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...

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...

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...

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...

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...

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...

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, 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 what the legal and consulting worlds could learn from each other about how to create compelling and meaningful...

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. 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.

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 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. PwC’s EMEA Consulting Clients and Markets Leader, Julian Wakeham joins us today, to discuss what firms can do to make sure value is demonstrated at all stages of a...

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 and it’s easy to see why it’s often argued that we’re living through an “age of crisis”. 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 lands