One of the most entertaining articles I have read in quite some time was published in the Financial Times earlier this week. Entitled "A doctor's note for virulent consultants", author Andrew Hill quotes "a respected captain of industry" as saying that "consultants are 'a virus': let one in and you infect the whole organisation". Two sentences later, Hill discloses that he actually agrees with this statement.
Interesting metaphor. So why does Hill agree with this statement? He gives the following reasons:
- Viruses cannot exist alone.
- Viruses can mutate into different strains.
- Viruses multiply.
- All living things are susceptible to viruses.
- Viruses endure.
The connotation here is obviously very negative. But are all five of these reasons actually negative? No, this is not the case.
Viruses cannot exist alone. The author writes that "a consultancy without clients is a contradition in terms: it would simply be a collection of smart people nattering to each other about strategy". Oh? And what would one of the clients be without their customers? Exactly. They would cease to exist.
Viruses can mutate into different strains. Hill points out the fact that management consultancies have "mutated" over time, and even lists various "strains" of consultancies that offer specialties in different areas. These mutations are nothing more than variations of mergers and acquisitions that traditional firms experience. And the strains of "strategy", "marketing", "operations, "customer service", and "information technology" that the author lists? Sounds like a list of departments within a firm, does it not?
Viruses multiply. Finally a good argument (I am clearing my throat in jest as I write this sentence). A consultancy is a virus because they hire large amounts of employees? Nothing different than any other traditional firm that is doing well. And in this economy, how would hiring employees be a bad thing?
All living things are susceptible to viruses. Now the author decides to shift to a higher gear by calling out a "consultancy pandemic". Well, most readers know by now that H1N1 was really not a pandemic, and being alarmist by highlighting the fact that consultancies are now marketing to "fast-growing economies" just does not make sense. Any reasonable investor would want to know that their investments were targeting growth markets.
Viruses endure. Hill starts his explanation of this fifth reason by writing that "consultancies outlive scandal and even the failure of clients". And? There is nothing different here than with traditional firms. Consultancy failure should not arise from client misfortune anymore than a retail chain should go bankrupt because one of their customers have gone south.
As a consultant myself, here are my reasons why good consultancies bring benefit to firms:
- Consultants collaborate with clients.
- Consultants adapt to the needs of clients.
- Healthy consultancies grow.
- Most firms can benefit from consultants.
- Healthy consultancies survive.
If I ever saw an article like this one in The Wall Street Journal, I would end my subscription. The remaining points that Hill makes are nonsensical, and do not take note of the actual history of the consulting profession itself, the best text of which I am personally aware is "The World's Newest Profession: Management Consulting in the Twentieth Century", by Christopher D. McKenna. You can find my review in an earlier post on this blog.
In general, my satisfaction as a consultant has been high, and my broad experience in what Hill would call the technology "strain" has brought positive results to clients throughout my career by solving problems, leading teams, improving processes, giving recommendations, and providing advice in systems and software architecture, data architecture, enterprise architecture, and software development.
In "The World's Newest Profession", McKenna explains that much of the way that organizations are currently structured is due to the work of early consultancies. Because consultants are typically exposed to the inner workings of a large number of firms over the course of their careers, they are able to gain a much broader perspective of the industries in which firms exist. And because of this, my work as a consultant has enabled me to share accumulated knowledge with my clients that I might not otherwise have been able to develop.
"Developing Knowledge-Based Client Relationships: Leadership in Professional Services", by Ross Dawson (see my review in an earlier post), eloquently explains that sharing knowledge with clients should never be feared, and is actually the best way to earn trust; this has been my experience as well.
Counterpoint: Defining Big Data