221–230 of 328 posts
I work at a much, much smaller niche-focused management consultancy. I'm really glad we don't do this or play political cover...
but also it would be fantastic to make what they make. The perils of actually having expertise that clients need and not playing pork games, I guess.
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As a consultant I like to flip this situation around, and let the internal staff who are already advocating for the direction I feel is best to be my biggest cheerleaders. Engage them early, let them know you're there to help them personally, and they'll help you do a better job when presenting your shared ideas to the brass.
Meta, but this comment reads exactly like it was written by a consultant.
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It's exactly this. Within any organization, you can have 3 or 6 important people pushing in completely different strategic directions. And it can be clear to any unbiased observer that there's only one good, responsible choice, but within your org that gets met with essentially "but that's just your opinion , man". So you call in a consulting firm and they deliver what most of the people already know. The consultants…
I know y’all want to repeat the whole thing about consultants we've all heard before, which sure, is “exactly this”, but the article goes much deeper, and is specific to the government. Here, consultants are ripping off taxpayers because a Clinton-era rule financially incentivized the government to outsource work to “entrepreneurs”. This department is literally given a percentage of the money it gives to consultants.
The incentive to get more dollars if you get more under management as a contract-service-provider does make sense. They’re not a monopoly on procurement in government, despite the author writing a book about monopolies.
Note: in some cases they have monopolies on some things in government, but not procurement.
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Wouldn't one enjoy some benefits from being proven right?
I've been in this position. The feeling of satisfaction wears off in a few minutes. My resume was updated later that week and I was on to the next adventure within two months. And this was with a DR who stuck up for me and mentioned to the CEO directly that we paid a consultancy big bucks to tell us something a chorus of engineering team members have been saying for years.
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Other countries have solved this issue simply by automatically forcing an election if a budget is not passed. Their representative are somehow able to overcome ideological differences and pass legislation once their jobs are on the line.
That doesn’t solve the problem because the idea here is that some laws should sunset, some shouldn’t. When a civil rights law sunsets, lots of bad can happen in a short period of time. I’m using the example of the government unable to agree on a budget as an analogy. What happens when we can’t agree on how to renew the Civil Rights Act and it sunsets for a period of time?
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This is reading more and more like you're begging the question. One of the sibling replies that predates this comment by a quarter of an hour already addresses your specific missing connecting dot here. Not to mention the article itself, which is also well cited. It's good. I suggest you read it. Interrogating my two sentence oversimplification of the forest is not a useful way to learn about this.
I get the impression some of the commenters don't really have experience with government contracts on either the public or private side. The IG report points out real problems, but I think people are extrapolating too far because they don't truly understand how contracts are awarded via the GSA schedule. I think people are confusing being awarded a listing on a GSA schedule with an actual order. Being on the GSA sche…
While some of us have run with my oversimplification, there are plenty of comments in this sub-thread about down-selecting. Your answer to that is a giant assumption on what the article (which again is rigorously sourced) 'implies'.
> The article also implies other contractors are also listed, although they don't get similar preferential price treatment.
In fact, the IG report[0] that is cited in the selection of the article I replied with has nothing to do with McKinsey, but a different contractor altogether. Reading comprehension is your friend here: "In 2013, the GSA Inspector General traced a similar situation with different contractors."
Agencies aren't necessarily selecting the more expensive item. As you point out, in most cases they have a mandate not to. They're awarding the bid to an already-short list designed to generate the highest IFF possible for the GSA.
Which is what the article's about.
[0]https://www.gsaig.gov/sites/default/files/audit-reports/A120...
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I know y’all want to repeat the whole thing about consultants we've all heard before, which sure, is “exactly this”, but the article goes much deeper, and is specific to the government. Here, consultants are ripping off taxpayers because a Clinton-era rule financially incentivized the government to outsource work to “entrepreneurs”. This department is literally given a percentage of the money it gives to consultants.
Isn't this the definition of a kickback?
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Right up until you realize the 23 year old snot who made the recommendation billed ~$3 million against your ~$100k salary.
If you look at entry-level consultant salaries at McKinsey and then divide by the fact that they're often working 7-day, 100-hour workweeks... you'll quickly discover that your "23 year old snot" is actually making around minimum wage on an hourly basis. They could be flipping burgers instead with a lot less stress. The consultants aren't the ones taking the money home, the firm is. So don't blame the 23 year old. He…
Sort of a buried lede here. There's nothing shocking about overpriced, underdelivering consultants. But the bit about how the GSA is essentially profit sharing with said overpriced consultants at the expense of the rest of the government and taxpayers, via the IFF incentive structure, is pretty mind blowing. Another brilliant financial "innovation" by the Clinton Administration that's been quietly burning billions of…