Will strategy consulting ever become obsolete? [links]
First, read this article in Mck Quarterly if you haven't already: https://www.mckinseyquarterly.com/The_second_econ…
Next, skim/get the gist of their report on "big data": http://www.McKinsey.com/mgi/publications/big_data/index.asp
Their conclusion about "big data," which is essentially just the huge, exponentially increasing volumes of information that businesses are gaining from new monitoring technologies, is that there will be increased demand for people who can take all this data and tell the businesses what to do with it.
The article on the "second economy," however, states:
"in the early 20th century, farm jobs became mechanized and there was less need for farm labor, and some decades later manufacturing jobs became mechanized and there was less need for factory labor. Now business processes—many in the service sector—are becoming “mechanized” and fewer people are needed, and this is exerting systematic downward pressure on jobs."
This may seem obvious, but think about what he means in context. The system of integrated computers is now replacing jobs that require communication or transmission of ideas, rather than just jobs that require manual labor.
What happens when the "second economy," which is a degree of separation closer to all the "big data" of company processes than we are anyway, becomes computationally capable of a) processing the information and b) producing actionable recommendations to streamline businesses, maximize efficiency, and optimize outcomes?
Will strategy/management consulting be a largely obsolete human-to-human service industry in 20-30 years?
excellent question!
i don't know the answer but i'm sure some of the bright minds of WSO will have something to say.
if i had to guess, i would think firms like MBB will start to embrace this big data movement and evolve their business models to stay relevant.
i'd like to add an additional question to OP, if you don't mind. the following quote is from the Big Data article:
"There will be a shortage of talent necessary for organizations to take advantage of big data. By 2018, the United States alone could face a shortage of 140,000 to 190,000 people with deep analytical skills as well as 1.5 million managers and analysts with the know-how to use the analysis of big data to make effective decisions."
if this Big Data revolution changes the business world this much, will the "Top MBA" model become obsolete as well?? will Management Consulting firms and the Fortune 500 start valuing an MS in Statistics more than a Harvard/Stanford MBA?
^ Yes.
My personal hypotheses on these matters are that all major industrialized First World countries will eventually (this could be a century from now or much sooner) transition to quasi-technocracies. People with extremely high levels of knowledge of computers, statistics, engineering, the internet, genetics, nanotechnology, etc. will be in such high demand and low supply that we'll have no choice but to empower them and pay them far more than even current employees of the financial services industry. Technology will replace an enormous percentage of human jobs, to the point at which further technological R&D is really the only "industry" left at all, so those people will have ridiculous, unprecedented leveraging status.
Hmmm I can get behind the "under a century" timeline, that makes sense. But people with high level technological knowledge won't be empowered, they will be slaves.
no of course not, if you know what strat does.
strat will go out of business the day lying and cheating go out.
You seem unable to grasp the fundamental concept I'm driving at here. Everything you just described will be more easily and quickly done by computers. CEOs will backup their decisions with software-produced analysis, just like they currently do with people.
While you may be right about the availability of data and analysis, you're missing one thing - a safety blanket. It's much easier to hire MBB to come in and tell you something (that you probably already know) and have the blame go to them if it goes wrong than to use INTERNAL people, data, systems, etc...
I am living this hell right now. We want to make a change, so we've hired a consulting firm to come in and tell us to make that change. They are 90% of the way through the second and final phase of the project and there are basic things they still don't know. The final presentation is next Thursday, I can't wait to have them regurgitate our suggestion back to us. It's totally useless process, but now this wasn't our management's doing, we're going to do it because MBB tells us to.
Also, semi-related sidenote:
Anyone who views scientific, mathematical futurism (predicting technologies, the Singularity, etc.) as a bunch of crackpot Y2K-esque tomfoolery, the burden of proof is really on you, actually. These developments are highly predictable based on accurate models developed from data points across the last century. It's extraordinarily simple: we use the latest technology to develop and invent the next (so we're currently using the internet to invent the latest paradigms like search engines and social media). The exponential trend of technology is mathematically irrefutable at this point, so your only argument against it has to be some faith-based presumption that the pace of technological growth will randomly, inexplicably, spontaneously slow down for some reason. The trend has persisted through the Great Depression, through war after war after war, through all human events. It is elegant, unperturbed, and eventually destructive.
In short, the people who see these sorts of things coming are merely positing the persistence of the status quo (it's been growing exponentially, so why do you expect it to stop?). The person arguing AGAINST the status quo has to backup his argument of change with something substantial.
Eh on a long enough timeline all human jobs will be replaced by technology; we are innovating ourselves into obsolescence. That's not even debatable, it is a fact.
