IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/vrs/mancon/v4y2021i1p5-20n6.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

How Small Consultancies Grow: Challenging Problem-Based Theorising

Author

Listed:
  • O’Mahoney Joe

    (Cardiff Business School)

Abstract

This paper explores the adequacy of problem- based theorising in explaining the growth of small management consultancies. Literature on professional service firm growth tends to skip over the entrepreneurial stage, assuming ‘crises’ of governance during growth periods. Using interviews with 42 founders who grew their firms, the paper identifies challenges and potential solutions that impacted success. The paper argues that challenges were generally pre-empted by founders through the deployment of expertise that was acquired during experience, education or the use of software. The paper finds no evidence for the assumptions of ‘problem based’ theories of growth, and argues that changes in technology, experience and education may have rendered the theory useless – at least for understanding the growth of small consulting firms.

Suggested Citation

  • O’Mahoney Joe, 2021. "How Small Consultancies Grow: Challenging Problem-Based Theorising," Management Consulting Journal, Sciendo, vol. 4(1), pages 5-20, January.
    • Handle: RePEc:vrs:mancon:v:4:y:2021:i:1:p:5-20:n:6
    DOI: 10.2478/mcj-2021-0002
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.2478/mcj-2021-0002
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.2478/mcj-2021-0002?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Bianca A.C. Groen & Mirthe van de Belt & Celeste P.M. Wilderom, 2012. "Enabling performance measurement in a small professional service firm," International Journal of Productivity and Performance Management, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 61(8), pages 839-862, October.
    2. Joe O'Mahoney & Stefan Heusinkveld & Christopher Wright, 2013. "Commodifying the Commodifiers: The Impact of Procurement on Management Knowledge," Journal of Management Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 50(2), pages 204-235, March.
    3. Monder Ram, 1999. "Managing Consultants in a Small Firm: A Case Study," Journal of Management Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 36(6), pages 875-897, November.
    4. Jonathan Levie & Benyamin B. Lichtenstein, 2010. "A Terminal Assessment of Stages Theory: Introducing a Dynamic States Approach to Entrepreneurship," Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, , vol. 34(2), pages 317-350, March.
    5. Alexander Becker & Dodo zu Knyphausen-Aufseß & Alexander Brem, 2015. "Beyond traditional developmental models: a fresh perspective on entrepreneurial new venture creation," International Journal of Entrepreneurial Venturing, Inderscience Enterprises Ltd, vol. 7(2), pages 152-172.
    6. Enno Masurel & Kees Van montfort, 2006. "Life Cycle Characteristics of Small Professional Service Firms," Journal of Small Business Management, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 44(3), pages 461-473, July.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Anne Domurath & Simon Taggar & Holger Patzelt, 2023. "A contingency model of employees’ turnover intent in young ventures," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 60(3), pages 901-927, March.
    2. Antonio Davila & George Foster & Xiaobin He & Carlos Shimizu, 2015. "The rise and fall of startups: Creation and destruction of revenue and jobs by young companies," Australian Journal of Management, Australian School of Business, vol. 40(1), pages 6-35, February.
    3. Ammar Hussain & Minhas Akbar & Muhammad Kaleem Khan & Ahsan Akbar & Mirela Panait & Marian Catalin Voica, 2020. "When Does Earnings Management Matter? Evidence across the Corporate Life Cycle for Non-Financial Chinese Listed Companies," JRFM, MDPI, vol. 13(12), pages 1-19, December.
    4. Dowling, Michael & O’Gorman, Colm & Puncheva, Petya & Vanwalleghem, Dieter, 2019. "Trust and SME attitudes towards equity financing across Europe," Journal of World Business, Elsevier, vol. 54(6), pages 1-1.
    5. Minhas Akbar & Ahsan Akbar & Petra Maresova & Minghui Yang & Hafiz Muhammad Arshad, 2020. "Unraveling the Bankruptcy Risk‒Return Paradox across the Corporate Life Cycle," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(9), pages 1-19, April.
