the consulting industry?
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Is the biggest risk to consulting firms not job losses, but loss of judgement?
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How will AI impact firm profitability?
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How can firms navigate the "Three C's" (cannibalisation, cost structure, capabilities) of AI disruption?
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Where will clients really need consultants to unlock value from AI?
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What is the biggest mistake consulting leaders risk making around AI?
In this episode of the Future of the Firm podcast, Francine Bennett, Board Member at the Ada Lovelace Institute and at The British Library, joins Emma Carroll, Head of Client Voice at Source, to explore the rapid evolution of AI and its practical implications for business leaders.
Drawing on over 20 years of experience, Francine address the following questions and more:
- Where are we with agentic AI, and how far have businesses really got with its adoption?
- In what ways are multimodal AI and direct speech-to-speech voice models transforming customer interactions?
- How can leaders effectively leverage AI for strategy development while keeping human judgement at its heart?
- Why does mandating AI adoption through blunt metrics (like number of hours spent using AI) backfire, and what is a better approach to building workforce skills?
- Where can consultants add the most value for clients around AI?
- Where are we with the challenge posed by hallucinations and overconfident AI outputs today?
If you enjoyed this conversation, we have a whole catalogue of back episodes for you to delve into. In a recent episode, we sat down with Geert van den Goor, CEO at Valcon, to talk about the new competitive advantage of regional firms.
In this episode of the Future of the Firm podcast, Paul Clark, Partner & Global Alliance Leader - EY Microsoft at EY, joins Fiona Czerniawska, CEO at Source, to discuss reinventing technology alliances.
We address following questions and more:
- Is AI ushering in a new era of implementation partner dynamics?
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You don't get to the lightbulb through continuous reinvention of the candle. How can we reimagine the entire partner model to integrate deep domain expertise, sector insights, and an understanding of business processes?
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What if the real value of AI isn't replacing people, but amplifying human capability at scale?
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Are clients moving beyond the traditional divide between business and technology teams to fully integrated decision making?
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AI could completely reshape the future of payment models in professional services. Will outcomes-based pricing become the new normal?
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With large-scale alliances like EY-Microsoft, how can firms work together to make the most of the expertise on both sides?
If you enjoyed this conversation, don't miss our sister podcast, Business Leader's Voice. In the latest podcast episode, we spoke to Andrea Lattimore, Global Director – Compliance & Business Integrity at Vodafone, to explore how trust can be leveraged as a driver of growth and resilience in a global organisation.
In this episode of the Future of the Firm podcast, Natasha Cambell, Principal Consultant at Source, and Nicola Kostrzewska, Senior Consultant at Source, join Emma Carroll, Head of Client Voice, to explore the themes and findings of the latest Quality Ratings of Thought Leadership report.
Natasha and Nicola share insights that challenge the industry to rethink how content is created and activated to stand out in an increasingly crowded market and overcome the much-discussed "sea of sameness".
They address questions including:
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What does great quality thought leadership look like from the perspective of senior buyers?
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How is the rise of AI fuelling demand for innovation and making extreme audience specificity the most successful strategy for differentiation?
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What made top-tier campaigns so provocative and successful?
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Why do most clients rank "having a sense of how firms can help" as such a crucial attribute of thought leadership, and how can firms demonstrate this without resorting to a hard sell?
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How can thought leadership teams consistently adopt an audience-first approach to build empathy with executives?
If you enjoyed this conversation, don't miss our sister podcast, Business Leader's Voice. In the latest podcast episode, we spoke to Andrea Lattimore, Global Director – Compliance & Business Integrity at Vodafone, to explore how trust can be leveraged as a driver of growth and resilience in a global organisation.
In this episode of the Future of the Firm podcast, Andy Baldwin, Global Managing Partner & SVP Offerings & Growth at IBM Consulting, joins Fiona Czerniawska, CEO at Source, to explore the rapidly evolving landscape of asset-based consulting.
Andy shares insights that challenge the industry to rethink how traditional human consultants integrate with digital software assets and autonomous agents.
We address questions including:
- What is "asset-based consulting" and how do productivity-based assets differ from business-value assets?
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How will consulting firms transition away from the traditional time-and-materials pricing model to consumption-based plans?
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Why is it essential for consulting firms to build software-style product management capabilities?
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How are predefined agents and fully autonomous systems fundamentally changing client experience and delivery models?
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In a complex IT landscape packed with overlapping tools, why is the demand for a centralised "agent management platform" becoming critical for clients?
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How will delivery models change over the next 5 to 10 years, and what will separate the winners from the losers?
If you are interested in how generative AI and autonomous agents could reshape the consulting profession, this conversation is for you.
If you enjoyed this conversation, don't miss our sister podcast, Business Leader's Voice. In this series, we talk directly to business leaders about what is disrupting their industries, what occupies their headspace.
In this episode of the Future of the Firm podcast, Geert van den Goor, CEO at Valcon, joins Emma Carroll, Head of Client Voice at Source, to talk about the new competitive advantage of regional firms.
Geert takes us through Valcon's growth journey towards a "European powerhouse" model that balances regional expertise with the scale necessary to deliver tangible, AI-driven business transformation.
In this episode, we explore the following questions and more:
- Given the rapid pace of political and economic change, will transformation work itself need to change?
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How is client behaviour evolving in Europe, and how does this differ to in the US?
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What are the advantages of a firm that acts as a "regional powerhouse"?
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What will be critical to success of regional firms in the next five years?
If you enjoyed this podcast, then you won't want to miss our recent Emerging Trends report, The new consulting frontier: Adapting to global economic change. It dives into clients' attitudes towards globalisation for their own businesses and what they want from firms' geographic delivery models. To buy the report or for more information, get in touch.
In this episode of the Future of the Firm podcast, Jo Rhoden, Executive Director at Tapestry Networks, joins Emma Carroll, Head of Content at Source, for a creative journey to rethink the audit profession.
Speaking in her personal capacity, Jo shares insights from her recent series of blogs on the future of audit, challenging the industry to look beyond compliance and standardisation to innovation and creativity.
We address questions including:
- Beyond the obvious impact of technology, what are the other major drivers of change in the audit market today?
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How can technology and human creativity intersect to deliver the best outcomes?
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Can technology ever truly exercise professional judgment, or will this always require human oversight?
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Why do "soft skills" like storytelling, imagination, and relationship-building remain the strength of humans in this field?
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In a world of "noise" and deep fakes, how can audit evolve to become a primary enabler of trust?
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What practical steps can firms take right now to prepare their workforce for this new world of audit?
If you are interested in how human creativity could reshape audit, this conversation is for you.
If you enjoyed this conversation, don't miss our sister podcast, Business Leader's Voice. In this series, we talk directly to business leaders about what is disrupting their industries, what occupies their headspace, and what it is really like for them to work with professional services firms.
In this episode of the Future of the Firm podcast, Nicki Wakefield, Global Clients and Industries Leader at PwC, joins Emma Carroll, Head of Client Voice at Source, to talk about how client needs are changing and the opportunities this creates for firms.
Nicki shares her insights on the shift towards long-term partnerships that focus on deeply understanding the client's unique context, working towards measurable outcomes, and building solid foundations in data and strategy to effectively scale AI.
In this episode, we explore the following questions and more:
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How are clients' priorities and the services they'll need changing?
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How are clients responding to industry convergence?
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What is changing about how clients want to work with consulting firms?
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How are new client needs creating opportunities for consulting firms?
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Where do firms go wrong when it comes to understanding their clients?
In this ever-shifting professional services landscape, it's crucial to be on top of how clients' needs and priorities are changing as the world does. This conversation provides crucial insight and expertise to help turn client pain points into opportunities for your firm.
If you enjoyed this conversation, don't miss our sister podcast, Business Leader's Voice. In this series, we talk directly to business leaders about what is disrupting their industries, what occupies their headspace, and what it is really like for them to work with professional services firms.
In this episode of our Future of the Firm podcast, Alison Huntington, Global Commercial Strategy and Insights Leader at Russell Reynolds, sits down with Emma Carroll, Head of Content at Source, to discuss how firms can create true commercial value from their research—both now and in the future.
We consider the following questions and more:
- Beyond the traditional white paper, what content falls under the category of "insights" today?
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In what ways do successful firms use research to create value for themselves and their clients?
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What examples are there of this being done well?
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How do the marketing funnel and mapping the customer journey come into play?
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What are the biggest mistakes firms make when trying to commercialise their research?
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With AI changing the game, how will the role of insights and research evolve in the coming years?
If you are a professional services leader looking to ensure your insights are not static but instead drive revenue, this conversation is for you.
If you enjoyed this conversation, don't miss our sister podcast, Business Leader's Voice. In a recent episode, we talked to Ahmed Abdel Wahab, General Manager for India at Mars, about what it takes to be a truly authentic leader today, particularly in a time of volatility.
In this episode of our Future of the Firm podcast, Fiona Czerniawska, Source CEO, sits down with Head of Content, Emma Carroll, to tackle one of the most pressing issues on firm agendas today: the impact of AI on the pricing of professional services.
We consider the following questions and more:
- What's worrying firms about the use of AI in their operating models and the impact on pricing in particular?
- Will the efficiency gains of AI shrink the market and result in a catastrophe for firms?
- How does Source's new AI impact model work, what does it deliver for firms, and why is this insight needed now?
- What does our data tell us about how the size of the tax market (for example) could change?
- Is focusing solely on efficiency the biggest mistake a firm can make in the age of AI?
If you are a consulting leader thinking about how to price your AI-enabled services and how to model future market sizes then this conversation provides the insight you need to plan effectively.
If you'd like to discover more about how AI could reshape your own firm, contact us. We'd be happy to share our research into the impact AI might have on the tax market. Or we could explore a custom study to understand how other capabilities and lines of business may be set to change along with the implications for your firm.
In this special New Year edition of our Future of the Firm podcast, Fiona Czerniawska, CEO at Source, and Nick Jotischky, our Head of Market Trends, sit down with Head of Content Emma Carroll to dissect the big trends, challenges, and opportunities awaiting professional services firms in the year ahead.
We consider the following questions and more:
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Will 2026 see a return to higher growth norms, or are firms facing another rollercoaster year?
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What will the hotspots of client demand be in the year ahead?
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How can firms move beyond traditional industry segmentation to better understand and serve their clients?
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How will firms secure the capital they need to invest where it really matters in 2026?
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Are your alliances providing true differentiation, and how can you talk about them in a compelling way?
If you enjoyed this conversation, don't miss our sister podcast, Business Leader's Voice. In a recent episode, we talked to Ahmed Abdel Wahab, General Manager for India at Mars, about what it takes to be a truly authentic leader today, particularly in a time of volatility.
The rise of AI may well be the most urgent topic facing the consulting industry today. But beyond the hype, how can firms successfully use AI to transform their operating model?
In this episode of the Future of the Firm podcast, Dan Diasio, Global consulting AI Leader at EY, and Colm Sparks-Austin, Americas Tech Consulting Leader at EY, join our Head of Content, Emma Carroll, to re-imagine consulting through the prism of AI.
We address the following questions and more:
- How can firms move past retrofitting AI into old processes and instead rethink how they operate from first principles?
- How are firms managing the major challenges around pricing AI-enabled services?
- What are the limits of using AI in professional services? (If there are any).
- What will the professional services workforce look like in 2030?
- What are clients buying in the AI space?
- What is the single biggest pitfall firms must avoid when trying to get the best results out of AI?
If you enjoyed this conversation, don't miss our sister podcast, Business Leader's Voice. In a recent episode, we talked to Ahmed Abdel Wahab, General Manager for India at Mars, about what it takes to be a truly authentic leader today, particularly in a time of volatility.
Marissa Thomas, CEO and Co-founder of Unity Advisory, joined Emma Carroll, Head of Content at Source, on the latest episode of our The Future of the Firm podcast to discuss the learnings and challenges of combining deep expertise with AI-enabled delivery to create a new advisory firm that's fit for the modern market.
Marissa shared her insights on the following matters and more:
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How co-founders Thomas and Steve Varley saw a disruptive opportunity from three angles—AI and other exciting technologies, what experts want from their careers, and what clients really need—to launch Unity Advisory in March 2025.
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One benefit of launching a firm in today's landscape is being able to take a comprehensive AI approach: Unity Advisory is "AI born, not AI-retrofitted".
