Build a Moat Around Your Career
Build your career moat with rare skill stacks, a visible reputation, wider networks and measurable wins.
Latest
Every Facilitated Session ever
A tongue-in-cheek sketch of 29 personas who show up to a facilitated session, and the serious truth about meeting each of them where they actually are.
Are you contracting or consulting?
There is no write or wrong when it comes to contracting or consulting. It just means trying to notice the opportunity cost.
The ConsultantCafe underground map with 80+ methods, frameworks and the like
Every consultant has a method drawer. Mine became a London Tube map with 89 stations across several lines in one slightly nerdy ride. Mind the methodology gap.
Its time to start the ethical consulting movement
This is an open invitation for anyone to join a ConsultantCafe Cafe Shot Master Class on ethics in consulting. Subscribe to the free mailing list, and you will get an invite.
My Change Management Playbook subscribers can download now
Enjoy these 44 pages of my Change Playbook. I have tried to capture everything I have learnt over the years about change management.
4 more Laws Consultants should know how to deal with
Consulting is messy. Another 4 timeless laws help you spot patterns early, manage the chaos, and steer complex work toward outcomes that actually stick.
So you have been asked to do business development!
Business development is a long game of building trust and earning the right to ask for the work when the timing is right.
Winner of the Breakthrough Business Award
Queanbeyan-Palerang Business Awards, 2026 winner of the Breakthrough Business.
Project Burn-Downs: From Old-School Spreadsheets to AI-Powered Forecasts
I wrote the original article anchored in the old-school way of tracking project burn-downs. The fundamentals still hold, but AI now gives us a not-so-old-school way to keep forecasts current....and it will blow your mind.
Should you fake it 'till you make it?
Fake it 'till you make is like fabricating it till you fluke it. Feel your way forward instead. Six practical moves when label on the tin is bigger than the tin itself.
Proper engagement forecasts provide commercial control while options still exist
Project financial forecasting turns budget variance into a management advantage. Seeing under or overspends early lets you adjust scope, pace, and resources while options still exist. It is how smart teams stay in control and finish with fewer surprises....and maybe even increase fees.
Consulting Insight
Ai Winners Are Not Using More Ai. They Are Redesigning Their Workflow
The latest Ai headlines for consulting firms suggest the market is moving beyond novelty and into a harder phase where agentic capability, cyber risk, and enterprise control matter more than demo magic.
Skill
Why Great Consultants Start With a Delivery Compass
The Most Overlooked Skill in Consulting Starts Before the Work Does, with a a structured approach.
Consulting Insight
My Week in Consulting
If consulting is ambigous and messy, inside a single week, how do you stay steady enough to do good work and enjoy it?
Best Self
3 Chat-GPT scripts to find your consulting strength
Ever wonder why some work gives you momentum, some meetings stay with you for days, and some client moments make you feel genuinely powerful? These three ChatGPT scripts help you decode the pattern and use it to grow as a consultant.
News
Whats Percolating at ConsultantCafe?
I pause and give you a proper update and, more importantly, say thank you.
Technique
Laws Consultants Should Know
Consulting is messy. These timeless laws help you spot patterns early, manage the chaos, and steer complex work toward outcomes that actually stick.
Consulting Insight
My Consulting Capability Map you can download
This one-page capability map brings together 39 capability areas and 172 supporting elements across the full system of consulting to help you build your career with intention.
Best Self
No Room for “Jacket on the Chair” Ethics: Consulting Won’t Recover Without Real Integrity
A reflection on consulting ethics that looks beyond scandals to the everyday decisions that define credibility, culture and the kind of professional you want to become.
Consulting Insight
Some Of My Personal Ideas To Disrupt and Reinvent Consulting
Disruptive ideas to reinvent consulting, from open IP, expert swarms to mutuals, that challenge the unwritten rules of consulting.
Consulting Insight
Consulting Is Not Linear. Here Is What Actually Changes over time
A graph of how consulting changes over time that started as a bit of humour and turned into insight. One line says it all....
Technique
Is Your Program Actually Viable?
Missed dates and stressed teams aren’t the problem. They’re symptoms. The Viable Systems Model (VSM) can help consultants diagnose structural underlying issues.
Consulting Insight
So you're in the ADF and considering becoming a consultant
Leaving the ADF can feel like stepping onto a new map. What you need is the civilian language, a few consulting frameworks, and this 180 day plan to turn experience into influence.