Consulting recommendations vs adoption
- A social post criticised BCG's post‑acquisition integration engagement as solid but not novel for a high fee. - Another thread lampooned a McKinsey study on NYC waste, highlighting agency resistance to adopting external recommendations. - Those exchanges illustrate recurring gaps between consulting advice and client or political willingness to implement it. ( )
Two viral posts this month landed on the same complaint: consulting firms can sell a polished plan, and clients can still balk at using it. (bcg.com) (x.com) One post mocked a Boston Consulting Group-style post-merger integration playbook as competent but familiar. BCG says post-merger integration helps clients capture 9% more value on average, and says it worked on more than 550 mergers and acquisitions in the past five years. (bcg.com) (x.com) The other post revived New York City’s 2022 McKinsey contract on trash containerization. City officials said the Department of Sanitation ultimately paid McKinsey $1.6 million for a 20-week study, down from an initial contract value of $4 million. (realclearinvestigations.com) (crainsnewyork.com) (x.com) That study did not just ask whether a bin could hold garbage. The Department of Sanitation’s April 2023 report said it modeled waste by block, reviewed peer cities, and concluded containerization was feasible in many parts of New York City but would require major changes to streets, equipment, and collection operations. (nyc.gov) New York then moved from study to rollout in stages. Mayor Eric Adams and Sanitation Commissioner Jessica Tisch unveiled the official NYC Bin on July 8, 2024, and the city put container rules into effect for buildings with one to nine units on November 12, 2024. (nyc.gov 1) (nyc.gov 2) The city still has not finished the job. The Department of Sanitation says small residential buildings may use existing lidded bins for now, but starting in June 2026 they must switch to the official NYC Bin. (nyc.gov 1) (nyc.gov 2) That sequence helps explain why consulting work keeps drawing fire online. A client can buy outside analysis for a merger or a sanitation overhaul, but the expensive part often comes later, when managers, workers, regulators, or voters have to accept new routines. (bcg.com) (nyc.gov) Consulting firms frame that gap as an execution problem. BCG says more than half of mergers and acquisitions fail or underperform, and ties that result to the difficulty of integrating systems, cultures, and operating models after a deal closes. (bcg.com) Public agencies face a parallel problem with more veto points. The sanitation report said citywide containerization would require some of the largest changes in a generation to public space, and the current rules show how New York has phased those changes in over multiple years instead of all at once. (nyc.gov 1) (nyc.gov 2) (nyc.gov 3) The posts that set off this round of criticism were aimed at fees and originality. The paper trail shows a narrower point: consultants can map a path, but adoption still depends on whether the buyer is willing to reorganize a company or remake a street. (x.com) (x.com)
