Chapter 3: Using Evaluation Research to Improve Consulting Practice

Consultants are engaged primarily to improve the performance and effectiveness of their client organizations. To date, the focus of most of the literature and research related to management consulting has been on topics such as the consultative process, consultant-client relationships, ethics and values, knowledge and skills, and strategies and approaches. Meager attention, however, has been paid to measuring the effectiveness of consulting results and outcomes. In a comprehensive review of the consulting literature, for example, Gable (1996, p. 1176) concluded, “a relative dearth of rigorous empirical research into engagement success and the complexities associated with its measurement.”

This chapter proposes the application and use of evaluation research to consulting. Evaluation research is a practice discipline that emerged during the U.S. government funded Great Society programs era of the 1960s, requiring assessments of program activities, processes and outcomes. After addressing the need for more systematic and evidence-based evaluation of consulting engagements, the chapter provides a brief overview of the various context-driven approaches, methodologies, and phases of evaluation, and relates them to a generic consulting process. It also discusses both the promises and the challenges involved when applying this approach to consulting interventions and outcomes.