Editor's Note: Consultants, Guns, & Money

At first, it sounded like nothing more than a bad consultant joke in search of a punch line. How many consultants does it take to start a workforce revolution? At the risk of sounding a bit too literal, I'd say somewhere upwards of 500,000, or whatever the ever-growing head count number is that pundits stick on the consulting workforce these days.
Perhaps the better question concerns where exactly the seeds of such a revolution are being planted, and what, if anything, will come of them. In our cover story, entitled "Consultants, Guns, and Money," we invite you to take a leap into the future, where a revolution has been fought and won, and where consultants enjoy greater control over their careers and home life. Along the way, we interview a few of the people who now face a litany of both workforce and technological challenges, as they seek to release their firms from the stifling grip of the talent wars. It is here that the patrons of traditional human resource theory have found themselves with little or no defenses, and it is here where the talk of a new "free-agent model" has recently gone from banter to buzz.
Such talk has often been triggered by a number of "what ifs": What if the consulting workforce model were flipped upside down, and individual consultants could have the freedom to selectively bid on projects? What if consultancies began to invite outside consultants to bid on contracts, thereby growing their potential workforce from 40,000 to 100 million?
For individual consultants, the line of questioning might go something like: Do I want to work in Hawaii for $100 an hour, or in Ottawa for $150 an hour? Well, it depends on how deep the snow or how badly you may need the money. Bottom line: It's your choice.
By offering their consultants more choice and flexibility, consultancies will be liberating their people to better manage their work/home life balance. The end result will be better opportunities for fueling your career's ascent, which is why Consulting associate editor Mina Landriscina decided it was time to speak to a number of those residing back on the home front. In our article entitled "Conversations With Your Better Half," we spotlight those people who probably understand better than anyone the unique challenges and motivations of ever-mobile consultants.
Only time will tell whether the profession embraces the fluid laws of the free-agent model, but those of us scouting the origins of consulting's next workforce revolution may need to look no further than the home front.