Market conditions

The art of “and” is the title of an article by the Boston Consulting Group on how organisations, post-recession, need to grow revenue while simultaneously cutting costs. It’s not a question of one or the other, the article suggests: you have to do both.

If we look for a moment at the UK consulting industry (every country is a bit different), we can divide it into three parts. On one side of the scales is the market in financial services; on the other is that in the public sector. Each of these markets is similar in size: in the middle and a little bigger than both is everything else: telecoms, utilities, manufacturing, media companies, etc.

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.