What in the world is an anti-consultant?!

Traditional professional services and consulting is broken.

The endless PowerPoint decks, the army of junior consultants learning on your dime, the bloated retainers for strategy that never sees the light of day. Companies actually building the future don’t have time for that.

That’s why we’ve built StealthX around being anti-consultants. We’re not here to fill seats, waste time, or drown you in frameworks recycled from the last five clients. We’re here to get sh*t done.

I recently sat down with my friend and former colleague — Ronnie Battista on the Building Great Experiences podcast. He flipped the tables on me mid-episode and asked a really good question: What does being an anti-consultant actually mean?

So let’s break it down, because this isn’t just about StealthX. It’s about how you can apply this thinking to your team, your company, and the way you work.

1. Less words, more work

The old way: meetings about meetings, decks about decks, hours billed for conversations that don’t actually move the needle.

The anti-consultant way: Cut the fluff. Get to execution. Solve the problem.

How to apply this:

  • Kill useless meetings. If it doesn’t move the work forward, it shouldn’t exist.

  • Swap long presentations for rapid prototypes, MVPs, and testable experiments.

  • Make decisions in hours/days, not weeks/months.

2. No jargon, no BS

Traditional consultants hide behind jargon to justify their existence. If you’ve ever sat through a meeting thinking, What the hell did they just say?, you know what I mean.

The anti-consultant way: Say what you mean. Be brutally clear. If a strategy needs 40 slides to explain, it’s not a strategy. It’s noise.

How to apply this:

  • Speak like a human. Ditch the buzzwords.

  • Make every deliverable actionable. If it can’t be executed, it’s useless.

  • Create a “no jargon” rule in your org. If someone can’t explain their idea simply, they don’t understand it.

3. Build, don’t just advise

The old way: consultants hand over a shiny report, shake your hand, and leave you to figure it out.

The anti-consultant way: If we recommend something, we’re in the trenches executing alongside you. We don’t just tell you what to do. We help make it real.

How to apply this:

  • Hold teams accountable to execution, not just ideas.

  • Prioritize working sessions over passive presentations.

  • Hire people who can both strategize and build.

4. No copy-paste consulting

Big consultancies reuse the same slide decks for different clients. That’s why all their strategies sound the same.

The anti-consultant way: every engagement is unique. Every problem requires a new approach. No templates, no plug-and-play BS.

How to apply this:

  • Stop copying what other companies are doing. Solve your problems.

  • Challenge teams to build from first principles instead of using cookie-cutter solutions.

  • Demand fresh thinking, not repackaged ideas.

5. We don’t exist to sell more work

The old way: consulting firms measure success by how long they can keep you on the hook. The longer the engagement, the better.

The anti-consultant way: Like SEALs, we solve the problem, get you moving, and get out.

How to apply this:

  • Reward efficiency, not just effort.

  • Avoid work that feels like it’s being stretched out just to justify a budget.

  • Partner with teams that focus on delivering impact, not maximizing billable hours.

6. Kill the discovery phase bloat

The old way: spend months in discovery, gathering insights, building decks, and burning budget before doing anything.

The anti-consultant way: get to action as fast as possible. Research should be lean, fast, and directly connected to implementation.

How to apply this:

  • Set hard limits on research. Get what you need and move.

  • Use AI to accelerate insights and eliminate repetitive work.

  • Make sure every discovery phase leads directly to execution.

7. Small, elite teams > bloated armies

Big consultancies bring in huge teams, often with junior staff learning on the job at your expense.

The anti-consultant way: lean, expert teams that move faster and deliver more impact.

How to apply this:

  • Hire small, high-caliber teams instead of large, slow-moving groups.

  • Measure output, not hours worked.

  • Build a culture of problem solvers, not just task executors.

8. AI-first thinking

Traditional firms are still doing things the way they did a decade ago. We use AI, automation, and new tools to move faster and eliminate waste.

How to apply this:

  • Automate repetitive work to free up time for real problem-solving.

  • Make AI part of every workflow, not just a separate experiment.

  • Reward teams that embrace new tools and work smarter.

Wrapping Up

Being an anti-consultant isn’t just about what we do at StealthX. It’s about how work should be done. It’s about cutting through the noise, eliminating the bloat, and getting straight to solving problems.

So here’s my question to you: How can you apply this mindset to your team? What’s one thing you can do this week to work faster, smarter, and with less BS?

Let’s make work better. Let’s make it real.

And if you want to see this philosophy in action, check out our 4-part commercial series on what it means to be an anti-consultant. Videos are embedded below. Watch and let me know what you think 🤘

Onward & upward,
Drew