The transformation is stalling. Internal resources are at their limit. The expertise is missing. So you bring in advisors. Six months and half a million euros later: a stack of PowerPoint slides no one reads, recommendations that do not fit reality, and a team that feels sidelined.
External advisors are a tool, not a cure-all. Those who know when and what to use them for gain added value. Those who do not buy expensive presentations. The problem is rarely the advisor alone. It is the question that was never asked: Do we really need external help—and if so, for what exactly?
A board I supported hired a major strategy consultancy for a transformation programme. After four months, 300 slides were on the table. Brilliant analysis, no objections. But no one on the leadership team could explain what, specifically, was supposed to change. The recommendations were correct, but they spoke the advisors’ language, not the organisation’s. The project fizzled out within weeks.
Not every challenge requires advisors. But there are three situations in which external support creates real added value.
The first is expertise you do not have. Some topics require specialist knowledge that is not available internally and would take too long to build: regulatory requirements, technical specialisms, industry knowledge from other markets. Here, external expertise provides an advantage you cannot create internally at short notice.
The second is capacity you lack. Your best people are fully utilised. Day-to-day operations leave no room for strategic projects. External resources help not because your employees could not do it, but because they cannot manage it time-wise. The question, however, is whether more consistent prioritisation would not be cheaper than an advisor’s fee.
The third is neutrality you cannot provide. Some topics are too charged internally for an objective view: conflicts between divisions, assessment of leaders, an honest diagnosis of problems no one wants to voice. An external party can say things an internal person cannot—and will be heard differently.
Before you engage advisors, ask: Which of these three reasons do we meet? If none applies, you probably do not need them.
There are situations in which external support makes the problem worse. If you want to buy legitimacy because the board is more likely to agree with a well-known advisor name than with your own analysis, that is not advisory—it is political cover. Your organisation sees through that. If you want to delegate responsibility because you want to hide behind advisor recommendations when making unpopular decisions, that damages your credibility, not the advisor’s.
Most often, however, it fails when the real issue is leadership. No advisor can replace what leadership must deliver: setting direction, making decisions, bringing people along. If the core problem is weak leadership, an advisory project will not solve it—it will only cover it up at great expense. And if the organisation is not ready for change, advisors can deliver the best analysis they want. Willingness to change is a prerequisite, not a result of advisory.
A division head put it succinctly: “In three years, we had four advisory projects on the same topic. Each time a new advisory firm, each time a new analysis, each time the same recommendation. Nothing was ever implemented. The problem was never the analysis. The problem was that no one wanted to make the decision.”
Advisors can analyse problems and develop solutions. They cannot replace the work you must do yourself.
The selection determines success or failure. David Maister, one of the most respected authors on professional services, put it this way: The value of an advisor lies not in what they know, but in their ability to help the client use their own knowledge better. Three questions are decisive.
The first concerns substance versus brand. Do the advisors understand your business, or are they bringing standard solutions from other industries? Ask for relevant experience and check who will actually work on your project. The partner who sells you the project is rarely the one who delivers it. The industry calls this “bait and switch”: the experienced partner as bait, junior advisors deliver. Ask specifically who will really work on your topic and what experience these people bring. Also ask whose training you are paying for: advisors learn from you—your business, your processes, your strategies. They take that knowledge to the next client, possibly to your competitor.
The second concerns the approach. Some advisors arrive with ready-made solutions and look for problems that fit. Others listen, understand, and develop tailored approaches. Pay attention to how collaboration with your team is designed. Advisors who bypass your employees create resistance. Advisors who involve your team create acceptance.
The third concerns the exit plan. The best advisory makes itself redundant. Ask how knowledge transfer works and what remains when the project ends. If the answer is “You can hire us again for implementation,” be cautious.
Even with the right advisors, a lot can go wrong—usually on the client side. The most serious is an unclear mandate. “Just do an analysis” is not a mandate. What exactly should the outcome be? Which questions should be answered? Which decisions depend on it? The more precise the mandate, the better the result.
The second common mistake is too little internal commitment. Advisors need access to information, to people, to executives. If you assign the advisors a conference room and leave them alone, you will get generic results. Advisory is not a service you order and pick up. It is collaboration. And have the courage to challenge. Advisors are not oracles. They can be wrong, overlook what matters, give the wrong recommendation. The best advisors value critical clients.
The third is a lack of anchoring in implementation. The people who are supposed to implement the recommendations often only hear about them at the final presentation. Then resistance is inevitable. And without a genuine sponsor at leadership level, even the best concept remains paper.
The most common complaint after advisory projects: “Great concept, but once the advisors were gone, no one knew what to do next.”
Knowledge transfer must not be a step at the end; it must be part of the project from the start. Who from your team is working along? Who is learning the methods? Who understands the analysis? The best advisory enables rather than does. Advisors who show your team how to do it leave more behind than advisors who do everything alone. Demand usable documentation: not PowerPoint decks with 200 slides, but practical guides, checklists, decision criteria, process descriptions. Before the project ends, define who internally is responsible for implementation and further development.
Agree on a transition phase—a shadowing phase—in which your employees take over responsibility while the advisors are still available. Not only once they are gone. This phase uncovers knowledge gaps while they can still be closed.
Do not measure the success of advisory by the quality of the presentation. Measure it by what still works six months after the project ends.
Advisory is expensive. The question is not whether it is expensive, but whether it is worth the price. Put the costs into perspective: if the problem costs you a million per month, €200,000 for a solution is money well spent. If the problem is small, even €50,000 is too much. And ask for the smallest sensible entry point. Not every topic requires a major project. Sometimes a workshop, a diagnosis, or sparring is enough before you book the full package.
Before you commission advisors, answer three questions:
First: Which of the three legitimate reasons do we meet—expertise, capacity, or neutrality—and can we formulate that in one sentence?
Second: What exactly should the outcome be, and who from our team will work along and learn in the process?
Third: Who is responsible for implementation after the project ends, and how will we measure whether the investment paid off?
If you cannot answer the first question, you do not need an advisor. You first need clarity about your problem.
The advisory industry lives on being needed. That is not a reproach; it is its business model. But it means: not every recommendation to bring in advisors is neutral.
You can solve many problems yourself. You know your business better than any external party. You have employees who can produce smart analyses. What is often missing is not expertise, but time, focus, and permission to be honest. The best advisory is the one you no longer need. The second-best is the one that makes you know exactly what you need it for.
This week, look at your ongoing or planned advisory projects and ask yourself for each one: Can we say in one sentence why we need this advisor? If not, have that conversation internally first.
Reverse engineering instead of copy-paste – Advisors often bring best practices. Why they do not always fit and how to use them correctly.
Collaboration that no one steers – External support is particularly helpful where internal division boundaries block collaboration.
All Insights can be found in the overview.
Proven tools and models for self-application are available under Solutions.
If you want to take these thoughts further for your company, a no-obligation initial conversation is worthwhile.
