Mother in Law: A consultancy model of the right vintage

Recently, I asked people to contact me to tell me about working for consultancy-model firms like Keystone or Setfords. This was with a view to writing this article, but also – to be honest – because I was considering the move myself. I even spoke to one of their recruitment people. As far as I can work out, from my own and others’ experiences, the top three reasons for making the move are as follows:

1. Current colleagues are idiots;

2. Current colleagues are idiots; or

3. Current colleagues are idiots.

The idiocy can, of course, take many forms. Someone else taking all the good work, people overlooking you for partnership because you work part-time, the powers that be setting targets that are unachievable, or unachievable if you want to pursue extra-curricular stuff like pro bono work or branching into other work types. Being made to do stuff that is a waste of your precious time. Bullying.

Most of us have been prompted by an advert to try their website calculators. I work part-time and based on what I earned in fees last year, according to Keystone (who are not the firm I ended up speaking to), I could either work 1.2 hours a day to carry on earning my current salary, or I could carry on working the same hours and get a pay rise of £71,000. That is £71,000 on top of my current salary.

Makes you think, does it not? Imagine how slowly I could drink a cup of coffee in the morning if I only worked 1.2 hours a day. Alternatively, with an extra £71,000 I could employ my own barista. Maybe a sommelier too.

While there was no mention of baristas or sommeliers (weird), the comments I received from people who have made the jump were overwhelmingly positive.

The ‘flat’ structures mean a lot to a lot of people. Perhaps your team is too small to have two partners, and the current partner is showing no signs of retiring. (For the avoidance of doubt, I do not agree with this being a bar to a partnership, but I know very well that it is the way some firms structure themselves). Perhaps you just think your hourly rate should be higher, or you should be freer to market yourself in the way YOU think best. Perhaps, as I say above, someone else in the team is taking all the good work, or the opposite is happening – you get all the work because no one else can be bothered.

It is a sad reflection on where we still seem to be, in 2023, that the comment I got most about the advantages of the model was ‘if I want to go to the dentist or my child’s nativity, I don’t have to ask permission’. I do not think anyone over the age of 16 should have to ask permission to go to the dentist, and my children’s nativities were the HIGHLIGHT OF MY LIFE. Line managers, try telling a parent of young children that you will have to ‘think about’ their request for two or three hours off for sports day because ‘Dave has already booked that week off’. Not speaking from experience, of course, but see if that employee is still with you for the following year’s sports day.

I think lockdowns (*shudder*) have made it feel more feasible for people. Most of us are set up for home working, we are a lot less paper-reliant and many clients are happy with video calls. Despite what the tabloids say, I know very few people who are not more productive at home.

As you know, at least 85% of my daily thoughts are about how guilty (see tinyurl.com/w7mzubsj) I feel about everything. Despite earning my firm lots of money and being a helpful, conscientious colleague, if I get stuck in traffic or the Harvest Festival overruns, or I dare to get a sickness bug, it feels like guilt is actually pulsing through my veins. That would all go, wouldn’t it, if I was working for myself? And I would be able to stop early to prepare a nutritious dinner and not feel guilty that my children might be half way to getting scurvy. This week, I know I am going to have to drag them kicking and screaming to holiday club and spend each day worried that they are sitting on a bench somewhere on their own.

While these firms often have large business development teams, it is a worry that I do not work in an area where I have long-term existing clients. ‘There is a risk whenever you move jobs,’ I was told by the recruitment guy, ‘you might hate the new job, and at least by working for yourself you are taking out a lot of the risks’. He’s right, of course – I would not have mean colleagues or too much work or a weird atmosphere – but the risk that I would be taking is whether we could pay the mortgage.

As much as I told myself that we could survive on my husband’s income while I established myself, that we could take a mortgage holiday, that kids have as much fun on the beach in Norfolk as they do on a beach abroad and that we could save a fortune by just not popping into M&S ‘for a couple of bits’ on the way home from work, these thoughts started to consume me. And at that moment, the boiler broke.

If I did not have a big mortgage, if I had some redundancy money to play with, if I worked in an area where my existing contacts would get me off the ground, I think it would be a really great option. It is not for me now, but maybe in 10 years’ time I will think again. In the meantime, I will – of course – keep you updated on the scurvy.

*Some facts and identities have been altered in the above article