The era of strategy and organization consultancies commenced in the 1960s, when the demand for engineering-based advice on the shop floor diminished and the upturn in international trade and corporate expansion began to shift the demand for consulting services to the boardroom level (Kipping 1996, 1997, 2002). McKenna (1995, 2006) points out that the first wave of advice on finance, strategy, and organization was triggered by the Glass-Steagall Banking Act in the 1930s. From the 1950s onwards the strategy and organization consultancies not only expanded their activities considerably in the United States but also opened offices in Europe and, later, in Asia and Latin America. With the growth of these firms in the 1980s and 1990s the consulting market took off, gaining considerable importance in relation to national gross domestic product (GDP). Figure 2.1 represents the global management consulting revenues between 1970 and 2001.

The data indicate an impressive growth of the market in the 1980s and 1990s in terms of annual revenue and proportion of the gross world product (Kennedy Information 2002: 58). When they prepared their 2002–2005 projections Kennedy Information were forecasting a general economic upswing in 2002, and did not predict the stagnation of the consulting industry between 2001 and 2003, and as a result the figures were (over-)estimated. Since 2003 the consulting market has been recovering, in Europe with growth rates of 3.5 percent (2003), 3.7 percent (2004), and between 8 and 14 percent (2005) (FEACO 2006: 2–6).