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Unity strives to focus on the service areas where clients want more choice, feel there is a supply shortage, or are inconsistently served.
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Having found that the traditional hours and rates model is not well-loved by clients, Unity is using a combination of fixed and outcomes-based fees, including fees linked to metrics like satisfaction and cost savings.
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The combination of engineering or coding skills and deep technical knowledge in areas like finance or tax is becoming an increasingly valuable asset when forming a team of experts.
If you enjoyed this conversation, don't miss our sister podcast, Business Leader's Voice. In a recent episode, we talked to Ahmed Abdel Wahab, General Manager for India at Mars, about how to be a truly authentic leader in a time of volatility like today.
In this episode of the Business Leader's Voice podcast, Antonia Wade, Global Chief Marketing Officer for PwC, joins our Head of Content, Emma Carroll, to share her experience of PwC's recent rebrand.
Antonia shares insights on these matters and more:
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Rather than focusing solely on demand generation, it is important that firms strategically invest at the broader brand level to increase awareness, perception, and consideration, especially as modern business requires reaching a broader set of C-suite executives than before.
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Define distinctiveness through how work is done: Consulting firms should differentiate themselves by focusing on how they execute their services, rather than just what services they offer. A core component of brand strategy should be identifying and amplifying the distinctive ways your firm operates, which also aids in winning work as well as attracting and retaining top talent.
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It's important not to treat a brand transformation solely as a marketing exercise; instead, firms can establish co-ownership of the programme with other senior stakeholders and colleagues, including those from Human Resources, Account Management, and Client Experience, to achieve greater impact, relevance, and longevity.
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Prioritise internal training for people. The workforce is the ultimate expression of you brand, so don't neglect internal buy-in. Provide compelling training on the brand's value and their ambassadorial role. Think about giving local teams the flexibility to adapt core materials and use other ways to secure commitment across regions.
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To ensure brand efficacy, firms must establish a continuous client feedback loop. This process allows for constant refinement of the brand system, media spend, and service offerings. Effectiveness can be validated using tangible metrics like advertising recall, share of search, and proprietary brand consideration data.
If you enjoyed this conversation, don't miss our sister podcast, Business Leader's Voice. In a recent episode, we talked to Ahmed Abdel Wahab, General Manager for India at Mars, about what it takes to be a truly authentic leader today, particularly in a time of volatility.
In this episode of the Future of the Firm podcast, Emma Carroll, our Head of Content, speaks to Karen Morton, the Chief Marketing Officer of Cleary Gottlieb and President of LMA Europe. They discuss the newly launched report, produced in a collaboration between Source and the Legal Marketing Association Europe, that examines The Top Challenge for Legal CMOs: Building a Next Generation Growth Engine.
Karen and Emma shared their insights on these matters and more:
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Revenue generation is a core part of the CMO’s role, and 67% of those surveyed say it is set to become even more important. With growth a big goal for firms today, their marketing leaders need to free up time and resource to support them with this.
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96% of marketing leaders say they’ll be investing more in technology within their function over the next 18 months. Challenges they face include knowing the optimal timing for tech investment, guaranteeing seamless integration across disparate systems, and transforming raw data into meaningful insights.
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Over 50% of respondents from the survey say that using technology and analytics to better understand client behaviour and deliver an exceptional experience is crucial. This shift further towards data-driven insights is now central to the role of CMOs.
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Law firm marketing and business development leaders should prioritise using technology to increase efficiency and output by automating mundane tasks and reducing human error, thus creating a high-performing and sustainable team.
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Law firms need to move away from mass content distribution and instead focus on delivering personalised, targeted insights that really resonate with clients.
If you enjoyed this conversation, don’t miss our sister podcast, Business Leader’s Voice. In a recent episode, we talked to Aurelija Pletiene, Director of Product Management at Vinted, about how you can cut through the noise to align, focus, and deliver innovation around trust and safety.
In this episode of the Future of the Firm podcast, Emma Carroll, our Head of Content, interviews experts from across Source to unpack what “value” really means in consulting today. Drawing on our Emerging Trends Report and our latest research, we explore the persistent gap between quality and value—and what firms can do to close it.
We discussed the following matters and more:
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According to our research, 79% of clients rate consulting quality highly, but only 49% believe they get enough value over and above what they pay in fees. Our experts offer some advice on how firms can close this gap, including by communicating the value they create.
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In today's climate of economic uncertainty and tighter budgets, clients are demanding a clear, measurable return on investment (ROI) from every engagement. Before they pursue any new initiative, they need to be certain they will get a tangible return.
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Clients see “better” value as being created in many ways, including:
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- more innovation
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- stronger stakeholder influence
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- lasting education for their teams
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While over 80% of firms discuss value with clients during a project, only 17% continue that conversation once the work is done. This means the vast majority are leaving future opportunities—and important insights—on the table.
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High-quality thought leadership creates lasting value when it's differentiated, engaging, credible, and actionable. For example, executives are constantly horizon scanning for market signals and trying to anticipate change. In an unreliable business landscape, thought leadership provides them with data-backed research, expert analysis, and fresh perspectives that help them make smarter decisions and challenge their assumptions.
On our latest episode of The Future of the Firm podcast, Sophie Gunn, Senior Consultant at Source, caught up with Emma Carroll, our Head of Content, to debate some of the most important findings from our Client Perceptions programme so far in 2025. They then discuss how firms can use this information to gain competitive advantage.
Sophie shared her insights on the following matters and more:
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Based on surveys of nearly 4,000 senior buyers, sector expertise and subject matter experts have been the top differentiators for consulting services in recent years. Sophie also reveals other crucial attributes.
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Client perceptions show notable regional differences. Some examples include:
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In the US, there's a rising emphasis on a firm's global reach; a trend likely driven by recent shifts in supply chains and tariffs.
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In countries like China and Japan, clients are primarily focused on a firm's implementation ability.
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In the UK, GCC, and Australia, thought leadership is comparatively a more highly valued attribute.
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According to the survey, there is a gap between the perceptions of firms by existing clients and prospects, with current clients rating firms’ quality of work higher than their prospects. Sophie shares what this means for marketing teams.
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There's a notable shift in how senior managers perceive consulting firms: those below the C-suite are becoming less positive. Sophie sets out how firms can respond.
If you enjoyed this conversation, then head over to our Client Perceptions reports page, where you’ll discover much more about how senior decision makers perceive leading firms. We share our independent analysis by geography, sector, and service lines, with recent reports including those on financial services, energy & resources, and the US market. Use these reports to gain insight into client priorities, competitor strengths, and market gaps to better position your brand. You can access the reports directly or contact us for more information.
On our latest episode of The Future of the Firm podcast, Fiona Czerniawska, CEO of Source, caught up with Emma Carroll, our Head of Content, to discuss how the volatile environment is shaping client futures, and what that means for firms’ scenario planning.
Fiona shared her insights on the following matters and more:
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Using Source’s proprietary data, clients (and by extension firms) have been categorised into three groups: undecided, frightened, and determined. These are defined by their approach to strategy and investment in an unpredictable market.
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While many firms engage in scenario planning, its value diminishes after a certain point. To keep the scenarios relevant, they must be converted into credible strategies that empower people to take confident steps in an uncertain world.
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This episode discusses two major challenges for professional services firms in their own scenario planning:
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- Leading with a narrative: It's difficult for firms to convince their teams and clients to believe in a strategic direction when there's no visible, concrete path forward. Business leaders must build "an invisible staircase" to help their people move forward with confidence.
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- The rise of AI: AI introduces uncertainty about how to price services and deliver value.
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Given the unreliable global environment, it is crucial for firms to prepare for worst-case scenarios. Having a clear plan can help them navigate uncertainty and respond effectively.
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Value creation is seen as a crucial concept that underpins all the scenarios. Firms need to shift their focus from pricing based on inputs to pricing based on outputs, or the value delivered to the client.
If you enjoyed this conversation, don’t miss our sister podcast, Business Leader’s Voice. In a recent episode, we talked to Husayn Kassai, CEO and Founder of Quench.ai, about AI adoption and how you can move beyond the hype to achieve success.
On our latest episode of The Future of the Firm podcast, Ben Tye, CEO of Gate One Consulting, caught up with Emma Carroll, Head of Content at Source, to discuss what clients want from growth and CX work today.
Ben shared his insights on the following matters and more:
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While clients rarely begin by stating "we need to grow our business", this desire for growth is behind many of the challenges they raise, such as CRM system issues or new product launch hurdles. It is therefore crucial for consultants to link these discrete problems back to the ultimate business outcome of driving growth in order to tailor the services firms offer.
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While traditional buyers like COOs, CTOs, CPOs, CFOs, chief digital & information officers, and chief transformation officers still buy services, consultants need to be careful not to assume these roles are buying the same services as they were historically. For instance, a chief people officer might now be more interested in technology and data insights. This leads to more cross-functional buying, plus two or three buyers may be involved, rather than a single sponsor, making the sales process more complex. Clients want support around the technological, operational, and data aspects of AI.
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The need for ethical and responsible AI use is increasingly important to clients and is also driving consulting demand. Where AI-driven decisions influence customer experience or service delivery getting those right is particularly critical.
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Clients are actively identifying and developing a backlog of AI use cases. Firms can help them manage these as a portfolio, using clear decision criteria to quickly determine if a proof of concept is viable. Interestingly, "edge cases" from this portfolio, rather than the immediately obvious ones, often prove to be the most impactful.
If you enjoyed this conversation, don’t miss our sister podcast, Business Leader’s Voice. In a recent episode, we talked to Andrew Brothers, former Chief Information Officer at Primark, about targeting tech investment as a CIO.
In the latest episode of The Future of the Firm podcast, Dr. Katharina Weghmann, Global ESG Leader within Forensic & Integrity Services at EY, and Nick Jones, Director of Client & Markets Engagement also within Forensic & Integrity Services at EY, sat down with Emma Carroll, Head of Content at Source to discuss why ESG integrity is at a crossroads.
Nick and Katharina shared their insights on the following matters and more:
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Many organisations face challenges in clearly defining industry-relevant ESG targets and translating them into actionable initiatives. ESG efforts are often siloed from the organisation's core purpose and strategy; treated more as a compliance risk than as an integrated, strategic priority.
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A 'say-do gap' often exists between leadership’s ESG commitments and how employees perceive those priorities. Bridging this gap requires clear, consistent communication, and alignment across all stakeholders—employees, investors, customers, and boards.
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Companies that excel in ESG often view it as a long-term strategic imperative rather than a regulatory exercise. They integrate ESG into their purpose, are willing to make tough choices and short-term sacrifices for long-term value, and they prioritise building trust with all stakeholders.
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To drive Integrity-First ESG, organisations should prioritise a few key areas where they can make a significant and measurable impact, rather than spreading efforts across too many KPIs.
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Embracing collective action by collaborating with peers in the industry or region can accelerate progress toward shared ESG goals and deliver more meaningful change.
This podcast discusses EY’s article Why ESG integrity is at a crossroads between aspiration and regulation, which was rated as one of the top pieces of content in Source’s annual report, Quality Ratings of Thought Leadership for 2024.
If you enjoyed this conversation, don’t miss our sister podcast, Business Leader’s Voice. In a recent episode, we talked to Andrew Brothers, former CIO at Primark, about targeting tech investment in retail as a CIO.
On our latest episode of The Future of the Firm podcast, Dr Jan van de Poll, MD and Founder of Praioritize, caught up with Emma Carroll, Head of Content at Source.
Jan and Emma shared their insights on the following matters and more:
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According to Source’s latest quarterly client survey, 98% of consulting buyers believe that generative AI will replace consultants to some extent, with 55% expecting it to do so to a significant degree
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Virtual consulting is challenging the established consulting model: Jan argues that while traditional consultants typically only serve 1% of the organisation, virtual consulting models offer the opportunity to extend insights and support to the remaining 99%.
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AI is streamlining consulting processes—turning time-consuming tasks like conducting and analysing hundreds of interviews into more efficient, dynamic workflows using smart, real-time questionnaires.
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Virtual consulting has implication for the governance processes within firms, and partners may find their role evolving.
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We can now combine the two, GenAI and human consultants, while AI can rapidly process and structure information, human expertise remains essential for tailoring insights and delivering client-ready solutions. [5:11]
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Despite current limitations, virtual consultants and human professionals are not mutually exclusive—but can, in fact, complement one another to create a more efficient, adaptive consulting model.
