Mckinsey: Brought Back Down To Earth?

When a company hires a consulting firm to do work for them, often they don’t know what they want. Since the clients are seeking knowledge that they themselves lack, they can’t measure the results, quality, or judge the outcome of the consultant’s recommendations.

This quandary suits consulting firms just fine. After all, who are you, the clueless client, to question the almighty consultant in front of you – even though you’ve paid an astronomical sum for this smug person to tell you how to run your business, a.k.a. “giving advice”?

This hubris is paradoxically how McKinsey earned its fearsome reputation. Its clients, awed by its prestige, rarely question its advice, whether right or wrong. Price is also a factor in burnishing its credentials, as the more McKinsey charged its clients, the more reputable it seemed. On the flip side, company boards often hire McKinsey so they can say to investors that they’ve hired McKinsey. The best consultants money can buy have signed off on a controversial move – what more could you ask for?