Forrester Research

Exceeded Consulting Bookings Targets Amid 2008 Financial Crisis

Heading into 2008, I stepped into leadership of the overall consulting team with an ambitious bookings target already in place; one made significantly harder by the onset of the financial crisis, which put immediate pressure on client budgets across the board. The challenge was clear: how to hit an aggressive goal while the market environment worked directly against us. To address this, I restructured the consulting team to unify scoping, proposal development, and delivery under a single, more integrated model, eliminating friction between the stages of the sales-to-delivery pipeline. I partnered closely with our business development directors and sales leaders to align priorities and ensure consulting was tightly coupled with the broader sales motion. I also introduced a weekly pipeline review process to track deal progress in real time and flag at-risk opportunities early enough to intervene. These efforts paid off: the team achieved 109% of our 2008 bookings target, and then 104% of our 2009 goal despite the financial crisis headwinds. Beyond the numbers, beating the target during a downturn earned the consulting practice greater credibility with sales leadership, and validated the restructured team model as a lasting success, one that reshaped how consulting operated going forward.