Asymmetric Upside, the Value of Collaborating, a New Insider’s View
Joining an Organisation Built Differently
Since joining nem Australasia (nem) there have been many eye-opening moments such as the realisation that here’s an organisation with 35+ partners operating across Australasia with an incredible breadth and depth of knowledge, the extent of this surprised me. I have worked with consultants from many different firms and freelancers.
There have been good ones and not so good ones, but never have I, or the executives in the organisations I’ve worked with, been advised or consulted to by individuals with the depth and breadth that I’ve seen from nem. I’m talking about government agencies, $600 million businesses, global multinational public companies, all have used consultants. In my time with them, none of them have had the depth and breadth of experience that I’ve found at nem.
The “Regular Consultant” Profile
So what does a ‘regular’ consultant look like, well let's start with the upper echelons, this is globally considered to be companies such as MBB and Lek (McKinsey, Bain, Boston Consulting Group, and L.E.K) and in this region a lot of emphasis is put on what is commonly referred to as the Big Four, these are Deloitte, Ernest & Young, KPMG, and PwC.
Generally, these consultants are reasonably well educated with an undergraduate degree and likely Masters level degree. They have worked, mostly if not, solely in consulting. The most senior consultants, the ones who are rolled out for special occasions by the Big Four and the like, have spent 20 years in consulting.
There is nothing wrong with this per se, I’m not for a second saying that they are not qualified, smart, or cannot add value. What I am suggesting is that the contrast between that persona and nem’s partners is stark. So what do you get from nem?
Well, our partners have also often worked in consulting for decades too, usually after having led significant businesses for brands such ITW, GE, Siemens, Amcor, Sanofi-Aventis, ANZ, Clarks, AIG, Mitre 10 Group, and/or starting and running their own businesses as well. The partners also have a wealth of education including partners with PhD’s, but the experience of doing what they are advising on really sets nem apart.
Why Brand Names Don’t Guarantee Value
Over the last decade, in various roles, I have worked with a number of platforms and recruiters to bring expertise into the initiatives I'm working on. I learnt there is a real tendency for these organisations to sell a potential candidate based solely on their experience with the consulting firm they have worked for. Like dropping the name of one of MBB, or Big 4, is enough to make anyone jump at the opportunity to even be in the same room as these, supposed elite level individuals.
Of course, it must follow that their expertise and value proposition is in line with the experience, that is this previous consulting experience is the most valuable thing a company can gain from engaging that consultant.
Knowing that this wasn’t always the case, I interrogated the concept further with some of the middle-people (recruiters, mostly) I was working with. The best answer I got was about tools and agility. The candidate having worked with one of these 8 or so consulting firms in question gave them exposure to tools and an agile enough style to deal with almost any situation.
At the time, I thought this answer had merit, although I still didn’t really get the reason why simply a company name was enough of a badge of honour to ensure quality service and advice. It’s honestly bugged me ever since, it’s only now that I’ve realised why, and that’s because working at a large consultancy isn't a signal of the value you might bring as consultant or advisor. Experience, support, and approach are.
To address the concept that only ex-MBB are worthy of hiring let me suggest that:
On the subject of tools, there is no doubt that consulting firms have been at the forefront of thought leadership in a number of areas such as strategy, marketing and leadership development, but what I now realise is that firms like nem, can also bring very useful tools (nem for instance has a whole raft of IP available to clients).
Agility: Yes, agility is important. I think we can all agree that leaders of SME’s and multinationals have to be the most agile of all. This is what you are working with when you engage with nem. Leaders, people who have run the business, owned the outcomes, reinvented time-and-time again. CEO’s, CFO’s Chairs, Directors, and business owners, that’s nem.
The Breadth and Depth of Expertise Within nem
The experience within the Partner network at nem is incredible from manufacturing and operational excellence, to productivity, international project funding, private equity, digital and AI, platforms and software, finance, strategy and so much more from true business leaders, CEO, MD’s, Board Members, Business Owners, Entrepreneurs and more. This is without mentioning the broader hub and spoke network that you gain access to by working with nem.
These Partners offer real, practical advice and beyond that implement, and even measure those initiatives. The nem approach is in contrast to mainstream consultancies, as nem don’t have a sales team, but have instead built a business around trust, allowing others to confidently refer nem, this in itself says a lot about the organisation. Nor, do nem rely on a leveraged structure.
To be clear, most consulting firms rely on junior staff to do the ‘hard yards’ on your project, this is where the firms profits come from, and it also means that the 20-year veteran that they rolled out at the meeting, isn’t actually working on your project. I can attest to this, in real project situations.
So obviously, nem’s fees also follow suit, given the IP, experience of partners, and the network, right? Well, I’ll let you decide but I have had the experience of paying consulting firms hundreds of thousands and even tens of millions of dollars in projects with which I have been involved. What do I see at nem? Generally, I see partners charging their clients $5k for a discrete piece of work or $30k-40k for a more open-ended or large project or even $25k-$30k for ongoing support.
