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Management Consulting and International Business Support for Smes: Need and
Obstacles

Article  in  Education and Training · October 2004

DOI: 10.1108/00400910410569542

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Management Consulting and International Business Support
for SMEs: Need and Obstacles

Terry Mughan is Principal Lecturer in Intercultural Management Ashcroft International Business

School, Anglia Polytechnic University, East Road, Cambridge, UK. Tel: 01223 363271 Fax: 01223
417700 E-mail: T.Mughan@apu.ac.uk

Lester Lloyd-Reason is Reader in International Enterprise Strategy, Ashcroft International

Business School, Anglia Polytechnic University, East Road, Cambridge, UK. Tel: 01223 363271
Fax: 01223 417700 E-mail: L.Lloyd-Reason@apu.ac.uk

Carsten Zimmermann is a Research Fellow Ashcroft International Business School, Anglia

Polytechnic University, East Road, Cambridge, UK. Tel: 01223 363271 Fax: 01223 417700 E-mail:
Carsten_Zimmermann@yahoo.com

Management Consulting and International Business Support for SMEs: Need and Obstacles

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Management Consulting and International Business Support
for SMEs: Need and Obstacles

ABSTRACT

This paper explores the challenges involved in the development of coordinated management
consulting services for small and medium-sized international companies in the East of England.

Whilst literature exists that examines the need of small and medium sized companies for
management consulting services, little coordinated policy has been developed in this area and
the market inhibitors of cost and geographical concentration of expertise, as well as managerial
mindset, remain significant barriers to company and economic growth in the region.

This paper will synthesise the findings of recently published quantitative and qualitative research
to identify the characteristics of SMEs seeking to trade internationally. The provision of
coordinated and funded consulting services for these companies will require skills and marketing
tools development for advisers and consultants. The region’s success in achieving its economic
targets will be assessed in terms of its inherent features and emerging strategies to move from
service based on the information paradigm to those based on the consultancy paradigm.

KEYWORDS

Management consulting, SMEs, international, regions, universities.

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INTRODUCTION

This paper explores the obstacles and benefits associated with the increasing of provision of
management consulting services for small and medium-sized companies active in international
markets. Drawing on primary research in the East of England, it will show how company needs
may be well met by the consulting process and how this might help improve regional trade
performance. There are however obstacles to the development of this service and the associated
benefits.

Consulting and training services undoubtedly represent one of the most dynamic sectors in
Europe (Soriano 2003). In this context a considerable amount of literature is available on the
subject of consulting (Payne 1986), ranging from developing consulting skills (Eveloff 1992) to
the challenges of corporate consulting (Sandberg and Werr 2003). However, the literature of
management consulting is not very well stocked as regards small and medium sized enterprises
(SMEs), where the focus has been mainly on theory development and methodological
applications (Armenakis and Burdg 1988). Little work has been done on the management of the
consulting process and the framing of new consulting communities (Tunwall and Busbin 1991).
Yet in the global environment economic and technological change happens so quickly that
management development needs, once reserved for employees of large companies, also begin to
apply to small and medium-sized companies. Nahavandi and Chestern (1988) point out that SMEs
essentially need consulting support for information, operation and processing activities especially
given their limited ability to develop in-house staff departments (Tunwall and Buskin 1991).
Chrisman and Leslie (1989) categorise the problems facing small businesses in two major areas:
Identifying the causes for small business failures and manager perceptions concerning the
essential problems small businesses face. The major reasons for the failure of businesses seem to
be management competence, lack of planning and securing financial resources (Hambrick and
Crozier 1985) with small businesses requiring help in operating and administrative topics,
specifically in accounting/finance and marketing (Chrisman and Leslie 1989). This is particularly
the case for companies which export, import or otherwise trade internationally and which interact
with larger companies. Interestingly, only very few studies mention the importance of strategic
planning and orientation to small business managers (Peterson 1984) showing the low
recognition level of external strategic approaches for SMEs. To improve the small business
performance in these areas, government assistance programmes have recently started to adapt
their policy towards a more consultancy-oriented framework.

