Management consulting (sometimes also called strategy consulting) refers to both the practice of helping companies to improve performance through analysis of existing business problems and development of future plans, as well as to the firms that specialize in this sort of consulting. Management consulting may involve the identification and cross-fertilization of The term best practice generally refers to the best possible way of doing something; it is used in the fields of business management, software engineering, and medicine. Business management In business management, a best practice is a generally accepted “best way of doing a thing”. A best practice... best practices, analytical techniques, Change management is the process of developing a planned approach to change in an organization. Typically the objective is to maximize the collective efforts of all people involved in the change. Change management can be either reactive, in which case management is responding to changes in the macroenvironment (that is... change management and coaching skills, technology implementations, strategy development or even the simple advantage of an outsider's perspective. Management consultants generally bring formal frameworks or The word Methodology is used in several ways. Methodology can refer to the science that studies the methods of problem solving. Most sciences have their own specific methodology. Methodology is sometimes used synonomously with method, particularly a complex method or body of methods, rules, and postulates employed by a discipline... methodologies to identify problems or suggest more effective or Efficiency is the capability of acting or producing effectively with a minimum of waste, expense, or unnecessary effort. The term has widely variant meanings in different disciplines. See Algorithmic efficiency for its use in computer science. efficiency is also a computer science term used when discussing parallel computing and speedup... efficient ways of performing Historically, the term business referred to activities or interests. By extension the word became (as recently as the 18th century) synonymous with an individual commercial enterprise. It has also taken on the more general meaning of a nexus of commercial activities. People establish businesses in order to perform economic activities... business tasks.

There is a relatively unclear line between management consulting and other consulting practices, such as IT consulting.

History

Management consulting grew with the rise of Management (from Old French ménagement the art of conducting, directing, from Latin manu agere to lead by the hand) characterises the process of leading and directing all or part of an organization, often a business, through the deployment and manipulation of resources (human, financial, material, intellectual or intangible). One... Management as a unique field of study. The first management consulting firm was Arthur D. Little, Inc. is the name of the worlds first management consulting firm. Founded in 1886 by Arthur Dehon Little, an MIT chemist who discovered acetate, and co-worker Roger Griffin, in Cambridge, Massachusetts, Arthur D. Little pioneered the concept of contracted research. The company played key roles... Arthur D. Little, founded in the late 1890s by the MIT professor of the same name. Though Arthur D. Little later became a general management consultancy, originally specialized in technical research. The first pure management and strategy consulting company was McKinsey & Company is a privately owned management consulting firm. Known both internally and externally as simply The Firm [1], McKinsey was founded in Chicago during 1926 by James O. McKinsey, but the modern McKinsey was shaped by Marvin Bower, who believed that management consultancies should adhere to the same... McKinsey & Company, still considered a leader in the field. McKinsey was founded in Chicagos skyline at day Chicago is the third largest city in the United States, after New York City and Los Angeles, with an official population of 2,896,016, as of the 2000 US Census. It is the fourth largest city in North America and the seventh largest in... Chicago during 1926 was a common year starting on Friday (link will take you to calendar). Events January-April January 1 - Irelands first regular radio service, 2RN (later Radio Éireann), begins broadcasting. January 8 - Abdul-Aziz ibn Saud becomes the King of Hejaz January 12 - Freeman Gosden and Charles Correll... 1926 by James O. McKinsey is the founder of McKinsey & Company Categories: Business bio stubs ... James O. McKinsey, but the modern McKinsey was shaped by Marvin Bower was born on August 1, 1903 in Cincinnati, Ohio and grew up in Cleveland, Ohio. He attended Brown University where he earned a bachelors degree in 1925. His father advised him to study law, and Bower graduated from Harvard Law School in 1928. After having been turned... Marvin Bower, who believed that management consultancies should adhere to the same high professional standards as For information on the type of fish called Lawyer, see the article on Burbot. A lawyer or attorney at law is a person licensed by the state to advise clients in legal matters and represent them in courts of law (and in other forms of dispute resolution). Most countries today... lawyers and Doctor means teacher in Latin. It has been used continuously as an honored academic title for over a millennium in Europe, where it dates back to the rise of the university. This use spread to the Americas, former European colonies, and is now prevalent in most of the world. However... doctors.

