By Alfredo Granados Durini
Founder, Garda Group LLC | Global Marketing & Innovation Consultant | 25 Years CPG Leadership

1. The Consulting Landscape Is Being Rewritte

For decades, the big consulting brands dominated through global scale, deep benches of talent, and the credibility that came with their names. But the industry is now experiencing one of its most significant realignments in years. Growth is cooling, hiring is slowing, and clients are questioning whether massive teams and long timelines still deliver the best value.

This isn’t a collapse — it’s a redistribution of power. And the firms gaining ground aren’t necessarily the biggest, but the ones delivering the clearest, fastest impact.

2. AI Has Shifted the Center of Value

Artificial intelligence has transformed consulting’s economics.
Tasks that once required analyst squads — research, benchmarks, diagnostic models, even draft strategies — can now be produced in minutes.

Knowledge is no longer scarce. What’s scarce is judgment, context, and the ability to convert insights into action.

This shift plays directly into the strengths of boutique consultancies. While large firms navigate layers of approvals and legacy processes, boutiques integrate new tools immediately, letting AI amplify senior talent rather than replace junior capacity.

AI hasn’t weakened consulting. It’s changed who benefits most from it.

3. Why Boutiques Are Thriving in This New Era

Boutiques aren’t winning because they’re small — they’re winning because they’re built for the new rules.

They offer:

• Senior-led teams from the first conversation to final delivery
• Deep specialization instead of shallow breadth
• Lean overheads and flexible, outcome-based pricing
• Speed and adaptability, free from heavy internal governance
• Genuine partnership, embedding themselves into the client’s reality

In a world of abundant information, clients aren’t paying for volume — they’re paying for clarity and results.

4. How Procurement and Buying Behavior Have Changed

Corporate buyers have rewritten how they hire consultants.
The long, 18-month mega-programs are giving way to 90-day sprints, rapid pilots, and ROI-linked work. AI accelerates this shift: when machines eliminate much of the “manual consulting,” clients no longer see value in stacked teams of junior analysts.

This fundamentally undermines the traditional big-firm pyramid — but fits the boutique model perfectly.

5. What Clients Really Think (Mid-Size Perspective)

Mid-size companies appreciate boutique agility — but they’re not naïve. They ask:

• Can a small firm scale if the project expands?
• Will delivery depend too heavily on one partner?
• Will the board question choosing a boutique over a global name?
• Can a small team support multi-country execution?

Clients want focus and senior attention — but also continuity, stability, and risk mitigation.

That’s why the smartest mid-size organizations build a hybrid ecosystem: boutiques for sharp insight and speed, big firms for scale and long-term delivery.

6. The Big Firms’ View (and Why They Aren’t Going Anywhere

Inside the large consultancies, the story looks different.
They aren’t fading — they’re repositioning.

Big firms still dominate programs requiring scale, governance, and cross-border coordination: ERP deployments, regulatory transformations, multi-market operating model redesigns. They’re also investing heavily in AI platforms and proprietary technologies that boutiques could never build alone.

Their center of gravity is shifting from creating the “what” to delivering the “how.”
Less conceptual strategy — more full-stack execution.

It’s evolution, not decline.

7. The Hybrid Consultant & The Future Model

The consultant who thrives in the AI era won’t be defined by how many frameworks they’ve memorized or slides they can produce — but by how well they combine machine intelligence with human judgment, alignment, and influence.

This “hybrid consultant” blends AI-powered analysis, real-world experience, commercial instinct, and the ability to drive change inside complex organizations. Boutique firms nurture this profile naturally. Big firms are racing to scale it.

The future isn’t big vs. small. It’s fit-for-purpose ecosystems: specialist boutiques plugged into global delivery engines, enabled by AI, and aligned around results.

The firms that win — regardless of size — will stop selling “people and hours” and start delivering clarity, capability, and momentum.

That’s the new playbook. And the industry is already reorganizing around it.