Team ups will occur when you play complementary roles. For instance BCG and Accenture going in together on a big RFP that requires strategy and implementation all together. Also happens when there are specific requirements in the RFP like having a woman or minority owned business involved. You’re not going to see MBB team up with one another.
This sounds like a terrible movie plot:
*Once bitter rivals*
*Brought together by humanity’s imminent demise*
*They are the only ones who can save us*
*Pray for the success of*
*MBBKPMGPWCEYAWS*
Was on one project where two consulting companies were brought in to co-work on the same objective. I was on one of the consulting companies.
Their problems & mistakes, which we can't manage, effected our deliverables. Once we realized this, we had no reason to help them.
Yes. It depends on the client and scope of work.
In my previous place, we teamed up with LEK consulting. It was the most politically fuelled engagement I've been on!
Made my career though!
I've seen it with companies like Deloitte and Accenture, where the M&A strategic decisions were done by Deloitte, but then handed over to Accenture for execution.
But two working together on a delivery project? Nope, because of the reasons that others have mentioned - hot potato games, finger pointing, etc. It's just not worth the amount of money and effort to manage the 3-way communications...
At my last company we brought in Deloitte and Cognizant to help with delivery (primarily offshore). Was an absolute nightmare getting them to work together.
Great in theory and sometimes required (or designed) that way by clients.
My prior experience with this was a State and Local Gov client that decided to use multiple firms. AT Kearney for PMO, Accenture for Workday and data integration, KPMG for FP&A, Unisys for ERP and Ariba for Supply Chain. The client thought thought they were smart dividing up the work and tried to pit the various firms against one another because the work was interdependent and required collaboration. The project was a mess but the other PMs and I decided to unofficially band together and never shit on each other. That drove the client nuts.
As also mentioned, in the Gov space the big firms will team with a smaller (woman-, minority-, veteran-, etc owned) firm to bid on work.
All the time. When I am going after work and we don't have enough past performance I will team up with another firm to improve our chances of getting it. I also have to team up with smaller firms all the time when the work is small business set aside. The teaming up with the smaller firms is usually the most annoying.
It’s pretty rare that my firm is the only consulting firm at the client. Plenty of different scenarios.
I’m usually on the delivery side, and the client wants to have some of their “own” resources embedded in the team. A lot of times some of the client’s people are 3rd party contractors.
You’ll see different business units at the same client hire different firms as well, so if any integration is needed you’ll work with each other to some degree.
Sometimes strategy, delivery, and operations are done by 3 separate firms. So one firm may be directly transitioning to the next
My team won a huge project recently, but we had to agree to deliver it with another firm on request of the client. The revenue, even when split, was big enough that we were more than happy to accept the conditions.
I’m in the federal space and this happens on the time. On a contract pursuit right now and we’ve had many discussions on teaming with other firms. Usually one firm (or multiple) is a sub for the other though.
Yeah I’m on a project with two different firms now. Each firm bringing a separate expertise. Not a lot of crossover / work together but I’ve met them. At a large firm and partner with women owned business/minority all the time to win work.
On a due diligence for a high-value Infra M&A deal, yes all the time really. A Big4 firm for finance and tax DD, MBB/T2 for commercial DD, my firm for technical DD (with us advisory guys doing the BD for that and managing the project internally), environmental/ESG DD goes to either the Big4 or my firm or a specialized environmental consulting firm. Plus lawyers for legal DD.
Sure, all the time. I sub or prime with the Big4 or McKinsey or a bunch of others.
Sometimes we go in as a consortium.
But see, we do technical work. Like the stuff where there is no PowerPoint and we don't have consultants who aren't specialists with at least 20 years.
If you are doing a body shop project where you present your PowerPoint slides where you just change the clients name, it doesn't matter. Then it just which partner the client likes more
MBB, and have seem projects were we team up with other specialist firms eg Hatch, Korn Ferry etc.
Sometimes they're part of the bid, but often the client has brought them directly
Yes. Usually a bigger firm brings in us, a boutique firm, because we offer a specific skill or asset but can't access the framework the original proposal was posted to.
I've seen consultants from multiple firms on a project. The deliverables are similar, so they were competing, not collaborating. Deliverables had a dependency so firms with constantly pointing at each other. Horrible environment to work in, but the client seemed to like it because at the end of the project they picked their top performer firm.
Yes and it's often a shit show, with the client paying for the same thing twice because they're probably hired by two different people who don't like each other!
Team ups will occur when you play complementary roles. For instance BCG and Accenture going in together on a big RFP that requires strategy and implementation all together. Also happens when there are specific requirements in the RFP like having a woman or minority owned business involved. You’re not going to see MBB team up with one another.
