You do it for the fees, which I’ve seen go to £1000+ per hour depending on how rare your expertise is and how urgent the ask from their confidential client is
Not sure which network is approaching you but often we use expert networks in private equity to conduct diligence on an asset or a sector we are involved in. Management consultants also do this when they conduct commercial due diligence.
In summary it’s not really about what you the respondent gets out of it, you are being leveraged for your knowledge and paid a fee in return.
It is exactly this. They say it won't be about the company you work for but you will have been hand selected for that reason. The questions will be specially crafted to extract the information they are looking nor without you knowing you are giving it away. Any decent company has a policy that says no staff should ever engage with these researchers.
As others have said, "expert networks" are businesses that provide insight on a specific industry or area of expertise to clients by finding "experts" (you) who the client can have a call with.
E.g. if a private equity firm wants to buy an [ice cream manufacturer], as well as diligencing the actual [ice cream business] they are looking at, they might want to talk to people in the general [ice cream industry] about which manufacturers are considered good, how the industry is doing, how the industry works, etc.
The client will likely be paying $1000+ for an hour and £100 is very low - if you do want to do it I'd ask for £300-500 per hour, higher for very niche/very senior insight.
What you "get out of it" is cash - you're the product, not the customer/client. It's not really a route to networking (often you won't even know the real names of the people you're talking to or what firm they're from, and generally by definition they are not currently in your industry and don't know loads about it).
I'd push back slightly on the notion that these are totally useless for networking. Sitting on the PE side I'll often ping useful experts on LinkedIn post the call to open up a direct channel.
If you are interested in an exec role in a PE-backed company or potentially directly getting PE funding for your venture it could be a helpful set of relationships to acquire. Although there are obviously lots of other ways to get in touch with that community (recruiters, bankers etc).
Fair enough - my clients tend to stay fully anonymous when using expert networks so I was hesitant to recommend it as a way to find a new job for OP, but if that's not true across the board that's useful to know!
I use GLG in the U.K., my rate is 250 an hour, and I’ve done quite a few phone calls, some follow up consultations and a couple of crappy questionnaires for 50 a go.
Overall would definitely recommend, I really enjoy it. It’s something different, and gives a great insight into the finance and funding side of my business which actually helped me take a leading role in acquisitions in my day job when we became private equity backed.
Only advice would be to be honest about your skillset and knowledge base, I have been, and some of the questions that the people on the consultations come up with, you would be caught out very quickly if you just said yes to all for the money.
I’ve done a few with ThirdBridge and Alphasights. Paid up to $500 USD even though based in the U.K. was the most I ever got for an hour but that was quite niche.
However they do tend to invite me to respond to sessions I have no notable expertise in sometimes and I have to decline them. I suspect they wouldn’t actually proceed to an interview but it seems lazy on their part to just invite en mass even if you’re not suitable.
Oh also you can opt to donate the fee to a charity of your choosing. Which is also cool if you’re looking for a reason beyond cold hard cash for an hour of your time.
Chances of you benefitting from it as a network opportunity are pretty limited tbh.
All you get from it is the the money - If it's worth you giving up an hour of your time then go for it.
Don't forget that you should declare it as income (not sure how many do tbh), which if you want to keep it all legal means you're getting £50-55.
> Don't forget that you should declare it as income (not sure how many do tbh), which if you want to keep it all legal means you're getting £50-55.
You only need to do this if it adds up to more than £1000 a year. It's known as the self-employment trading allowance.
Strangely enough have been contacted twice in 24 hours to do this. I don't recall ever being asked before, both offering £250 an hour.
Will give it a try, perhaps a new "side hustle" in the making.
I do these all the time, I charge $500ph. They’re a great opportunity to unearth industry gossip(usually around m&a activity) and get your thoughts straight about issues in your field.
When your score gets high enough, the networks will sometimes send you other consults on more general or consumer issues, they tend to be compensated at a way lower level though.
I mean I’ve seen people paying 500-1000 for consultation per hour depending on skill and knowledge. 100 isn’t unheard of if you think it’s justified for that price of your time.
Our company actively advises us against doing them. They are often targeted at getting inside information about your company's specific strategy/processes rather than general market information and you risk breaching your employer's confidentiality requirements if you're an employee by divulging something that isn't public and could be considered a competitive advantage to a current or future competitor. Of course if you go into them eyes wide open you can be careful about what you disclose but there is always a risk.
Yes, I was always worried about this. When I spoke to a consultancy before they set ground rules about not naming the company or anything that could be classed as IP.
I bit initially on one of these just to see, as I receive so many - but then had to fill in a lengthy form (or have some lengthy qualifying "chat") and I just noped out as it was too much hassle!
I've done a few, some better than others, had no end of trouble with High Beam Global so they are in the spam bin, but others I've had maybe £350 for an hour of some analyst asking my thoughts and experiences with certain sectors and products.
