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McKinsey Mind
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The groundbreaking follow-up to the international bestseller--a hands-on guide to putting McKinsey techniques to work in your organization
McKinsey & Company is the most respected and most secretive consulting firm in the world, and business readers just can't seem to get enough of all things McKinsey. Now, hot on the heels of his acclaimed international bestseller The McKi ...more
McKinsey & Company is the most respected and most secretive consulting firm in the world, and business readers just can't seem to get enough of all things McKinsey. Now, hot on the heels of his acclaimed international bestseller The McKi ...more
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Hardcover, 272 pages
Published
October 17th 2001
by McGraw-Hill Education
(first published September 26th 2001)
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I have a Master's Degree in industrial-organizational psychology and am working on a Ph.D. I say this so you will know where I am coming from in this review. This book is filled with jargon that appears to be unique to the McKinsey firm. Much of the book seems to be an advertisement for the firm, indicating that anyone who works for this firm is a superhero in the business world, and only the absolute best of the best (reminiscent of Top Gun) would ever be chosen. I do believe that there is wisd
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This book (which I keep calling "the Minkey Mind" after Peter Seller's character in the Pink Panther) is an illuminating view into the brainwashing and McKinsey-speak that many of America's CEOs and consultants spout without much forethought. While McKinsey's "scientific" approach to problem-solving (break it down into pieces, come up with a hypothesis, test your assumptions) can sound yawningly trite, there are a few McKinseyisms that are worth being aware of. One is MECE ("mee-cee"), for Mutua
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Worth reading. Especially if you are in consulting. I like the beginning of the book especially, and will be turning back to some of those pages for reference.
Thinking logically
The book starts strong by introducing "MECE: Mutually Exclusive Collectively Exhaustive." I use it often in my teams. Think of it as building a decision tree, where you cover every option, and none are overlapping. Each branch in the tree also has more MECE sub-branches. When deciding or investigating something, draw the ...more
Thinking logically
The book starts strong by introducing "MECE: Mutually Exclusive Collectively Exhaustive." I use it often in my teams. Think of it as building a decision tree, where you cover every option, and none are overlapping. Each branch in the tree also has more MECE sub-branches. When deciding or investigating something, draw the ...more
A superficial overview of a superficial process. This is a kind of dated overview of the 1990s McKinsey management consultant, still used by big dumb companies to some extent. There's a bit of obfuscation through special terminology (MECE: Mutually-Exclusive, Collectively Exhaustive, etc.), but really it boils down to "find smart people with limited experience, have them express their thoughts in falsifiable ways (as hypotheses in a scientific sense), then gather data to confirm or falsify those
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These are the notes that I took when reading the book:
-Thinking MECE (mutually exclusive and collectively exhaustive) helps to avoid jumping to premature conclusions and restricting one’s array of options because MECE thinking forces the consultant to take the whole range of options into account. (p. 6)
-Inductive thinking, or hypothesis-driven thinking, is the most efficient problem-solving approach and used extensively by McKinsey. (p. 15)
-An issue tree bridges the gap between structure and hyp ...more
-Thinking MECE (mutually exclusive and collectively exhaustive) helps to avoid jumping to premature conclusions and restricting one’s array of options because MECE thinking forces the consultant to take the whole range of options into account. (p. 6)
-Inductive thinking, or hypothesis-driven thinking, is the most efficient problem-solving approach and used extensively by McKinsey. (p. 15)
-An issue tree bridges the gap between structure and hyp ...more
Having been a consultant at some point or rather, this book is just the very epitome of what a consultant really is: Someone who 'cons' you out a big, fat fee, and then proceeds to 'insult' you by telling you exactly what you already know.
Lost interest after 30 pages in.
What's good:
1. Conclusion first, evidence second and hypothesis last consultant presentation style
2. Data and Chart
What lost me:
1. Self promoting advertising book of the company
2. Idealistic old school management style
3. Makes you believe the only way to become the best of the best is to go to top biz school and get into this company working 90 hours a week, forgetting health and personal life.
4. Very little know how and substance
What's good:
1. Conclusion first, evidence second and hypothesis last consultant presentation style
2. Data and Chart
What lost me:
1. Self promoting advertising book of the company
2. Idealistic old school management style
3. Makes you believe the only way to become the best of the best is to go to top biz school and get into this company working 90 hours a week, forgetting health and personal life.
4. Very little know how and substance
Interesting but ultimately doesn't really add that much more to the author's previous book "The McKinsey Way".
Good overview to some of McKinsey's techniques and perspectives. Interesting book gave me a few things to think about, but it's a fairly superficial treatment.