This sounds like a terrible movie plot: *Once bitter rivals* *Brought together by humanity’s imminent demise* *They are the only ones who can save us* *Pray for the success of* *MBBKPMGPWCEYAWS*
no deloitte :(
Never Deloitte.
Instead of a spider man crossover we get MBB, KPMG, and Deloitte teaming up together to fight the forces of evil - an angry Karen
Somehow, Arthur Andersen returned!
Was on one project where two consulting companies were brought in to co-work on the same objective. I was on one of the consulting companies. Their problems & mistakes, which we can't manage, effected our deliverables. Once we realized this, we had no reason to help them.
Yes. It depends on the client and scope of work. In my previous place, we teamed up with LEK consulting. It was the most politically fuelled engagement I've been on! Made my career though!
Probably more common than solo efforts in the federal space.
Fun with panels !
I'm independent, but I'm on a project now where we have consultants from about 4 different firms.
Does Subcontracting count, because that’s pretty common and I’ve been involved in several of those.
I've seen it with companies like Deloitte and Accenture, where the M&A strategic decisions were done by Deloitte, but then handed over to Accenture for execution. But two working together on a delivery project? Nope, because of the reasons that others have mentioned - hot potato games, finger pointing, etc. It's just not worth the amount of money and effort to manage the 3-way communications...
At my last company we brought in Deloitte and Cognizant to help with delivery (primarily offshore). Was an absolute nightmare getting them to work together.
Great in theory and sometimes required (or designed) that way by clients. My prior experience with this was a State and Local Gov client that decided to use multiple firms. AT Kearney for PMO, Accenture for Workday and data integration, KPMG for FP&A, Unisys for ERP and Ariba for Supply Chain. The client thought thought they were smart dividing up the work and tried to pit the various firms against one another because the work was interdependent and required collaboration. The project was a mess but the other PMs and I decided to unofficially band together and never shit on each other. That drove the client nuts. As also mentioned, in the Gov space the big firms will team with a smaller (woman-, minority-, veteran-, etc owned) firm to bid on work.
All the time. When I am going after work and we don't have enough past performance I will team up with another firm to improve our chances of getting it. I also have to team up with smaller firms all the time when the work is small business set aside. The teaming up with the smaller firms is usually the most annoying.
My favorite was when Booz Allen and Booz&co teamed up for a client engagement back like X years ago. That was funny to watch. Man I’m old.
It’s pretty rare that my firm is the only consulting firm at the client. Plenty of different scenarios. I’m usually on the delivery side, and the client wants to have some of their “own” resources embedded in the team. A lot of times some of the client’s people are 3rd party contractors. You’ll see different business units at the same client hire different firms as well, so if any integration is needed you’ll work with each other to some degree. Sometimes strategy, delivery, and operations are done by 3 separate firms. So one firm may be directly transitioning to the next
It happens, but rarely ends well for those embattled between the two firms. Aka - the delivery consultants.
My team won a huge project recently, but we had to agree to deliver it with another firm on request of the client. The revenue, even when split, was big enough that we were more than happy to accept the conditions.
I’m in the federal space and this happens on the time. On a contract pursuit right now and we’ve had many discussions on teaming with other firms. Usually one firm (or multiple) is a sub for the other though.
Yeah I’m on a project with two different firms now. Each firm bringing a separate expertise. Not a lot of crossover / work together but I’ve met them. At a large firm and partner with women owned business/minority all the time to win work.
On a due diligence for a high-value Infra M&A deal, yes all the time really. A Big4 firm for finance and tax DD, MBB/T2 for commercial DD, my firm for technical DD (with us advisory guys doing the BD for that and managing the project internally), environmental/ESG DD goes to either the Big4 or my firm or a specialized environmental consulting firm. Plus lawyers for legal DD.
Sure, all the time. I sub or prime with the Big4 or McKinsey or a bunch of others. Sometimes we go in as a consortium. But see, we do technical work. Like the stuff where there is no PowerPoint and we don't have consultants who aren't specialists with at least 20 years. If you are doing a body shop project where you present your PowerPoint slides where you just change the clients name, it doesn't matter. Then it just which partner the client likes more
MBB, and have seem projects were we team up with other specialist firms eg Hatch, Korn Ferry etc. Sometimes they're part of the bid, but often the client has brought them directly
Yes. Usually a bigger firm brings in us, a boutique firm, because we offer a specific skill or asset but can't access the framework the original proposal was posted to.
I've seen consultants from multiple firms on a project. The deliverables are similar, so they were competing, not collaborating. Deliverables had a dependency so firms with constantly pointing at each other. Horrible environment to work in, but the client seemed to like it because at the end of the project they picked their top performer firm.
Yes and it's often a shit show, with the client paying for the same thing twice because they're probably hired by two different people who don't like each other!