It's because "the immediate surface appearance of quality" is all that management consultants are capable of themselves.

They cannot perceive the difference.

Because these consultants are only hired to shift the blame and responsibility away from civil servants.

"It was not my fault, we were just following Deloitte advice!"

It always has been a waste of money

Wouldn’t be all that surprised if quality went up with the use of AI for this stuff.

The word “slop” is tossed around way too much, but these sorts of engagements are a perfect example of replacing low value human slop with computer generated slop.

Probably a net positive to society because a few interns at a consulting company got to spend a Friday night enjoying themselves vs. working on a BS report.

Yes, I might be slightly jaded. But I’m not certain I feel this is hyperbole either.

With many bureaucratic systems AI seems to be used to build a better horse when cars and tractors already exist. Everything was built for a paper based world and was never designed with data or automation in mind.

I wouldn't say they're at threat from AI. Consultancies are most of the time there to partially offload work from the main company, and also to serve as someone to blame when something does not go well. It's rarely about the content itself.