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The next steps for AI consulting will focus on objective quantification of soft aspects such as future readiness, leadership, innovation, and organisational dynamics. These can then be used to create KPIs to derive actionable insights.
If you enjoyed this conversation, don’t miss our sister podcast, Business Leader’s Voice. In a recent episode, we talked to Matthew Wilson, Chief Legal Office at Fremantle, about creating business resilience.
Sebastian Stoeckle, Global Head of Audit Innovation at KPMG, caught up with Emma Carroll, Head of Content at Source, on the latest episode of our The Future of the Firm podcast.
Sebastian and Emma shared their insights on the following matters and more:
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Audit today is as important as it’s always been, with its core mission still centred around generating trust in business entities. But the environment in which audit operates is transforming as a result of geopolitical, regulatory, and technological change.
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There has been a shift in clients’ attitudes to audit. Historically, they have seen it as burden, but now they understand that it can provide valuable insights for organisations.
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Clients now expect more than just an analysis of transactions—they want insights, such as how to evolve their compliance systems and how they stack up against the rest of the marketplace.
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The ability to apply a digital audit is limited by the client’s own digital maturity. If organisations themselves have invested in standardising and centralising systems, this increases the capacity for audit innovation.
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Neural networks and basic machine learning have been being used in audit for some time, but auditors are increasingly seeing the value of large language models. There’s also huge potential in agentic AI and research reasoning models.
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The future of audit is not about replacing humans, but creating a powerful combination of human expertise and machine capabilities.
If you enjoyed this conversation, don’t miss our sister podcast, Business Leader’s Voice. In a recent episode, we talked to Matthew Wilson, Chief Legal Office at Fremantle, about creating business resilience.
Kapish Vanvaria, EY Global and Americas Risk Consulting Leader, caught up with Emma Carroll, Head of Content at Source, on the latest episode of our The Future of the Firm podcast.
Kapish shared his insights on the following matters and more:
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There have been some big changes in risk services in recent years, including technology innovation, the impact of regulatory changes, and an evolution of client expectations—in particular, clients wanting more sector-specific and personalised solutions.
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The sweet spot for risk experts lies in offering strong domain expertise—for instance, top tier talent in regulatory compliance—and marrying that up with deep sector knowledge, while supporting this with insights from other industries as well.
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To really solve business problems for clients, it often involves more than just consulting. Audit, legal, industry experts, and technology experts all need to have a seat at the table, and firms should look at creating shared KPIs to encourage this collaboration.
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When bringing solutions to clients, firms should be using themselves as client zero, and working on the concept of ‘proof, not promises’. Testing solutions within the firm itself and showing its successes brings credibility to the offering.
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When choosing which firms to shortlist, clients are most concerned about expertise, but an ability to implement is close behind. Firms can translate their expertise into implementation by never being afraid to fail and by going through the iterative process of finding what doesn’t work to lead you to what does.
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Firms are starting to supplement their workforce with digital FTEs. Beyond improving quality and reducing costs, this also allows work for be carried out more quickly. People become reviewers rather than doers and have more time to thrive as individuals.
If you enjoyed this conversation, don’t miss our sister podcast, Business Leader’s Voice. In a recent episode, we talked to Francine Bennett, Board Member at the Ada Lovelace Institute, about solving business problems with AI.
Source’s Natasha Campbell, Principal Thought Leadership Consultant, and Nicola Kostrzewska, Senior Consultant, caught up with Emma Carroll, Head of Content, on the latest episode of our The Future of the Firm podcast.
Natasha and Nicola shared the themes and findings from Source’s latest Quality Ratings of Though Leadership report, including:
- Being relevant to your target audience isn’t just about making your presence continually felt in the market, but also about showing that you deeply understand your clients’ current and future—even latent—needs.
- For firms to improve their resilience scores in Source’s Quality Ratings report, they should make sure they are not merely naming authors but are also including biographies that outline their experience and knowledge to boost credibility.
- There is little transparency about how firms have been using GenAI in their thought leadership—and firms could be making an error here: Our quarterly survey found that clients actively want firms to demonstrate their use of AI.
- This year’s report found that there was less thought leadership made in collaboration with think tanks, universities, or other organisations—but firms would benefit from using partnerships to foster innovation, expand reach, and amplify content.
If you enjoyed this conversation, don’t miss our sister podcast, Business Leader’s Voice. In a recent episode, we talked to Francine Bennett, Board Member at the Ada Lovelace Institute, about the opportunities and risks of AI for client organisations.
Lesley Uren, Global CEO of Consulting for Korn Ferry, caught up with Emma Carroll, Source’s Head of Content, on the latest episode of The Future of the Firm podcast to discuss where the hot spots and challenges in human capital consulting are today, and where clients’ needs are set to shift in this space.
Lesley shares her insight on the following matters and more:
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Volatility in the market for human capital consulting is being driven by large macro factors that are impacting clients’ appetite to invest. This uncertainty is likely to persist, and consulting firms need to be able to pivot quickly to respond to clients’ changing business issues.
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CEOs are facing a big challenge around maintaining business performance as they transform their organisations. AI is one of the big triggers here, as leaders start to rethink their business models, but there are other drivers too, including cost pressures.
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Data, including the use of data to create insights, is set to be the biggest change in human capital consulting. We discuss the power of unlocking client data and combining that with a firm’s data to reveal hidden information about talent and drive better business performance.
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The big questions from clients around AI include: How can we redesign our organisation? How will work be different? What kind of skills will we need? Where will we find those skills at scale? How can we galvanise our people behind this change? How will softer skills ensure this transition is successful?
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The political temperature around DEI is impacting the type of support clients need in this area. We discuss what is changing and what is staying the same.
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Firms will need to think differently about demonstrating value to clients. It’s about more than processing and sythesising data now: It’s about proving impact.
If you enjoyed this conversation, don’t miss our sister podcast, Business Leader’s Voice. In a recent episode, we talked to Sarah Ricketts, SVP for Procurement at Rolls-Royce, about transforming procurement with data, culture, and tech.
Michael McMahon, Professor of Economics at University of Oxford, and Fiona Czerniawska, CEO of Source, caught up with Emma Carroll, Head of Content at Source, on the latest episode of our The Future of the Firm podcast to debate the potential impact of President Trump’s policies on professional services via the four global megatrends of deglobalisation, decarbonisation, demographics, and digitalisation.
Michael and Fiona shared their insights on the following matters and more:
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The new US government’s protectionist policies are the latest iteration of a global move towards deglobalisation. While clients may turn to consultants to help navigate these changes, the inflationary impact (of tariffs, etc.) may lead to tighter purse strings and decreased consulting demand long term.
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Trump has made his stance on climate change and decarbonisation very clear. But firms should not be packing away their ESG services—the world could look very different at the end of Trump’s presidency.
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The new US government’s plans to restrict immigration, paired with other demographic changes, will lead to skills shortages in the labour market. This may affect the services clients are looking for—for instance, there may be an opportunity for firms to offer more staff augmentation services to fill this gap.
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While the EU is bringing in regulations to encourage ethical AI use, the US wants to keep restrictions to a minimum. The region is therefore likely to see a further boom in digitalisation and tech growth, and firms can expect a boost in tech consulting work as a result.
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Consulting leaders should be looking to the capital markets to assess the impacts of Trump’s policies—this is how he will be measuring success. Firms should also keep an eye on client confidence levels and consumer behaviour patterns to respond to any early trends.
If you enjoyed this conversation, don’t miss our sister podcast, Business Leader’s Voice. In a recent episode, we talked to Benjamin Samuels, Former Chief Revenue Officer at WeWork about navigating growth and change.
Source’s CEO, Fiona Czerniawska, and Director of Market Trends, Catherine Anderson, caught up with Emma Carroll, Head of Content, on the latest episode of The Future of the Firm to discuss trends and opportunities for consulting firms in 2025.
Fiona and Catherine share their insights on the following matters and more:
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They predict increased demand for technology, risk, and HR & change work—although this may come from different areas of the business to where you might expect.
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Clients may initially be interested in AI for specific point solutions, but these will open their eyes to the wider possibilities of the technology. Firms should therefore be quick to jump on these early windows of opportunity.
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The end of last year saw client sentiment shift towards growth after a long period of caution and cost cutting. We discuss why this is the case and how firms can best support clients with their ambitions.
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Clients are looking for firms that understand them and their industry but can also bring consulting expertise that offers them a new perspective. They don’t want to be given teams they have to train themselves or firms that offer a cookie-cutter approach.
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Fifty-eight percent of clients expect fee rates to decline, but this could be a case of wishful thinking. We also discuss how clients are responding to the idea of outcomes-based pricing.
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Fiona and Catherine discuss their predictions for consulting in ten years’ time, including a shift from pure advisory to more delivery-focused work and an evolution of traditional consulting firms into technology firms.
If you enjoyed this conversation, don’t miss our sister podcast, Business Leader’s Voice. In a recent episode, we talked to Benjamin Samuels, Former Chief Revenue Officer at WeWork, about navigating growth and change.
Wavestone’s Neil Sharp, Head of Proposition and Go to Market, and Uta Niendorf, ExCom Member and Partner for Digital Customer in Germany, caught up with Emma Carroll, Head of Content at Source, on the latest episode of our The Future of the Firm podcast.
Uta and Neil shared their insights on the following matters and more:
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Data collection is central to producing seamlessly integrated touchpoints and creating a frictionless omnichannel experience.
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Businesses should not just focus on aspects that deliver immediate revenues like sales and marketing, but also on after-sales and service—and crucially on the customer’s “moment of truth”. We discuss why.
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In the current fast-changing business landscape it is important to have an energetic, agile business model that allows for trial and error in a controlled way. We explore what this looks like.
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Empathy is at the heart of customer services, and while AI that delivers convincing and genuine empathy remains yet to be seen, emotional AI could be the next big thing.
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Professional services firms are increasingly being asked to use AI to perform labour-intensive jobs that would traditionally have been carried out by junior consultants.
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While technological advancements are rife in the consulting world, it ultimately remains a people business: Nurturing relationships will remain key to success.
If you enjoyed this conversation, don’t miss our sister podcast, Business Leader’s Voice. In a recent episode, we talked to Benjamin Samuels, Former Chief Revenue Officer at WeWork, about navigating growth and change.
Ryan Piper, Global CEO at Morison Global, and Fiona Czerniawska, CEO of Source, caught up with Emma Carroll, Head of Content at Source, on the latest episode of our The Future of the Firm podcast.
Ryan and Fiona shared their insights on the following matters and more:
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The impact of PE funding on the use of technology in audit firms, in particular looking at how AI can make an impact.
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How the time horizons of PE deals have shifted to become more long term as a consequence of market volatility, and whether this shows any signs of changing.
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The commoditisation of audit services, and how this leads to a greater emphasis on customer experience to differentiate firms.
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Consolidation in the audit industry, and how firms globally are achieving growth and scale through mergers & acquisitions.
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Practical advice for audit firms, including exploring funding options and understanding market positioning.
If you enjoyed this conversation, don’t miss our sister podcast, Business Leader’s Voice. In a recent episode, we talked to Benjamin Samuels, Former Chief Revenue Officer at WeWork, about navigating growth and change.
David Blowers, Co-President of the Financial Advisory Practice at Kroll, and Fiona Czerniawska, CEO of Source, caught up with Emma Carroll, Head of Content at Source, on the latest episode of our The Future of the Firm podcast.
David and Fiona shared their insights on the following matters and more:
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While deals tend to drop off during more turbulent times, it all comes down the quality of the asset. If corporates are laser focused on a really good asset, it will get done despite market conditions—and this is something that will persist.
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David and Fiona share their views on the performance of the deals market in the last 18 months, including drivers and predictions.
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While AI is the technology everyone is talking about, it is a proxy for overall efficiency gains. Looking beyond just AI to focus on the technology that is the right fit for the client will yield the best results in the long term.
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The professional services market is bifurcating into two streams, with commoditised work in one direction and innovation in another. Likewise, half of the market is striving to be more technology-led, while the other half is focusing more on people.
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The importance of using a period of crisis to your advantage, for instance taking the opportunity to pull back on hiring, invest, and evolve to be ready for future opportunities.
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The big mistakes that firms could make, including trying to approach clients with a one-size-fits-all solution rather than listening to their needs and talking about the issues that resonate.