This paper examines a regional context within which strategic aims set by government economic
agencies are driving the business training sector for SMEs towards the management consultancy
model. To do so the key developments in government assistance affecting the East of England
will be examined in the following chapter. After this, internationalisation aspects will be
highlighted and the support infrastructure analysed. The next section then explores company
needs and management consulting issues from a regional perspective including aspects of a new
framework and community for management consulting. The inhibitors for such a development
will also be discussed and implications drawn.

DEVELOPMENTS IN BUSINESS SUPPORT POLICY IN THE UNITED KINGDOM

The national policy perspective

In the United Kingdom, at a national level, British Trade International was established in May
1999 to bring together the joint work of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and the
Department of Trade and Industry in support of British trade and investment both overseas and

Management Consulting and International Business Support for SMEs: Need and Obstacles

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in the United Kingdom. Both trade development and outward investment activities and inward
investment activities are now delivered under the banner of UK Trade and Invest. The overall
rationale for these activities is that international trade is a crucial element in delivering a thriving
business sector, which in turn creates jobs, prosperity and wealth to pay for high quality public
services (Girma, Greenaway and Kneller, 2001).

On a strategy level, this policy is broken down into key priorities, core priorities and delivery
essentials. A selective review of these reveals a set of challenging performance targets. For
example, a key priority within the British Trade International Corporate Plan is building a ‘major
focus on developing new exporters’ with a target of developing 5000 new exporters in England
by 2004 and of ensuring that 15% of assisted new exporters will improve their business
performance within two years. A further key priority is to develop exporters’ capabilities for
international business with a target of 18,000 UK firms successfully into markets new to them by
2002, with 50% of assisted exporters to improve business performance within two years. Other
key priorities concern the type of infrastructure required to support agencies in achieving such
targets. The Corporate Plan outlines the need for the establishment of a top-class trade
information service for all UK firms (facilitated by state-of-the-art electronic and web-based
systems), the achievement of high quality foreign direct investments and the importance of
delivering all services to world-class standards. However, progress against such targets will be
difficult to benchmark and quantify and hence demonstrate value for money.

The regional policy perspective

A key trend in the delivery of policy objectives and business support in the UK is regionalisation
(Johnson et al., 2000). In terms of export and internationalisation, UK Trade and Invest have
introduced a series of Regional International Trade Directorates to co-ordinate, deliver and
implement the Corporate Plan. Each region has developed an international trade strategy which
outlines a set of objectives, targets and actions. Within the East of England [1], the focus for the
paper, the East of England Development Agency (EEDA) and UK Trade and Invest published the
International Trade Strategy for the region in August 2001. Overall, it sought to increase the
number of active exporters from 3500 in 1999 to 4000 in 2004. Over the same period the total
goods value exported would increase from £15.6bn to £18bn. Interestingly, it noted that the
East of England did not simply follow the geographic distribution of UK exports and as a result, a
major thrust of the strategy should be to improve export activity with Europe. Like other regional
strategies throughout Europe, the strategy espoused the values of a policy of cluster
development, along the example of the Cambridge Phenomenon, in the light of the diversity in
the region’s economy. This has been perceived as a vehicle to sustaining and enhancing
economic growth and a greater coordination of support activities.

In 2002, EEDA published ‘The International Agenda ’ which identified five strategic priorities for
the region in achieving its aim of being a world-class economy and one of Europe’s 20 wealthiest
regions:

• Promoting the East of England’s image and identity

• Building trans-national partnerships
• Promoting international trade and inward investment

1
The East of England is one of the most diverse regions in the UK. It comprises the six counties of Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire,
Essex, Hertfordshire, Norfolk and Suffolk and has a population of just under 5.5 million. The region boasts good international
communications infrastructure with excellent port (Harwich, Felixstowe, Ipswich, Great Yarmouth) and airport (Luton, Stansted,
Norwich) infrastructure. Felixstowe is the UK's fastest growing port and Stansted is the UK's fourth busiest and fastest growing
airport. The East of England has one of the strongest economies in the UK. In terms of GDP per head, the region ranks third when
compared with other UK regions (1999). The region has one of the highest employment rates (79.2%) although there are significant
variations across the sub-regions.

