Doesn't seem surprising. If it's implementing a specific technical process, there are measurable outcomes that must be met, and your client will know whether or not you met them.
Senior leadership contracting an outsider to tell them how their own industry works and explain their place in it, though, is right up there with asking the Psychic Friends Network for career advice. They're just begging to be taken for a ride.
"Senior leadership contracting an outsider to tell them how their own industry works and explain their place in it" might be a straw man. Strategic consulting could just as easily be, "We're considering expanding into this new market that we don't know as well, and we're hiring a consultant who specializes in that." Or, a previous employer hired a consultant for guidance on how to prepare the company to be sold.
Senior leadership contracting an outsider to tell them how their own industry works and explain their place in it, though, is right up there with asking the Psychic Friends Network for career advice. They're just begging to be taken for a ride.