Consulting 101

This report provides Monadnock Research estimates for 2026 Strategy Consulting rates in the US from our firm's continuous cross-industry consulting rate analysis of current negotiated MSA rates between clients and strategic firms. Mean and median hourly, daily and weekly rates are provided for 15 categories of professional, with full detail on experience, education and customary titles for each level. The report also provides weekly team-based rates for the 10 most common strategy project team types. Legacy firm category break-outs include: Large Strategy Specialists; McKinsey, Bain and BCG; Small and Midmarket Strategy Specialists; Large Operations Specialists; Small and Midmarket Operations Specialists; Large Financial, Legal and Risk Advisory Specialists; Big Four; Large HR Specialists; and Large IT Consulting Specialists. The report also provides a section on frequently used strategy consulting terms and regional breakouts for 15 large US metro markets. (109 pages, 54 Exhibits)...More

This report provides Monadnock Research estimates for 2025 Strategy Consulting rates in the US from our firm's continuous cross-industry consulting rate analysis of current negotiated MSA rates between clients and strategic firms. Mean and median hourly, daily and weekly rates are provided for 15 categories of professional, with full detail on experience, education and customary titles for each level. The report also provides weekly team-based rates for the 10 most common strategy project team types. Legacy firm category break-outs include: Large Strategy Specialists; McKinsey, Bain and BCG; Small and Midmarket Strategy Specialists; Large Operations Specialists; Small and Midmarket Ops Specialists; Large Financial, Legal and Risk Advisory Specialists; Big Four; Large IT Consulting Specialists; and Large HR Specialists. The report also provides a section on frequently used strategy consulting terms and regional breakouts for 14 large US metro markets. (108 pages, 53 Exhibits)...More

This report provides Monadnock Research estimates for 2024 Strategy Consulting rates in the US from our firm's continuous cross-industry consulting rate analysis of current negotiated MSA rates between clients and strategic firms. Mean and median hourly, daily and weekly rates are provided for 15 categories of professional, with full detail on experience, education and customary titles for each level. The report also provides weekly team-based rates for the 10 most common strategy project team types. Legacy firm category break-outs include: Large Strategy Specialists; McKinsey, Bain and BCG; Small and Midmarket Strategy Specialists; Large Operations Specialists; Small and Midmarket Ops Specialists; Large Financial, Legal and Risk Advisory Specialists; Big Four; Small and Midmarket Advisory Specialists; Large IT Consulting Specialists; and Large HR Specialists. The report also provides a section on frequently used strategy consulting terms and regional breakouts for 14 large US metro ma...More

This report provides Monadnock Research estimates for 2023 Strategy Consulting rates in the US from our firm's continuous cross-industry consulting rate analysis of current negotiated MSA rates between clients and strategic firms. Mean and median hourly, daily and weekly rates are provided for 15 categories of professional, with full detail on experience, education and customary titles for each level. The report also provides weekly team-based rates for the 10 most common strategy project team types. Legacy firm category break-outs include: Large Strategy Specialists; McKinsey, Bain and BCG; Small and Midmarket Strategy Specialists; Large Operations Specialists; Small and Midmarket Ops Specialists; Large Financial, Legal and Risk Advisory Specialists; Big Four; Small and Midmarket Advisory Specialists; Large IT Consulting Specialists; and Large HR Specialists. The report also provides a section on frequently used strategy consulting terms and regional breakouts for 14 large US metro ma...More

This report discusses rate trends for 2023 and the ten levers of consulting and advisory services rate negotiations. The 2023 Consulting Rate Factors report helps organizations and their consulting and advisory service providers understand key elements that impact consulting rates from the perspective of client organization and its strategic service providers. (53 pages)...More