    6. Maria Tunberg & Alistair R. Anderson, 2020. "Growing a small firm; experiences and managing difficult processes," International Entrepreneurship and Management Journal, Springer, vol. 16(4), pages 1445-1463, December.
    7. David Leong, 2023. "Action in Complexity: Entanglement and Emergent Order in Entrepreneurship," Journal of Entrepreneurship and Innovation in Emerging Economies, Entrepreneurship Development Institute of India, vol. 32(1), pages 182-217, March.
    8. repec:zbw:inwedp:692017 is not listed on IDEAS
    9. D’Angelo, Alfredo & Buck, Trevor, 2019. "The earliness of exporting and creeping sclerosis? The moderating effects of firm age, size and centralization," International Business Review, Elsevier, vol. 28(3), pages 428-437.
    10. Susan Mueller & Thierry Volery & Björn von Siemens, 2012. "What Do Entrepreneurs Actually Do? An Observational Study of Entrepreneurs’ Everyday Behavior in the Start–Up and Growth Stages," Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, , vol. 36(5), pages 995-1017, September.
    11. Brown, Ross & Mawson, Suzanne & Rocha, Augusto & Rowe, Alex, 2025. "Looking inside the ‘black box’ of digital firm scaling: An ethnographically informed conceptualisation," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 186(C).
    12. Ugo Rizzo & Francesco Nicolli & Laura Ramaciotti, 2014. "The Heterogeneity of the Development Process of New Technology-Based Firms. Implication for Innovation Policies," Journal of the Knowledge Economy, Springer;Portland International Center for Management of Engineering and Technology (PICMET), vol. 5(1), pages 114-132, March.
    13. Rosca, Eugenia & Agarwal, Nivedita & Brem, Alexander, 2020. "Women entrepreneurs as agents of change: A comparative analysis of social entrepreneurship processes in emerging markets," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 157(C).
    14. Marta Gancarczyk, 2015. "Proces wzrostu przedsiębiorstwa w świetle podejścia zasobowego i teorii kosztów transakcyjnych," Gospodarka Narodowa. The Polish Journal of Economics, Warsaw School of Economics, issue 5, pages 5-31.
    15. Sumita Sarma & Sunny Li Sun, 2017. "The genesis of fabless business model: Institutional entrepreneurs in an adaptive ecosystem," Asia Pacific Journal of Management, Springer, vol. 34(3), pages 587-617, September.
    16. Luis Javier Garcia-Martinez & Sascha Kraus & Matthias Breier & Andreas Kallmuenzer, 2023. "Untangling the relationship between small and medium-sized enterprises and growth: a review of extant literature," International Entrepreneurship and Management Journal, Springer, vol. 19(2), pages 455-479, June.
    17. Luigi Mosca & Martina Gianecchini & Diego Campagnolo, 2021. "Organizational life cycle models: a design perspective," Journal of Organization Design, Springer;Organizational Design Community, vol. 10(1), pages 3-18, March.
    18. Juha Saukkonen, 2017. "From a Student of Startup Business to a Startup Employee or Entrepreneur: Study on Career Narratives of Students in Entrepreneurial Programs in a University," Journal of Educational Issues, Macrothink Institute, vol. 3(1), pages 214235-2142, December.
    19. Per Davidsson & Jan Henrik Gruenhagen, 2021. "Fulfilling the Process Promise: A Review and Agenda for New Venture Creation Process Research," Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, , vol. 45(5), pages 1083-1118, September.
    20. Manzi-Puertas, Mario A. & Agirre-Aramburu, Izaskun & López-Pérez, Sain, 2024. "Navigating the student entrepreneurial journey: Dynamics and interplay of resourceful and innovative behavior," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 174(C).
    21. Kalm, Matias, 2012. "The Impact of Networking on Firm Performance - Evidence from Small and Medium-Sized Firms in Emerging Technology Areas," Discussion Papers 1278, The Research Institute of the Finnish Economy.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:vrs:mancon:v:4:y:2021:i:1:p:5-20:n:6. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Peter Golla (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.sciendo.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.