Management Consulting and International Business Support for SMEs: Need and Obstacles

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• Influencing European policy
• Maximising the effectiveness of European funding.

National and regional policy therefore reveals a predilection for a concept of international trade
which embraces inward investment, international partnerships and importing as well as
exporting.

A BRIEF REVIEW OF RELEVANT LITERATURE

There is a wealth of evidence within the academic literature and government statistics that
demonstrate that exporting is the predominant mode by which SMEs engage with international
markets and trading. Since the mid 1990s, there has been a great deal of debate around the
exporting activities of small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs), in both a regional and a
national context. A brief review of the academic and practitioner literature highlights a number
of perceived benefits to businesses from exporting. These include exposure to differing ways of
doing business (Barclays Bank, 1996), additional demand for the product or service of the
business (Julien et al., 1997) and opportunities for modifications of existing products and new
product development. The successful development of export markets by SMEs has also been
recognised by government as critical to enhancing the competitiveness of these businesses and
hence to the strengthening of regional and national economies. It is these public benefits -
principally the generation of a larger number of more secure jobs - that provides the basis for the
substantial expenditure of government funds in the support of private businesses. In the United
Kingdom, for example, policies have drawn upon research by Girma, Greenaway and Keller
(2001) that provides evidence of causal link between exporting and improved business
performance.

Findings from a recently completed audit of export provision for Trade Partners UK (Sear et al.,
2001) highlight that, at a local and regional level, the support infrastructure for exporting is
complex, involving a large number of players in a series of multiple networks and relationships.
Amongst this diversity, however, the following eight general types of organisation operating as
export support providers can be identified:

i. Government bodies and agencies incorporating regional and national government bodies
and supporting the funding of trade services. This structure is not fixed. Recently, the
re-branding of British Trade International as UKT&I has created a number of ambiguities,
especially in terms of the focus of Government support.
ii. Regional agencies such as Regional Development Agencies (RDAs) that have trade
development as one of their strategic activities.
iii. The BusinessLink network which bridges, to some extent, the regional-local divide in
support configuration, in that it is a sub-regional provider but operates as an interface
between local and regional support programmes.
iv. Local authority economic development units (EDUs) who focus on trade development
and exporting as a means of job and wealth creation.
v. Chambers of Commerce who operate largely at a sub-regional or local level.
vi. Business federations, associations and institutes which are generally business-led but
with some support and input from the public or quasi-public sector.
vii. Private sector providers supporting different types of export activity.
viii. A broad range of other providers of support, such as enterprise agencies and
Universities, who are involved at a local, regional and national level and offer varied
services. Such agencies tend to have somewhat different, and unclear, relationships with
the above groupings of providers within and between regions.

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The extent to which these different types of organisations are involved in the provision of export
services varies between each English region, although the role and type of service provided by
each grouping of provider is somewhat similar throughout England (Johnson et al., 2000). For
example, Chambers of Commerce tend to provide a plethora of services including advice,
information, training and documentation services, whilst local government economic development
units focus on the provision of information and direct financial assistance. There is, however, a
degree of flux and interaction between these different organisations, at all levels, that blurs
organisational and network boundaries. For example, the development of the Small Business
Service franchises has altered the configuration of export services at a local level within several
of the regions. Such changes and turbulence within support structures create issues to be
resolved and present challenges to business support organisations in developing coherence
within the configuration of provision that makes sense to the business community (Gibb, 1997).
For example, since the mid 1990s, there have been three major changes to the nature of central
government support for exporting which have hindered attempts to integrate national schemes
into the portfolio of local providers. Furthermore, they have aggravated the confusion within the
business community as to the accessibility and availability of different schemes (The Wilson
Review, 1999).

