But I do know of one guy that charged $250,000 p/a as a 
'interoperability consultantant'. He didn't actually do any 
programming or implementation. Just looked at (message) 
exchanges at a stock-broking company.
    

Actually, he probably listened to the arguments of the programmers who
wanted to do it using tool X, and the arguments of the programmers who
wanted to do it using tool Y, neither of whom was able to explain the
business reasons for their preference; and then he told the managers which
lot to back, and saved the company $2m a year by helping them get off the
fence.

(Alternative ending: he told the managers which lot to back but they ignored
his advice and employed another consultant to give a third opinion...)