If you enjoyed this conversation, don’t miss our sister podcast, Business Leader’s Voice. In a recent episode, we talked to Benjamin Samuels, Former Chief Revenue Officer at WeWork, about navigating growth and change.
Alison Grigg and Kerry Grigg, Managing Partners at Multiple Group, and Fiona Czerniawska, CEO of Source, caught up with Emma Carroll, Head of Content at Source, on the latest episode of our The Future of the Firm podcast.
Alison, Kerry, and Fiona shared their insights on the following matters and more:
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The dangers of social washing and how demographic change is driving increased accountability, as the younger generations expect businesses to deliver on the ESG promises they’re making.
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The mistakes firms could be making, such as assuming that good leadership happens overnight and not doing enough work to embed social value throughout all areas of the business.
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The importance of assessing learning agility during recruitment and in performance reviews, to both foster an adaptable workplace and to give your employees the tools to carry them through life.
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The four generational “tribes” and how they approach the workplace, and every facet of their lives, differently.
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Practical takeaways for firms to implement, such as focusing on communication and getting to know your team.
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The extent to which consulting firms should consider and be held accountable for the intended and unintended human consequences of the changes they implement in a business.
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The importance of bringing not just a financial and business impact lens to big decisions, for instance headcount reductions, but also considering the intended and unintended social impact risks that might occur as a consequence.
If you enjoyed this conversation, don’t miss our sister podcast, Business Leader’s Voice. In a recent episode, we talked to Sam Samaratunga, Global Head of Risk Services at PwC, about the future of the risk services market.
Sam Samaratunga, Global Head of Risk Services at PwC, and Fiona Czerniawska, CEO of Source, caught up with Emma Carroll, Head of Content at Source, on the latest episode of our The Future of the Firm podcast.
Sam and Fiona shared their insights on the following matters and more:
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Many clients think their leaders aren’t quick enough to respond, but Sam stresses the importance of taking risks intelligently and making decisions with confidence.
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PwC’s annual risk survey found that 44% of CEOs believe their organisation won’t be economically viable if they carry on along their current economic path. We discuss the need to change, adapt, and reinvent.
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Sam takes us through the four layers of risk services—from macroeconomic risks through to crisis management.
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GenAI is improving productivity, decision making, and client and employee engagement—but it brings with it threats as well as opportunities. We discuss what these might look like in the risk space.
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Data analysis is important, but it is only as good as the quality of data available. We consider the importance of combining proprietary and external data to support decision making.
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Making use of ecosystems and working in a joined-up way is not just beneficial for firms, but for clients too.
If you enjoyed this conversation, don’t miss our sister podcast, Business Leader’s Voice. In a recent episode, we talked to Benjamin Samuels, Former Chief Revenue Officer at WeWork, about navigating growth and change.
Fiona Czerniawska, Source’s CEO and Emma Carroll, Source’s Head of Content, discuss innovation in professional services firms, on the latest episode of our The Future of the Firm podcast.
They discussed the following and more:
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When clients think about the types of innovation they see from firms they talk about blue-sky thinking, best practices that they can apply in their organisation, and flexible ways of working.
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If firms want to convince clients that they are innovative then they need to prove it rather than talk about it. A concrete example might include a small technology tool they’ve created or a solution to one, small pain point.
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Innovation has fallen from the top of clients’ wish lists of the attributes they want to see in firms. They still think it is important, but have prioritised things like expertise and the ability to implement in 2024. We wouldn’t be surprised to see this rebound when growth hits the business agenda again.
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“Tried and tested innovation” may not be innovation at all. And the value of innovation to a client can be eroded if firms roll the idea out more widely.
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Managed services offerings have a tricky tightrope to walk between being innovative and tailored to each client versus being commercially viable for firms.
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When clients talk about innovation, they often mean technology. Firms can help clients innovate fast with small-scale, quick tech wins, rather than large-scale, extended projects.
This podcast can be listened to in conjunction with Source’s new publication, The Innovation Challenge, which takes a deeper dive into the subject and is available to subscribers of Source’s White Space programme. If you’d like to learn more, please get in touch.
If you enjoyed this conversation, don’t miss our sister podcast, Business Leader’s Voice. In a recent episode, we talked to Andy Haywood, former Chief Modernisation Officer of Yorkshire Water, about the recurring challenges in businesses that he’s experienced during his career.
Fiona Czerniawska, Source’s CEO, and Margaret Cameron-Waller, Associate at Source, caught up with Emma Carroll, Source’s Head of Content, on the latest episode of our The Future of the Firm podcast to discuss the thorny issue of whether consulting should be regulated.
Fiona and Margaret shared their insight on the following matters and more:
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If regulation is needed, then there is a decision to be made about whether firms or individual consultants would be the target. We think about what these options would involve.
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We consider what self-regulation looks like in the consulting industry today and what impact it is having.
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The wide nature of consulting work would make it extremely difficult to regulate—we look at the other pros and cons.
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There is an argument in favour of junior consultants going through a recognised qualification—we consider what this would entail. We also debate the need for CPD.
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We conclude that the consulting scandals that hit the headlines are outliers rather than the tip of an iceberg or the sign of a systemic problem.
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Firms should carry out satisfaction surveys with all clients, and this should include a question about the value created. We challenge firms to publish the results.
If you enjoyed this conversation, don’t miss our sister podcast, Business Leader’s Voice. In a recent episode, we talked to Andy Haywood, former Chief Modernisation Officer of Yorkshire Water, about the recurring challenges in businesses.
Marna Ricker, Global Vice Chair for Tax at EY, and Fiona Czerniawska, CEO of Source, caught up with Emma Carroll, Head of Content at Source, on the latest episode of our The Future of the Firm podcast.
Marna and Fiona shared their insight on the following matters and more:
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Clients say that choosing where to start implementing AI in their tax operations is tricky. Something simple and repeatable is a good first target. We look at concrete examples across three, increasing levels of maturity.
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Some of the big challenges that clients are facing include getting robust data in place, legality & ethics, and how to put together a business case for implementing AI.
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Quantum computing is set to have a profound impact on tax, particularly around predictions and policy development. We consider what opportunities lie ahead.
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We explore three areas where EY is reimaging tax services: compliance and reporting, advice, and new services.
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Marna suggests that some tax services will never be carried out by AI, particularly ones where judgement is required. We consider what’s in and what’s out.
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There continue to be talent and capacity challenges in tax services; we consider some solutions.
If you enjoyed this conversation, don’t miss our sister podcast, Business Leader’s Voice. In a recent episode, we talked to Jason Maude of Starling Bank about what a tech-first business wants from consulting firms.
Greg Sarafin, Global Vice Chair, EY Partner Ecosystem, caught up with Fiona Czerniawska, CEO of Source, on the latest episode of our The Future of the Firm podcast.
Greg and Fiona shared their insight on the following matters and more:
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Clients want firms to help them drive their business outcomes, and increasingly take joint responsibility for those outcomes. That includes bringing along the collective partners that are needed.
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Partnering is the route to an outcome-based commercial model vs. the traditional product and services-based one.
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The role of consulting firms is shifting from being the advisor to the orchestrator. We discuss how EY is approaching this globally.
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Stakeholder value is created when clients move to a major platform as a service (PaaS) which is then strengthened by adding an orbiting ecosystem of smaller software businesses.
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A journey lies ahead that will take AI from being a copilot to having agency. We discuss the opportunities and timeline.
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Clients want to pay firms based on the value their ecosystems create. We explore what this means for fee models.
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We finish by discussing how firmss may take their partner ecosystems to the next level.
If you enjoyed this conversation, don’t miss our sister podcast, Business Leader’s Voice. In a recent episode, we talked to Jason Maude of Starling Bank about what a tech-first business wants from consulting firms.
Fresh from the publication of Source’s latest Quality Ratings of Thought Leadership report, Natasha Cambell, Principal Thought Leadership Consultant; Nicola Kostrzewska, Thought Leadership Consultant; and Emma Carroll, Head of Content, get together to debate today’s big thought leadership trends.
They also discuss exactly how firms can improve the differentiation, appeal, resilience, and action-driving capability of their material.
Natasha and Nicola discuss the following matters and more:
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Thought leadership has long been considered essential to driving awareness of a firm’s brand. However, Source’s research shows that it is also integral to the whole lifecycle of the firm-client relationship.
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Thought leadership has come a long way since the one-time-only launch of the doorstop report, where 80% of investment and effort was put into producing the thought leadership and only 20% on activating it. A more even split is now needed.
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Changing customer behaviours are shaping thought leadership. More content is being consumed on the move and clients want short, sharp resources. This is changing how thought leadership is produced and governed. Collaboration across a firm is key.
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Though leadership quality scores are at their highest ever this year. “Challenger brands” have worked harder on all dimensions of quality, and against this background, appeal and resilience have started to become non-negotiable hygiene factors.
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Thought leadership is distinguished from its “poorer relation” content marketing by a strong dataset. We look at what else sets it apart.
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Prompting action is, once again, where thought leadership often falls short. Firms have some good ideas in this space but fail to apply them consistently.
If you enjoyed this conversation, don’t miss our sister podcast, Business Leader’s Voice. In a recent episode, we talked to Jason Maude of Starling Bank about what a tech-first business wants from consulting firms.
Jon Brewer, CMO of global law firm Orrick and European President of the Legal Marketing Association, caught up with Emma Carroll, Source’s Head of Content, on the latest episode of our The Future of the Firm podcast.
Jon shared his insight on the following topics and more:
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How the role of the CMO in legal services has evolved, including becoming an advisor to the CEO and being more campaign focused
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The importance of building up a support network of peers
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How CMOs can influence strategy if they don’t have a seat at the board table
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Understanding your competition and adapting your value proposition in response
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How to get ahead of your customers’ needs, including the demands of regulation
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How to cut through with thought leadership in an era of digital distraction
If you enjoyed this conversation, don’t miss our sister podcast, Business Leader’s Voice. In our latest episode, we talk to Simon Bumfrey of HSBC Innovation Banking about how to prioritise customer experience.
Ismail Amla, Global Practice Leader at Kyndryl, and Fiona Czerniawska, CEO of Source, caught up with Emma Carroll, Source’s Head of Content, on the latest episode of our The Future of the Firm podcast.
Ismail and Fiona shared their insight on the following matters and more:
- Demand for support with AI, new regulation, innovation, and sector-specific digital transformation are all driving growth in this consulting sector.
- Clients are imagining new, cross-sector propositions. These will need new solutions from a technology point of view.
- Clients are becoming more realistic about making good use of AI. They aren’t becoming less interested, but they realise it isn’t as easy as they thought at first.
- There may be some interesting uses for AI around account management, particularly for clients that are working with multiple advisors.
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There is a trend towards technology-first when it comes to consulting projects. We discuss what this will look like and how it is set to transform the professional services sector.
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More mergers, acquisitions, or new partnerships may be on the cards between consulting firms, data companies, and platform providers. We look at what new entrants can add to partnerships and where firms are falling short with their ecosystems.
If you enjoyed this conversation, don’t miss our sister podcast, Business Leader’s Voice. In our latest episode, we talk to Simon Bumfrey of HSBC Innovation Banking about how to prioritise customer experience.
Helen Tudor, MD of executive search organisation, Sheffield Haworth, and Fiona Czerniawska, CEO of Source, caught up with Emma Carroll, Source’s Head of Content, on the latest episode of our The Future of the Firm podcast.
Helen and Fiona shared their insight on the following matters and more:
- There has been a decline in the proportion of female partners appointed, from 29% in 2022 to 26% in 2023. This is against the trend we’ve seen over the past 10-15 years.
- Firms that hire female leaders from outside their direct competitors and similar organisations achieve greater diversity.
- In a difficult economic environment, firms want senior hires that can hit the ground running and are less likely to take risks on people who don’t have all the requisite skills or those that will need more investment.
- Clients themselves are looking to work with more diverse consulting teams.
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Current employers of strong female candidates will work hard to keep them, and low salary offers (even in the current environment) won’t be accepted.
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Firms look for people with strong networks, and this can prove a problem for some non-consulting candidates, including those in industry and people who have been out of the market for a while.
- During restructures, redundancy criteria can inadvertently result in high-potential people exiting. Firms should consider this carefully.
If you enjoyed this conversation, don’t miss our sister podcast, Business Leader’s Voice. In our latest episode, we debate whether organisations have pursued the cult of leadership to such an extent that they have forgotten how to manage.