In mapping provision across the English regions, Sear et al (2001) note a plethora of information-
type services to exporting companies (see Table 1), though the figure for the East of England is
significantly lower (50.0%) than the national norm (74.2%).

i) Percentage of providers in East of England and England offering each type of

service

Service East of England England

(%) (%)
Advice 42.3 74.2
Consultancy 38.4 35.5
Finance 19.2 51.6
Information 50.0 74.2
Networking 30.7 29.0
Training 34.6 12.9
Other 76.9 61.3

Note: Percentages add to more than 100 as multiple responses allowed.

There is also a lack of financial provision nationally (51.6%) which is even lower in the East
(19.2%). There is therefore evidence from this study that that there are significant differences in
support provision across the English regions which the authors attribute not only to differences in
the socio-economic characteristics of the regions but also to differences in entitlement to
European monies to underpin business and export support services and differences in regional
strategies. The East of England emerges as a region with a relatively balanced provision of
support services across the exporting process (see table 2).

ii) Percentage of providers in each region catering for each stage of the exporting
process

Activity East of England

England
% %
DMC 50.0 25.8
Management Consulting and International Business Support for SMEs: Need and Obstacles

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 RM 57.6 54.8
ELP 53.0 45.2
Selling 42.3 71.0
OF 69.2 64.5
S&D 65.3 41.9
Strategy 23.0 12.9
Financing 3.8 58.1

Key: (DMC – Developing motivation and confidence; RM – Researching the market; ELP –
Establishing a local presence; OF- Order fulfilment; S & D – Shipping and delivery)

THE EFFICACY OF CURRENT PROVISION

The majority of services are configured around the needs of small and medium-sized companies
exporting for the first time or seeking to break into a new overseas market having had some
success with their first venture. Market research, translating services and market visits
predominate as subsidised activities. A review of the efficacy of these services (Wilson, 1999) led
to the introduction across the United Kingdom of a more structured and sustained support
package whereby companies are assisted in the development of an export plan, its
implementation and the first stages of managing international business. Passport to Export
Success has been a successful offering with companies mainly because of the sustained and
programmed support and its aim to nurture companies through the formative, planning stages
before leaving them to fend for themselves, though even on completion of the programme
owner-managers are able to call on the International Trade Advisers for occasional support.

The provision of such support has placed skills demands on International Trade Advisers who
hitherto had been primarily a conduit for the fulfillment of requests for market and technical data
and problem-solvers. Most consultancy activities (see Table 1) have traditionally been offered by
private enterprises. In complementing information-type services with more structured support in
recent years, UK Trade and Investment has therefore taken a significant step in the provision of
strategic advice (see Table 2) and support to companies and appears to have met a real market
demand. More sustained, strategic involvement with companies has yielded better exporting
results and higher satisfaction rates with the service providers. UK Trade and Invest responded to
this development in a number of ways. Firstly, and in response to broader changes in macro-
economic strategy in the UK, they focused more sharply on industrial sectors and clusters as
motors of growth (Keeble, 2000). Specialist advisers were appointed in each region to service
sectors such as life sciences, ICT and energy, in the first instance, and then agriculture and
education and training later. In this way, companies could access expert technical advice more
readily and clusters and networks could be promoted. Secondly, a further review of current
services and market positioning was commissioned to assess whether funds could be more
effectively targeted at specific markets. A study carried out by PriceWaterhouseCoopers proposed
some significant shifts in strategy, not least of which was an increased focus on ‘middle-market’
companies as a source of significant growth potential in international markets.

