Discover how small and medium-sized project-based firms can scale with confidence—winning the right work, improving profitability, and delivering sustainable growth.
This article outlines how small and mid-sized architecture, engineering, and consulting firms can grow profitably by winning the right work, improving resource visibility, controlling costs, and tracking the right KPIs.
Why it matters: With cost pressures rising and only 22% of firms having full operational visibility, getting these fundamentals right is what separates sustainable growth from growth that erodes profitability.
Key Takeaways
- Most firms lack full operational visibility: Only 22% of firms have a fully integrated, end-to-end view of their operations, making it harder to scale with control.
- Cost control is now the top profitability lever: 34% of firms say improving cost control is their top profitability lever, and financial management systems can help automate much of it.
- Workforce growth is expected in 2026: 63% of firms expect to grow their workforce in 2026, making scalable processes and technology essential to sustainable growth.
According to the 7th Annual Deltek Clarity Study, growth remains firmly on the agenda—but it's becoming more complex. A third (33%) of architecture, engineering, and consulting firms are already transforming their business models to stay competitive, while rising pressures continue to reshape the operating environment. With 55% citing global political uncertainty and 54% inflation as among the top major concerns, firms are being forced to rethink how they scale.
For small and mid-sized firms, this shifts the role of growth entirely. It's no longer just about winning more work—it's about delivering it profitably, consistently, and with control. Scaling successfully now depends on having the right visibility across projects, resources, and financial performance to make better decisions, faster.
Yet many firms are still operating without that foundation in place. The Deltek Clarity Study shows that only 22% have a fully integrated, end to end view of their operations—making it harder to manage complexity as they scale.
To help firms navigate this complex terrain, we've updated and republished The Growth Blueprint—a practical guide to scaling smarter, improving profitability, and building the operational foundations needed for sustainable growth.—a practical guide to scaling smarter, boosting profitability, and setting meaningful goals.
Read on for a summary on how to win and deliver great projects, control costs, and create targeted KPIs that drive measurable results.
Win More Profitable Work: Focus on Projects That Matter
You'd think that all new business is good business, but it's important to focus on winning the right kinds of projects. Ideally, you want to find work that fits into your overall strategy, whether that's projects that make the most of your expertise in a particular field or multi-site projects that demonstrate your ability to manage complex programs of work.
To truly build momentum with your project pipeline, it pays to:
- Track and analyze business development efforts by calculating your win rate.
- Create a compelling proposal template to streamline RFPs.
- Personalize each proposal to align proof points with each client's specific challenges, goals, and preferred language.
- Centralize business development through a single enterprise resource planning (ERP) platform, where possible.
Resource Management: The Hidden Growth Lever
Growth brings opportunity, but it can also introduce new challenges in managing resources to meet the growing demands of project portfolios.
When optimizing your resource management processes, here are some key things to keep in mind:
Visibility
Maintaining visibility into resource availability and utilization is vital. Use dashboards or visual resource management views to track who's booked where, how resources align with project timelines, and identify resource gaps.
Forecasting
Historical project data offers a great way to spot trends and identify areas for improvement in the future. Ensure that you review project progress each week and proactively adjust plans as you identify emerging patterns that suggest future opportunities.
Budget and schedule alignment
The most effective way to mitigate risks is to identify them early. Project management tools are particularly helpful, especially those that offer both resource planning and financial performance dashboards. When you can see how hours are spent compared to initial plans and directly compare budgets and costs, you can make informed adjustments—before projects start running over.
Tasks and assignment updates
Keeping task lists and team assignments up to date is crucial. However, this isn't always easy, especially if you have to get in touch with every team member individually. The right project management tools can streamline team communications, making it easier to adjust tasks, resources, and schedules as project needs change.
Control Costs, Cash Flow, and Operational Performance as You Scale
Delivering great projects leads to continued growth and success. But the only way to deliver projects consistently over the long term is to ensure sustainable operations and continued cash flow. That's why improving cost control is now the number one lever for profitability, cited by 34% of firms.
That means shoring up back-office operations by ensuring bills and invoices are carefully managed and sent out on time, every time.
While it's possible to achieve this manually, the right financial management systems can ensure operational consistency, minimize admin burden, and:
- Automate routine tasks to reduce errors and free up time
- Accelerate approvals to keep projects and payments moving
- Track real-time financial performance across teams and projects
- Close the month faster with fewer manual reconciliations
- Scale processes without adding complexity or overhead
However, many firms still lack the visibility required to manage this effectively. Without an end-to-end platform, it becomes harder to track performance in real time and respond to issues before they impact delivery. This is reflected in the delivery challenges firms continue to face—including changes in client requirements (35%), project delays (32%), and data or integration issues (31%).
Measure What Matters - The KPIs That Drive Growth
Setting and monitoring the right metrics is a crucial part of getting the results you want. The results from the Deltek Clarity study show that firms are strengthening KPI discipline to support growth.
But which metrics are best for firms focusing on growth?
Start by looking at KPIs such as:
Utilization rate
This KPI measures the percentage of an employee's available time used for productive, billable work. This helps you understand how efficiently you're charging clients and ensures your bills cover costs and overheads.
Project margin
The difference between project revenue and costs. Measuring project margin is vital in assessing project profitability. You can then build financial performance into your wider strategy, allocate resources effectively, prioritize higher-margin projects and set appropriate pricing strategies.
Pipeline stability
By comparing your project pipeline's outlook to your revenue forecast, you can monitor your progress towards revenue targets in any given quarter. From there, it's easier to understand the health of your pipeline and adjust your approach to project bids as needed.
Take the Next Steps to Scalable Growth
With 63% of firms expecting workforce growth in 2026, scaling sustainably will depend on the right combination of people, processes, and technology.
This blog only touched the surface of how you can find new growth in even the most challenging markets. To learn more, make sure you take a look at The Growth Blueprint: Win More Work, Improve Cash Flow, and Deliver Projects Profitably.
Scale Smarter, Win More Work, Boost Profitability
Transform how your firm approaches growth with a complete operational framework covering every stage of the project lifecycle
