Business Model Configurations in the Consulting Sector
Anagnostopoulos, Panagiotis Georgios (2015)
Anagnostopoulos, Panagiotis Georgios
2015
Kuvaus
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Tiivistelmä
The current global financial crisis might have been pledging deeply economies and various business sectors around the world, but not that deeply the KIBS, and particularly the consulting industry, in Finland. To comprehend the particular phenomenon, the research lens is steered towards the successful Finnish business consulting companies and their business models. The particular lens investigates maps of different business model configurations which represent combinations of business model components related to the internal and the external environment of a company. Such focus captures a hollistic picture of the Finnish business consulting industry and the way involved companies operate. Hence, the motivation for the execution and the primary objective of this study is to identify the types of business model configurations successful Finnish business consulting companies apply.
There are two key theoretical areas that this thesis examines so to provide a solid picture of the different types of business model configuration in the Finnish consulting industry. Firstly, it appears important to comprehend the business model concept and identify the different suggested-in-time configurations through a systematic literature review, and secondly to understand the nature and the behaviour of the KIBS companies, and particularly of the consulting ones. Hence, the literature part of this thesis examines retrospectively and systematically published articles in journals and books regarding these two key theoretical areas. To further extent and in support to the drawing of a holistic picture, the thesis introduces findings of a qualitative empirical study from the Finnish business consulting industry by using semi-structured interviews with people from the higher levels of the companies.
The findings of the study suggest that there are 29 different types of business model configurations applied by the business and management consulting firms in Finland. Upon their commonalities, these types were assigned to configurational patterns. In particular, the six types form a pattern of two levels and each level consists of three distinct types of configurations. Two more types of configurations out of the 29 are also deduced each distinctly to a pattern. The rest of the 21 types of business model configurations are claimed as individual types of business model configurations that cannot be patterned further. The name and the description of each pattern and each configuration are all available under the section with the name Synthesis.
There are two key theoretical areas that this thesis examines so to provide a solid picture of the different types of business model configuration in the Finnish consulting industry. Firstly, it appears important to comprehend the business model concept and identify the different suggested-in-time configurations through a systematic literature review, and secondly to understand the nature and the behaviour of the KIBS companies, and particularly of the consulting ones. Hence, the literature part of this thesis examines retrospectively and systematically published articles in journals and books regarding these two key theoretical areas. To further extent and in support to the drawing of a holistic picture, the thesis introduces findings of a qualitative empirical study from the Finnish business consulting industry by using semi-structured interviews with people from the higher levels of the companies.
The findings of the study suggest that there are 29 different types of business model configurations applied by the business and management consulting firms in Finland. Upon their commonalities, these types were assigned to configurational patterns. In particular, the six types form a pattern of two levels and each level consists of three distinct types of configurations. Two more types of configurations out of the 29 are also deduced each distinctly to a pattern. The rest of the 21 types of business model configurations are claimed as individual types of business model configurations that cannot be patterned further. The name and the description of each pattern and each configuration are all available under the section with the name Synthesis.