Considerable attention has been given to this report and considerable efforts have been made to
agree a definition of ‘middle-market’ which encompasses matters of size (turnover, number of
employees etc), structure, management characteristics and sector. Few firm conclusions have
been reached apart from the over-arching strategic recognition that international trade activity
and economic growth in the regions can be facilitated as much by medium-sized companies as by
smaller ones, which have traditionally been the main recipients of government-subsidised support
for training and other business services. Developing the resources to support this sector of the
trading economy and thereby increasing regional productivity and international trading
Management Consulting and International Business Support for SMEs: Need and Obstacles

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performance has become something of a priority2. Once the commercial decision to invest
overseas has been made, support agencies, have a vital part to play in advising such companies,
ensuring best practice is followed and enabling the location of suitable overseas partners. The
delivery of professional advice is crucial, whether public or private. UK Trade & Investment can
provide support of this type through specialist advisors, but such support is not currently
available at a regional level.

ADVANCES TOWARDS A NEW COMMUNITY AND FRAMEWORK FOR MANAGEMENT

CONSULTING IN THE EAST OF ENGLAND

The regional strategy

The regional economic and administrative structures which have emerged in England since 1997
are still tentatively gathering the resources and building the institutions necessary for the
implementation of an international business strategy. The vehicle for the discussion and
elaboration of this strategy is the International Trade Forum. Composed of representatives of the
public authorities, professional bodies, business associations and higher education, this body
seeks to represent a wide range of views and to shift public policy regionally and nationally in
such a direction as to make international trading easier for companies, more productive and more
widespread. It published the first International Trade Strategy in 2001 and is currently revising it
to publish a new version in Spring 2004 and in so doing, inform the forthcoming revision of the
Regional Economic Strategy.

A key difference between the first and second International Trade Strategy documents will be a
shift away from a macro-economic perspective concentrating on international market data and
high-level targets towards a micro approach where the position and characteristics of companies
in the region are given more priority. An assessment of the learning needs of those companies
and of the business support resource available to deliver them is central to the new strategy.
Analysis of the performance of the UK Economy by Michael Porter (2003) reinforced this view. He
suggests that the UK’s productivity failings are largely related to microeconomic, rather than
macroeconomic factors – those of skills deficits, low capital investment and weak research and
investment. The strategy takes account of this:

“While these (macroeconomic) indicators provide a helpful way of measuring the progress of the
region as a whole, they need to be considered in the context of events and trends that are
outside of the control of regional support organisations. In particular, this strategy recognises the
impact of macro-economic trends and external events on the development of international
business. In terms of monitoring progress, this strategy focuses on output indicators that are
more directly attributable to activities undertaken at a regional level by different organisations.”

Regional studies

The deliberations of the International Trade Forum have been informed by two key studies
carried out in the region with a view to mapping company activity and needs and identifying
effective management development strategies. “Competing Effectively in International Markets’”
was funded by the East of England Development Agency and set out to identify successful
aspects of international business planning, resource management, international networking,
market intelligence gathering and global skills and knowledge development that can be made
transferable across business sectors via training, educational, development and recruitment
programmes. By interviewing 1200 companies over the telephone and 80 face-to-face, the study

2
East of England International Business Strategy, 2004
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concluded that success in international business depends more on the skills and knowledge of the
owner-manager and his personnel than on currency fluctuations or logistics problems. Among the
conclusions are:

• Planning (the way in which the firm plans its involvement in foreign markets), manning (the
way the firm organises or develops its resources to service foreign markets) and scanning
(the way in which the firm informs itself about those markets) are the areas of skills and
knowledge required by all firms active in international markets.
• The configuration of these skills, and the support designed to improve them, varies according
to experience, sector and size.
• All firms benefit from strategic planning and management development.
• All firms benefit from the development of international skills (foreign languages and/or
intercultural awareness). It is the development of these skills within successful firms that
facilitates the transfer of business acumen from domestic to international markets.
• Firms new to international activity (the Curious and the Frustrated) are very receptive to, and
appreciative of, current support provision.
• Successful firms have specific skills and knowledge needs which are not all met by current
provision.
• We identify an intermediate set of firms (the Tentative) whose international activity is static,
who have lost the initial enthusiasm for international activity and who need tailored support
which is not currently available.
• Demand Transformation: There is a need to distinguish between what companies want and
what they need. They want information, money and solutions to precise, small problems.
They need to learn to plan, to broaden their management mindset and to build better
manning and scanning skills.
• Skills and knowledge development for international trade takes place via the processes of
exporting, importing, inward investment and international research arrangements.
• Best practice in firms often emanates from patterns of trading involving one or all of these
elements.

