A new engagement starts in two weeks. Who is free?
A client signs for an operating model review starting in a fortnight. The engagement partner wants a manager with retail experience and two consultants who know process mapping. The staffing coordinator checks the staffing spreadsheet, messages three managers, and finds that the one with retail experience is due to roll off a project that has just been extended. Two partners want the same senior consultant. The analyst who asked for more client-facing work gets overlooked again because nobody remembered.
Decisions get made, but they are made in hallway conversations and message threads, and they are hard to explain later.
Why staffing is so hard to get right
- Availability depends on engagements that extend, pause and change shape.
- Skills and sector experience live in people's heads and old CVs.
- Development goals from appraisals are not visible at staffing time.
- Partners negotiate for the same people informally.
- Nobody records why a staffing decision was made.
Firm size makes it harder, not easier. In a small firm everyone knows everyone's experience. As the firm grows past a few dozen consultants, that shared knowledge thins out, and staffing falls back on whoever the partner has worked with recently.
What poor staffing costs
| Pattern | Consequence |
|---|---|
| Same stars staffed on everything | Burnout and resentment |
| Wrong experience on an engagement | Weaker work, unhappy client |
| Development goals ignored | Consultants leave for firms that deliver them |
| Late decisions | Engagements start short-handed |
The cost of a poor staffing choice often lands on the client first. A team without the right sector knowledge takes longer to get credible with the client's executives, and the engagement partner spends time covering gaps that should have been filled at the start.
How we build a staffing tool
- Each consultant has a profile with sector and functional experience, drawn from past engagements and confirmed by them.
- Availability comes from current engagements, planned roll-off dates and leave, updated as engagements change.
- Development goals from appraisals are recorded, with the consultant's own preferences.
- A new engagement request specifies dates, roles, sector and skills needed.
- The tool lists candidates who fit, with availability, relevant experience and whether the role supports their development.
- Partners and the staffing coordinator make the decision, and the tool records it with any notes.
- Conflicts, where two engagements want the same person, are visible early, not discovered on day one.
Suggestions are a shortlist, not an answer. Client relationships, chemistry and judgement matter, and the tool leaves those to people.
We usually start by drafting consultant profiles from the last couple of years of engagements and asking each person to correct theirs. That first pass tends to surface experience partners did not know they had in the firm.
What staffing looks like with it
The staffing conversation starts from a list of genuinely available people with the right experience. Partners see conflicts early and negotiate them openly. Consultants see that their development goals are on the table when they are staffed.
Over time, the record shows whether staffing is spread fairly and whether development commitments are kept.
Recognise your firm here?
- Staffing is decided by messages and hallway conversations.
- Nobody can quickly find who has experience in a sector.
- Development goals are rarely considered when staffing.
- The same people are staffed on everything.
- Engagement extensions cause surprise conflicts.