Implementation to Strategy Consulting: Tips / is it worth it?

Fellow Monkeys,

I've occassionally followed WSO threads since university and there's been some good advice. I'm sensing a blocker and can do with thoughts from the consulting community/looping in with those in strategy consulting for a view.

I've been working in FS implementation consulting for nearly 3 years, focusing on 'transformation' projects. Mostly operational; think process optimisation, digital transformation / trading ops improvement roles. My work is delivery-orientated, working with clients to solve ops challenges on the ground.

Current concerns/blockers:

• This is my first consulting role following an industry change at a junior level. At the time, I hadn't distinguished much between strategy/implementation consulting when applying, despite awareness of this. Partly as I was keen to switch industries sooner and knew this switch was hard enough. This was one of the first roles that came up and at the beginning, satisfied my desire to solve a greater variety of business problems which I lacked in my first role.

As time goes on:

• I realise FS isn't the industry I'm the most interested in. The implementation side, or nature of projects I work on don't feel particularly innovative or forward-thinking. I routinely see the same operational and change management challenges that are very difficult to overcome with clients constantly playing catch up to try and innovate. I also crave a greater breadth of industry exposure.

• Implementation experience has been invaluable in developing people skills, the ability to detect practical/real issues on the ground quickly and to turn around a large scale solution fast. However, I keep feeling something is 'missing'. It's the bigger picture i.e industry/market thinking and wider impact of my work on the organisation beyond than a given function/silo. I crave greater market knowledge (there's limited external research in my role) and deployment of such knowledge into recommendations. That would make me feel as if I'm growing more, beyond what is mostly hands-on, people skills development

In my role I've enjoyed interviewing clients to understand current and target state, unpicking the roots of their issues, and structuring a resolution that is proposed (and in my case, implementing it). I care a lot about impact. From my experience, implementation impact is direct and visible, but may not be as impactful as the original proposal which led to it. You're limited to key decisions already been made.

I've been reading about strategy consulting and am interested in people's experiences - whether that seems to address any of the gaps highlighted under the concerns.

I know this is a different skillset so I wanted to hear any stories of transitioning or proposed routes.

Furthermore, if anyone is able to connect for a further discussion on their role to get a better sense of how you find strategy consulting that would also be much appreciated.