What emerges strongly from the study is the need for strategic and soft management skills and
knowledge which enable owner-managers to critique their own organisation, re-engineer it and
build the competencies needed to succeed in competitive environments. Similar issues were
explored in the second study “The Management Skills Gap in Technology SMEs: Real or
Perceived’” (YTKO 2003). This study investigated whether a market gap in the existence and
availability of these capabilities exists. The study comprised a representative telephone survey of
some 400 technology based SMEs owner managers across the region, a series of in-depth
interviews and focus groups, and further analysis of existing secondary data and intelligence. The
findings of the study supported the hypothesis that the restrictions on growth are mostly
connected with the inability of the SMEs’ own management to adopt and utilise management
capacity within their companies, rather than an inherent lack of management advice and support
available to SMEs.

This disconnect between perceptions and reality, however, is complex and is related
fundamentally to the nature of how enterprises are formed, operate and develop. The study
provides a model for understanding the dynamics and psychology of how SMEs develop and
acquire the management capabilities required to grow firms over time. By highlighting the key
constraints, the reasons behind these constraints, and how they have been overcome within
more successful firms, this study shows examples of best practice from which SME
owner/managers can usefully learn. Rather than a shortage of available management talent,
support and training, a key finding of this study indicates that, as a consequence of the lack of
complete understanding of SMEs’ development and of company life cycles, skills are wrongly
targeted or are inappropriate to the growth requirements of SMEs.

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The report goes on to recommend a re-positioning of management support and advice to
attempt to respond appropriately to the ubiquitous and well-documented reluctance of British
SMEs to buy in training and management development:

• The importance of close informal networks in the management development of SMEs means
that not only are depth and breadth of management development opportunities limited, but there
is little desire to search outside the immediate community. Management support providers must
therefore seek ways to become part of these personal networks and offer more tailored and
informal support.
• Management support organisations need to work harder on instilling trust in their professional
advice. This requires working within the comfort zone of individual companies knowledge
networks, where recipients are familiar and confident in the support provided.
• The clear value of management learning through training and education means that greater
effort is required on not just raising awareness but in effective marketing and selling of quality
management support services to SMEs.
• Trusted mentors have a clear impact on the management development and growth of an
enterprise, yet most of these successful case studies are a result of chance. Effort should be
made in providing SMEs with greater opportunity to access mentors.

Key messages

A coherent picture begins to emerge from these two regional studies. One message is the
importance of trust and relationship-building between support services and small and medium-
sized companies. In this respect SMEs would appear to have something in common with larger
companies in the consulting process. Schein (2002) talks of a development of effective
consulting through building ‘levels of mutual acceptance’. This involves a shift away from support
to small companies based on classical training and information-giving processes towards a less
structured, responsive and mutually helping one. That this process might be similar for both
smaller and larger companies may surprise some, yet the findings of the two afore-mentioned
reports make it clear that smaller companies also need customised, strategically oriented advice
delivered in a manner appropriate to their individual operating and learning circumstances.

Furthermore, it would appear that the SME/management consulting paradigm offers a win-win
prospect. Tunwall and Buskin (1991) highlight the true valuation and appreciation of this support
by small and medium-sized enterprises, who only turn to outside advice if they are in real need.
Consulting and training projects within SMEs place the advisor in a central and visible position
within these organisations, resulting in the possibility of developing knowledge networks and
creating hubs for sharing concepts and experience on the one hand and allowing for deepening
of sector knowledge and valuable market relations on the other. Also the long-term impact and
the educational effect of the individual advisor’s work can be largely increased by a consulting
rather than solely information-based approach developing out of a deep process-understanding
of the specific customer needs and the joint framing of implementable solutions. Further to this a
possible shift from a staff identity to more of a more consultant identity may also result in
beneficial impacts on the self-esteem of the individual advisor regarding continuous training and
education as well as the variety and flexibility of services offered.

