Growth Gurus or Crooked Consultants? | E84 with Loren Shumate

Why do so many companies treat consultants like magic beans? 🤔 We’ve all seen it—bring in a “growth expert,” sprinkle them between teams, and pray they fix everything… without clear goals or accountability.

In this episode, we’re joined by Loren Shumate, growth consultant and our new Blame It On Marketing bestie, to unpack the consultant conundrum—why leadership chases silver bullets, where it blows up, and how to get real ROI instead ​E84.

We get into:
 ✅ The biggest myth giving consultants a bad rap—and why clear deliverables matter
 ✅ How to know when your startup needs outside help (and who should make that call)
 ✅ The right questions to ask before signing a statement of work
 ✅ Why siloed tactics fail—and how consultants drive cross-functional alignment
 ✅ Dodging “magic bean” tech plays: why you need vendor-agnostic advice
 ✅ Turning boardroom truths—like “my CRM’s a ball of yarn”—into actionable change ​E84
 ✅ Red flags that scream “run away” when you’re vetting marketing experts
 ✅ The LinkedIn soap-opera of fake influencer feuds—and why labels don’t make better marketing

If you’ve ever hired (or been tempted to hire) a consultant—and ended up with a mess—this one’s for you.