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- »One on One with Ed Hess
Grow or Die. It’s probably the most common business axiom, and the least accurate, according to the new book “Smart Growth: Building an Enduring Business by Managing the Risks of Growth” (Columbia Business School Publishing). To better understand the book’s implications for firms, Consulting’s One-on-One sat down with the book’s author, Ed Hess, a former Arthur Andersen strategy consultant and current professor at the University of Virginia's Darden Graduate School of Business.
- »One on One with Summit's David Litherland
When prospective employees interview for a job, they obsess over making a good, lasting impression. Firms should do the same. To learn how firms can avoid typical pitfalls, Consulting’s One on One sat down with David Litherland, managing partner of Summit Search Group, an executive search firm specializing in placing professionals within professional service firms.
- »One on One with PwC's Tom Craren
Senior executives are becoming immune to traditional marketing. Marketing consultants tell us that to pierce through the white noise of corporate communication, firms should consider “content marketing”. Instead of more traditional marketing, providing valuable insight and perspective in a blog or electronic newsletter can serve as a more effective door opener. One of the best examples is PricewaterhouseCoopers’ “10-Minute” series. For almost three years, PwC has boiled down complex thought leadership into small electronic pieces an executive can read in about ten minutes. To learn more about PwC’s marketing efforts, Consulting’s One-on-One sat down with Tom Craren, the firm’s brand strategy and thought leadership leader. His team of 20 writers produces between two to three 10-minute pieces each month, along with more detailed white papers.
- »One on One with Stanford Hospital's Kate Surman
Transitioning healthcare companies from paper to electronic records presents huge consulting opportunities.
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2009
»Top 25 Consultants, 2009: Rich Lesser
 Rich Lesser
Senior Partner
The Boston Consulting Group
Excellence in Healthcare
The Boston Consulting Group senior partner Rich Lesser could be described as a classic consultant—if the description sufficiently emphasizes change and roll-up-your-sleeves client collaboration. While Lesser values traditional hard-nosed consultant analysis and guidance, he believes a consulting mindset that does not include a strong emphasis on “thinking about change from day one” is ultimately insufficient.
“The old paradigm of the consulting industry is that you spend weeks conducting an analysis, come up with recommendations and only then do you think about how they’re going to get implemented,” says Lesser, a core member of BCG’s healthcare practice. “That is not a success paradigm. The success paradigm is that you take the time very early on to understand what is required to make change happen. What ideas have already been tried? If your ideas are such good ideas why haven’t they been done before? If they have, then why haven’t they succeeded?”
Lesser’s consulting mindset has generated success in several areas, including firm growth, firm diversity and success in the healthcare industry. Since assuming leadership of the New York Metro office system in late 2000, Lesser has built the office into the firm’s largest in the U.S. (and third-largest worldwide) based on revenue and headcount. Women comprise more than 35 percent of his office’s consultants and continue to earn promotions to partner level at an impressive clip.
Lesser currently heads a team that provides services to one of the firm’s largest clients, a Fortune 100 healthcare company. “The [healthcare] environment has never been harsher in recent memory than it is right now,” he notes. “Yet, the opportunities have never been greater. … Leading companies are working diligently to figure out how to reconfigure their business model, their approach to R&D, and their overall structure to adapt. We have the opportunity to work with them in this extremely challenging transformation process, and that is incredibly rewarding.”
—Eric Krell
>> Full list of Top 25 Consultants 2009
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