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As a consultant, you always want to remain in control. How do you do that when costs are rising rapidly, the labor market is becoming tighter and investors are changing the market? What impact do these developments have on the business operations of consulting firms?
We surveyed over 150 managers and owners of leading consulting firms to find out what is at the top of their strategic agenda in 2023. In this article, you can read the most striking trends from the research and get practical tools to stay in charge.
1. This is how consultancy firms deal with the tight labor market
The tightness on the labor market continues and consultancy firms notice this all too well. According to the CBS, there have been more vacancies than job seekers since the fourth quarter of 2021. The end does not seem to be in sight for the time being. Due to the aging population and the desire of many Dutch people to work part-time, it is becoming increasingly difficult to find new employees. Retaining employees also requires more and more effort. How can your consultancy firm entice people to work for you (and continue to work for you)?
In our research, consultancy firms indicate that they are quite capable of retaining their employees. However, it is becoming increasingly difficult to find new employees with the right specialization. Consultancy firms indicate that they are taking the following actions against the tightness on the labor market:
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Diagram showing the outcome of actions taken by consultancy firms to combat the tightness on the labor market
Increasing productivity (30%), actively recruiting staff (20%) and working on positioning as an employer (16%) are mentioned most often.
In order to remain attractive to new employees, consultancy firms will have to look more creatively at their employer role in the coming period. What is the motivation of your employees to stay with you? For example, agencies develop a new employer branding , they appoint an impact officer to really make a difference with their team, or they invest in greater personal involvement of the flexible shell at their agency. In addition, agencies limit their dependency on external factors by list of qatar consumer email making internal improvements. Most agencies choose to focus on productivity. They make their business processes more efficient, so that consultants have more time for clients.
This way you stay in control
30% of agencies choose to increase their ecommerce marketing: the complete guide to boosting virtual stores productivity. One of the methods to improve both employee satisfaction and productivity is ao lists automation. For example, if time registration and invoicing in Excel takes a lot of effort to figure out, agencies save a lot of time and frustration by improving these processes. For example, some interviewees indicated that after their automation they were able to manage up to four times as many projects