This is the second book of a trilogy on the project management methods of the consultancy giant McKinsey. The book presents a project methodology on how to solve business problems in a structured project form and also to manage the project team meanwhile. It does not cover The Firms strategic analytic models like the 7S Framework etc. Compared to best-selling precursor to this book, The McKinsey Way, this text focuses more on the methods former McKinsey employees have implemented where they work
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I had high hopes starting this book as a tech talk I watched referenced this firm and a book called the Pyramid Principle as a corner stone of her leadership process. This book is not a substitute for the other which is hard to find a copy of these days. It goes over various argumentative structures at a high level with some examples and quotations but it's just so high level so consistently that unless all of these concepts are new to you, they won't add to your current understanding of breakin
...more
This book shows McKinsey’s approach to break down business challenges, analyze them, generate action plans to solve them. Those skills, marked as McKinsey way, are applicable to more than high-income consultants, but general employees, managers, executives. They are common “best practices”. The author nicely put them together. Those knowledge by themselves are MECE - Mutually Exclusive, Collectively Exhaustive. Among them, MECE principle might be the most important take-away from the book, follo
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Introducing you progressively into the McKinsey world, this book is not a manifesto pro McKinsey as some people had anticipated. Conversely, McKinsey is used as an example of best practices from which useful business processes, techniques and management practices can be transferred -with different degrees of success- to the life of any average manufacturing or service company.
In this role former McKinsey employees are key as they explain their earlier experiences trying to implement the McKinsey ...more
In this role former McKinsey employees are key as they explain their earlier experiences trying to implement the McKinsey ...more
The thinking in this book is sound, despite it being delivered in a bone-dry package and prose. But its general wisdom should not be discounted; they are a respectable firm, and are worth learning about.
You will not have any life-changing experiences or professional breakthroughs, but in it is a pleasant feeling to know what a top-notch organization feels a more orderly way of thinking and work-related development looks like, as it sets a clear bench-mark for being an effective, well-rounded pro ...more
You will not have any life-changing experiences or professional breakthroughs, but in it is a pleasant feeling to know what a top-notch organization feels a more orderly way of thinking and work-related development looks like, as it sets a clear bench-mark for being an effective, well-rounded pro ...more
I found The McKinsey Mind a much more grounded and practical book than I expected. Yes it is a peek into the minds of two McKinsey-ites but what I loved about it was being able to pick up a couple of different tools and approaches that I could integrate into my existing business practices right now. It was also really interesting to hear how McKinsey alumni handled working in other companies and cultures by adapting some of the methodologies presented. Highly recommended reading - 5 stars.
Its a good book to prepare for interviews as a consultant. After a while you realise that just memorising a heap of stuff and giving cookie cutter answers doesn't really create anything. Especially with AI and the internet, we need people who don't memorise but can create new ideas and ways to see the world. Still, this book helps you to be able to use the right words so you can actually express your ideas. This book is book smart, not street smart.
The book outlines certain principles. At first glance, I thought those are quite common sense. But again, I was told that management consultants consistently work in a manner which is quite “common sense” while others tend to forget at time.
The issue is.. I feel this book more like a promoter for the firm, as described in the book, effective selling by pulling?
The issue is.. I feel this book more like a promoter for the firm, as described in the book, effective selling by pulling?
Super basic summary by a former McKinsey consultant jut like McKinsey Way telling as much about working at McK as could be read on the Wiki-page. Shortly introduces a couple of nice frameworks, but main takeaway will be that instead of reading a book about a company's work and culture it will always be better to just talk with someone who works there than reading about it.
Good
Interesting, and occasionally inspiring. However, I wish we could get a deeper version with more examples and/or cases. I’d recommend it as an inspirational tool.
Interesting, and occasionally inspiring. However, I wish we could get a deeper version with more examples and/or cases. I’d recommend it as an inspirational tool.
Interesting book about McKinsey's methods. Practical tools for use in consulting / consultative sales. Does not make you want to work for "the Firm"
disappointed, not very meaty.
Done
Great format and approach to strategic thinking. A a a a a a a a a a thirteen words done.
Great format and approach to strategic thinking. A a a a a a a a a a thirteen words done.
Interesting read. The book highlights the importance of smaller/often unnoticed factors and situations of corporate life, also providing with ways to handle the situation properly.
After reading the McKinsey Way - the Mind was a terrible thing to waste such a disappointment
Insightful, practical and succinct. Lots of value in this book.
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Good book for those interested in joining consulting.
A great book for anyone who is interested in knowing more about consulting companies, especially McKinsey & company. The content of this book is useful even for normal companies or personal businesses. It will help you to structure your thinking and give you a road map to help you in evaluating the feasibility of your business / idea.
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Simply awesome!
Left me wishing I had worked for McKinsey
Left me wishing I had worked for McKinsey
The book The McKinsey Mind by Ethan and Paul is a master-piece for professional seeking structured approach to problem solving. The book could broadly be divided into three chapters- Analyzing, Presenting and Managing. The authors have further divided this book into several chapters for each of these sections.
In the section Analyzing, the book covers the ways a problem statement could be formed through appropriate hypothesis formulation. designing of project delivery including staffing, resourc ...more
In the section Analyzing, the book covers the ways a problem statement could be formed through appropriate hypothesis formulation. designing of project delivery including staffing, resourc ...more
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Ethan M. Rasiel was a consultant in McKinsey & Co. s New York office. His clients included major companies in finance, telecommunications, computing, and consumer goods sectors. Prior to joining McKinsey, Rasiel, who earned an MBA from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, was an equity fund manager at Mercury Asset Management in London, as well as an investment banker.
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