Interviews
- »One on One with Jessica Blume, National Managing Director for Clients & Industries, Deloitte Consulting
Watch Jessica Blume, national managing director for Clients & Industries for Deloitte Consulting, discuss more about her clients and financial recovery.
- »One on One with Waite Associates' Thomas Waite
There is no doubt that this recession has been both brutal and prolonged for many consulting firms. And Thomas J. Waite, President and CEO of Waite Associates, should know. He’s on the front line, advising the leadership teams of consulting firms on how to improve their market position. That’s a difficult task, given that in today’s environment revenues are declining, billable hours are falling, clients are slower in paying, and, as a result, partner incomes have dropped and scores of consultants and staff have been laid off. Consulting's One-on-One sat down with Waite to discuss why he thinks a recovery may be sooner than most think and what firms should do in the meantime.
- »One on One with Deloitte Consulting's Gene Procknow
On Friday, May 8, Deloitte acquired the vast majority of BearingPoint’s North American Public Services Practice as well as other business units, including: healthcare, emerging markets, state and local government services, and education. While Deloitte’s presence in the state and local marketplace has been larger than in the federal space, the firm had been growing its federal practice at a significant clip even before the acquisition.
- »One on One with Author and Consultant Andrew Sobel
Andrew Sobel has nearly 30 years of management consulting experience—the last 13 years as the president of Andrew Sobel Advisors. Sobel has written several books about building and maintaining client relationships, including Clients for Life and Making Rain. His latest, All for One: 10 Strategies for Building Trusted Client Partnerships was released earlier this month and can be purchased at book stores or on Amazon.com. Sobel sat down with Consulting's One on One to discuss his strategies for building client partnerships.
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2009
»Out of Office: Milestone's Jess Varughese
 Jess Varughese is the Managing Partner of Milestone, a two-year old financial services consulting boutique. In the midst of what he calls “the worst environment that the financial services industry has ever seen,” it would be easy to focus on day-to-day client struggles and ignore firm culture. Instead, Varughese turned to community service activities to bring his firm together.
Consulting: Culturally, how is Milestone different?
Varughese: One of the drivers of starting our firm in May 2007 was that we wanted to create a real sense of community within our firm. And part of that effort is to focus on community service and local initiatives.
Consulting: How did you decide which community service activities to participate in?
Varughese: Most of us came from big firms, which tend to align around big causes. Participation expectations are set from the top down. We came at this a little differently. We wanted a bottom-up approach. We wanted our staff to be very involved. To insure full and vested participation, we really wanted it to be their idea. Our staff, as a group, chose to focus on New York Cares Day. It wasn’t just a handful of people; we did it as a firm. Our entire firm went out for an entire day and focused on one activity. We had 100 percent attendance and it built a tremendous sense of teamwork.
Consulting: New York Care Day is a massive volunteer effort. In a single day, 43,000 people participate in activities all over the city. What did your team do?
Varughese: Our job for the day was to help paint a school in Brooklyn. Our team attacked it like a consulting project. We broke up into teams and were assigned activities based on individual strengths. Painting assignments were doled out based on height, etc. It was a huge task. It posed challenges from the beginning—lack of scaffolding, paint brushes, etc. – but our team did whatever it took to get the job done.
Consulting: Were there any surprises?
Varughese: There were real personal relationships built that day. We’re a small firm that will only thrive if we can build a sense of community.
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