Richard Fleming, European Head of Restructuring at Alvarez & Marsal, and Margaret Cameron-Waller, Associate Consultant at Source, caught up with Emma Carroll, Source’s Head of Content, on the latest episode of our The Future of the Firm podcast.
Richard and Margaret shared their insight on the following matters and more:
- Hotspots for restructuring work currently include Germany, France, the UK and Nordics. When looking at sectors there’s activity in real estate, housebuilding, the automotive supply chain, and anything with a strong consumer focus.
- Early signs of trouble are a drop off in demand, liquidity pressures, and a lack of financial discipline.
- We discuss parallels between tech businesses that are in trouble today and those during the dot.com crisis, including the risk of large amounts of money being made readily available to creative, tech businesses where the financial acumen available in leadership teams doesn’t support the weight of the investment being made.
- Changes in the restructuring market itself, including spinouts from the Big Four, and how this has affected clients and competition.
- What clients are looking for when they choose a restructuring firm, including regulatory knowledge, restructuring creativity, great stakeholder management, reputation, the appropriate scale, and cost.
- Plus, Richard shares his experience of restructuring a critical healthcare business just as COVID lockdowns hit.
If you enjoyed this conversation, don’t miss our sister podcast, Business Leader’s Voice. In our latest episode, we debate whether organisations have pursued the cult of leadership to such an extent that they have forgotten how to manage.
Alex Teytelboym, Professor of Economics at the University of Oxford and Director of their Business Economics Programme, and Fiona Czerniawska, Founder & CEO at Source, caught up with Emma Carroll, Source’s Head of Content, on the latest episode of our The Future of the Firm podcast.
Alex and Fiona shared their insight on the following matters and more:
- Climate change can be viewed as a failure of the market—in theory, this means that solving it could make everyone better off.
- Policy responses and regulation are lagging behind what is happening to the planet. It’s very difficult to predict how the risks will manifest, but they will be complex and unpredictable.
- Business leaders should think about climate change as being about operating in a complex and unpredictable environment. That means we need to build in resilience and redundancy.
- There is going to be a lot of creative destruction. Successful businesses need to innovate early and broadly, thinking about innovation in terms of a portfolio.
- Consultants need to talk to clients about the long-term view and about the real problems climate change poses—this can be counterintuitive to consultants who like to be optimistic and target near-term wins.
- Voluntary carbon markets and carbon offsets are potentially a terrible way for businesses to meet their climate goals. Regulation is not sufficient and there are reputational greenwashing risks attached.
- Carbon measurement should be simple, but there’s still a lot of difficulty measuring complex supply chains. The EU’s Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism is set to accelerate progress, and consulting firms will be in demand to help clients comply with this.
- It’s going to be harder to be an average manager with so many different goals to meet. This means it is going to be even more difficult for businesses to incentivise their people appropriately.
- We used to think about climate change as a slow process, but that’s no longer true. To succeed in this space, businesses must move early and create a portfolio of innovations.
- Seventy-five percent of clients think that the way they are approaching sustainability needs to change.
If you enjoyed this conversation, don’t miss our sister podcast, Business Leader’s Voice. In our latest episode, we set out the big business challenges that clients say they’ll be facing in the year ahead.
James Byles, Partner & UK AI Service Delivery Transformation Leader at Deloitte, caught up with Emma Carroll, Source’s Head of Content, on the latest episode of our The Future of the Firm podcast.
James shared his insight on the following matters and more:
- Clients are asking questions about how firms are using AI themselves, including how they are dealing with risk, data, and adoption of this technology.
- Use-case themes include search capability, data scanning, autonomous coding, and how to generate, analyse & report on data.
- How the use cases in firms are set to translate into client services.
- Tricky questions around the appropriate use of data.
- How to empower people in your business to innovate around AI.
- Thinking about the areas where AI is set to disrupt the professional services market.
- Working out what the analyst of the future will look like and how that will impact pathways into the profession.
- Identifying non-traditional competitors and how they may disrupt the market.
If you enjoyed this conversation, don’t miss our sister podcast, Business Leader’s Voice. In our latest episode, we set out the big business challenges that clients say they’ll be facing in the year ahead.
As the age of the ubiquitous, AI-enabled organisation draws closer, leaders need to think differently about talent. New roles are emerging, existing ones becoming broader, and people across the board will need to be reskilled. We discuss how all this can be achieved by firms and their clients alike.
Dr Gianluca Barletta, Global Head of Data Science at PA Consulting, and Fiona Czerniawska, Source’s CEO and Founder, join Emma Carroll, Source’s Head of Content, for the latest episode of our The Future of the Firm podcast.
They share their insight into the following issues and more:
- Nobody knows exactly what the future will bring, so, when it comes to talent, organisations need to focus on resilience, readiness, and agility
- It is crucial to have your data foundation in place, to allow you to move beyond ‘proof of concept’, embrace AI, and scale at pace
- People will need to be reskilled. We discuss solutions, including AI academies and cultural change
- Fear can be a big barrier to delivering the talent piece around AI
- Everyone in an organisation now needs to be a data custodian. We examine what this looks like in practice
- What are the new roles we need as we ramp up AI? Clue: Beyond data scientists, there is a role for linguists, designers, and user experience experts
- How the concept of the T-shaped consultant is evolving, as knowledge needs to become broader, but clients are demanding more specialists
If you enjoyed this conversation, don’t miss our sister podcast, Business Leader’s Voice. In our latest episode, we set out the big business challenges that clients say they’ll be facing in 2024.
As we head into 2024, revenue growth is coming under pressure in professional services firms. In this podcast, experts at Source discuss the trends and challenges that will really matter in the year ahead, including which markets are set to grow, what clients are looking for from pricing, and how firms can’t risk letting customer experience fall off the leadership agenda.
Fiona Czerniawska, Source’s CEO and Founder, and Margaret Cameron-Waller, Associate at Source, join Emma Carroll, Source’s Head of Content, for the latest episode of our The Future of the Firm podcast.
They share their insight into the following issues and more:
- Revenue growth for professional services firms came under pressure in Q3 2023, and this has continued into 2024.
- Today’s market is patchy, and firms will have to select where they want to focus carefully. Technology, cybersecurity, and data & analytics will remain important.
- Pricing is coming under pressure. There is some discounting taking place to allow firms to maintain their market share.
- There are tentative signs that outcomes-based pricing is becoming more interesting to clients.
- AI remains top of mind for clients in 2024, and work will centre on areas like strategic reviews, pilots, and advice on regulation. However, clients aren’t yet spending on larger-scale projects.
- There is a danger that ESG work may get absorbed into business as usual, and this risks it failing to get the attention and investment it deserves.
- It’s crucial that customer experience doesn’t suffer in 2024, and expertise will be a crucial attribute for firms.
If you enjoyed this conversation, don’t miss our sister podcast, Business Leader’s Voice. In our latest episode, we set out the big business challenges that clients say they’ll be facing in 2024.
Emma Carroll, Source’s Managing Editor, is joined by Fiona Czerniawska, Founder & CEO at Source, and Paul English, Strategy Director at Source, for a special edition of our Future of the Firm Podcast.
AI is set to have a significant impact on the professional services market. At Source’s recent flagship event, leaders and experts shared how they are adapting their business models in response to the opportunities and risks this provides.
In this podcast, Fiona, Paul, and Emma discuss the big learnings coming out of the event.
They share their insight into the following issues and more:
- How strategy is changing
- The ways firms are reshaping their business models with the help of AI
- The opportunities and risks of tech ecosystems
- How firms can use their own ways of working to showcase AI in action
- What Source’s research is telling us about the market in this space
- Plus, a sneak peek into our new report on the role of AI in thought leadership
Successful transformation programmes need clear goals that are set and communicated upfront, honesty and openness from everyone involved, and sponsorship from an organisation’s top team.
In this podcast, we talk to Melanie Lindsay, Partner at Vici Partners, and Fiona Czerniawska, Founder & CEO at Source, about what else they would add to this recipe for success, including how to navigate the emotional timeline of any change.
They share their insight into the following issues and more:
- The key components of a successful transformation programme
- Drawing on the knowledge of people within a business to inform change
- Balancing the quality of change initiatives and the strength of buy in
- Empowering clients to challenge themselves
- Building agency and accountability within an organisation
- The emotional timeline of a transformation
- How tech can play a role in addressing emotional challenges
- Balancing strategy and implementation
If you enjoyed this conversation, don’t miss our sister podcast, Business Leader’s Voice. In our latest episode, we discuss reducing complexity in your business, with Beth Butterwick, CEO at Jigsaw.
“In the public sector, where we have a wealth of data, I think AI is going to be one of those tools that is a game changer,” Hilary Robertson
Emma Carroll, Source’s Managing Editor, is joined by Hilary Robertson, Strategy Director at Sopra Steria UK, and Fiona Czerniawska, Founder & CEO at Source, for the latest episode of our Future of the Firm Podcast.
The outsourcing market has shifted rapidly over recent years, and work done in the public sector is no exception. The pandemic, business failures, and digital developments have all played their part.
In this podcast, we talk to Hilary and Fiona about what’s new in the public sector outsourcing market, and where they see things heading next.
- They share their insight into the following issues and more:
- How the public sector procurement process has improved and why, including the introduction of the UK government’s outsourcing playbook.
- The importance of technology, including AI, and the risk of obsolescence and skills shortages.
- The search for agility and how clients saw outsourcing as a solution during the pandemic. This appears to be a trend that has stuck.
- How the pandemic has caused clients to reconsider organisational boundaries and consider outsourcing core parts of their businesses.
- How clients are balancing investment in resilience versus investment in change.
- Addressing low-cost-bid bias amid macroeconomic uncertainty.
- The governance challenges faced by organisations that are juggling multiple external consulting providers.
- What’s new in measuring value in public sector outsourcing: This includes the importance of social value measures.
- Mindset change as part of outsourcing and whether this can or even should be measured.
If you enjoyed this conversation, don’t miss our sister podcast, Business Leader’s Voice. In our latest episode, we discuss reducing complexity in your business, with Beth Butterwick, CEO at Jigsaw.
Emma Carroll, Source’s Managing Editor, is joined by Per Breuer, Head of Global HR at Roland Berger, and Fiona Czerniawska, Founder & CEO at Source, for the latest episode of our Future of the Firm Podcast.
A firm’s talent is by far its greatest asset, and managing this resource for success, in both the short and medium-term, is complex at the best of times. In today’s uncertain environment—when clients’ needs are unpredictable—balancing supply and demand requires both creativity and a practical approach.
In this podcast, we talk to Per and Fiona about what a truly successful approach to talent looks like.
- They share their insight into the following issues and more:
- Leading on talent in a VUCA world (volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous)
- Getting expertise in the right places, at the right time, in the best way
- The real opportunities AI is offering today—and what it promises for tomorrow
- Using multidisciplinary teams to support your clients and your people
- Driving individual accountability for creating client value
- The risk of neglecting the mid-term talent agenda.
A firm’s brand is one of its most important assets, but is yours still delivering? Shifting services, new tech competitors, and a more complex ecosystem of buyers may mean it needs attention.
In this podcast, we talk to Ed and Alison about how to make your professional services brand work harder.
They share their experiences of the following issues and more:
- The big challenge of differentiation in the professional services market today
- Balancing a master brand with a firm’s specialisms
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Leveraging your brand to help you move into new spaces
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Understanding buyers’ emotional responses in a B2B setting
- What’s new in brand measurement?
If you enjoyed this conversation, don’t miss our sister podcast, Business Leader’s Voice. In our latest episode, we discuss reducing complexity in your business, with Beth Butterwick, CEO at Jigsaw.
It may seem like a long time since the COVID lockdowns of 2020 and the sudden pivot to working from home, but our research on the buying habits of consulting clients confirms a lasting legacy of the pandemic on the significance of thought leadership. In December 2022, our global study of more than 3,500 executives in major markets found that over 90% of the C-suite across all regions and industries said thought leadership had at least some impact on their decision making when purchasing professional services.
With levels of thought leadership consumption growing strongly over the last couple of years, firms are thinking more strategically than ever about how to build a thought leadership function that drives brand awareness and reputation. One such firm is Oliver Wyman, whose flagship thought leadership wing, the Oliver Wyman Forum, reaches across industries and geographies, convening senior leaders from business, public policy, academia, and social enterprise to help solve the world’s toughest problems.
