Via empanelled professional
Independent business advisory that improves profitability and decision-making.
Business strategy, cost optimisation, budgeting and forecasting, and process improvement — connected to empanelled management consulting professionals who engage and bill you directly.
Connect with a professional →About this service
What is business advisory & strategy?
Management consulting provides businesses with external expertise on strategy, operations, cost structure, and financial planning to improve performance and competitiveness. Unlike financial compliance services, management consulting is advisory in nature — the value lies in structured analysis, independent perspective, and actionable recommendations rather than statutory deliverables. The professionals on Lekha's panel bring CA-qualified rigour to operational and strategic questions, combining financial analysis with business judgment.
Who it's for
Is this right for you?
- SMEs seeking to improve margins and profitability through cost structure analysis
- Growth-stage businesses that need an annual budget and a process for tracking it
- Companies entering new markets or launching new products and needing financial validation
- Businesses with operational inefficiencies they've identified but haven't been able to address
- Management teams that want an independent review before presenting a business plan to investors or a board
When you need this
- Your gross margins have been declining for 3 consecutive quarters and you can't identify why
- You're preparing a 3-year business plan for a board or investor meeting
- You've identified cost reduction targets but need a structured analysis to validate them
- You're considering entering a new market and need a financial model to test the decision
- Your operations have scaled but your processes haven't and it's showing up in the numbers
What you get
Key benefits
CA-qualified rigour on business problems
Management consultants on our panel bring financial statement analysis, cost accounting, and regulatory understanding to business strategy — not just frameworks from textbooks.
Actionable recommendations, not just reports
The value of consulting is in implementation, not documentation. Our panel professionals work with you to ensure recommendations are practical given your team and resource constraints.
Independent of your internal politics
An external advisor can identify problems and make recommendations that internal teams already know but cannot raise. Independence creates candour.
Common questions
Frequently asked
What is a cost optimisation engagement and what does it produce?
A cost optimisation engagement starts with a detailed mapping of all costs — direct, indirect, fixed, and variable — to identify where money is going and whether it's producing commensurate value. It produces a ranked list of cost reduction opportunities with the estimated saving, implementation difficulty, and risk for each, followed by an implementation roadmap. Typical outcomes include 5–15% cost reduction within 6–12 months of implementation.
How is a management consulting engagement different from a CFO engagement?
A Virtual CFO engagement is ongoing and covers the full financial management function — reporting, compliance, investor relations, and strategic input. A management consulting engagement is typically project-based and focused on a specific question or problem — a strategy review, a cost optimisation project, or a market entry analysis. The two can work together but serve different purposes.
What does budgeting and forecasting actually produce?
A budgeting and forecasting engagement produces an annual budget (revenue, cost, and cash flow targets broken down monthly) and a model that allows you to update actual vs. budget variance each month. The budget is only as useful as the process around it — monthly review, variance explanation, and rolling reforecast. Our professionals help build both the model and the process.
Via registered professional
Business Strategy & Growth Advisory
Empanelled professional · ₹20,000/mo
Cost Reduction & Margin Improvement
Empanelled professional · ₹25,000
Business Budgeting & Financial Forecasting
Empanelled professional · ₹15,000
Process Improvement & Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs)
Empanelled professional · ₹20,000