IBM Now Wants their Consultants to Code. What’s Happening?

For decades, consulting was about slide decks, strategy frameworks, and long meetings that ended with a glossy report. But according to IBM, that era is ending fast.

A joint survey by IBM and Oxford Economics found that 86% of global executives buying consulting services now want AI and tech assets, not just strategy and advice.

In an interview with the Financial Times, Mohamad Ali, head of IBM Consulting, put it bluntly:

“The future of consulting is software.”

According to Ali, consulting firms need to act like tech companies — build reusable AI products, automate insights, and create tangible tools — not just slide decks. In doing so, they can evolve their delivery model and avoid becoming irrelevant in today’s AI-driven economy.

In recent years, AI has been challenging the traditional consulting business model that operated like a pyramid. This meant armies of junior analysts crunched data and synthesized research, while senior partners sold big-picture strategy and fostered relationships with clients clients.

As the Harvard Business Review explains, tools like generative AI and large language models now do much of the data collection, analysis, and synthesis that entry-level consultants used to handle.

When algorithms can summarize industry research or generate client-ready decks in minutes, the traditional pyramid flattens fast. Consulting firms are thus realizing they can’t just charge for hours — they need to deliver software-driven value at scale.

IBM isn’t waiting around. The company is redesigning consulting from the inside out, betting big on agentic AI — systems that can act semi-autonomously to support business workflows.

By building these AI platforms directly into client solutions, IBM is reshaping what it sells: less advice, more tools.

Their IBM Institute for Business Value report argues that AI shouldn’t replace consultants — it should augment them, helping deliver collaborative, democratized, and evidence-driven outcomes. As a result, AI has been at the forefront of IBM’s reported $3.5 billion in cost-savings in two years.

And it’s not just IBM, too. Other consulting giants are racing down the same path. IBM rival McKinsey built its own AI assistant, Lilli, cutting research time by 30%.

Meanwhile, Deloitte and PwC rolled out their respective agentic AI applications, Zora and Agent OS, to optimize business workflows and support client-facing services like analysis, scenario modeling, and decision-making.

Still, this shift comes with a catch. When your client deliverables depend on AI tools, accuracy and accountability suddenly get complicated.

Just ask Deloitte Australia, which had to partially refund the government after an AI-assisted report included fabricated quotes and technical errors.

It’s a reminder that the growing intersection between consulting and AI can be powerful, but also complicated.

The more firms automate their insights, the more they’ll need real governance, training, and review systems to prevent “AI hallucinations” from making their way into official reports.

Clearly, the winning consulting firms of the next decade won’t just be the smartest — they’ll be the most software-driven.

Today’s consultants must not only craft the best strategy slide but also embed AI models effectively into their client offerings. And as the AI race among top consulting firms continues, this may also reshape what tech careers look like.