Today we are delighted to be joined by John Romeo, Managing Partner and Head of the Oliver Wyman Forum, and Paul English, Director of Marketing Advisory here at Source, to discuss the changing needs of thought leadership consumers, and the Oliver Wyman Forum’s unique approach.
In a crisis-dominated world, clients are increasingly looking to transform their tax function. With more ambitious goals than pre-pandemic, they are now trying to adapt to a far more challenging and unpredictable world.
On this episode of The Future of the Firm, Fiona Czerniawska is joined by Marna Ricker, Global Vice Chair of Tax, EY to discuss the way clients are changing their thinking and what this means for professional advisors in this space.
According to our research, 'sector knowledge and expertise' is now the second most important attribute to clients when choosing a firm to work with, having skyrocketed from 12th place just a couple of years ago.
In this episode of The Future of the Firm, Ed Scott and Fiona Czerniawska are joined by Allan Platt, CEO of boutique consulting firm Clareo, to discuss the importance of sector-specific expertise in times of uncertainty.
Specialising in the natural resources, energy, and food industries, Clareo’s highly targeted approach is worlds away from the broad-brush strokes adopted by many larger firms, but it’s not a position Clareo landed on from day one.
The last few years have presented organisations with a seemingly endless series of new challenges to navigate. The big story in this regard was of course COVID-19, but with the situation in Ukraine, global market and geopolitical uncertainty, energy prices, and inflation to contend with, the plates of many businesses around the world are looking increasingly full.
Chuck in the destabilising effects of new technologies like artificial intelligence, and it’s a wonder anybody is able to keep up at all. How can consulting firms help clients to achieve resilience, then, when firms themselves are having to contend with new technologies and new ways of working?
Joining Ed Scott in the latest episode of The Future of the Firm podcast are Mohamed Kande, Vice Chair - US Consulting Solutions Co-Leader & Global Advisory Leader at PwC - and Fiona Czerniawska, CEO of Source.
In this episode, Ed, Mohamed, and Fiona discuss how firms and clients alike can build resilience that doesn’t just fortify them against challenging climates, but actively harnesses the potential inherent in uncertainty to drive growth.
Transformation. It’s something that almost every client we speak to at the moment is talking about.
In our most recent data, 52% of clients say that they’re either already making a significant investment in digital transformation or planning to do so in the next 18 months, and 41% say they’ll be investing in target operating model transformation.
But is something missing from this conversation? If transformation were just a matter of implementing new systems, models, or processes, it might be laborious, but not necessarily all that challenging. But of course, it’s so much more than that.
Joining Ed Scott to talk about the role of people in making transformation happen are Alex Bombeck, CEO of consulting firm North Highland, and Fiona Czerniawska, CEO and founder of Source.
Artificial intelligence is the topic on everyone’s mind at the moment, but what does it actually mean for consulting firms? To find out, we've been delving into our own quant and qual research, in which we regularly ask clients about the impact of emerging technology on their use of consulting firms.
Question: What do a father's mental health, a mother's chances of returning to full-time employment, and their newborn child's lifetime earnings have in common?
Answer: They would all be improved by an effective Equal Paid Parental Leave policy, according to PwC's 2023 Women in Work report.
In this episode of The Future of the Firm, Jennifer Richards, Chief Strategy Officer at PwC, joins Ed Scott to discuss shifting attitudes to parental leave, and the opportunity for firms to demonstrate genuine leadership in this space.
Ed Scott is joined by Martin White and Fiona Czerniawska.
The partnership model has its advantages, but the cancellation of EY's Project Everest has shone a light on some of its pitfalls.
When big decisions depend on a complex and lengthy voting process in which partners may put their self-interest ahead of the firm’s, a firm’s ability to reconfigure its business and meet clients’ evolving needs is hampered.
In this episode of the Future of the Firm podcast, Martin White and Fiona Czerniawska discuss the future of the partnership model.
In the last few months, we’ve seen artificial intelligence skyrocket from the pages of speculative fiction to increasingly becoming an everyday reality. Technologies like ChatGPT have been the subject of much discussion, but thus far, at least from the outside, AI is yet to break through that invisible boundary between ‘interesting gimmick’ and ‘revolutionary new tool’.
So, what’s going on? Is AI destined to remain an interesting sidenote in the annals of technological history, or does it represent something more fundamental? Could it be the future, for instance, of consulting?
Dr Jan van de Poll certainly thinks so. As the founder and managing partner of PRAIORITIZE, an Amsterdam-based provider of virtual consultancy technology for consulting firms and organisations, he's on a mission to drag the consulting industry into the 21st century, using artificial intelligence to create a virtual consultant which offer advice vertically and horizontally across an organisation.
When was the last time you experienced a crisis? How did you react? If you're anything like the rest of us, the answer might be—not that well.
But what if that crisis wasn’t something personal, but global? How would you deal with that if you were in a position of leadership, and others were looking to you for guidance?
In this episode, Fiona Czerniawska speaks with Adrian Bettridge, who brings over 26 years' experience as a consultant to his role as managing partner at Baringa.
Recorded as part of our Greater Leadership Rethink in collaboration with Sheffield Haworth, Adrian and Fiona discuss how leadership within professional services has evolved over the past few decades, particularly in the light of the COVID-19 pandemic and subsequent crises.
Against an increasingly tumultuous economic and geopolitical landscape, what really matters for professional services firms in 2023?
Join Fiona Czerniawska and Margaret Cameron-Waller for a look at the year ahead.
The professional services sector has always been a continuum. At one end of the spectrum, we’ve got high-end advice at the most strategic level in client organisations; at the other, we’ve services that are so familiar and standardised that they’ve become a commodity.
Professional service firms don’t have many people who are explicitly looking at the opportunities for productisation across their business as a whole. Instead, productisation is more likely to be an emerging strategy, in which specific client projects yield opportunities to convert services into products and where much of the actual work is done in people’s spare time.
Joining us to discuss where the greatest opportunities for productisation lie is Jonathan Attia, KPMG UK's Head of Digital Products.
Thought leadership is a critical means by which a professional services firm can communicate the range of depth of its knowledge in a way that conventional, brand-led marketing can’t. But a major lesson learned during the pandemic is that mid-market organisations are looking for practical, real-world experience. How, then, can professional service firms best engage with this market? Joining us to discuss the type of support mid-market clients want from consulting firms and the role thought leadership can play is Tom Stewart, author of the groundbreaking 1999 book Intellectual Capital.
Global economic and political trends have been making it difficult for clients and firms to make sweeping, large-scale decisions, and seemingly no area of business — or life in general, for that matter — has been left untouched.
Mergers and acquisitions have historically a line of business characterised by immense financial and logistical movements, but recently the market's been moving in the opposite direction, towards a more frequent, small-scale approach.
So how can firms help clients looking to invest in a serial approach to M&A? Joining us to discuss this issue is Ravi Chanmugan, Director for Growth & Strategy and Health within Accenture Strategy.
How do a team of five people manage the entire tax function of New Zealand's largest company? With ease—thanks to the power of a managed service. In this episode, we spoke to Grant Duncan, Group General Manager for Tax, Customs, and Insurance at Fonterra, to find out more about how Fonterra's partnership with EY has helped this multi-million dollar business streamline its global tax function.
How do a team of five people manage the entire tax function of New Zealand's largest company? With ease—thanks to the power of a managed service. In this episode, we spoke to Grant Duncan, Group General Manager for Tax, Customs, and Insurance at Fonterra, to find out more about how Fonterra's partnership with EY has helped this multi-million dollar business streamline its global tax function.
It's been known for some time now that EY, one of the ‘Big 4’ professional services firms, has been considering splitting its auditing and consulting arms into separate organisations. Well, it was recently revealed that the split has been approved by EY’s senior leadership, and will now be subject to a partner vote. If approved, EY’s audit business would remain in the existing partnership structure, whilst a new, larger advisory business would spin out into a standalone company. This episode, Source CEO Fiona Czerniawska is joined by colleagues Paul English, Director of Marketing Advisory, and Martin White, Principal Consultant. In this roundtable discussion, they get to grips with what the EY split might mean for the resultant audit and advisory firms, as well as the wider professional services market. Find out more about the impact of an EY split
It's been known for some time now that EY, one of the ‘Big 4’ professional services firms, has been considering splitting its auditing and consulting arms into separate organisations. Well, it was recently revealed that the split has been approved by EY’s senior leadership, and will now be subject to a partner vote. If approved, EY’s audit business would remain in the existing partnership structure, whilst a new, larger advisory business would spin out into a standalone company. This episode, Source CEO Fiona Czerniawska is joined by colleagues Paul English, Director of Marketing Advisory, and Martin White, Principal Consultant. In this roundtable discussion, they get to grips with what the EY split might mean for the resultant audit and advisory firms, as well as the wider professional services market. Find out more about the impact of an EY split
Digital transformation and ESG are the two highest priorities for firms when it comes to investment — but what if these weren’t siloed service lines, but two sides of the same coin?
This week Susanna Hasenoehrl, Head of Sustainability at SAP in Asia Pacific and Japan, joins us to discuss the role big tech firms can play in helping organisations reach net zero.
Digital transformation and ESG are the two highest priorities for firms when it comes to investment — but what if these weren’t siloed service lines, but two sides of the same coin?
This week Susanna Hasenoehrl, Head of Sustainability at SAP in Asia Pacific and Japan, joins us to discuss the role big tech firms can play in helping organisations reach net zero.
Compared to conventional consulting, the outcomes associated with a managed service are more specific and more tangible. Throughout the pandemic, we’ve seen evidence of growing interest in managed services, fuelled by the shift to remote working that made clients much more aware of the way in which technology can complement consulting rather than simply replace it.
Joining us this week to discuss the growth of managed services is Paul Clark, Global Vice Chair of Managed Services at EY.
Increasingly, success in business requires the coming together of different skillsets and technologies. But, in an ever more complex world, it’s getting harder and harder for large-scale transformation programmes to be delivered by just one firm - hence, the growth of alliances. Joining us this week to discuss the future of alliances in consulting is Adam Lai, Partner at PwC.
All our research during the pandemic suggested that the thought leadership produced by professional services firms was becoming more important to clients. If we look at our most recent client perceptions data and ask clients about the relative importance of thought leadership when considering which firm to hire, thought leadership has dropped from being the third most influential factor in 2021 to the seventh this year.
This is leading us to wonder if professional services firms are missing a trick, and if they’re not producing the kind of material clients want, even need, to read.
Accepted thinking around the consulting and wider professional services industry suggests that being a mid-sized firm isn't a comfortable place to be, lacking both the brand weight and scale of the very large firms, and the personalised service and specialist know-how of smaller ones. Yet, here we are, two years on from the single greatest upheaval ever in the consulting industry and most mid-sized firms are still going strong. Our own research suggests that our assumptions about mid-sized firms could be wrong.
Innovation has become a hot topic in consulting over the past few years: No longer content to be mere advisors, firms want to play a more proactive and hands-on role helping clients build and launch innovative new products and solutions. And clients seem keen to work in this way, too: Our client data consistently reveals that “having an innovative approach” is one of the most important attributes a firm can have. But what does all this really mean? To explore the topic of innovation in the consulting industry, we’re joined by Giles Colborne, CEO of cxpartners. Cxpartners is Sopra Steria’s digital innovation consultancy.
It's almost impossible to glance at the business press these days without some kind of coverage on global talent shortages—and the consulting industry is feeling the pressure of these shortages particularly keenly. Is there anything consulting firms can do to increase retention, and halt the "great resignation" that's impacting them? To discuss the role of learning & development in consulting firms, Fiona Czerniawksa is joined by Nhlamu Dlomu, Global Head of People at KPMG.
Pricing is one of the most complex issues in the consulting industry, and clients are often unclear on what exactly they are paying for; in fact, our latest research has shown that only 23% believe that consulting firms are transparent when it comes to their fee rates. What can be done to reduce this friction, and how can consulting firms take a more intelligence approach when it comes to their pricing models to ensure harmony on all sides? To discuss the topic, we're joined by Dr. Peter Colman from Simon-Kucher & Partners.
To continue our discussions around brand in professional services, David Redhill, ex-Global CMO at Deloitte, joins us for this podcast episode. We explore whether firms can truly use their culture as a differentiator, the extent to which expertise is related to brand, and how mid-sized firms can compete in an increasingly crowded market.
