At the end of 2018, Norway’s consulting market was expected to cross the €1 billion mark. While the data from 2018 is still under analysis, because of this growth rate and for an easy ride on the market, the consultancy companies might have to restructure or at least take into consideration some important expectations of their clients.
The market needs more creative and innovative consultants
According to Source Global Research, the consulting market’s clients struggle to point out companies that stand out in delivering exceptional work. Also, the clients are asking for innovation grounded in practical realities, and much less on best practices from other sectors or geographies. Thus, consultants should step out from the magic frameworks they use to analyze business cases, and choose a more problem-driven structure approach in their consultancy work, proving creativity and innovation.
The consultancy companies should start to change their perspective, from the moment they hire their consultants. When they build their case interviews, the companies should use new approaches like the one proposed by MyConsultingCoach:
- base the case interview on real client projects the company has worked on;
- have senior consultants involved in the process;
- use time pressure and psychological pressure during the interview;
- test critical thinking, proactivity, problem-solving, numerical agility and communication;
- and the most important part, make sure the new consultant has the ability to create structure. Using creativity, the would-be consultant should prove his/her ability to tailor a framework for every case, through proper understanding of the objectives of the case and identification of the drivers to achieve the wanted outcomes.
Get consultants ready for multi-disciplinary projects
Also, the Source Global Research mentions that the consultancy companies should do better in positioning themselves on the market. They should find essential market differentiators in high quality innovative work, and less in the services they offer.
Finally, the clients expect from management consultancy companies to have the right experts to support them in multi-disciplinary projects. This demand requires fewer consultants that have all the qualities and expertise in a specific sector, and more consultants with diverse backgrounds, skills and qualifications, able to work together in challenging multi-disciplinary projects.
According to Consulting Norge report from 2018, Norway’s consulting market focuses on three main consultancy services, which represent 76% of the total clients’ demand:
- Strategy, the largest segment of the market, 31% of the total, refers to activities that support organizations to make plans for improving or restructuring their business, processes and results.
- People & Change represents 26% of the market, and deals with the human capital of the companies, offering HR strategy, learning and change management, performance measurements, compensations, etc.
- Operations makes 19% of the total market and it provides business solutions for customer relationship management, procurement, research and development, cost reduction, etc.
Consulting Norge also shows that Norwegian management consulting industry is predominantly focused on the domestic market, but many companies are restructuring towards a Nordic model. At the moment, Norway’s consulting industry accounts for about a quarter of the Nordic consulting industry.