In a historical retrospective, although the existing literature names the sector of management consulting industry as an extraordinary and unique phenomenon in business and in fact these claims have not been substantiated by academic studies that will assess these same interpretations. This article therefore aims to address the lack of studies in this emerging field, and, from the analysis of a set of semi-structured interviews and questionnaires with management consultants and managers of SMEs, aims to discuss the paradox of the concept of management consulting, presenting the results of a prospective analysis linked to the search field of strategy-as-practice and four business paradigms that constitute it.

--

Management consulting, Strategy, Strategy-as-practice