Has anything truly disrupted the consulting industry in the years since Clayton Christensen's groundbreaking article in the Harvard Business Review? To discuss the issue of disruption within consulting, Fiona Czerniawska is joined by Julian Birkinshaw and David Lancefield from the London Business School.
Our latest research reveals the greatest shake-up in what clients tell us is important when working with a consulting firm since we started tracking this metric seven years ago: Having an innovative approach has been replaced by brand & reputation as the most important attribute. Could this signify a flight to brand, caused by the pandemic? To discuss the topic of brands in professional services, Fiona Czerniawska is joined by Beth Ann Kaminkow, Global CEO at VMLY&R Commerce.
The question of who and what we're willing to trust is one of the defining issues of this digital age. In the context of professional services, trust has always played a critical role in the purchasing decisions of clients, and the pandemic has only served to cement that. In this episode, we are joined by J.C. Lapierre, Chief Strategy & Communications Officer for PwC in the United States, to discuss the role of trust, and how firms can build it in this new age.
| Historically, the professional services industry hasn't been a place of gender diversity, but things seem to be changing. This podcast episode, recorded to celebrate International Women's Day, features Rachel Barton, Europe Strategy Lead at Accenture, and Alison Huntington, Director of Client & Brand Insights at Source, to discuss what it's really like to be a woman in the consulting industry today. |
It will come as no surprise that the pandemic has resulted in a major rethink about the nature, and future, of work. In this podcast episode, we are joined by Jean-Marc Laouchez, President of the Korn Ferry Institute to explore this issue further, and to hear about how Korn Ferry are contributing to this change.
Clients are becoming more demanding of their consultants than ever before. Clients are looking for partners to assist them with their thorniest challenges, and consulting firms need to step up. In our first podcast episode of 2022, Fiona Czerniawska is joined by Source expert, Margaret Cameron-Waller, to discuss what the year has in store for consulting firms and their clients, and the key drivers of demand.
Clients in Japan have always tended to be relatively conservative in their use of consultants, and have historically been somewhat reluctant to invest in large-scale consulting programmes. In this episode, we’re joined by Kenji Katsura, the leader of PwC’s technology consulting business in Japan, and Yann Bonduelle, a Senior Advisor to the firm, to discuss how changes are reshaping this market—and what lessons consultants in other parts of the world can learn from their experiences in Japan.
Is it time for the consulting sector to undergo its own behavioural revolution? In this episode, we're joined by Andros Payne, Managing Partner and Founder of the consulting firm Humatica, to discuss what a more behaviour-centric model of consulting would look like, and how a richer understanding of human behaviour could help consultants more effectively deliver change for their clients.
Thought leadership has always been a critically important brand-building tool for consulting firms; and, increasingly, the same is also true in the world of legal services. In this episode of the podcast, we’re joined by Leor Franks, Business Development & Marketing Director at the law firm Kingsley Napley, to discuss the history and the future of the legal thought leadership landscape. And we dive deep into the similarities and the differences between thought leadership in the legal and consulting sectors, and what the two worlds could learn from each other about how to create compelling and meaningful content.
In recent years, the private equity market has started to become an increasingly important buyer of consulting services. The recent surge in deal making in the wake of the pandemic has created both opportunities and challenges for the firms that serve this market. At the same time, investors are becoming more and more interested in building environmentally sustainable portfolios, and often need the support of consultants to make that a reality. On this episode, we discuss trends in this market with Mark Veldon, Co-Head of the UK and Co-Lead of the private equity team at AlixPartners, and Eric Benedict, the firm’s Head of Business Development for Europe.
Moments of crisis have always brought with them opportunities for consultants operating in the forensics and litigation space; when businesses are put under strain, underlying issues have a tendency to reveal themselves. Today, we'll be examining the various ways in which the pandemic continues to reshape the landscape of forensics, disputes & litigation consulting work—as well as some of the longer term societal and technological changes that have impacted these fields. David Dearman, Senior Managing Director at Ankura, joins us to discuss these trends, and what they all mean for the long-term future of forensics consulting.
In today’s consulting landscape, clients want their consultants to create real, tangible, and measurable value—value that persists long after your team finishes the project. Generally, clients are highly sceptical about whether their spend on consulting services is generating a positive financial return on investment. So any firm that is able to define, measure, and ultimately create, value is likely to find itself standing out in what is becoming an increasingly crowded market. In this episode, we’re joined by PwC’s EMEA Consulting Clients and Markets Leader, Julian Wakeham, to discuss value in consulting: what it is, how it’s created, and what firms can do to make sure value is demonstrated at all stages of a project.
The pandemic has acted as a sharp reminder of just how fragile the world’s economy and our global infrastructure truly is. Layer on top of that the new kinds of threats that have emerged—from immediate dangers such as cybercrime, through to long-term, planetary issues like climate change and geopolitical realignments—and it’s easy to see why it’s often argued that we’re living through an “age of crisis”. On this episode, we’re joined by Nicholas Bahr—Global Managing Director for Operational Risk Management and Sustainability at DuPont Sustainable Solutions—to discuss how consultants can help their clients navigate this new threat landscape.
Since the beginning of this year, the consulting market has bounced back faster than many had anticipated—leaving many firms struggling to find the resources to keep pace with client demand. While the so-called “war for talent” is not a new phenomenon in this industry, the problem does feel more acute now than ever before. So, on this episode of the podcast, we’re joined by Amanda Gethin—the Global Talent Leader for Consulting at EY—to discuss how the pandemic has intersected with longer-term factors to produce today’s talent shortages, and what firms can do to solve this crisis.
The pandemic has made COOs and CEOs acutely aware of their human capital dependencies, and many have turned to technologies like artificial intelligence and robotic process automation as a means of building more resilience into their businesses. And that’s been great news for the new generation of specialist automation consulting firms and “automation as a service” providers. In this episode, we speak to Roboyo’s Charles Vivian and Nicolass Hess to find out where this field goes next, and what implications that will have for the wider consulting sector.
Over the past decade, digital transformation has been one of the most important drivers of consulting spend; our latest data suggests that the digital transformation market makes up over a third of the total global market for consulting services. However, the pandemic has had some profound effects on the digital priorities of clients—and, in many industries, has led to a significant acceleration of digital trends. In this episode, we’re joined by Didier Bonnet—an Executive Vice President at Capgemini Invent—to discuss how consulting firms can update their digital offerings for this new world.
For many of us, strategy work is what we immediately picture when we think about consulting. However, like every facet of this industry, strategy consulting has moved on a great deal over the past few decades. Indeed, for many clients, the word “strategy” itself has a very different set of connotations than it once did. In this episode of the podcast, we’re joined by Jonathan Goodman—Chair of Monitor Deloitte and a Vice Chair of Deloitte Canada—as we discuss just how much has changed about strategy consulting, and how the field will continue to evolve over the coming years.
Thought leadership is a crucial part of the brand-building strategy of the modern professional services firm. And over the past year and a half, it’s taken on a new level of importance; for many clients, it has played a vital role in helping them successfully overcome the challenges of the pandemic. On this episode, we’re joined by Francis Hintermann, the Global Managing Director of Accenture Research, to discuss what firms can do if they want to maximise the impact of the content they produce, and ensure it accurately reflects the priorities of their clients.
As issues of racial justice have taken on a new level of importance in the public consciousness, consulting firms have become more aware of the need to confront the sector's historical failings. In this episode, we’re joined by Ekow Sanni-Thomas, founder of Inside Voices, a platform dedicated to holding companies accountable for their diversity pledges. We discuss the practical steps that consultants can take if they want to transform their firms into truly anti-racist organisations.
Over the past few years, the boundaries between freelancers and established consulting firms have become a lot more porous than they used to be. Spurred on by a desire to create more flexible resourcing models, large consulting firms have adopted a much more proactive approach to bringing freelancers into the delivery of their client engagements. And that’s been facilitated, in part, by the arrival of a new generation of “talent-on-demand" platforms, which have made it easier than ever before to source and vet freelance consultants. So, on this episode of the podcast, we’re joined by Charlotte Gregson, Managing Director for the UK & US at COMATCH, in order to take a deep dive into the rapidly evolving world of freelance consulting—and what it all means for established professional services firms and their clients.
In the modern consulting industry, it’s vital that firms understand how to help clients unlock the innovation potential within their organisations. Increasingly, clients aren’t just looking for consultants who know how to write a compelling PowerPoint deck; they want to find partners who can provide them with the practical support necessary to develop, launch and scale radically innovative products and services. In this episode of the podcast, we’re joined by Frazer Bennett, Chief Innovation Officer at PA Consulting, to discuss the role of innovation in today’s consulting sector. As well as looking at the longer-term trend of firms embracing their role as enablers of innovation, we’ll also be examining the extent to which COVID has pushed this topic up the agendas of clients, and the various ways in which firms have had to adjust their approaches to innovation in response to the rise of virtual working.
Over the past twelve months, the global Black Lives Matter movement has forced businesses in every industry to ask themselves some hard questions about their track record on issues of diversity and inclusion. For the consulting sector, these questions feel particularly pertinent, given the way in which a firm’s success is directly rooted in the human capital it has access to. On this episode of the podcast we’re joined by Susan Haseley—Executive Vice President at Protiviti and the firm’s Global Diversity and Inclusion Leader—to examine this topic in more detail. We explore why—from a commercial and ethical standpoint—consultants ought to care about diversity and inclusion, and we examine what specific steps firms can take to transform themselves into more diverse organisations.
Whether you’re a leader within a consulting firm or a consultant who advises clients on questions about management and leadership, there’s a good chance you’ve spent a lot of time over the last year thinking about the topic of employee engagement. Engagement might not be a new concept, either for consultants or their clients, but it is one that feels more relevant right now than ever. The pandemic has, after all, had a profound impact on the relationship between leaders and their workforces. So, on this episode, we’re joined by Pamela Hackett—CEO of consulting firm Proudfoot and author of “Manage to Engage” —as we take a deep dive into the world of engagement. We’ll look at what it takes to build an engaged workforce, and we’ll explore the role that consulting firms can play in helping clients take their first steps along that journey.
Since the very beginning of the pandemic, there was talk in both the private and public sector about the need to “build back better” and ensure a “green recovery” from COVID-19. Now that we’re starting to get a better sense of what a post-COVID future could look like, clients are asking themselves tough questions about what, exactly, a green recovery will mean in practice—and how to balance competing priorities at this critical moment in time. In this episode, we revisit the topic of sustainability; and more specifically, we examine the way in which client demand for sustainability services has started to reshape the competitive dynamics of the consulting sector. To discuss this topic, we’re joined by Dame Jo da Silva and Carol Lemmens from Arup—the firm’s Global Sustainable Development Director and Global Advisory Services Leader, respectively.
Digital transformation has been a critically important driver in the growth of consulting spend over the past decade. And customer experience has been one of the areas where digital transformation has played the greatest role in unlocking new opportunities for clients. Any business needs to be able to meet its customers where they are; so, as consumers have become more digitally savvy, businesses have been forced to develop their own digital capabilities accordingly. On this episode of the podcast, we’re joined by Quinton Pienaar—PwC's EMEA Customer Transformation Leader—to discuss how firms can support their clients’ customer transformation journeys, particularly in the context of the changes to consumer behaviour caused by the pandemic.
M&A is a crucial engine of growth for large consulting firms. But it also holds the potential to fundamentally reshape the parameters of the industry and the axes along which firms compete with one another; over the past few years, there have been a number of high profile examples of firms buying up companies from outside the sector in an effort to diversify their service portfolios and, in some cases, create entirely new customer propositions. Conversely, there have also been cases of companies from outside the sector using well-placed acquisitions as a way of gaining a foothold within consulting. In this episode, we’re joined by Daniel Schwartmann—Accenture’s Managing Director responsible for inorganic growth activities across their global strategy and consulting business—to discuss what M&A activity today can tell us about the future of the industry.
Historically, consulting firms haven’t always been seen as attractive investment vehicles for private equity. As organisations whose success depends primarily on their human capital, consulting firms can be harder to properly value than many other businesses. And the nature of project-based work can lead to unpredictable cashflows—not something that many investors are looking for. But recently, something seems to have changed; private equity investors are taking a closer look at the sector, and that’s led to a number of high profile deals in the past few years. In this episode, we’re joined by Richard Holden—a partner at the investment bank Alantra—to explore the reasons behind that shift, and what it will mean for the future of consulting.
