What do clients really buy from consulting? Someone who shares the decision

Clients buy one thing above all from consulting: someone who shares the decision. Any AI delivers knowledge in seconds today, but it doesn't deliver responsibility. That's my view as Felix Degeler, founder of Degeler Consulting (DC) in Vienna, and it explains why AI doesn't make consulting obsolete.

80 euros an hour to be told what you already know. The person who finds that most absurd is the one collecting the 80 euros. Someone who makes a living from exactly this told me the story recently, and it gets to the heart of what people actually pay for in consulting.

Why do clients pay for an answer they already know?

Because they don't want to carry the decision alone. Confirmation from someone with experience takes part of the weight off, and that's worth money to them.

Clients call with a request but already know the answer. Sometimes they even get told so: that just cost you 70 euros, why did you call at all?

The reply is the same every time: it's better if someone says once more that we decided correctly. It was told to me almost apologetically, as if it were undeserved money.

What do clients really buy from consulting?

Shared responsibility. That is the actual product of good consulting, even if no invoice calls it that.

Shared responsibility in consulting is the commitment not just to give a recommendation but to carry its consequences too: being reachable, adjusting course and standing behind your own assessment.

So my answer to the story was: that's exactly what you're allowed to charge for. People pay not to have to carry responsibility alone. And if what's hard for others comes easily to you, that is your product.

Whoever calls like that isn't looking for information. That was already on Google before, and today any AI delivers it in seconds. They're looking for someone to share the decision.

What can't AI do in consulting?

Share the weight. An AI can tell you what's right, but it can't stand next to you when it turns out wrong.

It isn't liable, it doesn't know the consequences from its own experience, and it isn't there the next day when things are on fire. It also doesn't know your people, the history with that supplier or the mood in the team after the last failed project, unless someone tells it.

What AI can do is still a lot: sort options, supply counterarguments, write drafts. At DC we work with Claude ourselves, following the human in the loop principle: the AI does the legwork, the human is responsible for the result. The same division of labour applies between consultant and client.

That's why I don't believe AI makes consulting obsolete. It only makes visible what consulting always was when it was good. More on why our industry has to reinvent itself: Consultants have a credibility problem.

How do I price consulting in the age of AI?

By the value of the responsibility you share, not by the hours in which you pass on knowledge. If you keep selling only time, you're selling exactly the part AI makes cheaper fastest.

An hourly rate measures effort. When an AI does the research in minutes, the effort shrinks, but the value of a well-supported decision doesn't. If you bill strictly by the hour, you get punished for your own efficiency.

That doesn't mean every engagement has to be a flat fee. It means your offer shows what you stand behind: which result, by when, with what availability. Then the client pays for what they actually buy and doesn't have to wonder why a short call costs so much.

How to make your shared responsibility visible as a consultant

By agreeing on it explicitly instead of delivering it silently. These four steps help.

Step 1, agree on the scope: before you start, set out which decisions you share and which you don't. In writing, in simple sentences. Our terms of use for working together show what that can look like before a project starts.

Step 2, be reachable when things are on fire: say which channel you use and how quickly you respond when a decision starts to wobble. The call the day after is often the moment your client actually paid for.

Step 3, offer results instead of hours: describe the result at the end in your offer, not the hours you need for it. That's how we work at DC: implementation through to the result instead of slides.

Step 4, document decisions: record who decided what, on which basis and when. That protects both sides and later makes it traceable that you didn't just guess but shared the weight.

The test question for every offer: can your client say in one sentence what you stand behind? If not, you're selling knowledge, and they can get that for free now.

Where does shared responsibility in consulting end?

At the decision itself. The client always makes it, and what a consultant is liable for is set out in the contract.

Sharing doesn't mean taking over. A consultant who pulls decisions towards themselves makes the client dependent and takes away exactly what the client needs in their own company: the ability to decide for themselves.

Shared responsibility isn't a liability promise either. The legal side belongs cleanly in the contract, not in gut feeling. What I carry is the quality of my recommendation and my presence when it counts.

And sometimes you don't need consulting at all. If you only want a technical question answered and make the decision alone anyway, an AI or a good reference book will serve you well. Paid consulting pays off where responsibility weighs heavily.