Professional Purchasing Provides Professional Projects and Removes Personal Bias. Doesn’t It?

Abstract Gone are the days when management consultancy projects were arranged due to friendship and networks, based on relationships between a board member and a consultant. Management Consultancy firms have themselves diluted high-personalisation by adopting a policy of commoditisation and workforce leverage in their quest for optimising profitability. Clients have diluted the one-to-one nature of buying by professionalising purchasing practices. Consulting firms nonetheless invest in relationship managers in the belief they rely on these strong relationships for their future business. Using semi-structured interviews to collect data on buyers’ triggers, validation, decision-making and selection processes, the research presented in this paper explores the changes in purchasing practices and examines what they mean with regard to what clients see as successful relationships between consultants and their clients.