Management consulting is not a licensed profession. That means nobody here can claim a qualification they have not earned — there is none to claim — and it means the real risk runs the other way: an adviser drifting into work that IS licensed, for a client who assumed it was all the same conversation.
six boundaries
Each names who does it instead
None of them is negotiable
Every consultancy has a boundary and most of them are discovered by the client in month two.
Ours is on the website, in the navigation, and linked from every practice-area page, because a
boundary you have to find is not a boundary, it is a disclaimer.
None of these is a matter of capability or appetite. Each one is either a profession with a
licence behind it or a trade where somebody else is genuinely better, and in both cases the
right thing is to say so early — ideally in the first meeting, and at worst the moment a
conversation gets there.
We do not prepare, compile, review or audit your accounts, and we do not prepare or file a tax return.
That is a licensed profession and a different one. We read the statements your accountant produces and work out what they say about how the business is running — which is the whole of what the numbers work on this site is. The moment a question becomes what goes on a return, or how something should be recognised in the accounts, it stops being ours.
We do: Read the statements, and take the business apart by job, customer and kind of work.
Who does the rest: Your accountant, or a certified public accountant if you do not have one.
We are not attorneys and nothing on this site or in an engagement is legal advice.
Contracts, terms of business, entity structure, partnership agreements, employment law and anything with a dispute in it are legal work, and we do not do any of it. We will happily tell you that a question has become a legal one — noticing that early is worth something — and then we stop.
We do: Tell you when a question has stopped being an operational one.
Who does the rest: An attorney, and for anything to do with staff, one who does employment law specifically.
We do not give investment advice, we do not put a value on your business, and we have nothing to do with securities.
A number that says what a business is worth is a professional opinion with a licence behind it and consequences attached to it. We will not produce one, we will not imply one, and we will not let a piece of work quietly become one.
We do: Work on what makes the business more valuable, which is a different sentence.
Who does the rest: A business valuation professional, and for a sale, a broker or an investment bank.
We are not your human resources function and we do not advise on employment law.
Structure, roles, pay bands and how a hire is run are management questions and they are ours. Classification, leave entitlement, terminations, discrimination and anything with a filing deadline are not, and the distance between those two lists is shorter than it looks.
We do: The structure, the roles, the pay bands and the hiring method.
Who does the rest: An employment attorney, or a professional employer organisation if you would rather buy the whole function.
We do not sell software and we take no commission, referral fee or rebate from any vendor.
It is the only thing that makes advice about which system to buy worth having. If we ever did take a fee from a vendor, this sentence would have to come off the site, and we would rather keep the sentence.
We do: Write the requirement, score the shortlist, and sit in the buying conversation with you.
Who does the rest: The vendor, once you have decided — and you should be the one deciding.
We do not take an operating role in your business, and nobody here signs anything on your behalf.
An adviser who starts making the decisions is an expensive employee with none of the accountability, and the business gets worse at deciding rather than better. We work alongside your people, sometimes with our sleeves up, and the authority stays where it is.
We do: Work next to your people, including on the boring parts.
Who does the rest: An interim manager, if that is genuinely what the business needs.
What we will do at the edge of each of those
Noticing early that a question has stopped being ours is a real part of the job and it is worth
something. An owner who is told in week one that the thing they are describing is an employment
matter has saved three weeks and a bad decision; an owner who finds out in month three has paid
for both.
Say plainly, in the room, that this has become somebody else's question
Say which kind of professional it belongs to, and what to ask them
Work alongside them afterwards, if you want us to, on the management side of whatever they advise
Write it in the weekly note, so the boundary is on the record rather than in somebody's memory
What we will not do is give you the answer anyway with a caveat attached. A caveat does not
make unlicensed advice licensed, and the client is not the one who carries the consequence of
it being wrong.
We do not prepare or file your accounts. We read the financial statements your accountant prepares and work out what they say about the business. We do not prepare, compile, review or audit accounts, and we do not prepare or file a tax return — that is a licensed profession and a different one.
We are not attorneys. We are not attorneys and nothing on this website or in an engagement is legal advice. Contracts, entity structure, employment law and anything with a dispute in it belong to a lawyer, and part of our job is noticing early that a question has become one of those.
No investment advice and no valuations. We do not give investment advice, we do not put a value on a business and we have nothing to do with securities. Work that makes a business more valuable is not the same thing as an opinion of what it is worth, and we do the first.
We take nothing from any software vendor. We do not sell software and we take no commission, referral fee, rebate or reseller margin from any vendor. It is the only thing that makes advice about which system to buy worth paying for.
Questions
Do you do our accounts or our taxes?
No. We do not prepare, compile, review or audit accounts and we do not prepare or file returns. That is a licensed profession and a different one; your accountant does it. We read what they produce and work out what it says about the business.
Can you look at our contract?
No. We are not attorneys and nothing we say is legal advice. We will tell you when a question has become a legal one, which is genuinely useful and is where we stop.
Will you tell us what the business is worth?
No. We do not give investment advice and we do not put a value on a business — that is a professional opinion with a licence behind it. We work on the things that make a business worth more, which is a different sentence and an honest one.
Do you take a commission from software companies?
No — not a commission, not a referral fee, not a rebate, not a reseller margin. It is the only thing that makes advice about which system to buy worth paying for.
$2,200 a partner day · ninety minutes free · about one in four we talk out of it
Start with the assessment, or just telephone
The assessment takes about four minutes and gives you a written summary of what your answers suggest and which engagement addresses each thing. It is indicative and not professional advice, and it is a better opening than a blank contact form. If you would rather skip it, the telephone works and the first meeting is ninety minutes and free.