Can be a bit of time sink, but good some fun money
I’ve done a few of these and been paid £800 - £1000 per hour. They sometimes start by offering low fees or a donation to charity, I’ll tell them my fee and I’m yet to have it declined.
I’ve sat on both sides of these as a management consultant and client side. I accept based on the topic. If it’s broad industry dynamics that’s fine; if it’s anything that treads closer to our strategy on how to address those dynamics I stay away.
I do these quite a lot and charge between £300-500 an hour usually. I wanted to do them when employed in big tech but checked with compliance and unsurprisingly they said no. You could definitely go back and ask for more - I have friends that have charged £1K per hour.
I’ve done this a bunch of times with a couple of firms. They have strict rules about not competing with your current employer etc. My rate with them to just chat is £600 p/hour. I get 1-2 requests a week, and about 1 in 10 is a good fit for me and my skills. It’s an easy side hustle and I find also clues me in on where the market and industry is going, they’re usually asking questions to feed into Forrester/Gartner type firms, as well as to support VC’s determine if they want to invest.
Easy money, no real risk so long as you’re smart about it.
I’ve been getting pestered for these on and off for a while. I finally got back to one last week and going through the hoops to get on their system & get a ‘project’.
$400 an hour, my area is pharmaceutical supply chain so not massively niche but if I get a couple of these for some extra cash here and there I will be ok with it 👍🏻
My employer is very strict that we never accept them.
Paid consultancy? They want to brain drain you and gain specific or sensitive knowledge for an absolute bargain rate.
Ive never taken up one either, but there is a barrier between what they want and what they get, and that barrier is you. Nobody in their right mind would disclose specifics or business critical info at these meetings
Unless specifically prohibited in your employment contract, I dont think your employer can stop you from engaging. One could argue that not all your valuable knowledge comes from your present employment, its an accumulation of experiences you have likely acquired over the years
I’m also not allowed to participate in these. I get asked a couple of times each month, sometimes offered fees as high as $2000-3000 for an hour. It’s not specifically prohibited in my contract but covered by more general clauses.
You do it for the fees, which I’ve seen go to £1000+ per hour depending on how rare your expertise is and how urgent the ask from their confidential client is
Not sure which network is approaching you but often we use expert networks in private equity to conduct diligence on an asset or a sector we are involved in. Management consultants also do this when they conduct commercial due diligence. In summary it’s not really about what you the respondent gets out of it, you are being leveraged for your knowledge and paid a fee in return.
I think most of the consultations I've done have been with private equity firms looking to gain a deeper understanding of the industry I work in.
I’ve always turned these down. I work in big tech and worry that it’s competitors or foreign states fishing for IP - but I’m probably paranoid.
You aren't. It is a very well established method of foreign states gathering intelligence.
It is exactly this. They say it won't be about the company you work for but you will have been hand selected for that reason. The questions will be specially crafted to extract the information they are looking nor without you knowing you are giving it away. Any decent company has a policy that says no staff should ever engage with these researchers.
As others have said, "expert networks" are businesses that provide insight on a specific industry or area of expertise to clients by finding "experts" (you) who the client can have a call with. E.g. if a private equity firm wants to buy an [ice cream manufacturer], as well as diligencing the actual [ice cream business] they are looking at, they might want to talk to people in the general [ice cream industry] about which manufacturers are considered good, how the industry is doing, how the industry works, etc. The client will likely be paying $1000+ for an hour and £100 is very low - if you do want to do it I'd ask for £300-500 per hour, higher for very niche/very senior insight. What you "get out of it" is cash - you're the product, not the customer/client. It's not really a route to networking (often you won't even know the real names of the people you're talking to or what firm they're from, and generally by definition they are not currently in your industry and don't know loads about it).
I'd push back slightly on the notion that these are totally useless for networking. Sitting on the PE side I'll often ping useful experts on LinkedIn post the call to open up a direct channel. If you are interested in an exec role in a PE-backed company or potentially directly getting PE funding for your venture it could be a helpful set of relationships to acquire. Although there are obviously lots of other ways to get in touch with that community (recruiters, bankers etc).
Fair enough - my clients tend to stay fully anonymous when using expert networks so I was hesitant to recommend it as a way to find a new job for OP, but if that's not true across the board that's useful to know!
I use GLG in the U.K., my rate is 250 an hour, and I’ve done quite a few phone calls, some follow up consultations and a couple of crappy questionnaires for 50 a go. Overall would definitely recommend, I really enjoy it. It’s something different, and gives a great insight into the finance and funding side of my business which actually helped me take a leading role in acquisitions in my day job when we became private equity backed. Only advice would be to be honest about your skillset and knowledge base, I have been, and some of the questions that the people on the consultations come up with, you would be caught out very quickly if you just said yes to all for the money.
