HBR On Strategy · Harvard Business Review

How McKinsey Resisted Disruption

·29 min·2 clips

What can we learn from how McKinsey itself responded to disruption in the management consulting industry?

Conversation between Clay Christensen (disruptive innovation theorist) and Dominic Barton (McKinsey managing partner) analyzing how McKinsey recognized and responded to disruption in consulting industry. Christensen explains disruption framework: leaders chase attractive (premium, profitable) segments, leaving small projects/clients vulnerable. McKinsey, like airlines optimizing long routes, abandoned small engagements to focus on large client problems—opening space for boutique consultants. In 2009, Barton commissioned Global Forces study, discovering technology advancing 5x faster than management, Asia rising, resources scarce. Result: 18-month internal strategy review challenging company orthodoxies. Key finding: clients wanted flexibility (data without consultants, 60% analysis vs. comprehensive studies, varied team sizes). McKinsey Solutions emerged from 2007 Chinese consumer database project where clients valued data itself over McKinsey consultants—exemplifying low-value work outsourcing that paradoxically enables disruption (Christensen's key insight: doing right things sets up future disruption).

As heard by us

A clear case study of a firm learning to adapt without losing its shape.

McKinsey sits at the center of this conversation as both subject and example: a firm built to help clients through disruption has to explain how it handled pressure inside management consulting itself.

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Why you'd press play

A real-world look at how McKinsey adapted when disruption hit its own industry.

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