Getting sustainable value from consultants : PwC study

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17 June 2006

The extent of engagement among the managers from client organisations, who work side-by-side with consultants, determines the success of consulting projects, states a new report by Management Consultancies Association / Management Today.

The report, Ensuring Sustainable Value from Consultants, sponsored by PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP, finds that 86 per cent of clients are wholly or partially satisfied with the value provided by management consultants. The findings reveal that typically, a person who takes the decision to use consultants is about four times as likely to be positive as someone seconded in from other areas of the business to work on the consulting project.

The report, based on a survey of more than 180 managers in the UK, reveals that organisations use consultants for four reasons:

• Access to people with specialist skills accounts for almost half of all consulting projects
  
• Gaining an outside perspective accounts for a further third.
  
• To push through or provide a plan for managing change and
  
• To help take difficult decisions

"Decision makers tend to view consulting projects in a positive light because that validates their decision to use consultants; it may also be that they are in a better position to see the overall benefits," says Fiona Czerniawska, author of the report.