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Good practice Imported

IPPC Consulting Vouchers — Puebla's Subsidized Management-Consulting Programme for Small Firms

Mexico · Puebla · See the Mexico profile · See the Puebla profile

Evidence: Randomised controlled trial Top 50% 67/100 · Ask Evidence Copilot about this practice

Puebla's state competitiveness agency subsidized 70-90% of a year of management consulting for small firms; a randomized trial found productivity and returns on assets rose within a year, and five-year social-security records showed 57% more employees and 72% higher wage bills.

432 / 150 firms
Firms interested/randomised
80 of 150 offered
Firms that took up the service
0.21 standard deviations
Sales-based productivity gain (1 year) (1 year)
0.22 standard deviations
Return on assets gain (1 year) (1 year)
5.7 employees (+57%)
Additional employees (5-year IMSS tracking) (5 years)
~72 %
Higher total wage bill (5-year tracking) (5 years)
70-90 %
Consulting cost subsidy

Details

Promoter
Instituto Poblano de Competitividad (IPPC)
Period
2009–2014
Keywords
SME development, business consulting, state economic development policy

Context

Most small and medium enterprises in developing economies lack access to formal management consulting, and it has been unclear whether subsidising private consulting improves performance or is mainly captured by already better-connected firms.

Activities

Puebla's state competitiveness agency (IPPC) opened applications; researchers randomly assigned 150 of 432 interested firms to a consulting offer subsidising 70-90% of the cost, pairing them with local consultants for four hours a week over a year on a jointly chosen focus area — only 80 of the 150 offered firms ultimately took up the service.

Results

A year later, treated firms showed a 0.21 standard-deviation rise in sales-based productivity and a 0.22 SD rise in return on assets, alongside more formal accounting and marketing practices; tracking the same firms for up to five years through IMSS payroll records found treated firms had added 5.7 more employees on average (+57%) and roughly 72% higher total wage bills than comparison firms.

Conclusions

Take-up was voluntary and partial — just over half of the firms offered the subsidy actually used it — so the results describe the effect on interested, self-selected adopters rather than all small firms, and IPPC's continued operation as the delivery channel was specific to Puebla state.

Implementation
Indicative cost
Medium (€50k–€500k)
Time to results
Medium (1–3 years)
Staffing & skills
Instituto Poblano de Competitividad (IPPC), Local private consultants

Conditions for success

  • Partial (not full) subsidy to study genuine take-up and value-for-money
  • Long-run administrative tracking via Mexican Social Security Institute (IMSS) payroll records

Common failure modes

  • Take-up was voluntary and partial — just over half of offered firms actually used the subsidy
  • Results reflect self-selected adopters, not all small firms

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Data sources

Where this practice's information was retrieved from, and when.

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