After World War II, a number of new management consulting firms formed, most notably The Boston Consulting Group (BCG) is a management consulting firm founded by Bruce Henderson in 1963. Today the Boston based firm is among the largest and most profitable management consulting firms worldwide. BCG has 60 offices in 37 countries and in 2004 had a revenue of US$ 1.3 billion... Boston Consulting Group, founded in 1963, which brought a vigorous analytical approach to the study of management and strategy. Work done at McKinsey, BCG, and Harvard Business School (HBS) is one of the graduate schools of Harvard University, and is one of the worlds leading management schools. Official name: Harvard University Graduate School of Business Administration: George F. Baker Foundation The School was founded in 1908 with an initial class of 59 students. Its... Harvard Business School during the 1960s and 70s developed the tools and approaches that would define the new field of Strategic management is the process of specifying an organizations objectives, developing policies and plans to achieve these objectives, and allocating resources so as to implement the plans. It is the highest level of managerial activity, usually performed by the companys Chief Executive Officer (CEO) and executive team. It... strategic management, setting the groundwork for many consulting firms to follow. Also significant was the development of consulting arms by both accounting firms (such as Arthur Andersen LLP, based in Chicago, Illinois, was one of the Big Five accounting firms and performed auditing, tax services, and consulting until 2000. In 2002 the firm lost auditing license in the U.S. as a result of involvement in the Enron collapse. Andersen has sold its assets outside... Arthur Andersen) and global IT services companies (such as International Business Machines Corporation (IBM, or colloquially, Big Blue) (NYSE: IBM) (incorporated June 15, 1911, in operation since 1888) is headquartered in Armonk, New York, USA. The company manufactures and sells computer hardware, software, and services. With over 330,000 employees worldwide and revenues of $96 billion (figures from 2004... IBM).

Current State of the Industry

Management consulting has grown rapidly, with growth rates of the industry exceeding 20% in the 1980s and 1990s. As a business service, consulting remains highly cyclical and linked to overall economic conditions. The consulting industry shrank during the 2001-2003 period, but had been experiencing slowly increasing growth since. In 2004, revenues were up 3% over the previous year, yielding a market size of just under $125 billion [1] (http://www.consultingcentral.com/).

Currently, there are three main types of consulting firms. First, there are large, diversified organizations, such as International Business Machines Corporation (IBM, or colloquially, Big Blue) (NYSE: IBM) (incorporated June 15, 1911, in operation since 1888) is headquartered in Armonk, New York, USA. The company manufactures and sells computer hardware, software, and services. With over 330,000 employees worldwide and revenues of $96 billion (figures from 2004... IBM's Global Services and Deloitte Consulting offer a range of services, including IT consulting, in addition to a management consulting practice. Second are the large management and strategic consulting specialists, like the venerable McKinsey, that offer purely management consulting, but are not specialized in any one industry. Finally, there are boutique firms, often quite small, that have extremely focused areas of consulting expertise, such as banking or telecommunications.

Approaches

Management consulting has become the primary source for innovation in the practice of management, forming a bridge between academia, firms, and thought leaders in other fields. As a result, management consulting firms use a variety of tools and techniques to approach business problems. See Strategic management is the process of specifying an organizations objectives, developing policies and plans to achieve these objectives, and allocating resources so as to implement the plans. It is the highest level of managerial activity, usually performed by the companys Chief Executive Officer (CEO) and executive team. It... strategic management for more information.

