Management consulting effectiveness: Contribution of the working alliance and the consultant’s attachment orientation.

Despite growing interests in understanding the effectiveness of consulting in organizational settings, the contribution of individual and interpersonal factors suggested in the literature has yet to be determined. This article examines the relationship between the client-consultant working alliance, the consultant’s attachment orientation and consulting effectiveness from the consultant’s viewpoint. Self-report questionnaires were administered to 193 internal and external consultants in Canada. The hierarchical regression analyses suggested that the professional agreement dimension of the working alliance was the strongest predictor of consulting effectiveness as perceived by consultants, in terms of both process and outcomes. Additionally, the consultant’s attachment orientation, whether anxious or avoidant, moderated the associations between the working alliance and consulting effectiveness. These findings shed new light on factors contributing to consulting effectiveness from the consultant’s perspective and pave the way for innovative avenues in consultants’ training and professional practice development.