Senior Advisory Lead (Ref: 197737)

Management consulting and business services work at the centre of this organisation’s offering, with advisory teams helping clients address complex strategic, operational, and transformation priorities. In the absence of a more detailed company profile, the opportunity is positioned within a professional services environment where rigorous analysis, practical recommendations, and measurable client outcomes guide engagements. Based in Chicago, the role supports work that connects senior decision-makers with clear options for growth, performance improvement, and sustainable value creation.

The Senior Advisory Lead will direct high-impact advisory engagements, translating complex client challenges into commercially sound strategies and executable programmes. This role combines senior stakeholder counsel, structured problem-solving, engagement leadership, and the development of pragmatic recommendations that improve performance and support strategic decisions.

Success will involve earning the confidence of executive clients, maintaining high standards across concurrent workstreams, and turning insight into action. The postholder will also strengthen advisory capability by coaching consultants, shaping propositions, contributing to growth initiatives, and ensuring that delivery remains aligned with client objectives, scope, quality, and commercial expectations.

Based in Chicago, the position may support clients across locations and sectors, requiring adaptability, confident communication, and sound judgement in situations where priorities evolve quickly. The role suits an experienced consultant or professional services leader who can move comfortably between board-level discussions, team direction, commercial development, and detailed engagement oversight.

• Set the direction for complex advisory engagements, establishing clear outcomes, milestones, governance, and measures of success.
• Diagnose client issues through structured analysis of business performance, operating models, market conditions, and organisational priorities.
• Convert findings into concise recommendations, decision papers, transformation roadmaps, and implementation plans for senior stakeholders.
• Lead client workshops and executive discussions, creating alignment across competing interests and maintaining momentum toward agreed outcomes.
• Oversee multidisciplinary delivery teams, allocating work effectively and safeguarding quality, pace, consistency, and commercial discipline.
• Identify delivery risks early, resolve escalated issues, and adjust engagement plans as client needs or market conditions change.
• Build trusted relationships with senior client sponsors and expand the organisation’s relevance through credible, outcome-focused advice.
• Contribute to proposals, account planning, solution design, scoping, pricing, and the conversion of qualified business opportunities.
• Develop junior and mid-level colleagues through coaching, feedback, knowledge sharing, and purposeful delegation.
• Support the creation of reusable methodologies, market perspectives, case studies, and practical intellectual capital.
• Track engagement economics, resource utilisation, client satisfaction, and delivery performance against agreed expectations.
• Represent the advisory practice with professionalism in client meetings, industry conversations, and internal leadership forums.

• Significant experience in management consulting, business advisory, professional services, or a closely related strategic role.
• A strong record of leading complex engagements from initial problem definition through recommendation and implementation planning.
• Demonstrated ability to advise executive stakeholders and communicate difficult or highly technical subjects with clarity.
• Commercial awareness covering scope management, proposal development, pricing, account growth, and engagement profitability.
• Advanced analytical and problem-solving capability, supported by a disciplined approach to evidence, synthesis, and decision-making.
• Experience directing multidisciplinary teams and developing consultants through practical coaching and constructive challenge.
• Exceptional written and verbal communication skills, including the ability to produce persuasive presentations and executive-ready materials.
• Confidence operating with ambiguity, shifting priorities, sensitive information, and demanding client expectations.
• Sound judgement, personal accountability, and the ability to build credibility quickly with diverse stakeholders.
• A bachelor’s degree in business, economics, finance, engineering, social sciences, or another relevant discipline; postgraduate study is advantageous.
• Ability to work from or regularly access the Chicago area and travel to client locations when engagement requirements call for it.
• Commitment to ethical, inclusive, and high-quality professional practice across every client and internal interaction.

• Exposure to senior client stakeholders and strategically significant assignments with visible business impact.
• Opportunities to shape advisory propositions, market perspectives, and the organisation’s approach to complex client challenges.
• Structured access to leadership coaching, peer learning, and development through varied engagement experience.
• Scope to influence team standards, mentor emerging consultants, and build a lasting contribution beyond individual projects.
• A professional services setting that rewards clear thinking, commercial initiative, and consistently strong client delivery.
• Potential flexibility around working arrangements, subject to client commitments, engagement needs, and business requirements.
• Competitive benefits may include healthcare coverage, retirement support, paid leave, wellbeing resources, and professional development assistance, subject to the applicable package.
• A Chicago-based platform with opportunities to collaborate across practices, client sectors, and geographic markets.

The Senior Advisory Lead will be expected to combine strategic perspective with dependable execution. Candidates should be ready to demonstrate how their advice has influenced decisions, improved performance, managed risk, or enabled meaningful organisational change.

Engagement patterns, travel requirements, and working arrangements will vary according to client needs. Specific compensation, benefits eligibility, and employment conditions will be confirmed during the selection process.