Interim advisory arrangements are one of the most frequently misused forms of external support. Organisations sometimes reach for them when what they actually need is a defined project with a clear output. Other times, they are exactly the right tool. The difference matters, because the two things cost different amounts and produce different results.
What interim advisory is actually for ¶
An interim advisory arrangement makes sense when an organisation is navigating a specific transition that requires ongoing judgment rather than a defined deliverable. A funding round, a leadership change, a merger, a period of rapid growth: these are situations where the questions keep changing, where the value of external support is in the thinking partnership rather than the output, and where a defined project scope would be too rigid to be useful.
When a project engagement is better ¶
If you can describe what you need in terms of a specific output, a strategy document, a diagnostic report, a facilitated process, then a project engagement with a fixed scope and a fixed fee is almost certainly better than an advisory arrangement. It is cleaner, it is easier to evaluate, and it does not drift. Advisory arrangements that should have been projects tend to become expensive and vague.
The scope question ¶
The most important thing to get right in an interim advisory arrangement is the scope. Not the deliverables, which are by definition flexible, but the domain. What kinds of questions is the adviser there to help with? What is outside their remit? What decisions are they informing versus making? These questions need to be answered explicitly before the arrangement starts, and revisited every month or so to make sure they still reflect the actual situation.
How we structure interim advisory at Guild Branch ¶
Our interim advisory arrangements run for three to six months, with one day per week of named senior time. The scope is defined at the start and reviewed monthly. There is a clear end point, and a structured handover process at the close. We do not offer open-ended advisory arrangements, because in our experience they tend to drift in ways that are not good for the client or for us.
If you are trying to decide whether an interim advisory arrangement or a project engagement is the right fit for your situation, that is exactly the kind of question a discovery call is designed to answer. No charge, no obligation.