This report provides Monadnock Research estimates for 2022 Strategy Consulting rates in the USA from our firm's continuous cross-industry consulting rate analysis of current negotiated master service agreements between clients and strategic firms. Mean and median hourly, daily and weekly rates are provided for 15 categories of professional, with full detail on experience, education and customary titles for each level. The report also provides weekly team-based rates for the 10 most common strategy project team types. Legacy firm category break-outs include: Large Strategy Specialists; McKinsey, Bain and BCG; Small and Midmarket Strategy Specialists; Large Operations Specialists; Small and Midmarket Ops Specialists; Large Financial, Legal and Risk Advisory Specialists; Big Four; Small and Midmarket Advisory Specialists; Large IT Consulting Specialists; and Large HR Specialists. The report also provides a section on frequently used strategy consulting terms and a regional breakouts for 1...More

The current edition of the report provides Monadnock Research estimates for 2020-2021 Strategy Consulting rates in the USA from our firm's continuous cross-industry consulting rate analysis of current negotiated master service agreements between clients and strategic firms. Mean and median hourly, daily and weekly rates are provided for 15 categories of professional, with full detail on experience, education and customary titles for each level. The report also provides weekly team-based rates for the 10 most common strategy project team types. Legacy firm category break-outs include: Large Strategy Specialists; McKinsey, Bain and BCG; Small and Midmarket Strategy Specialists; Large Operations Specialists; Small and Midmarket Ops Specialists; Large Financial, Legal and Risk Advisory Specialists; Big Four; Small and Midmarket Advisory Specialists; Large IT Consulting Specialists; and Large HR Specialists. The report also provides regional breakouts for 14 large US metro markets. (101 pag...More

Most organizations are struggling today with an unfamiliar reality, where businesses and public service organizations must continue to deliver products and services during a global pandemic. Face-to-face contact is minimized, even eliminated, in many jurisdictions. To help clients and firms better understand how this may impact consulting rates, this report updates our analysis of rate differentials between services provided on a client's premises, and those provided by consulting staff located off site. Where firms offer these two rate alternatives, a second set of rates is provided for services performed from the consulting firm's offices or other off-site facilities, in addition to the standard rate schedule for services performed on the client site. This report provides results of MR's 2020 study of rate differentials. Master services agreements for 18 location-based rating schemes from 16 firms were analyzed for 2020 rates, contrasting these results with trends detailed in our 201...More

Table of Contents: (1) 2019-2020 US IT Consulting Rates; (2) 2019-2020 US Operations Consulting Rates; (3) 2019-2020 US Strategy Consulting Rates; (4) Deloitte Fiscal 2019 Consulting Revenues Up 13 Percent; Audit Revenues Unchanged; (5) US Census Bureau Publishes Q1 and Q2 Professional Services Revenue Numbers; (6) BearingPoint Reorganizes; Reenters US Consulting Marketplace; (7) BDO US Grows Fiscal 2019 Advisory Revenue by 40 percent; (8) Accenture Acquires Spanish Big Data Consultancy, Pragsis Bidoop; Completes INSITUM Acquisition; (9) Consulting Leadership: DXC, SAIC, Capgemini, Publicis Sapient; and (10) Consulting Thought Leadership: Aon and Accenture. (2,565 words)...More

This report provides Monadnock Research estimates for 2019-2020 IT Consulting rates in the United States from our firm's continuous cross-industry consulting rate analysis of current negotiated master service agreements between clients and strategic firms. Mean and median hourly, daily and weekly rates are provided for the 15 most common categories of professional, with full detail on experience, education and customary titles for each level, along with rate differential break-outs for 14 large metropolitan IT Consulting markets in the US. The report also includes rate break-outs for 9 IT consulting service sub-categories, as well as a firm category break-out for Large IT Consulting Specialists; Large Commercial IT Consultant Specialists, Large Public Sector and Defense Specialists, Small and Mid-Market IT Consulting Specialists, the Big Four and Operations Specialists. (69 Pages, 35 Exhibits)...More

Table of Contents: (1) Big Four Fiscal 2018 Consulting Rankings and Audit Conflict Risk Metrics; (2) Jay Alix Loses Battle with McKinsey; But the AlixPartners/McKinsey Legal War Continues; (3) UK Regulator May Consider Alternatives to Proposed Split of Big Four Consulting and Audit Operations; (4) BDO USA Acquires Management Consultancy, AC Lordi; (5) Accenture Completes Acquisitions of Droga5 and ESP; (6) Consulting Leadership: Deloitte, EY, PwC, BearingPoint and Navigant; and (7) Thought Leadership: A.T. Kearney and PwC. (2,950 words)...More

