Projectworks Blog: Consulting Advice

The shape of consulting demand has changed. More projects, smaller budgets, same BD team. AI can help at every stage of the cycle. But not every stage equally, and not in the ways most people think.

Mark Orttung (Projectworks CEO) and Dominique Rennell (Projectworks CCO) are joined by Christophe Delaire, the CEO of Marshall Day Acoustics, to discuss what good differentiation looks like at different stages. Marshall Day Acoustics is a one-of-a-kind acoustics consultancy with a global team of experts working everywhere from concert halls to wind farms.

Client concentration risk can compress your valuation and put your firm at risk. Learn what it is, how to calculate it, and how to reduce it.

Learn how EBITDA multiples work for consulting firms, what the realistic benchmarks are, and the six factors that move your multiple up or down.

What is your consulting firm actually worth? Allen Debes and Mark Orttung have bought and sold more than 10 consulting firms between them. In this episode, they break down how buyers arrive at a number, what moves your multiple, and why exit preparation starts earlier than most founders think.

In a recent Projectworks Podcast episode, Doug Taylor (who co-founded Provoke and scaled it to 150 staff) sat down with Mark Orttung (who took Nexient from $30m to $130m). Together, they co-wrote The $50 Million Consulting Firm, and in this episode they shared a collection of lessons they wish they'd had earlier when scaling their software consulting firms.

Novigi has an impressive story. Since launching in 2016, they’ve scaled to 550 staff across six offices and two countries, while becoming the fastest-growing professional services firm on the AFR Fast 100 - their story is worth studying.

Many consulting firms look healthy from the outside, yet behind the scenes everything is only just holding together. Often the problem comes down to operational infrastructure that isn’t fit for purpose. Common examples include everything still depending on a small number of people, leadership teams avoiding the elephant in the room, and the firm’s Founder being the only source of new business. Sound a little too close to home? Read on, or watch the latest episode of the Projectworks Podcast below.

Most founders think about consulting M&A backwards – they think the game starts when a buyer turns up, when in fact it actually starts years earlier, in how you build the firm.

Consulting firm growth does not slow down politely. It hits a wall. One month you are humming, the next you are swamped with work but somehow moving slower.

Most consulting firms grow by default. Fewer grow by design. That distinction matters more than many leaders realise, especially if the goal is to build a firm that attracts a strong revenue multiple. In the first episode of Season two of The Projectworks Podcast, Mark Orttung and Dominique Rennell introduced the Growth Maturity Model they are developing to help consulting leaders answer a hard but necessary question: is your firm actually built in a way someone else would want to buy it?