CrackerJack Consulting Podcast

While many consulting firms serve clients in locations that span a country or even the entire globe, focusing your firm on a narrow geography--even one city--can be a very successful strategy. I explored the advantages of a local focus with Kellen Smith, CEO of 8020 Consulting, and also discussed how a local success can be a springboard for expansion.

How do you continue to innovate so that your firm becomes increasingly valuable to your clients? To answer that question, I turned to Charles Mauro shortly before he retired because he has made a (successful) practice of keeping his firm on the cutting edge of their specialty.

Your consulting firm may be enjoying a banner year. Or, you may be trying to climb out of a revenue dip. Or perhaps you're somewhere in between on the revenue roller coaster that seems to define small consulting firms. Managing the ups and downs with excellence and poise is a skill set worth mastering, and it's what I tackled in this interview of Colleen Murray from Jump Asociates.

If your target market is no longer buying, your firm may have to pivot. Great idea in theory, but how do you do it? Zo Ratansi, founder of Sixsense Strategy Group has mastered this skill and put it to good use in building a successful boutique consulting firm, so I tapped into his wisdom to help you when you need to pivot your firm.

Consulting firms frequently view software products as the holy grail. They're infinitely scalable revenue streams that don't require any labor (or at least minimal labor) after they're built. But are they really the holy grail? I attempted to answer that question with the CEO of a firm that has launched a software solution to its clients.

More and more clients are turning to giant staffing firms for consulting capability. Firms like Graphite, BTG, Infosys, and Toptal present real competition for your consulting firm. I dug into this challenge and how to overcome it with Mark Piro, the Founder and Managing Partner of Affusion Consulting.

If your executive team consists of multiple people (e.g., practice leads, or functional heads) or you have multiple equity partners at your firm, it's shockingly easy for that small group to have divergent visions and plans for the business. I delved into that situation with David Burnie, founder of Burnie Group.

On your journey down the yellow brick road of consulting firm leadership, you've probably encountered the occasional result (or person or team, or practice area) that falls short of expectations. Or, perhaps you're post-merger/acquisition and the evil spell of disorganization has hit your firm. In either case, it's time to visit a wizard of consulting firm leadership and operations: Kurt Brykman. I did, and this excellent podcast episode is the result.

Consultants work hard. Very hard. Sometimes too hard, especially when there's a spike in project demands and you have trouble finding talented people to add to your team. The inevitable result? Burnout. Unhappy consultants quit, which leads to more pressure on the remaining team and more burnout and a vicious burnout cycle. I addressed this topic with Robin Nasatir, who was the CEO of Cliff Consulting and experienced burnout firsthand.

Ask any successful boutique consulting firm leader what the number one success factor was in building their firm, and they'll say, "culture." Great. But what if your firm's culture isn't strong? Or, what if your culture is downright broken in some ways? That's an easy problem to run into, particularly if you've been involved in any acquisitions. To lead us in an exploration of these questions, I turned to Tom McMakin, the CEO of Profitable Ideas Exchange.