The Blog
Long-form essays, field notes, and frameworks from the FIRMSconsulting team — published weekly.
All posts
Published weekly-
They Left Elite Consulting Firms To Build Their Own. Here Are 9 Questions They Asked
Eight senior partners left the world’s most respected consulting firms to start their own boutique. Before writing a single proposal, they spent twelve hours answering nine questions most firms never bother to ask. Here is what they decided, and why it matters for your consulting career in 2026.
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Having insights doesn’t mean you are celebrated
Being right is not enough. When your value depends on other people believing what you see, having insights can become a dangerous position. A letter on identity, the Semmelweis reflex, and the price of carrying your insights into the world.
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The Rate-Limiting Step That Will Slow AI
The rollout of AI has a built-in, organic rate-limiting step that will naturally throttle its rollout, dramatically increase its cost of use, and, in the end, make that rollout far more thoughtful. The rate-limiting step that will slow AI. Everyone – from companies to cities to countries to individuals – is going all in on…
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When Someone Erases Everything They Know About You
A misread word nearly ended a years-long relationship. Why the most dangerous thing a leader can do is judge someone on a single frame instead of the whole film.
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Prompt Engineering Is the Self-Checkout of AI
Prompt engineering is not a skill to master. It is shadow work AI companies offload onto you. Good AI carries the burden — you shouldn’t have to.
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A perfect corporate sleight of hand becomes tougher with AI
Every expert who sells judgment is scored on results — except advice, outside or internal. Real accountability means being measured against banked value.
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They Complain and Envy You
A short letter on reinventing yourself: if your life isn’t working, why not rewrite it? On changing your identity, paying the price for a reimagined life, and why others complain and envy those who do the work.
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If You Are Not Growing, You Are Degrading
A letter on why the most successful leaders never stop investing in themselves. Through the stories of two exceptional clients, why building capability that stays with you for life beats any quick fix or shortcut.
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A Company Is Not Valued on Its Past. Neither Are We.
Most people cannot tell the difference between a bad decision and a bad outcome. Here is how to tell a real setback from a right decision that simply has not paid off yet — and how to rebuild momentum after a streak of them.
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AI Strategy Is Not a Strategy
Most companies launch an AI strategy without asking how it serves the corporate strategy. It must — long term, that means the ROIC–WACC spread and growth.
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The Success Trap: Breaking the Cycle of Never Enough (with Brooke Taylor)
Brooke Taylor spent more than a decade inside high-performance environments, including leadership roles at Google, before turning her attention to a question that many accomplished professionals quietly wrestle with: why does achievement so often fail to produce a lasting sense of fulfillment? In this conversation, she examines what she calls the “success wound” — the…
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Adjunct Professor at Cornell University, Cheryl Strauss Einhorn, on Critical Thinking vs. AI
In this conversation with Cheryl Strauss Einhorn, the discussion examines what happens to judgment and critical thinking as AI becomes embedded in daily decision-making. Drawing on her background as an investigative journalist at Barron’s, Einhorn explains how questioning assumptions and searching for disconfirming evidence shaped the development of her AREA Method for decision-making. She argues…