2010: The year of living dangerously

January is one of the high points of the consultant's year so far as business planning is concerned. For the firms whose financial year starts in the summer, the New Year is a good time to check progress against assumptions; for those whose financial years start in the next couple of months, it is the last chance to take stock.

Two things are striking this year.

The first is that consulting firms are – finally – being more cautious about the growth prospects for the next year. Talking to consulting firms at the start of 2008, I was amazed how many of them were banking on growth levels not dissimilar to 2007. No one’s making that assumption this time around. Few firms expect the market to grow: things may be picking up in financial services but most agree that this is unlikely to compensate for the cutbacks anticipated in public sector consulting.

But the second thing is that, despite this, most firms are still planning to grow. For any single company, this is a perfectly respectable strategy, but it’s clearly impossible for everyone to do so in a shrinking market. The only way to do this is to take market share from competitors. That will require a significant shift. You can grow in a growing market by staying close to your existing clients because they have bigger budgets and because they may move from organisation to organisation, taking you with them. You can grow by reminding people of your expertise with competent thought leadership. But a market in which you win work other firms would have assumed was automatically theirs is very different. You have to step into their relationship, like taking over someone’s partner at a dance. You need to reach beyond your existing network by producing thought leadership that actually lives up to its name. Most firms aren’t geared up to do this: is yours?