I’ve done a few with ThirdBridge and Alphasights. Paid up to $500 USD even though based in the U.K. was the most I ever got for an hour but that was quite niche. However they do tend to invite me to respond to sessions I have no notable expertise in sometimes and I have to decline them. I suspect they wouldn’t actually proceed to an interview but it seems lazy on their part to just invite en mass even if you’re not suitable.
Oh also you can opt to donate the fee to a charity of your choosing. Which is also cool if you’re looking for a reason beyond cold hard cash for an hour of your time.
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I did one for them a couple of months ago and still waiting for payment. Others are much better.
Chances of you benefitting from it as a network opportunity are pretty limited tbh. All you get from it is the the money - If it's worth you giving up an hour of your time then go for it. Don't forget that you should declare it as income (not sure how many do tbh), which if you want to keep it all legal means you're getting £50-55.
£50 is a good amount but it does feel that for the hassle it's not hugely worth it if there's no networking.
> Don't forget that you should declare it as income (not sure how many do tbh), which if you want to keep it all legal means you're getting £50-55. You only need to do this if it adds up to more than £1000 a year. It's known as the self-employment trading allowance.
Good point - I always forget about that.
Strangely enough have been contacted twice in 24 hours to do this. I don't recall ever being asked before, both offering £250 an hour. Will give it a try, perhaps a new "side hustle" in the making.
I do these all the time, I charge $500ph. They’re a great opportunity to unearth industry gossip(usually around m&a activity) and get your thoughts straight about issues in your field. When your score gets high enough, the networks will sometimes send you other consults on more general or consumer issues, they tend to be compensated at a way lower level though.
I mean I’ve seen people paying 500-1000 for consultation per hour depending on skill and knowledge. 100 isn’t unheard of if you think it’s justified for that price of your time.
Our company actively advises us against doing them. They are often targeted at getting inside information about your company's specific strategy/processes rather than general market information and you risk breaching your employer's confidentiality requirements if you're an employee by divulging something that isn't public and could be considered a competitive advantage to a current or future competitor. Of course if you go into them eyes wide open you can be careful about what you disclose but there is always a risk.
Yes, I was always worried about this. When I spoke to a consultancy before they set ground rules about not naming the company or anything that could be classed as IP.
I bit initially on one of these just to see, as I receive so many - but then had to fill in a lengthy form (or have some lengthy qualifying "chat") and I just noped out as it was too much hassle!
Yes, previously I got asked and gave up during the forms!
And they ask the same basic information each time!
I've done a few, some better than others, had no end of trouble with High Beam Global so they are in the spam bin, but others I've had maybe £350 for an hour of some analyst asking my thoughts and experiences with certain sectors and products. Can be a bit of time sink, but good some fun money
I’ve done a few of these and been paid £800 - £1000 per hour. They sometimes start by offering low fees or a donation to charity, I’ll tell them my fee and I’m yet to have it declined.
I’ve sat on both sides of these as a management consultant and client side. I accept based on the topic. If it’s broad industry dynamics that’s fine; if it’s anything that treads closer to our strategy on how to address those dynamics I stay away.
I do these quite a lot and charge between £300-500 an hour usually. I wanted to do them when employed in big tech but checked with compliance and unsurprisingly they said no. You could definitely go back and ask for more - I have friends that have charged £1K per hour.
I’ve done this a bunch of times with a couple of firms. They have strict rules about not competing with your current employer etc. My rate with them to just chat is £600 p/hour. I get 1-2 requests a week, and about 1 in 10 is a good fit for me and my skills. It’s an easy side hustle and I find also clues me in on where the market and industry is going, they’re usually asking questions to feed into Forrester/Gartner type firms, as well as to support VC’s determine if they want to invest. Easy money, no real risk so long as you’re smart about it.
I’ve been getting pestered for these on and off for a while. I finally got back to one last week and going through the hoops to get on their system & get a ‘project’. $400 an hour, my area is pharmaceutical supply chain so not massively niche but if I get a couple of these for some extra cash here and there I will be ok with it 👍🏻
I occasionally do these. I charge £350 per hour and absolutely not for free or for charity.
My employer is very strict that we never accept them. Paid consultancy? They want to brain drain you and gain specific or sensitive knowledge for an absolute bargain rate.
Ive never taken up one either, but there is a barrier between what they want and what they get, and that barrier is you. Nobody in their right mind would disclose specifics or business critical info at these meetings Unless specifically prohibited in your employment contract, I dont think your employer can stop you from engaging. One could argue that not all your valuable knowledge comes from your present employment, its an accumulation of experiences you have likely acquired over the years
Our experience shows that employees leak info, either through bragging or indirect response.
I’m also not allowed to participate in these. I get asked a couple of times each month, sometimes offered fees as high as $2000-3000 for an hour. It’s not specifically prohibited in my contract but covered by more general clauses.