Smaller Consultancies Deliver Because They Have to Get Every Decision Right

By Sam Shar / The Delivery Gap

How do you know your relationship is a priority when you're one of hundreds of clients? And how can you trust recommendations if the firm is also selling the products? That's where smaller, boutique consultancy firms have an advantage. Every client relationship matters, so a firm's reputation is tied directly to the quality of the advice it gives.

Recommend the wrong product, and it ends up with a dissatisfied customer and potentially a broken-down relationship. That's also why independence matters in consultancy. If a firm makes money from recommending a particular technology, clients can't trust that their advice is driven by what they actually need and not financial incentives.

Of course, this isn't exclusive to consultancies. If you're looking for an SUV at an Audi dealership, the salesperson will recommend an Audi to you, even if a Range Rover is better suited to your needs. The same principles apply when you approach businesses with a rigid set of implementation and improvement ideas. A stiff approach leaves you open to two major problems: ignoring the business's actual needs and trying to embed a new technology where it is not needed and won't work long-term.

I've read plenty of reports that show technologies become dormant after implementation, but most strikingly, a Gartner survey found that 79% of technology buyers regret their decisions. For an industry whose mission is to provide expert guidance on technology optimization and implementation, that number is far too high, and those regrets are far more than just wasted purchases. Employees have to learn new systems, existing processes need redesigning, and licenses often need to be paid for. Worse still, once a company has invested time and money into a particular platform, it can be difficult to move away from it.

For a smaller firm like ours at Trend-Setters, that could even spell the end of the client relationship. That risk to the client and ourselves plays into the conversations I have with them about implementing new products.

I always make sure to deliver a personal touch and a product recommendation that is specific to each client, a luxury we have as a smaller firm with third-party technology. A Trend-Setters specialism where that matters most is digital fax, which, for our clients, comes with real security concerns as they transition away from legacy systems.

Let's look at fax in more detail. 40% of hospitals in America still send faxes often, and it's an appropriate way to send private health information. Yet between 2020 and 2024, small healthcare data breaches increased 12%, and 'misdirected communications' (i.e., faxes sent to the wrong people) accounted for a share of those incidents.

There has been a clear response to update those systems, but with such a reliance on a legacy system, moving away is not easy, especially where security is a sensitivity. As with any business, it requires an understanding of where to make changes, which systems to integrate, how employees will adapt and how to ensure it alleviates specific concerns like security risks.

That is where small, independent consultancy can make the difference, particularly in highly regulated industries. Advice needs to focus entirely on meeting the corporation's demands and fitting within regulations, and when a consultancy uses third-party technology, it can focus on those needs rather than pushing the product itself.

At Trend-Setters, we have that freedom of being a boutique firm to help businesses understand the problems they have, assess the different product options objectively, and recommend the solution that best fits the business. Working directly with vendors creates a different set of incentives, as they focus on their own products and services.

Ultimately, a tech adviser and salesperson shouldn't be conflated into one. Businesses should look beyond bigger firms and consider who is genuinely free to recommend what works and who is accountable for the outcome. When a consultant is independent of the third-party solutions they are offering, the only incentive they have is for what works.