I think Data Science will (partly) disrupt Strategy Consulting.
As I was thinking about the impact, benefit and pricing of my new venture with SMART360°Biz and the Enterprise Social Graph (which I am currently validating through the LeanStartupChallenge), it struck me:
- We reduce the requirement from 10 Strategy Consultants to 1
- We help customers see the missmatch of their current organization and their strategy
- Through the use of data/visualizations based on graphs of their organization
- Algorithmic findings/patterns
- Recommendations help your organization to continously adapt and therefore reduce costs and risk of big change programms done by Strategy Consultants
- … plus many more ideas.
And just as I found this to be a great pricing pitch, I stumbled upon this posting from Thomas on “Can data science disrupt strategy consulting?“.
So I said yes, what is your thought?
KarstenVoges - Enterprise Architecture, Startup, Lean 
Sage words by good old Clayton Christensen. I agree, and dare to go even further:
Given the increasing level of uncertainty/compexity of the business context and the consequent need for agility and resilience, classic strategy consulting will not only be disrupted, it will downright extinct (finally!).
And it will be replaced by highly lightweight decision-making processes dependent on the capability to gather, structure, process and convey the relevant data on your organization and its context.
Data Science and Enterprise Architecture will together provide much of that capability. The rest is good old talent, leadership and collaboration.
Exciting times!
Hi Bernd,
thanks for your input. I wouldn’t say that this consulting will get extinct but rather marginalized or transformed.
Maybe they will get more into comparing organizations and industries and providing insights on an über-organizational level?
Karsten,
I strongly think that classic strategy consulting will extinct, at least in highly competitive markets, simply because organisations believing in long-term strategic plans are less and less likely to succeed. You can already observe McKinsey and their likes changing their business model towards providing much more down-to-earth operational services.
To put it pithily (again), this is the age of the practitioner.
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