The increased presence of management consultants in public policy has resulted in concerns from practitioners and policymakers that consultants are too influential. At the same time, there are genuine reasons to downplay consultant influence on policy processes and to instead see consultants as ‘servants of power’. This tension raises questions about how much influence consultants have and the ways in which their influence might vary. Previous studies have shown how two concepts—openness and trust—are useful in understanding variability of consultant influence. As part of this, public decision-makers must be open to the involvement of consultants in a reform process and must also trust the specific consultants involved. At the same time, limited consideration has, to date, been given to discursive explanations of variability. Focusing its analysis on the influence of coalitions on education policy, this paper’s main contribution is to show that consultants will be more influential when their discursive repertoire demonstrates resonance with the narratives of the coalitions they are trying to influence. As part of this, consultants should deploy concepts and language that are recognisable to those coalitions, but which also align with the coalitions’ underlying narratives about the problem being faced and appropriate solutions.

管理顾问在公共政策中的参与度不断增加，导致从业者和政策制定者担心顾问的影响力太大。与此同时，有真正的理由淡化顾问对政策过程的影响，并将顾问视为“权力的仆人”。这种紧张关系引发了人们的疑问：顾问的影响力有多大，以及他们的影响力可能会如何变化。先前的研究表明，开放性和信任这两个概念如何有助于理解顾问影响力的可变性。作为其中的一部分，公共决策者必须对顾问参与改革过程持开放态度，并且还必须信任所涉及的具体顾问。与此同时，迄今为止，对变异性的话语解释的考虑有限。本文重点分析联盟对教育政策的影响，其主要贡献是表明，当顾问的话语能力与他们试图影响的联盟的叙述产生共鸣时，他们的影响力将会更大。作为其中的一部分，顾问应该采用这些联盟可以识别的概念和语言，但也与联盟对所面临的问题和适当解决方案的基本叙述相一致。