Where's consulting headed and what shapes the market? Here are key statistics, facts, and figures you should know about consulting in 2025.
The world of IT consulting is changing. There are new types of pressure challenging it and new consulting trends moving it forward. With the global economy shifting, everyone needs to adjust to the new normal, or even better — maintain that constant flexibility mindset where you welcome change, rather than fear it.
In his interview for PwC, Sean Joyce, Global Cybersecurity and Privacy Leader, said that 'Today’s business leaders are becoming quasi-experts at crisis management. Disruption has become the normal operating environment. We must be able to respond and recover quickly – and that starts with being aware of critical business systems.'
If you happen to come from an IT Consulting or Digital Consulting services firm, this article will be your all-in guide to catch up with the major things that have been happening in the industry and disrupting it in the past few years.
In the infographic below, we're going to summarize all the key consulting statistics you need to know. Then, we'll dive deep into each one of them and see what they mean and how you can learn from them.
According to Statista, the size of the IT consulting industry in the US went up by more than 30% between 2011 and 2019.
By 2022, the industry revenue increased considerably to reach over 600 billion U.S. dollars for the first time. This was an increase of almost 30 billion U.S. dollars compared to 2021's figures.
Today, the management consultancy industry has a net worth of $250 billion. This massive, highly profitable industry continues to grow globally, with industry hotspots in the UK and the US, says Linchpinseo.
There are over 700,000 management consulting firms around the world. Consulting agencies provide a number of services, including general consulting and consulting on niche topics, including finance, HR, operations, and strategy. The Big Four – Deloitte, EY, KPMG, and PwC – outperformed high growth markets, with a total growth of 11.5% to £2.55 billion.
PwC has promised to invest $12B to open 100,000 new consulting roles in the upcoming five years.
With the IT consulting market growing stronger by the day, the demand for consulting specialists is on the rise, too. This is due to the fact that the global economy is struggling, markets attempt to reopen, businesses try to become recession-proof. And for all of that, they need specialized workforce, especially consultants with strong computer science skills.
In fact, the industry's Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) is expected to reach $1201B in 2025.
Digitization, change management, cloud computing, software engineering, and strategic consulting roles are going to be the hottest in the upcoming years. EY, PwC, Deloitte, and KPMG, are even going as far as hiring fresh university graduates to meet the rising consulting demand.
For consulting agencies this means that there will be lots of exciting opportunities lining up ahead, but also more competition and expectation from potential clients.
Consultants work 50 to 80 hours per week to cover the demand of their role, a recent research by Consultancy.uk found.
When you are in a consulting role, it is easy to lose track of the hours you have put in. Work-life balance was already a challenge for many consultants around the world, but with the pandemic bringing about a new remote-only society this issue has only grown more complicated.
In a consulting study with millennials in Dutch consultancies, researchers managed to pinpoint just how critical the problem of overworking can get in this industry,
'Mostly, I work on Mondays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays until 11:00 PM. And then Thursdays, sometimes I work until late, 10:00 PM, 11:00 PM, and other times I stop at 07:00 PM. Friday evenings I have time off and then a few hours during the weekend,' said one of the interviewees.
For professional services businesses and consulting agencies, tracking time and managing workloads is crucial to stop the problem of overworking, also known as the Black Plague of 21st century. And it can be resolved by using the right tech.
Management consulting is 27% likely to get automated, according to consulting statistics provided by Consultancy.uk.
"We're getting replaced by robots" is an old adage and it should not be taken literally. But it should also not get completely dismissed, because we are indeed getting massively impacted by technology.
In a recent consulting report, Consultancy.uk looked at the jobs that risk getting fully automated by the year 2055. While 5% of jobs are expected to fill that niche, 60% of jobs are expected to be greatly impacted by automation, but not fully replaced.
Management consulting is on the list, which means that the nature of consulting jobs will considerably change. And if you want to keep up, everything that you can optimize and automate, you should, to be ahead of the curve.
In other words, to remain competitive and profitable, management consultants must increase productivity through automation. After decades of calls for a transformation, the management consulting industry is finally poised at the epicenter of disruption. The disruption of management consulting will affect clients, practitioners, and entire industries from marketing to healthcare.
'A consulting firm's appetite for change, whether they are ready or not, has to be ravenous; otherwise, they will lose revenue and be out of the consulting game faster than expected. The need for a faster speed to change is no longer an option,' Gartner research found.
For 62% of business leaders, the culture reigning in the technology consulting industry is a hurdle to overcome, according to Linchpinseo.
Adaptability and flexibility is the name of the game.
Over the past few years, there has been an overall trend toward expansion. This has caused many firms, both young and old, to have to deal with organizational culture in new ways. While historically this was a problem that arose as firms reached a certain level of growth, today's firms need to put a lot more time into maintaining their culture as they expand.
Some firms may be having a hard time embracing this change, particularly when they're still trying to maintain the same level of quality and services they've always provided.
This is especially true for some consulting firms. As the pace of work increases and things begin to move faster, it can be difficult to keep up with all the new demands. This can create a lot of stress on your employees and prevent you from getting a lot done.
87% of clients say that trust is more important for their purchasing decisions in consulting services due to COVID, according to a recent consulting overview by Source Global Research.
Consulting clients are becoming less likely to investigate new consultancies for help with their problems. They are also growing less patient, and more risk-avert, in their search of consultants.
Potential clients want to know who they're buying from. They want to know what you do, what you specialize in, how you approach your client work, and why they should do business with you. Clients tend to stay with their current consulting firms if those companies have proven themselves as trusted advisors for a long time already.
There's also some good news for new consulting companies. Some stats in consulting suggest that those firm have a shorter selection lead time these days, but they must prove their expertise in the market or industry before a client will choose them.
That's where authority-led business development comes into play in consulting. You must be aware that marketing isn't responsible for this; it's done by you and your team.
A 2022 trends outlook by McKinsey found that by 2025, digital trust service providers will reach $101.5 billion in investments.
That same research found that 1 in 3 global organizations had to divert a cyberattack in 2019, which was a 36% increase compared to the previous year. Needless to say, the number of cyberattacks is on the rise.
Cybersecurity is a concern for consulting firms that are embracing digitalization. Consulting firms receive confidential client information and process it. According to Andrew Duncan, UK CEO and Partner at Infosys Consulting, cybersecurity must be a part of the consulting business, which is increasingly being impacted by automation technologies.
The failure to follow the rules concerning cybersecurity can cause leakage of personal or commercial information, affecting reputation and contracts as well as legal liabilities.
'With increased automation comes the need for self-regulation, and consultants will also be expected to lead on the ethical considerations of these new technologies: how to deploy smart AI while ensuring privacy safeguards, preventing bias in algorithmic decision-making, and meeting guidelines in highly regulated industries.'
With these consulting statistics on the table, here are the key take-aways you need to remember from this article:
With all of these learnings in mind, you will be geared up for the adventures to come!