BARRIERS TO PROGRESS

As a region, the East of England has set itself economic and strategic targets that involve a re-
calibration of business support if it is to achieve its challenging aims. Whilst these aims may be

Management Consulting and International Business Support for SMEs: Need and Obstacles

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rationally sound, they are exposed to a degree of market-risk which may necessitate considerable
investment if the globally-oriented targets are to be achieved.

Tunwall and Buskin (1991) for example highlight several internal issues that are specifically
connected with consulting in smaller companies. Project costs are regarded by American
companies as a painful investment with average project budgets often less than $5,000, making
methodological accommodations to low budgets necessary, as for example prioritizing of the
intended project aims. The tendency towards rapid and spontaneous decision making that is
usually attributed to small companies might be seen as contradicting the rather long-term
orientation of consulting approaches. Certainly a high degree of scepticism was found regarding
the managers’ perception of the credibility of the consultant and the practicality of gaining access
to the information required to undertake consulting projects.

Wood (2002) furthermore finds that prospects for regional economic growth are dependent on
the availability of specialised consultancy skills which are part of ‘a global system of expertise
exchange'. Consultancy specialisation and success, for example in southern England, is being
reinforced by working with the corporate functions of large clients, including MNC’s. Wood goes
on to say that quasi-public development agencies across Europe may not be able to realise their
ambitions as the ‘pace of business change promoted by mainstream consultancy may be
outstripping the ability of such agencies to offer state-of-the art expertise’.

It is incumbent on the public authorities in the East of England to take these warnings very
seriously. Shifting from a domestic to an international focus entails the recognition and adoption
of competitive standards which will inevitably be higher than what was previously taken as the
norm. Whether the advisors currently employed have the skills and knowledge base to carry out
management consulting on a professionally competitive level is not clear. If not, a strategy will
be required to identify and inculcate those skills.

CONCLUSIONS

The East of England has adopted a strategy that presupposes the achievement of economic
performance by companies in the region to the highest of international standards. Agencies
which previously offered information-based exporting support services are now setting
themselves up as mediators of business investment in an attempt to help companies, both
outward and inward investing, operate effectively in a competitive global environment. The
management consulting model appears much better suited to this strategy than the
training/information model which accompanied the exporting phase. Flexible, relationship-based
business advice delivered by a highly skilled consultant is clearly what companies want.

To make this transition to a more solution-driven approach, quasi-public and private-sector

development agencies need to develop new capabilities that include operational services, finance
and marketing. Leveraging the high potential of such an approach requires the management of
mutual adaptation as well as constant learning. The development agencies will need to rethink
their strategies for skills development and recruitment as well as introduce more rigorous
concepts of performance measurement and organizational change. More importantly, awareness
of the new community and the new framework for service-driven management consulting has to
be created within these organizations including the break-up of established power structures in
order to enforce the shift towards a more consulting-oriented methodology. It will be a challenge
for reasons of cost, flexibility and geographical disadvantage in a region with relatively few multi-
national companies around which to make this transition.

Management Consulting and International Business Support for SMEs: Need and Obstacles

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In order to redress these deficiencies, the region might give thought to the promotion of
public/private sector alliances with large management consultancy providers, consultant
recruitment and skills-building strategies and partnerships with higher education providers of
management development. Together, these agencies might be able to package and brand
systems of SME support which replicate the consulting services supplied to large corporations by
leading management consultancy companies. To do so, they will have to draw on all the talent
available within the region and find economic formulae which can work to the satisfaction of all
partners.

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REFERENCES

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