Criticism

Management A consultant is a professional that provides expert advice in a particular domain or area of expertise such as accountancy, information technology, the law, human resources, marketing, medicine, finance or more esoteric areas of knowledge, for example engineering and scientific specialties such as materials science, instrumentation, avionics, and stress analysis... consultants are often criticized for overuse of A buzzword (also known as a fashion word) is an idiom, often a neologism, commonly used in technical, administrative and political environments, consisting of an over-used word or phrase. Buzzwords appear ubiquitously but their actual meanings often remain unclear. A buzzword may or may not appear in a dictionary... buzzwords, reliance on management A fad, also known as a craze, refers to a fashion that becomes popular in a culture (or subcultures) relatively quickly, remains popular, often for a rather brief period, then loses popularity dramatically. List of fads All your base Beanie babies — 1990s Cabbage Patch dolls — 1980s Chia Pets... fads and a failure to develop executable plans that can be followed through. A number of highly critical books about management consulting argue that the mismatch between management consulting advice and the ability of business executives to actually create the change suggested results in substantial damages to existing businesses, see, for example Dangerous Company by James O'Shea.

Not surprisingly, management consulting is also the butt of many business-related A joke is a short story or short series of words spoken or communicated with the intent of being laughed at or found humorous by the listener or reader. This sort of joke is not the same as a practical joke. Laughter, the intended human reaction to jokes, is healthy... jokes, such as: "Question: What’s the difference between a management consultant and a used-car salesman. Answer: A used car salesman knows when he is lying."

Leading Firms

The Vault Guide to Top Consulting Firms (http://www.vault.com/nr/consulting_rankings/consulting_rankings.jsp?consulting2003=1) lists the following as the top five management consulting companies:

1. McKinsey & Company is a privately owned management consulting firm. Known both internally and externally as simply The Firm [1], McKinsey was founded in Chicago during 1926 by James O. McKinsey, but the modern McKinsey was shaped by Marvin Bower, who believed that management consultancies should adhere to the same... McKinsey and Company
2. The Boston Consulting Group (BCG) is a management consulting firm founded by Bruce Henderson in 1963. Today the Boston based firm is among the largest and most profitable management consulting firms worldwide. BCG has 60 offices in 37 countries and in 2004 had a revenue of US$ 1.3 billion... Boston Consulting Group
3. Bain & Company is a premium strategy management consulting firm with headquarter in Boston, MA. Along with McKinsey and the Boston Consulting Group (BCG), Bain is recongized as one of the leading firms in the consulting industry. External link Official website Categories: Corporation stubs ... Bain and Company
4. Wikipedia does not yet have an article with this exact name. Start the Booz Allen Hamilton article If you have created this page in the past few minutes and it has not yet appeared, it may not be visible due to a delay in updating the database. Please wait and... Booz Allen Hamilton
5. Monitor Group

Books about Management Consulting

• Managing the Professional Services Firm, by David Maister
• Guerrilla Marketing for Consulting, Jay Conrad Levinson and Michael W. McLaughlin
• Flawless Consulting, by Peter Block
• The Professional Services Firm Bible, by John Baschab
• Managing Transitions, By William Bridges

See also

• Strategic management is the process of specifying an organizations objectives, developing policies and plans to achieve these objectives, and allocating resources so as to implement the plans. It is the highest level of managerial activity, usually performed by the companys Chief Executive Officer (CEO) and executive team. It... Strategic Management
• A business philosophy or popular management theory is any of a range of accounting, marketing, public relations, operations, training, labor relations, executive time management, investment, and corporate governance approaches claimed (by their proponents, and sometimes only by their proponents and selected clients) to improve business performance in some measurable or... Business philosophies and popular management theories
• Providers of management consulting services include: Accenture A.T.Kearney Bain & Company BearingPoint (formerly KPMG Consulting) Boston Consulting Group Booz Allen Hamilton Cap Gemini Ernst & Young Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu IBM Business Consulting Services McKinsey & Company Mercer Management Consulting PA Consulting Group Former providers include: Arthur Andersen Ernst... Management consulting service providers

External Links

• Timeline of the history of management consulting (http://www.careerselector.com/consulting/hist.htm)
• Overview of the Management Consulting Industry (http://www.assoconsult.org/download/articoli/overview.pdf) (pdf)
• Growth Industry of the Century (http://canback.com/onsman.pdf) (pdf)