Most organisations default to project-based consulting because it is familiar. You have a problem, you commission a piece of work, you receive a deliverable. The retained advisory model is less common and less well understood. It is also, for a specific set of situations, significantly more useful. The question is whether your situation is one of them.

What project consulting is good at

Project consulting works well when the problem is bounded and the deliverable is clear. A market entry review, an organisational diagnostic, a restructure programme: these are problems with a defined scope, a beginning and an end, and a clear output. The project model is also useful when you need external credibility for a recommendation that will be presented to a board or an investor. An external consultant's report carries a different weight than an internal document, for better or worse.

What retained advisory is good at

Retained advisory works well when the decisions are ongoing and the value is in the thinking partner rather than the deliverable. Leadership teams that are navigating a sustained period of change, making a series of related decisions over six to eighteen months, or dealing with a problem that keeps evolving often find that a project engagement produces a report that is out of date by the time it is implemented. A retained adviser who is close to the situation can be more useful than a periodic project team.

The timing question

One way to think about the choice is timing. If you have a specific decision to make in the next two to four months, a project engagement is probably right. If you have a series of decisions to make over the next year and you are not sure yet what they all are, a retained arrangement gives you access to external thinking without the overhead of scoping and commissioning a new project every time a question arises.

The cost question

Retained advisory at £2,400 per month is a predictable cost. A project engagement at £9,500 to £18,000 is a larger upfront commitment with a defined end point. Neither is inherently better value. The question is which model produces more useful output for your situation. Some clients start with a project engagement to address a specific problem and then move to a retained arrangement to maintain the relationship. That is a common pattern and one we are happy to discuss.

A note on what retained advisory is not

Retained advisory is not a vague availability arrangement. It is twelve hours of structured advisory time per month, a monthly review call, and priority access for urgent questions. It is not unlimited access, and it is not a substitute for a project engagement when a project is what is needed. If you are considering the retained model, the questions we get asked regularly include what the monthly review call covers and how the hours are tracked. Both are worth asking in a scoping call.

If you are unsure which model fits your situation, the best first step is a scoping call. We will give you an honest read on which approach is likely to be more useful.