10 questions every consulting firm should ask before closing 2025

Some boutiques crushed 2025 with strong margins and predictable pipeline. Others didn't do so well - barely scraping by as they fought fires and padded hours.

If you want to put your best foot forward for 2026, you should be using 2025 as your crystal ball.

Here are the ten essential questions every boutique consulting firm should ask before closing 2025.

Be sure to check out our 25 essential KPIs checklist while you're here!

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1) Did your pricing & SOWs actually reflect reality?

Boutique firms often fall into the trap of acting bigger than they are by offering enterprise-level scope with a five-person team.

Ask yourself:

• Where did we underprice because we wanted to win?
• Which deliverables consistently took longer than estimated?
• How often did we cave on scope because saying “no” felt risky?

Pricing errors hit harder for smaller firms. A single underpriced SOW could wipe out margin for the quarter.

2) Which clients consumed resources faster than they generated revenue?

One bad-fit client can sink a boutique's utilization model.

Identify clients who:

• Needed too much handholding
• Blew through meeting and revision limits
• Required senior staff attention without paying senior-level rates

3) Who on your team has the skills you’ll actually need before the next pipeline hits?

As a smaller firm, you don't have bench depth to waste.

So you can't wait until a contract is signed to discover:

• You don't have enough capacity in a technical specialty
• Your PMs can’t manage multi-workstream engagements
• Your senior consultants are doing associate-level work

4) Which projects should never see the light of day again?

Don't just reflect on the projects that worked well - reflect on the ones that went not so well.

You know the ones:

• Profit-negative from day one
• Misaligned with your positioning
• Work that doesn’t build portfolio value
• Engagements you only took because “it was good money”

5) Who on your team was benched, and who was overworked?

A single person benched for months is a major cost. A single person overworked for months is a flight risk.

Utilization imbalances can have a much more devastating impact for boutiques.

Look for:

• Roles that were overutilized (red flag for capacity planning)
• Roles that were underutilized (red flag for positioning or sales)
• People who carried more emotional labor than their title reflects

6) Do you know your profit per engagement? Your real winners and losers?

Boutique firms thrive (or die) at the engagement level - it's critical to know your profit per engagement.

You need clarity on:

• Which services have the highest margin
• Which clients repeatedly result in write-downs
• Which delivery models (fixed-fee, retainer, hourly) actually work for your size

7) Did your pipeline deliver, or did it just look good on paper?

A bloated pipeline creates false confidence. You should be aiming for a pipeline that predicts reality rather optimism.

Ask yourself:

• How many proposals died late in the cycle?
• How many “verbal yeses” never materialized?
• How accurate were your forecasted close dates?

8) Are you reinvesting wisely?

When you have surplus cashflow, it matters where you put it.

Can extra cash fund training, new tools, or growth initiatives?

Smart firms ask:

• Did we reinvest in skill development that gives us pricing power?
• Did we adopt tools that reduce delivery drag or admin overhead?
• Did we support marketing initiatives that actually generate inbound demand?

9) Did your close rate improve as planned, or is there a sales gap to fix?

A lot of smaller firms make the mistake of relying on founders to sell rather than establishing a formal sales function.

Which means:

• Low close rates are felt immediately
• Founder bandwidth becomes a bottleneck
• Proposals take too long to produce

If 2025’s close rate didn't improve - or even declined - then you have a sales problem, not a market problem.

10) How hard was it to find this data?

Do you have the visibility you need to forecast 2026?

This one's the quiet killer. Most boutique firms store data in notepads, brains and spreadsheets.

If answering these questions required some detective work, you might not be ready for 2026.

2026 will reward firms with clean, centralized, and accessible data. That's because better data leads to better decisions, better pricing, better forecasting, and better margins.

If you think you're lacking in this department, you should check out our guide on Professional Services Automation (PSA) software.