By Robert Streeter, CEO, TheAX.ai

Let’s start with a truth most consultants quietly admit, some loudly proclaim, and others instinctively reject, you know, the usual range of reactions whenever something fundamental and unfamiliar threatens the status quo.

The old consulting model is running out of road. It’s not just creaking, it’s collapsing. And yes, AI is the prime suspect.

But that doesn’t mean consultancy is dead. Far from it. I believe we’re entering the most exciting chapter this industry has ever seen.

The cracks in the model are growing

For decades, consulting has been built on brilliant people, bespoke projects, and billable hours. It’s served us well, and it’s created real value for clients. But the economics are broken. The market is accelerating. Clients are getting smarter. And AI has permanently changed what “value” means in consulting.

After nearly 30 years in and around the industry, strategy, SaaS, digital transformation, you name it, I’ve never seen an inflection point like this. Even the dot-com boom (yes, I’m that old) doesn’t come close. What we’re witnessing now isn’t just a change in tools or technology, it’s a structural reset of the entire profession.

The model consultants grew up with, custom work, high fees, human intensity, simply doesn’t scale in a world moving at AI speed.

The traditional model was clever but fragile. You hire smart people, train them, build IP through client work, and charge by the day. Growth depends on utilisation, and margins depend on keeping people busy. It’s elegant, until you try to scale it.

Once utilisation passes 70%, growth stalls. You can’t deliver faster without hiring more people, and you can’t hire more people without diluting quality or destroying culture.

Meanwhile, the market has moved on. Clients now have access to AI tools, data, and analytics platforms that generate insights in seconds. Strategy consulting, which once made up 60–70% of the industry, now accounts for barely 10%.

Clients no longer want 10-week projects or theoretical PowerPoint decks. They want execution, speed, and measurable impact. They want outcomes, not effort. And they expect consultants to deliver those outcomes quickly and at a lower cost.

This shift is squeezing margins, reducing utilisation, and exposing the limits of an unscalable model. Add to that the billions being invested by the global giants into proprietary AI systems, and smaller consultancies are getting squeezed from both sides.

The cracks are widening fast.

GenAI has accelerated the fall

Let’s address the elephant in the room, Generative AI.

It’s changed everything.

And not just because it can draft reports or search documents faster. The real change is psychological. Once clients realise they can get “answers” from ChatGPT in seconds, the perceived value of a consultancy’s time evaporates overnight.

If what you’re still selling is hours today, the sale just got a lot harder.

That’s why I say, bluntly, the consulting model isn’t evolving. It’s collapsing. But collapse isn’t the end. It’s the clearing that allows something better to grow. Every industry hits this point. Consulting is simply having its turn.

From effort to systems: the rise of AI-powered Productisation

Here’s the good news.

Small and mid-sized consultancies are entering what I genuinely believe is a golden age of opportunity. The firms that will thrive in the next decade won’t be those dabbling with AI tools. They’ll be the ones rebuilding their entire operating model around it, what I call AI-powered Productisation.

Now, let’s clear something up. AI-powered Productisation is not about using GenAI to do research, draft blogs, or send clever emails. That’s surface-level stuff, useful, yes, but not transformative. It’s not about ChatGPT “wrappers” promising to revolutionise consulting with prompts, APIs, or dashboards.

This is about using AI as an embedded enabler inside your workflow, from how you build, launch, and deliver consultancy products to how you measure and improve outcomes.

Consultancy Productisation isn’t new, it’s been happening for decades with firms standardising their offerings and the way they work as much as they can. But GenAI makes Productisation possible in ways that were once too slow, too expensive, or too complex. It’s not a gimmick; it’s the infrastructure layer that lets you turn expertise into scalable, intelligent products, the kind that deliver real value, consistently, at speed.

That’s the difference between using AI tools and becoming an AI-enabled firm.

What this looks like in practice

Instead of reinventing the wheel for every client, productised consultancies design structured, repeatable propositions, assessments, diagnostics, maturity models, playbooks, powered by human expertise and enhanced by AI.

You codify what you know.
You systemise how you deliver it.
And you let technology handle what doesn’t need a human.

Data gathering, analysis, benchmarking, and reporting all become faster and more consistent, while consultants focus on interpretation, judgement, and facilitation, the things AI can’t replace.

AI handles the scale. You handle the sense-making.

That blend, machine speed plus human intelligence, is the new competitive edge.
And it’s already happening.

Consultancies using TheAX platform are building and launching new products up to 10x faster, cutting delivery time in half, reducing costs by 70%, and expanding their client base without increasing headcount.

That’s not theory. That’s market reality.

Why this matters right now

The next two years will decide who wins and who disappears in this new consulting era. There won’t be a long tail for laggards.

The big firms are investing billions in AI, but bureaucracy and legacy systems are slowing them down. Their size, once their advantage, has become their constraint.

Meanwhile, agile SME consultancies can move fast, experiment, and bake AI in from day one. They don’t need to bolt it on, they can make it the core of how they work.

If you’re a founder or partner today, this is your moment. And trust me, your competitors have already started.

While the giants are stuck in committees and compliance reviews, smaller firms are out there launching scalable products, testing new offers, and delivering faster, smarter, measurable outcomes.

They’re spinning up new propositions in hours, not months.

You can do the same. Own your niche. Build a consultancy that doesn’t just survive the AI era, but leads it.

Breaking free from the headcount trap

When you productise, you stop selling time and start selling value.

That shift changes everything. Delivery becomes faster, more consistent, and more profitable. Revenue becomes predictable through recurring or tiered models. Consultants stop burning out and focus on higher-value work. Clients see measurable ROI and stay longer.

You decouple growth from headcount. That’s how you scale sustainably.

And it’s exactly what we see every day with firms using TheAX to codify their IP, automate delivery, and turn traditional services into scalable, productised solutions.

The uncomfortable truth

I know change can be uncomfortable unless we embrace it (and embracing this change today is a must, not an option!). Many consultants hear “AI” and immediately think “replacement.”

But that’s the wrong mindset.

AI doesn’t replace human expertise, it amplifies it. Used properly, it removes the repetitive, manual, low-value work so your people can focus on what truly creates impact: trust, interpretation, facilitation, empathy, and strategic judgement.

It doesn’t replace people. It replaces inefficiency, duplication, and inertia.

So, if you’re still billing by the day, rebuilding PowerPoints from scratch, and depending on “hero consultants” to hold it all together, the writings on the wall. The consulting model we knew is collapsing. The only question is whether you’ll collapse with it or use this moment to reinvent yourself.

The future of consulting isn’t man or machine, it’s both

The winners in this new era will be the consultancies that combine human depth with AI-driven scale. This isn’t about chasing trends or experimenting with tools. It’s about re-architecting your business so that expertise, not effort, becomes your growth engine.

If the last 30 years were defined by consulting as craft, the next two will be defined by consulting as system. And that’s a good thing. Smaller, sharper firms can finally compete with, and outperform, the global giants.

The collapse of the old model isn’t the end of consulting. It’s the beginning of something faster, smarter, and infinitely more scalable. AI isn’t coming for consulting. It’s coming from within consulting.

And the firms that understand that, that use AI not as a shiny tool but as the foundation of how they build, deliver, and grow, will define the next era of this industry.

The question is no longer whether this change is happening.
It’s how quickly you’ll own it.

Because the future of consulting won’t be built by the biggest firms.
It’ll be built by the boldest ones.

Make sure that’s you.

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