This is the ninth annual report detailing our analysis of the Big Four's consulting practices, as they continue to seek organic growth and strategic M&A with a special focus on non-audit services. Fiscal 2018 global non-audit advisory services of the Big Four, including tax services, increased to $97.3 billion (USD) in fiscal 2018, an 11.8% increase over fiscal 2017 levels. Total non-tax consulting and advisory services of Deloitte, KPMG, PwC and EY were $63.6 billion, an increase of 13.1% over fiscal 2017. Overall, Big Four fiscal 2018 revenue was $148.21 billion, up 10.29 percent. Growth in advisory, however, contrasts with overall growth of 7.5% in audit revenue to $50.94 billion, up from an increase of 2.79% in fiscal 2017. We note that the Big Four continue to aggressively seek organic growth and strategic M&A in non-audit consulting and advisory services as their number 1 strategic priority. This Research Note offers an in-depth analysis of the growing conflict risk since 2010 po...More

This Monadnock Research (MR) report provides analysis of 2019 country-level non-exchange rate factors that impact consulting rates globally. The report profiles average hourly operations consulting rates in local currency for 28 countries around the world, compared to US rates. We provide detail on various firm-level global rate strategies, and the associated country, firm and client factors. Our analysis of each country includes information on currency stability, form of government, legal system, population education levels, corruption and other governance factors. We also include detail and a contextual analysis of four rate categories: country-level average rates for the consultant through senior partner professional levels for the MR Average Hourly Rate (AHR); the US AHR expressed in local currency; the estimated Local Resource Average Hourly Rate; and the estimated gap between the MR average rate for that country and the Local Resource AHR. (78 Pages, 28 Exhibits)...More

This report provides Monadnock Research estimates for 2018-2019 US Financial, Accounting, Legal, Risk, Compliance and Transaction Advisory rates in the United States of America from our firm's continuous cross-industry consulting rate analysis of current negotiated master service agreements between clients and strategic firms. This is our first rate report published in each of these areas. Mean and median hourly, daily and weekly rates are provided for the 15 most common categories of professional, with full detail on experience, education and customary titles for each level. The report includes rate break-outs for Financial Advisory; Accounting Advisory; Legal & Forensic Advisory; Internal Audit, Risk and Compliance Advisory; and Transaction Advisory. (46 Pages, 15 Exhibits)...More

This report provides Monadnock Research estimates for 2018-2019 US Marketing and Interactive Consulting rates in the United States of America from our firm's continuous cross-industry consulting rate analysis of current negotiated master service agreements between clients and strategic firms. This is our first rate report published in this area. Mean and median hourly, daily and weekly rates are provided for the 15 most common categories of professional, with full detail on experience, education and customary titles for each level. The report includes rate break-outs for Marketing Strategy, Marketing Operations, and for Digital and Interactive Services. (45 Pages, 12 Exhibits)...More

This is the eighth annual report detailing our analysis of the Big Four's consulting practices, as they continue to seek organic growth and strategic M&A with a special focus on non-audit services. Fiscal 2017 global non-audit advisory services of the Big Four, including tax services, increased to $87 billion USD, a 6.56% increase over 2016 levels. Total non-tax consulting and advisory services of Deloitte, KPMG, PricewaterhouseCoopers and Ernst & Young were $56.23 billion, an increase of 7.41% over fiscal 2016. Overall, total Big Four fiscal 2017 revenue was $134.38 billion, up 5.2 percent. Growth in advisory still contrasts with growth of just 2.79% in audit revenue at $47.39 billion, up from a decrease of 0.55% in fiscal 2016. We note that the Big Four continue to aggressively seek organic growth and strategic M&A in non-audit consulting and advisory services as their number 1 strategic priority. This Research Note offers an in-depth analysis of the growing conflict risk since 2...More