Professional consultant vs contractor/consultant

The differences between professional consultants and contractor/consultants can be seen in a few details. Each job has different responsibilities and duties. Additionally, a contractor/consultant has an average salary of $84,811, which is higher than the $80,770 average annual salary of a professional consultant.

The top three skills for a professional consultant include customer satisfaction, customer service and C #. The most important skills for a contractor/consultant are healthcare, post implementation, and data analysis.

Professional consultant vs contractor/consultant overview

	Professional Consultant	Contractor/Consultant
Yearly salary	$80,770	$84,811
Hourly rate	$38.83	$40.77
Growth rate	11%	11%
Number of jobs	100,996	64,573
Job satisfaction	-	5
Most common degree	Bachelor's Degree, 64%	Bachelor's Degree, 64%
Average age	44	44
Years of experience	4	-

What does a professional consultant do?

Professional consultants provide their expert advice to organizations and businesses. This professional advice helps the organization to improve its business performance in terms of management, operation, and strategy. Their main tasks are to detect issues and find ways to resolve them, conduct surveys and research an understanding of the business, and assess the pros and cons of possible strategies. Professional consultants must have good numerical, teamwork, and interpersonal skills to succeed. Also, they must have commercial awareness, self-motivation, and good attention to detail.

What does a contractor/consultant do?

A contractor is a self-employed businessperson who agrees to work for a fixed price. His/her job involves the evaluation of clients' needs and actual performance of work. On the other hand, a consultant is a skilled independent businessperson who provides expert teaching and training in a specific market by assisting existing staff for the improvement of operations, problem-solving, and development of strategies. His/her role is to assess clients' needs and provide expert advice and opinion. However, both individuals are not employees, since they came from outside of the organization to perform such services.

Professional consultant vs contractor/consultant salary

Professional consultants and contractor/consultants have different pay scales, as shown below.

	Professional Consultant	Contractor/Consultant
Average salary	$80,770	$84,811
Salary range	Between $69,000 And $93,000	Between $58,000 And $123,000
Highest paying City	San Rafael, CA	Boston, MA
Highest paying state	New Jersey	New Jersey
Best paying company	Citi	Cerner
Best paying industry	Finance	Technology

Differences between professional consultant and contractor/consultant education

There are a few differences between a professional consultant and a contractor/consultant in terms of educational background:

	Professional Consultant	Contractor/Consultant
Most common degree	Bachelor's Degree, 64%	Bachelor's Degree, 64%
Most common major	Business	Business
Most common college	Northwestern University	Western Carolina University

Professional consultant vs contractor/consultant demographics

Here are the differences between professional consultants' and contractor/consultants' demographics:

	Professional Consultant	Contractor/Consultant
Average age	44	44
Gender ratio	Male, 56.7% Female, 43.3%	Male, 66.2% Female, 33.8%
Race ratio	Black or African American, 8.5% Unknown, 4.5% Hispanic or Latino, 9.2% Asian, 10.2% White, 67.3% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.2%	Black or African American, 6.4% Unknown, 4.6% Hispanic or Latino, 9.4% Asian, 8.8% White, 70.4% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.4%
LGBT Percentage	12%	11%

Differences between professional consultant and contractor/consultant duties and responsibilities

Professional consultant example responsibilities.

Manage implementation of initial ERP modules.
Manage a team responsible for designing service-orient application architecture, standards and best practices guidelines, security and data access frameworks.
Provide guidance to clients in Sarbanes-Oxley compliance.
Provide and customize marketing materials for TLC affiliates.
Identify improvements and gaps in client's existing SOX programs and testing parameters.
Work with several manufacturing clients with international facilities, assisting in streamlining the SOX process and focusing on key controls.

Contractor/consultant example responsibilities.

Manage design and development of cloud-base billing application for streamlining payroll and invoicing, as well as offering real-time business analytics.
Assist PMO in defining project scope, task and budget, collaborating closely with developers.
Bill and provide appropriate documentation to submit reimbursement for services to appropriate insurance to include Medicaid, Medicare, etc.
Motivate and ensure SME team member engagement in projects.
Provide Linux server setup, documentation, and internal support.
Develop and implement SQL store procedures and DTS packages to process client billing data.

Professional consultant vs contractor/consultant skills

Common professional consultant skills

Customer Satisfaction, 31%
Customer Service, 29%
C #, 11%
Financial Statements, 4%
Internal Audit, 2%
Regulatory Compliance, 2%

Common contractor/consultant skills

Healthcare, 30%
Post Implementation, 25%
Data Analysis, 7%
Project Management, 5%
Financial Statements, 3%
Medicaid, 3%

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Professional Consultant
Professional Consultant vs Contractor/Consultant

Updated January 8, 2025

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