Management consulting (sometimes also called strategy consulting) refers both to the practice of helping companies to improve performance through analysis of existing business problems and development of future plans, and to the firms that specialize in this sort of consulting. Management consulting may involve the identification and cross-fertilization of best practices, analytical techniques, change management and coaching skills, technology implementations, strategy development or even the simple advantage of an outsider’s perspective. Management consultants generally bring formal frameworks or methodologies to identify problems or suggest more effective or efficient ways of performing business tasks.

Management consulting grew with the rise of management as a unique field of study. The first management consulting firm was Arthur D. Little, founded in the late 1890s by the MIT professor of the same name. Though Arthur D. Little later became a general management consultancy, it originally specialized in technical research. Booz Allen Hamilton was founded as a management consultancy by Edwin G. Booz, a graduate of the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University, in 1914, and was the first to serve both industry and government clients. The first pure management consulting company was McKinsey & Company. McKinsey was founded in Chicago during 1926 by James O. McKinsey, but the modern McKinsey was shaped by Marvin Bower, who believed that management consultancies should adhere to the same high professional standards as lawyers and doctors. McKinsey is credited with being the first to hire newly minted MBAs from top schools to staff its projects vs. hiring older industry personnel. Andrew T. Kearney, an original McKinsey partner, broke off and started A.T. Kearney in 1937.

After World War II, a number of new management consulting firms formed, most notably the Boston Consulting Group (BCG), founded in 1963, which brought a rigorous analytical approach to the study of management and strategy. Work done at BCG, Booz Allen Hamilton, McKinsey and the Harvard Business School during the 1960s and 70s developed the tools and approaches that would define the new field of strategic management,

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setting the groundwork for many consulting firms to follow. Another major player of more recent fame is Bain & Company, whose innovative focus on shareholder wealth (including its successful private equity business) set it apart from its older brethren. Also significant was the development of consulting arms by both accounting firms (such as Accenture of the now defunct Arthur Andersen) and global IT services companies (such as IBM). best mba admissions consultants in Bangalore

Though not as focused on strategy or the executive agenda, these consulting businesses were well-funded and often arrived on client sites in force.

The current trend in the market is a clear segmentation of management consulting firms. Bain, BCG and McKinsey retain their strong strategy focus, with pure strategy houses such as L.E.K., Marakon and OC&C competing effectively in this high-end market. Many other generalist management consultancies such as Accenture are broadening their offering to work on projects that are performance oriented.

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