Ross Parker

Knowing that I used to be a strategy consultant, a colleague forwarded me a link to a post on the industry from Overcoming Bias. Robin Hanson’s blog is in my newsfeed, but I’d missed this post, which is a suggestion that firms hire consultants purely to break internal coalitions blocking change. My colleague comments that he wouldn’t be so dismissive of the ‘best practice’ explanation, with which I agree. Both explanations seem right to me. There may be other explanations too: for example, the need for instant-on brains without the hassle of a recruitment round and short-term employment contracts. (It’s at this point that I should mention that anyone with a background in consulting will probably enjoy this site – although it’s not one to read in public.)