Best Software for Consulting Firms in 2026: 8 Tools That Protect Utilisation

HybridHero is the workspace management entry because it treats the project team as the unit of booking. A project manager or assistant reserves a block of desks for the whole team in one action, booking on behalf of colleagues is supported, and neighbourhoods keep the team together on a busy Wednesday. Check-in with automatic release returns desks to the pool when a client meeting runs over and the team never arrives.

Client rooms, visitor management and parking sit in the same platform, so a client workshop is one booking: the room, the visitors pre-registered with a QR code and badges, the parking bays. Multi-location management from one admin console covers a firm with offices in several cities, with 15 languages in the platform UI for international teams and amenity-based desk search for anyone who needs a second monitor or a quiet zone.

Utilisation reporting shows floor and team use by day, which is the evidence for the next lease decision. SSO and Active Directory and multi-location management sit on the Professional plan; a custom API and board-ready reporting on Enterprise. ISO 27001 certified, GDPR compliant, with 24/7 real human support on Professional and above.

Use case: Team days that work: the whole project team seated together, the client workshop booked in one step, empty desks released.

Scenario: A 180-consultant office with 110 desks has three project teams wanting the same Wednesday. Each lead books the team’s desks in one action, one team stuck at a client until 11am loses its desks to the waiting pool automatically, and the partner sees Wednesday utilisation by team before the renewal.

Kantata (the former Mavenlink) is professional services automation for firms of 50 to 5,000 people: resource planning, project management, time and expense, budgets and burn rates, forecasting and invoicing in one system. Reviewers say it lets them replace several tools and see utilisation and burn at a glance.

It is rated 4.2 from 628 Capterra reviews. The consistent complaints are complexity and a steep learning curve, heavy data entry without enough bulk actions, and price for smaller teams. It suits a firm that has outgrown spreadsheets and a lighter PSA, not a twelve-person boutique.

Use case: See the whole firm’s utilisation, burn and forecast in one place instead of reconciling five spreadsheets.

Scenario: A 300-consultant firm moves resourcing and project financials into Kantata, sees bench time by practice every Monday, and stops discovering over-served fixed-fee projects at invoice time.

Float does one thing: it shows who is scheduled on what, with capacity, time off and over-allocation visible on one timeline, and it does it well enough that 1,621 Capterra reviewers rate it 4.5. It is the tool for a firm whose real problem is the bench and the double booking, not the invoice.

It is not a PSA. Project financials, invoicing and forecasting sit elsewhere, and firms that need those in the same system move to Kantata or Projectworks. For most boutiques and mid-size firms, Float plus a time tracker plus accounting is the whole stack.

Use case: Answer “who is free in the second week of October” in ten seconds.

Scenario: A 60-person strategy boutique schedules every consultant in Float, sees a partner has double-booked two engagements for the same week, and moves the work before the client notices.