How McKinsey Lost Its Way in South Africa • Hacker News Board

Re: How McKinsey Lost Its Way in South Africa

#31

Post by sonnyblarney » Wed, Jun 27, 2018, 10:03 PM UTC

mad_tortoise wrote: post #15

sonnyblarney wrote: post #5

Ok, I find this very problematic - along the lines of 'Hey, our country is massively corrupt and dysfunctional, and these Westerners came in and didn't do really anything really wrong or corrupt, there are other actors who are clearly to blame, but let's blame the Western Colonialists! This is a bad meme. First - don't trust McKinsey or any consultants to implement anything unless it's been done before and clear. The…

You are totally wrong as another commentator pointed out. Mckinsey knowingly incited and spread racial hatred for their personal gain, and pushed the idea of "white monopoly capital" so that the ANC could leverage that as a political point. The result being highly inflamed racial tensions on their part, not only this but they were paid by Gupta linked companies and organisations. The Gupta's, an Indian billionaire fa…

"Mckinsey knowingly incited and spread racial hatred for their personal gain, and pushed the idea of "white monopoly capital" so that the ANC could leverage that as a political point."

I'm sorry I don't agree.

I don't see the evidence for this - marketing, PR, communications is not something McKinsey has any core competencies in - moreover, in the long run it works fundamentally agains their interests, after all they basically represent the interests of highly vested, oligarchic, Western interests.

"have been responsible for corruption of the previous president Zuma"

Fully disagree.

---> Zuma is responsible for Zuma's corruption

And Gupta is a party to that.

McKinsey is the most peripherial player, and it seems they got kind of duped and eventually bailed.

If S. Africa wasn't so corrupt, they simply would not have paid McKinsey.

This is is the story of a corrupt and dysfunctional region - not a story about McKinsey.

Any organization at any scale doing business in such a place will get caught in these tentacles.

Re: How McKinsey Lost Its Way in South Africa

#32

Post by sonnyblarney » Wed, Jun 27, 2018, 10:05 PM UTC

wernsey wrote: post #20

mad_tortoise wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are totally wrong as another commentator pointed out. Mckinsey knowingly incited and spread racial hatred for their personal gain, and pushed the idea of "white monopoly capital" so that the ANC could leverage that as a political point. The result being highly inflamed racial tensions on their part, not only this but they were paid by Gupta linked companies and organisations. The Gupta's, an Indian billionaire fa…

The "white monopoly capital" was not incited by McKinsey, though. What happened was that the Gupta brothers and the president received a lot of negative media attention for a series of very serious corruption allegations, so they hired UK-based PR firm Bell Pottinger. Bell Pottinger spun a story that they were victims of rich white people who spread these stories because their wealth was being threatened. They also h…

Yes - to add, McKinsey does not do corporate communications.

I know some McKinsey types and they are the last people on earth to really grasp populism, field marketing, branding, perception etc..

You don't hire McKinsey to do 'online twitter / Instagram' campaigns.

Re: How McKinsey Lost Its Way in South Africa

#33

Post by jessaustin » Thu, Jun 28, 2018, 12:10 AM UTC

hectormalot wrote: post #29

jessaustin wrote: post #17

Also troubling was the fact that McKinsey had won the contract without competitive bidding. One finds this nugget more than halfway through longish TFA. This really buries the lede. Without a competitive bid process, a public organization is at the mercy of its stupidest and most corrupt officials. When a tiny town in the middle of nowhere wants an abandoned building torn down, they don't call the mayor's cousin. The…

Don’t really agree with the idea that everything should be tendered. Tenders are a poor fit for complex situations where the complete path is not clear. To use your analogy: what if the tender included selecting the building to tear down as well as demolishing it? Without further specification, the winner of the tender could have an abnormally low price, be incentivized to pick the easiest building to demolish, and l…

It wasn't an analogy. This literally happens every day. All towns have a process in place for selecting which local hazards to demolish.

Of course for more involved requirements it may be good to break the process into more than one step. It's possible that no one knows what's wrong with the public power utility. If you have to hire McKinsey because corruption, negotiate a simple fee for them to run an actual RFP process for an actual management consulting engagement for you. One of the requirements for that RFP will be that theirs cannot be the only viable bid. If they can't get a bid from another firm that has consulted for publicly-owned utilities, they don't get their RFP fee either.

Re: How McKinsey Lost Its Way in South Africa

#34

Post by sonnyblarney » Thu, Jun 28, 2018, 2:50 AM UTC

wernsey wrote: post #21

sgift wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Ok, I find this very problematic - along the lines of 'Hey, our country is massively corrupt and dysfunctional, and these Westerners came in and didn't do really anything really wrong or corrupt, there are other actors who are clearly to blame, but let's blame the Western Colonialists! That's the long and short of it. I read that article twice now and all comes down to 'South African law forced them to get a local…

The allegations are more that McKinsey specifically chose a partner that they knew was well connected with the political elite in order to have government business sent their way. Yes, it is true that the South African law forced them to get a local partner. During the apartheid years black people were limited in where they were allowed to work, and this law is an attempt to rectify the past. Unfortunately this law i…

"The allegations are more that McKinsey specifically chose a partner that they knew was well connected with the political elite in order to have government business sent their way."

On it's face, that's extremely rational and normal behaviour.

The less transparent a government is, the more this is a necessity. Basically outside the Western world, and many places within, it's a given.

Try getting a snow clearing contract from the Montreal City Hall ... and then find out 'who knows who' ...