All posts tagged: consulting

AI synthetic audiences are already here and poised to upend the consulting industry

AI synthetic audiences are already here and poised to upend the consulting industry

Published by skeptic

There is a war brewing between AI and consulting. Akin to an armies slow march towards the castle, a new technology is coming to dethrone the expert guessers of Mckinsey, Nielsen, Gartner, Publicis and the rest. Any consulting that involves analyzing people (think all of marketing, research, polling, etc.) will have to reckon with the technology of “synthetic audiences”. Synthetic audiences aim to generate digital versions of people that can then be surveyed almost instantly and affordably, but not as accurately. Think Tamagochi but with people. By prompting AI with information about a person, we ask AI to get in their shoes, simulate the thoughts, behaviors, priorities and decisions of real world humans. We can also invent non-specific placeholder people or personas and survey them as though they are real. Various firms have already fielded products in these domains, including startups Electric Twin, Artificial Societies, and Aaru, and even the century-old Dentsu. What used to take 4 months to survey people, plus two months to create a nice PowerPoint presentation of findings at a total …

We ARE consulting on EHCP appeals, insists DfE

We ARE consulting on EHCP appeals, insists DfE

Published by skeptic

Lawyers ask for an ‘urgent explanation’ after conflicting messages on SEND tribunal Lawyers ask for an ‘urgent explanation’ after conflicting messages on SEND tribunal More from this theme Recent articles The government has insisted it is still consulting on proposed changes to the SEND appeals system, despite its own lawyers previously saying ministers have already “made decisions about them”. As part of widespread reforms to the SEND system, the Department for Education has proposed the legal duty to fulfil provision outlined in an education, health and care plan (EHCP) be shifted onto schools, rather than local authorities. While the consultation said families would retain their right to appeal aspects of an EHCP through tribunal, there are no questions directly referencing the changes to legal duties proposed. 55% rise in appeals In February public law and human rights firm Rook Irwin Sweeney launched a legal challenge on behalf of pupil Jessica Hayhurst, arguing that the consultation was “unfair and irrational”. The letter initiating the judicial review claim said: “The proposal to shift the legal duty to …

Gartner forecasts downbeat annual results on slowing demand at consulting unit

Gartner forecasts downbeat annual results on slowing demand at consulting unit

Published by Sam Flores

Feb 3: IT research firm Gartner on Tuesday forecast annual revenue and earnings below Wall Street expectations, as enterprises scaling back their spending dampened demand for its consulting services. Shares of the Stamford, Connecticut-based firm were down 5.1 per cent in premarket trading following the results. Businesses have been tightening their spending budgets amid economic headwinds and choppy customer demand. Increased use of automation and in-house AI tools has also enabled many companies to handle more planning and performance assessments internally, creating additional uncertainty for external advisory providers such as Gartner. The company expects its total revenue to be $6.46 billion for 2026, below analysts’ average expectations of $6.71 billion, according to data compiled by LSEG. It forecast annual adjusted earnings of $12.30 per share, below expectations of $13.53. Gartner also projected annual revenue of $5.19 billion at the insights unit, its biggest, below estimates of $5.3 billion. “Investors will likely be interested in the pace of 2026 CV (contract value) acceleration from here and the softer Insights Revenue guide could suggest that the pace …

New Consulting Contracts in Texas Will Muzzle Authors and Harm Students

New Consulting Contracts in Texas Will Muzzle Authors and Harm Students

Published by José Betancourt

Texas has been one of the early adopters of Trump-era policies that deny the rights of people who don’t fall within the cis-het, male, and white identity. The state has enacted numerous laws and policies that have enabled rampant book banning in public schools. Anti-DEI laws–those intended to deny inclusive education to marginalized people–are on the books, including anti-DEI laws that direct public colleges and universities in the state to dismantle their affinity programs and projects. We’ve seen the impact all of these laws have had, not only in complete school library shut downs, not only in the use of AI to remove books from schools, and not only in the removal of readings in university classes where the only attendees are full-grown adults (that course was ultimately canceled). In early 2026, children’s author Chris Barton learned that his author visit with Alamo Heights Independent School District had been canceled. This happened after three parents complained that one of his books explored the history of glitter. The book included references to LGBTQ+ people, which was …

Booz Allen Shares Hammered After Treasury Cancels Consulting Contracts

Booz Allen Shares Hammered After Treasury Cancels Consulting Contracts

Published by Jenni Sidey

Shares of Booz Allen Hamilton tumbled the most in months during late Monday morning trading after U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent canceled dozens of contracts tied to the consulting firm. Secretary Bessent said 31 contracts with Booz Allen were terminated, representing $4.8 million in annual spending and $21 million in total obligations. “President Trump has entrusted his cabinet to root out waste, fraud, and abuse, and canceling these contracts is an essential step to increasing Americans’ trust in government,” he said, adding, “Booz Allen failed to implement adequate safeguards to protect sensitive data, including the confidential taxpayer information it had access to through its contracts with the Internal Revenue Service.” Treasury pointed to an incident with Booz Allen in recent years: Most notably, between 2018 and 2020, Charles Edward Littlejohn — an employee of Booz Allen Hamilton — stole and leaked the confidential tax returns and return information of hundreds of thousands of taxpayers. Last spring, Booz Allen said it was undergoing a major restructuring and planned to cut roughly 2,500 jobs, about 7% of …

How KPMG is redefining the future of SAP consulting on a global scale

How KPMG is redefining the future of SAP consulting on a global scale

Published by skeptic

Presented by SAP SAP consulting projects today involve a vast amount of documentation, multiple stakeholders, and compressed timelines, which often require manual knowledge retrieval from online SAP documentation. At the same time, cloud ERP programs now demand faster design cycles, continuous enhancements rather than big-bang rollouts, and near-real-time decision-making. Joule for Consultants, SAP’s conversational AI solution, was designed to help meet these expectations and support consultants throughout their daily tasks, from reconciling best practices and validating design considerations, to navigating SAP’s expanding AI, data, and application landscape. The result: consultants work more productively than ever before, with superior results, and deliver faster, high-quality SAP cloud transformations. That promise attracted early attention from KPMG firms, which became some of the largest SAP enablers participating in the Joule early access program, and one of SAP’s largest customers overall. The organization has onboarded 29 KPMG member firms around the world to this point, and now thousands of KPMG consultants are using Joule for Consultants in their daily work. “For us it wasn’t about experimenting,” says Valentino Koester, global …