Pricing strategy engagements: projects, retainers and the gap between them

Two things get priced in this work, and they behave differently. The planning project is a defined piece of work with a deliverable. The retainer is access to a rhythm and to judgement. Pricing them the same way undersells the second.

Pricing the planning project

Scope drivers that genuinely move the price:

• Number of stakeholder groups to be engaged (this dominates everything else).
• Whether measures must be defined from scratch or already exist.
• Whether the plan must satisfy a board, a council or a funder — each adds review cycles.
• Whether initiative costing and budget alignment are in scope.
• Public engagement or survey work.

Quote a fixed fee against a written scope with a stated number of workshops and review rounds. Hourly pricing on planning work punishes you for being fast and invites clients to economise on the sessions that create adoption.

Always include, in the fixed fee: setting up the working plan with owners and measures, and the first review. A plan handed over without those is a plan that will not be maintained — which is bad for the client and bad for your referrals.

Pricing the retainer

Charge monthly, for a twelve-month term, on the value of the rhythm rather than the hours. Structure two or three tiers:

Tier 1 — Cadence. Monthly exception note, quarterly review chaired by you, decision record, board pack. Suits organizations with a competent internal owner.

Tier 2 — Cadence plus stewardship. Adds measure verification, risk register upkeep, initiative costing support and access between meetings within a stated allowance.

Tier 3 — Embedded. Adds monthly leadership attendance and annual budget-cycle support. Priced for a client where you are effectively the strategy function.

Differentiate the tiers on cadence, seniority and access — never on how much reporting the client receives. Withholding reporting to sell an upgrade damages the relationship you are trying to make recurring.

What to exclude, in writing

• Delivery of the initiatives themselves.
• Data collection the client's systems should produce.
• Unbounded ad-hoc analysis (give an allowance; price beyond it).
• Attendance at unscheduled board or council meetings.

Handling software cost

Include it in your fee or bill it through at cost. A separate software purchase, particularly in the public sector, adds a procurement step that can delay a much larger retainer by a quarter. If you carry the platform yourself across several clients, you also keep control of the setup quality and can move a new client from signature to a working plan quickly. See strategy retainers for the operational side.

Annual increases and renewal

Build a stated annual adjustment into the agreement and raise it. Retainers held flat for three years turn into loss-making obligations, and the renewal conversation becomes the moment you request a large correction — which is exactly when the client is most price-sensitive.

When to decline the work

Three signals worth taking seriously:

• No sponsor with authority. Nobody who can reallocate money will attend the reviews, so nothing will change.
• The plan is required for a document deadline — a grant, an accreditation, a council packet — and nothing else. That is a writing job; price it as one and do not promise execution outcomes.
• The client wants the plan without owners or measures. Both are the mechanism; without them you will be blamed for the absence of results.

Declining these protects the results you can point at when the next client asks what changed.