The thing is, you are not paying a publicly listed company that not only has eye-watering overheads but also must return an increasing return to shareholders year-on-year. A nem partner will charge a fee based on the value provided and will retain a portion of that fee. Often, the work conducted will have a guarantee of no fee, if the client believes no value has been provided by the process. Instead of complex structure, leveraged staff, and public trading, you are working with one of the largest privately owned firms in this space, who are able to offer incredible value.
Understanding the Concept of Asymmetric Upside
So this brings me to my second big eye-opening observation; the value of collaborating with nem and asymmetric payoff of doing so. Firstly, let me take a moment to describe what I mean by the Asymmetric upside or payoff. Yes, this is a term I have borrowed from the investor community. I’m not quite sure who I can attribute the concept to as I’m not sure who it was originally coined by. Most definitely it has been used by and likely developed from the works of economists and investors such as Michael Spence, Mohnish Pabrai, Joseph Stiglits, George Akerlof, and even Navl Ravikant.
To summarise, the concept of the Asymmetric Upside, is that the downside (loss) is limited, and the upside (gain) is unlimited. Asking for help where your business doesn’t have Capability or Capacity, is not just smart business, it's a great investment. Speaking of great investments; the share market offers excellent examples of the concept of asymmetry. If you look at NVIDIA’s stock, you could have bought NVIDA shares on July 1st 2020 for $9.41 and if you’d then sold the stock on 1st of July 2025 then you could have sold it for $157.20.
So the potential downside is that you could have lost all your capital of $9.41 (per share), which could have become $0.00, so you would have lost 100% of US$9.41 (per share). If you think back to July 2020, with the Covid Pandemic gaining momentum, no one would blame an investor for thinking that perhaps any company may collapse. Of course, history tells us that by July 1st 2025, that stock price had in fact risen to US$157.20 more than 16x the original investment value on July 1st 2020.
What’s more is that while the potential losses were capped at US$9.41 per share, the potential growth is uncapped, it is worth noting that NVIDIA did in fact continue to climb and topped US$180 in August 2025. This would be around 20x the original investment from 1st July 2020. So in this case, the upside was hugely asymmetric to the potential downside.
Applying Asymmetry to Business Collaboration
Collaborating with the right team(s) is no different, except it’s easier and perhaps, less risky, given the fewer factors involved and more control you have! As a business owner or business leader, all you have to do is invite a nem partner for coffee or a site visit. It literally costs you nothing. Applying the principles of the Asymmetric Upside to collaboration is straightforward. If you decide to have a chat with one of nem’s partners and the partner determines they can add real value to your business, then you are going to engage commercially.
As a business leader, you’ll be faced with the decision of paying some amount of money that likely isn’t included in your opex budget, you’ll have to consider carefully and maybe influence others to approve the decision, but here’s the thing, the return on that investment is much higher than the cost of doing nothing or getting it wrong through lack of capacity and/or capability within your business.
The right advice can really help your business to fly, and what if the advice is wrong? Well, firstly nem will likely determine by working with you if there is value they can add and often agree to only proceed if you are happy with the work being completed in the early stages (for example, a Comprehensive Business Review might start with only a small taster, in some areas of the business).
Secondly, it is the nature of collaboration, and certainly the nature of nem’s work that the solution(s) will be based on research, and information gathered from the business, not a ‘cookie cutter’ approach. So there are plenty of touch points along the way and plenty of opportunity to ensure the advice is valuable.
Thirdly, and most importantly, the likely outcome is that you will, in time, see considerable value from initiatives and advice for which the fees were connected.
Lastly, and critically to establishing the Asymmetric Upside, if you truly received ‘bad advice’ would you as a business leader implement or continue using it? No, of course not. So your losses are, in this case, limited to the advisory fees. Painful maybe, but as described earlier in this article, the fees, at least from nem, are unlikely to be a business-collapsing kind of stuff.
Finding Your Asymmetric Upside
So next time you think about potential issues in your business, or ways to grow, or ways to get your arms around problems, or even thinking of what the macro environment might mean for you, remember there is an Asymmetric Upside waiting for you. Get in touch with an nem partner to find your Asymmetric Upside.
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Author: Michael Gorman, Partner at nem Australasia
Phone: 0421 734 086
Email: mgorman@nem.net.au
*Disclaimer: This is an editorial piece and the author is writing solely about their own experiences. It may or may not be aligned to the views of the firm or be shared by other partners of the firm. This article does not constitute financial advice in any way. Any analysis of Short-Selling or Leveraged Investing is well out of the scope of this article. There is no stock buy, hold, or sell recommendations provided in this article. The summary of the stock price in the article is for illustrative purposes only and each price quoted is sourced from the publicly available Investor Centre of that company. nem and the author would like to remind you that past financial performance is not an indicator of future returns and should you wish to make financial decisions, please do your own research and seek professional advice from licensed professionals.