Questions of brand-building have always been front of mind for consulting firms; but over the past year, those questions have taken on a new level of urgency. At a time when clients are scrutinising their consulting spend more carefully than ever, a strong brand can be the difference between a healthy pipeline and a sputtering one. So, on this episode, we’re joined by John Rudaizky—the Global Brand and Marketing Leader for EY—to talk all things brand: what makes for an effective professional services brand; how you can build one; and how you can put that brand to work as an engine for growth.
For the modern professional services firm, thought leadership can be a powerful tool for building a brand and establishing credibility with clients. But since the start of the pandemic, there have been some important changes both to the ways in which clients consume that thought leadership, and to what they’re looking for from it. In this episode of the podcast, we’re joined by thought leadership and content marketing expert Bev Burgess—a consultant, author, and Senior Adviser for ITSMA—to discuss what that all means for the future of firms’ content, and sketch out what thought leadership will look like in 2025 and beyond.
Even before the pandemic, it was becoming increasingly common to hear consulting firms talk about their sense of purpose—the idea that their actions are motivated by something above and beyond a desire to generate profits for their partnerships. And events of the last year have certainly put those claims to the test like never before. So, on this episode of the podcast, we take a look at what “purpose” really means in the context of the professional services industry; we ask why having a purpose matters, how you can figure out what yours is, and what firms can do if they want to make sure their commitment to a sense of purpose isn’t a hollow one.
Any consulting firm will tell you that their people are their greatest asset. Talent acquisition and retention have always been topics that leaders in this industry have paid close attention to, in order to ensure that their firms can continue to provide clients with the highly skilled, creative, and motivated project team members they’re looking for. But COVID-19 has introduced some new wrinkles into the talent proposition. With consultants travelling a good deal less than they once did, firms will need to rethink how they sell the profession to young graduates; at the same time, the shift to remote project delivery may allow firms to operate much more geographically distributed workforces. In this episode, we explore the various implications that the pandemic has had on talent—and what firms can do to set themselves up for success in the talent market of tomorrow.
Consulting has, historically, always been an industry in which sales were highly relationship-driven; and as a consequence of that, marketing teams within consulting firms have sometimes struggled to demonstrate their ROI to the rest of the business. Now that COVID-19 has created a situation in which partners aren’t able to spend as much facetime with clients, many firms have found that they’ve needed to lean more heavily on their marketing functions in order to continue driving sales. In the long-run, this experience may act as a catalyst for firms to start rethinking the role of their marketing functions, and how they interface with the rest of the business. On this episode of the podcast, we’re joined by Matthew Lieberman—CMO for the US and Mexico at PwC—to explore how one firm’s marketing function has stepped up to the challenges created by the pandemic.
Regular listeners of the podcast will know that we have a longstanding interest in how emerging technologies could shape the future of the professional services industry. So we’re delighted to be joined for this episode by Lorien Pratt—an AI expert with a long track record of pioneering new developments within the field in a commercial context. She sat down with us to discuss how consulting firms could unlock new growth opportunities by incorporating AI into their service offerings; with a particular focus on the comparatively new discipline of Decision Intelligence, and the potential it holds for embedding AI tools and techniques into high-stakes business decision-making.
Even prior to the pandemic, the ambition of becoming truly customer-centric was high up on the agendas of leading businesses across a wide range of sectors—in both the B2B and B2C space. COVID-19 has created a new sense or urgency around those ambitions; many organisations have come to realise that their ability to weather this particular storm will depend, in large part, on whether or not they can successfully close the gap between themselves, their customers, and the end consumer. In this podcast, we are joined by Mike Mickunas, former Global VP for Commercial Insights and Analytics at Kelloggs and current Bain External Advisor, to talk about how service providers can help businesses put the customer at the heart of their decision making.
It’s fair to say that organisations have never before been more conscious of the critical two way dependencies between themselves and their workforces. On the one hand, businesses are having to think about how they can keep their people safe and do right by their employees; on the other, those same businesses are trying to create the type of institutional resilience that will allow them to continue operating even if key individuals are temporarily unavailable. We could well be on the verge of a complete transformation of the relationship between employees, businesses and society-at-large. So, in this podcast, we explore the nature of that transformation—and ask whether it will lead to a consequent reimagining of the role of human capital consultants.
Regular listeners of the podcast will have frequently heard us address the thorny topic of value in the professional services industry; today, we apply that thinking to the world of audit. Non-discretionary work like audit isn’t always seen as “value-generating” in quite the same way that discretionary spend—consulting services, for example—is. But is that really fair? In this episode, we explore the relationship between audit and value, as understood by clients; and we ask what auditors can do if they want to maximise their perceived value-add.
Thought leadership has always been one of the most important weapons in a consulting firm’s brand-building arsenal. And that’s why it’s so important to invest time into making sure that your content output is highly differentiated; not just from the thought leadership that other firms are putting out, but also from all of the other media sources you’re competing against for client eyeballs. In this episode, we explore how clients’ content consumption habits have been affected by COVID-19, and what that means for consulting firms who want to make their material stand out from the crowd.
There is no shortage right now of stories in the press about how professional services firms are responding to the pandemic—be those positive stories about companies going above and beyond to protect their employees and their customers, or more negative ones about firms laying people off or failing to deliver on critical public health projects. But is all of that noise actually having an impact on client perceptions? In this episode, we examine how the brands of leading firms are holding up during this crisis, and ask what firms can do to ensure they come out of this period with their reputation in the market enhanced rather than diminished.
COVID-19 has undoubtedly transformed the way that clients think about risk, and how they evaluate the risk management practices of their own organisations. So what does that mean for the risk consulting market? In this podcast, we explore how the market for risk services has held up through the pandemic; what changes could be on the horizon for how risk services are delivered; and what firms can do today to set themselves up for success in this market.
Getting the right balance between breadth and depth in your service portfolio is one of the perennial challenges for consulting firms. Many clients greatly value the ability to buy multiple services from a single vendor; but spread yourself too thinly and you risk becoming seen as a jack-of-all-trades. So in this episode, we look at what firms need to consider when developing their service portfolio, and how they can find that sweet spot between doing everything under the sun and becoming single service providers. We also explore how the size of your firm helps shape client expectations for what services you’ll be able to offer them, and how you can best take advantage of those expectations.
Regulators in the UK recently announced the details of a plan to reform the audit industry, in response to a series of high profile business failures where auditors took a large portion of the public blame. And these UK proposals may well end up as the template for reforms in other markets. So, in this episode, we examine the role that regulation will play in shaping how audits are purchased and delivered over the coming years—and examine the relationship between regulation and other critical factors that will shape the future of audit.
Sustainability is a topic that’s moved up and down the client agenda for a while now—but around this time last year it felt to many like we’d reached a turning point, and businesses around the world were starting to actually put their money where their mouths were, spurred on by Greta Thunberg, the global climate strikes, and the new wave of media focus on the issue. And while COVID-19 has certainly impacted client priorities, and perhaps led to a bit more of an emphasis on the social side of the ESG equation, it doesn’t seem to have much dampened interest in the topic. Today on the podcast, we’ll be examining the role that sustainability services play in today’s professional services market—and what role they could play in the future.
Consulting firms have not been shy these past few years about making acquisitions; in fact, there have been several high-profile recent examples of firms buying businesses that fall well outside the traditional definition of consulting, in an attempt to augment their service portfolios or create entirely new customer propositions. In this episode of the podcast, we ask whether M&A energy has been diminished or magnified by COVID-19, and explore how the pandemic may change what firms look for in potential acquisition targets.
A firm’s brand is always one of its most important assets. Not only is it a critical part of getting your foot in the door with new clients, but it also sets the limits of what work you can and can’t feasibly bid for; like it or not, brand is one of the key factors that clients look at when deciding who to work with and who to avoid. So in this episode of the podcast, we explore exactly how your brand shapes the work that clients are willing to buy from you, and we look at how COVID-19 may reshape what it means to have a great brand identity.
Investing for organic growth as a professional services firm is rarely straightforward, even in times of relatively stable background economic conditions. There are a myriad of factors that go into decisions about which markets to enter, what new services to launch, and how to invest in talent. In periods of crisis and uncertainty, those decisions become orders of magnitude more complex. In this episode, we explore what smart investing looks like in the time of COVID-19.
We take a break from our regularly scheduled programming to bring you a special live Q&A episode, in which we answer the burning questions on the minds of consulting leaders.
This is a recording of an online panel discussion we recently hosted, for which we invited firms to submit questions on the theme of how COVID-19 has changed professional services. In this episode, we go through those questions and explore how different facets of the industry have been impacted by the pandemic.
COVID-19 has rewritten the rulebook for consulting projects; firms have had to adapt, virtually overnight, to a world in which the vast majority of their work must be done remotely. In this episode of the podcast, we take a closer look at the challenges and opportunities that firms are facing right now, and we explore the potential longer-term implications of the current crisis on project delivery.
The modern consulting partnership looks very different from those of ten or even five years ago. Not only have more firms recognised the importance of diversity--both in terms of demographics and in terms of professional background and thinking style--at the partner level, but the skills required to be a successful leader in the consulting industry have changed dramatically. In this episode, we’re joined by Ben Richardson, of executive search and talent advisory firm Sheffield Haworth, to discuss the ongoing evolution of the consulting partnership.
Most consulting firms care a great deal about the quality of the thought leadership they put out into the market; but even so, there are still plenty of sub-par pieces that get published. In this episode, we discuss the impact that good thought leadership can have on a firm’s reputation, what makes some pieces stand out from the crowd, and what firms can do if they want to ensure consistency and quality in their thought leadership output.
Top graduates entering the talent market today have more options open to them than ever before. At the same time, career paths for consultants are more fluid than they’ve ever been, with mid-career professionals happy to move around between firms, go in and out of industry, and spend time as freelancers. All of this means that attracting and retaining top talent is becoming increasingly challenging for many firms; and on this podcast, we explore some of the different ways firms are trying to meet that challenge.
It's clear right now that we're in unprecedented times for the global economy. Across the world, professional services firms are trying to understand what impact COVID-19 will have on their own ability to continue operating and on their demand pipeline. In this episode, we explore the potential impact of the pandemic on the professional services sector, and talk about what we'll be doing to support listeners of our podcast through this challenging period.
Consulting is, to put it bluntly, not an easy industry to navigate. The dizzying array of firms out there - all offering jargon-laden, overlapping bundles of services - make it hard for even seasoned industry-watchers to accurately describe the landscape of the sector. But what if there was a better way to talk about consulting services?
A recurring theme of our podcast has been the way in which professional services firms are becoming increasingly complex and difficult to navigate. But as a consequence of that shift, the role of the account manager has become more important than ever. In this episode, we explore how firms are reinventing the way they manage client relationships, and what that means for you.
Our Emerging Trends report on The Future of Account Management is due to be published in March.
Professional services firms live and die by the strength of their brand. But there is precious little consensus about how to develop and protect it; different companies have taken very different approaches to brand management. In this podcast, we explore the pros and cons of different brand strategies.
The prevalence of discounting is one of the consulting industry’s biggest open secrets. For many firms, the rate card is more of a useful fiction than anything else. Should firms be wary of the long-term impact of discounting too much? Or is it all part of playing the game?
Nobody likes getting audited. But does that have to be the case? By asking what a discretionary audit would look like, we can better understand the opportunities for auditors to use new technology to make their services more attractive to clients.
Consulting is an industry with a perennial value problem; because the work that consultants do can often be relatively abstract and strategic, it can be difficult to prove the value created by a given project. Is there anything that firms can do to help make their unique value-add more concrete in the eyes of clients?
The stereotype of consultants is that they spend all their time jet-setting around the world; George Clooney even made a film about it. But in an age when all of us are having to think more about our environmental footprint, is it time for consultants to become a little more grounded?
The managed services model has historically been associated more with technology outsourcing than with high complexity advisory services. But in recent years, an increasing number of consulting firms have appropriated this model and begun offering continuous support to their clients in critical business areas. In this episode, we examine this trend, and ask whether it represent the inevitable future of management consulting.
The trusty time and materials pricing model may have served consulting firms well for decades, but is it on its last legs? In this podcast, we look at the growing appetite for linking project fees directly to outcomes, and ask whether this really is the future of the industry.