Consultants: Here’s How to Keep Your Job and Beat AI

As I’ve said before, consulting industry disruption isn’t coming. It’s here. A few months ago I keynoted an awards ceremony of the country’s top consultants sponsored by Consulting Magazine. At that time, most of the other consultants in the room seemed to believe that the overall industry would prosper as firms helped companies adapt to AI.

But even a short time later, it turns out the reality is harsher.

Young consultants fresh out of college are already feeling it: fewer entry-level roles, leaner staffing, and clients asking for deliverables faster and cheaper because they know AI is being used behind the scenes.

Big firms are cutting roles, creating smaller client engagement teams, and adopting internal tools that automate traditional consulting tasks.

So what do you do as a consultant yourself in this turbulent landscape?

AI Reshapes the Definition of “Consultant”

The good news for consultants is that firms aren’t fully eliminating entry-level roles. But they are changing how value is created by redefining where consultants have a role and where they don’t.

For example, it’s possible to create a SWOT analysis in just a few minutes using AI. All those billable hours of research, analysis, and pretty PowerPoint-making are quickly going by the wayside. Clients won’t pay for work that can be done by someone using AI at one-one-hundredth the time and cost. And neither do firms want to have people spending time on things that could be done more efficiently.

As an individual consultant, it’s important to admit that AI is strong at certain tasks:

• Researching and synthesizing large datasets, including producing draft insights
• Automating client reporting, slide creation, and models
• Brainstorming solutions and providing draft recommendations

But AI is weak for:

• Understanding deeply nuanced organizational dynamics, politics, or emotional contexts
• Asking bold, contrarian questions that surface client assumptions & motivate action
• Creating accountability and commitment for change
• Building relationships, trust, and client advocacy in messy situations

AI can indeed take over some of the fundamentals of consulting. But usually its work needs to be proofed, edited, and repackaged before it’s client-ready.

When you apply it that way, you improve your own effectiveness and become more strategic to your firm and clients.

Use AI to 10x Yourself

Using AI doesn’t have to be rocket science. You don’t need to program your own agents. You don’t need to subscribe to dozens of apps.

For my own consulting firm, InnovationPoint, I recently led a strategy engagement for a large national nonprofit organization. We conducted interviews with stakeholders using Zoom and recorded the conversations. We took the transcripts, fed them into AI, gave the AI a clear structure to summarize key themes, quotes, and strategic implications. We accomplished in half a day what would have taken two weeks.

1. Understand the spectrum of prompts

AI is only as useful as what you ask of it. That’s why it’s critical to learn how different types of prompts produce different results depending on the problem at hand.

• Use strategic prompts to explore options, identify risks, or stress test assumptions. Example: “What are 3 ways this go-to-market strategy might fail in a down economy?”
• Use execution prompts to streamline research, simplify analysis, or improve deliverables. Example: “Summarize this 30-page annual report into a one-slide summary for the CEO.”
  

Whether you’re crafting a business model or building a project plan, mastering multiple types of prompting helps you deliver better results, faster.

2. Combine AI with domain depth

AI gives you breadth. You bring experience. The real power comes when you merge both.

Let’s say you’re advising a healthcare startup. AI can instantly summarize FDA regulatory trends or patient experience benchmarks. But your industry knowledge lets you filter what matters, understand patient needs and translate those into compelling stories, and frame strategic options the AI would miss.

AI gives you the bricks. You still need to design the house.

3. Sandwich AI around your expertise

Don’t just “use” AI. Build it into your workflow like a thought partner, with you at the center.

Start with AI to generate ideas, do background research, or produce first drafts. Then you step in to refine, edit, and apply real judgment. Once you’ve shaped your point of view, give it back to AI. Ask it to poke holes, pressure test it, or tighten up the language.

It’s like a sandwich: AI is the bread, but you’re the meat that holds it all together.

4. Be transparent about your smart AI use

Don’t hide that you’re using AI. Let your clients and colleagues know how you’re using it. And, why it makes your work better.

This kind of transparency builds trust and positions you as someone who’s ahead of the curve. For example, if you’re using AI to synthesize stakeholder interviews or stress-test scenarios, say so. Make it clear that the goal isn’t shortcuts. It’s quality, clarity, and speed.

Most consultants are using AI quietly. You’ll stand out by showing you’re doing it thoughtfully.

5. Own your AI learning curve

Staying relevant now means becoming a lifelong AI experimenter. Don’t wait for your firm to train you. Carve out time each week to learn new tools, test new workflows, and try new platforms.

Just like lawyers do continuing education or doctors stay current on procedures, consultants need to stay current on the tools that will redefine tomorrow’s work.

Every time you experiment, you sharpen the edge AI can’t replicate: your ability to think, adapt, and lead.

Action Items:

 Here’s how to get started:

• Pick a current or past project and run AI prompts for both strategy and executional support. See how each changes your thinking, and might have changed the project’s results.
• Try the “sandwich method”: use AI to generate a few ideas, refine one of them yourself, then ask AI to critique your version
• In your next team or client meeting, share one smart way you’re using AI, not to show off, but to signal your value and transparency. Ask others what they’re doing.
• Schedule a weekly “AI sprint”: 30 minutes to try a new tool, workflow, or prompt. Keep the best, ditch the rest.

These things aren’t about becoming an AI expert. It’s about becoming the consultant with the AI partner, not the consultant AI replaces.If you want to embed AI into your consulting work including how to strategize, prioritize, and deliver strategic plans, check out my 3-Step Strategic Plan app or my masterclass in business strategy.