Have McKinsey and its consulting rivals got too big?

With labor becoming fungible in the eyes of c-suites, the holders of institutional knowledge are the libraries of the consulting firms. Consulting firms also have tech talent that traditional businesses had no access to in the past, so any large scale data driven related project is done with consultants.

However: 1. The costs are insane and probably we reached the point where the benefits do not justify the prices they are charging. 2. Wfh is a cheat code to get access to cheap tech personnel that is pissed with the RTO of big tech. I keep hearing tech folks working at traditional manufacturing shops remotely these days.

The economics of consulting are pretty raw: they basically arbitrage the hourly rate of folks. They pay you X and then bill you for X*1.3 (minimum). Folks are starting to realize they could just go direct to the customer, and the recent non-compete uncertainty has made a dent in the quality of talent these places have on their bench. Not to mention most of the talent at these shops are just window dressing for cheap offshore labor that actually does the work with mixed results.