20-30 years to replace consulting? I'm not sure, what kind of computing power is required to do the job of a consulting team? What will it cost to use in 2-3 decades?
Glad we agree on your first point. Some people disagree on the specific timing, but the end is inevitable. Since technological evolution largely replaced biological evolution (given its much faster pace), it's only a matter of time before something as biologically complex as a human brain can be translated into a bunch of algorithms. After all, DNA is literally just sequences of data, and the brain literally functions on a series of electrical signals. That's all.
People severely underestimate how different the world will be in a couple of decades. If you told someone from the 1980s about iPhones and Facebook, they'd look at you like you were out of your mind. Major paradigm shifts occur in a matter of months now. Another good topic to read up on is the "internet of things": https://www.mckinseyquarterly.com/The_Internet_of_Things_2538
Yes, I think management consulting will pretty much cease to exist in 30 years.
OP, do you have trouble reading? let me rephrase my points. you are being paid as a strat to:
these functions don't need superior analytics, even the qualitatively better ones you imagine in your post-Searle world of computers that have slipped the surly bonds of rules-based grinding. you need a man who is not too shameless to cheat and lie.
analytics is a very small part of the industry. strat is corporate assassination and industrial espionage.
i'm done. if you don't get it by now, either you are a troll, or you are an ignorant and headstrong kid.
Sorry, man, you're the moron here. I know that higher levels of abstract thinking can be tough stuff for most people, so I won't hold it against you.
It will be far easier for computers to take the fall than people. A quote from the "internet of things" article above: "Legal liability frameworks for the bad decisions of automated systems will have to be established by governments, companies, and risk analysts, in consort with insurers." In other words, in the future, a CEO will just rent out an expensive, functionally sentient computer system and run his data through it, and an insurance company will offer very expensive risk management plans in case the computer gets it wrong (it won't).
If you think this is the primary function of all strategy/management consulting, you're the ignorant one. It's a particular subset, not the reason for MBB-level billing. If that's all that's left for humans to do, it certainly won't be as profitable.
And what makes you think a computer wouldn't be able to do this? You say "you need a man who is not too shameless to cheat and lie," but what's even better than a man with weak morals? A machine with no morals at all.
LOL. I admit, you are a very good troll. A few points:
I guess my six years of working on AMO physics and quantum computation and two years of strat doesn't count for much around here. Will you let me come over and polish your Fields Medal?
Tell me all this again after you worked for a couple of years in strat. I'll put my experience against your ignorant speculation any day of the week.
You are indeed one of the most laughable morons I have met on WSO, and you have some powerful competition in that game. Worse, you are a know-it-all kid who fancies himself a deep thinker, but have never actually spent any time producing billables for a client or working on peer-reviewed scientific research, yet has the gall to lecture his betters.
OK I really do have to go and do real work now. I'll leave you here to mentally high-five yourself on your awesomeness.
So.......not a single substantive point? A weak attempt at bolstering your unsubstantiated claims with personal chest-pounding? Are you an intellectual or a gorilla? You're right, none of your experience counts for anything at all if your "argument" sucks. You haven't made a single dent in my extrapolations of current trends.
Again.....not one substantive word, just intensely primitive d*ck-measuring.
yawn shall I repeat my comments above? Nowhere in your entire post did you refute anything I've said. All you did was work yourself up and storm off in a huff like a poorly-written children's cartoon character.
I'm not entirely sure how you convinced a consulting firm that you possess a worthy set of analytical skills if you can't even analyze and debate a painfully simple topic like technological change.
Replace, firms using humans with computers.
People still own firms.
Those people that do will be rich as shit.
Everyone else will find a job dealing with making the computers or using the computers.
Eventually, computers will be the ones designing the computers and applying it uses without humans.
Then, either the computers will be benevolent rulers who take care of everything possible so most humans don't need to do anything, be partners in our endeavors using each others strengths, or commit mass extermination of man kind.
Read the book "Brave New World". It a satire but eerily relevant.
It's much easier to say "fuck what the computer thinks" than "fuck what MBB (who we just paid amilli+ to) thinks"
Mollitia ea et magnam eius nihil sit quae. Mollitia et asperiores ut ut. Voluptas repudiandae doloremque voluptatum fugit. Beatae aut rerum error ratione est necessitatibus. Corrupti voluptas ipsum totam pariatur.
Aliquid cumque accusamus ut ipsa. Pariatur et ratione id cumque velit fugiat quia.
See All Comments - 100% Free
WSO depends on everyone being able to pitch in when they know something. Unlock with your email and get bonus: 6 financial modeling lessons free ($199 value)
or Unlock with your social account...