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Essay
AI is changing what you can get from external strategy support
If you commission external strategy support, AI is changing what you should expect to get. The change is not mainly about cost or speed. It is about who actually does the thinking on your business problem.
Senior judgement, closer to your problem
When you hire external strategy support, you are not buying consulting hours. You are buying an answer to a business challenge, whether that's a detailed market assessment, a growth strategy, a value creation plan, a leaner cost structure or anything else.
In a traditional consulting set-up, a senior partner sold the work, while larger teams of junior consultants did much of the analysis, modelling and synthesis underneath. That created scale, but also distance. Distance between the client problem and the people doing the work, between senior judgement and the underlying analysis, and between the conversation in the room and the eventual recommendation.
AI is quickly reducing that distance. The analytical work that once required broad teams can now be done with smaller senior-led teams, or even by individual consultants, with experienced judgement staying much closer to the work itself.
This shift favours models built around experienced independent consultants working directly with clients. Emery Group has worked this way from the start.
So what?
The implication is straightforward: smaller senior-led teams, more direct ownership of the reasoning behind important decisions, and a closer working relationship with the people who actually understand your business.
We believe this shift will materially change what good external strategy support looks like over the next few years. And we are building Emery Group around that conviction.
We are also seeing AI reshape what consulting deliverables look like, with interactive tools alongside slides and models. We will explore that in the next edition of our newsletter.
Want to discuss what this means for your external strategy support? Contact us →
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