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Introduction
The management consulting industry has grown enormously, especially during the last decade. In 1988, about 100,000 people worldwide were estimated to work full-time as management consultants ([4] The Economist , 1988). In 1998, the top three consulting firms alone already employed more than a 100,000 consultants ([5] Financial Times , 2000). In 2006, the numbers are still higher. The management consulting industry has also become more heterogeneous. It now comprises a broad range of specialisms, which are offered by a wide variety of consulting firms, ranging from very small to very big and from specialized to all-round. Some of these have been in management consulting for about a century, while others entered management consulting more recently from fields such as accountancy and information communications technology (ICT), or from industry, as outsourced internal consulting departments. The consulting field changes constantly. Many established consulting firms are involved in the formation of strategic alliances, mergers, and takeovers. Big consulting firms grow bigger every year, and because of the low entry barriers ([3] Clark, 1995) - "the only real requirement for being a consultant is six dollars for business cards" ([7] Gilley and Eggland, 1989, p. 180) - new consulting firms are established every day, resulting in a growing number of small firms.
The growth and increased heterogeneity of the management consulting business has reduced its transparency, for clients and for consultants themselves. Who is good and who is a charlatan? Consulting firms try to enhance transparency for clients through a better marketing of their services ([13] Kaas and Schade, 1995) and through a professionalization of their work. Professionalization activities, carried out at the level of individual consulting firms as well as on the level of the occupational group, are meant to enhance the competence of consultants, i.e. their ability to perform to recognized standards ([11] Jessup, 1991), and to effectuate a demarcation between competent consultants on the one hand and juniors, amateurs, or snake-oil-salesmen on the other.
One of the key professionalization activities concerns the establishment of a methodology, as part of a common body of knowledge. A methodology, mostly understood as a phase-model or a prescribed set of steps, can, when it is shared among the members of a consulting firm or among the whole occupational...