1980
A 1980 McKinsey forecast for AT&T predicted 900,000 US cellular subscribers in 2000; the hosts say the actual figure was 109 million.
“They forecasted 900,000 people would be subscribed to a cellular telephony network in the year 2000.”
Topic
McKinsey & Company
76 facts from 19 episodes, in date order. These are what speakers said on the shows, each linked to the moment it was said. They aren't independently verified.
2010-2025
McKinsey measured the share of organizations passing its ten tests of strategy between 2010 and 2025.
“we looked at the change between 2010 and 2025 in the last fifteen years under this hypothesis that strategies are coming under pressure for all the reasons we've described.”
2010-2025
Andy West says McKinsey's data show about a 40% decrease in the quality of strategy over the period.
“40% decrease in the quality of strategy. So we're in this golden age of strategy potentially, and yet the quality of strategy is decreasing.”
2022
McKinsey's first Rewired book came out about three years before this episode, around the time ChatGPT was released, and an update appeared in April.
“If you look at our rewired research, the first book came free, it came out three years ago, pretty much at the same time where Chat GPT was released, and then this April, we released the update”
2025
Isaac Sacolick cited a McKinsey data point that IT departments were more than twice as advanced in using generative AI as other departments.
“I saw a data point from McKinsey saying that IT is more than twice a advanced using gen AI than other departments.”
2025
Daniel Whitenack says Deloitte, Accenture and McKinsey are making a lot of money from AI services.
“The companies that are making a lot of money off of AI are Deloitte, Accenture, McKinsey, right?”
2025
Daniel Whitenack says that in enterprise AI the firms making money have been services organizations such as Accenture, Deloitte and McKinsey, while OpenAI has been losing a lot of money.
“The ones making the money is Accenture, Deloitte, McKenzie, uh, et cetera, the the services organizations, right?”
2025
In McKinsey's annual CFO surveys, the share of respondents reporting AI investment in their finance function was 24% in 2023, 50% in 2024 and 65% in 2025, according to Davide Grande.
“In 2023, 24% of our participants said yes. In 2024, it was 50%, in 2025, 65%.”
2025
Davide Grande said that the share of surveyed CFOs actively using AI in finance rather than piloting it rose from 6% in 2024 to 51% in 2025.
“In 2024, 6% were active user, in 2025, 51%. So seven times increase in finance department.”
2026
McKinsey defines mega deals as those above $10 billion, which reached about $1.1 trillion in value in the first half of the year, according to Tobias Lundberg.
“deals above $10 billion is what we have defined as mega deals. And they have reached some $1.1 1 trillion in the first half of this year.”
2026
Tobias Lundberg says mega deal value in the first half was up almost 140% from a year earlier and was the strongest half year on record.
“that's up almost 140% versus the same period a year ago, and it's the strongest half year that we have we've seen on record.”
2026
Tobias Lundberg says mega deals account for 42% of global M&A deal value.
“So 42% of the global deal value sits now in these mega deal mega deals here.”
2026
Tobias Lundberg says equity-linked consideration has risen to 22% of deals, which shares re-rating risk with sellers.
“Where we see, you know, equity linked considerations rise up to a whooping 22% of the um of the deals.”
2026
Benjamin Houssard says a McKinsey survey found awareness of AI in upstream M&A rose to about 88 from 51 the previous year, though adoption is lower.
“You see the level of awareness for upstream now up to eighty eight, uh, fifty one point from last year, even if the level of adoption is, uh, lower.”
Undated
Antoine Montard states that McKinsey defines strategy as a coherent set of hard-to-reverse choices made ahead of time under uncertainty to create and capture economic surplus.
“strategy is a coherent set of hard reverse choices made ahead of time in the face of uncertainty to create and capture economic surplus”
Undated
On McKinsey's power curve of the largest companies ranked by economic profit, the middle three quintiles create almost no value.
“the middle three quintiles almost create no value. It means that markets are efficient. It is really hard to beat the market.”
Undated
About 10 percent of companies starting in the middle three quintiles reach the top quintile of economic profit over ten years.
“we know that about 10% of the companies that start in the middle three quintile end up in the top quintile over a ten-year period.”
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Antoine Montard describes the McKinsey strategy method as having three broad stages, starting with designing the strategy.
“So the strategy method has kind of three broad stages. I'll go through it quickly.”
Undated
Andrea Tricoli is an associate partner in McKinsey's Strategy and Corporate Finance Practice, based in London.
“Andrea Tricoli is an associate partner in our strategy and corporate finance practice and based in London.”
Undated
Bruce Delteil is managing partner of McKinsey's Vietnam office and leads its Strategy Practice in Asia.
“Bruce Delteil is the managing partner of our Vietnam office and leads our strategy practice in Asia.”
Undated
The guests identify five emerging roles for AI in strategy: researcher, interpreter, thought partner, simulator and communicator.
“We see the researcher, uh, the interpreter, the thought partner, and the simulator, and then communicator as these five emerging roles.”
Undated
Antoine Montard says McKinsey's ten tests of strategy are described in a document of about forty pages.
“And we have kind of a vertical document that that goes through kind of the logic of it. It's about forty pages.”
Undated
Antoine Montard says a colleague built an agent in about ten minutes or less that assessed a company's strategy against McKinsey's ten tests.
“it it took him probably no more than ten minutes to do that, and it's repeatable, right?”
Undated
Inside the Strategy Room had a library of more than 230 episodes at the time of this recording.
“where you can also access our entire library of more than 230 episodes.”
Undated
Kevin Carmody helped start McKinsey's transformation practice more than 15 years before this episode.
“So Kevin, you helped start our transformation practice more than 15 years ago.”
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Rob Montgomery says McKinsey has partnered with clients on nearly 1,200 transformations across 30 sectors and 90 countries.
“We've partnered with clients on nearly 1,200 transformations in 30 different sectors, 90 different countries.”
Undated
Louisa Greco says McKinsey research over roughly the last eight years shows engaging a broader set of employees raises transformation success odds by more than three times.
“We know that when we engage a broader set of employees in the ambition, the odds of success increase by more than three times.”
Undated
Rob Montgomery says nearly half of the impact seen in McKinsey client transformations now comes from top-line growth, a large rise over 15 years.
“nearly 50 of the impact that we have seen in our client transformations comes from growth, top line”
Undated
Rob Montgomery says McKinsey treats the first three to six months of a transformation as the window for quick wins and building momentum.
“We like to think about, you know, three to six-ish months, as you know, the initial window where we're really focused on those quick wins”
Undated
Kevin Carmody says 68 percent of the initiatives in McKinsey's transformations are small, worth $250,000 or less, reflecting wide involvement across the organization.
“68 of the initiatives in our transformations are smaller, 250,000, uh, dollars or less, not 10 million.”
Undated
Julie Goran says McKinsey research shows organizations lose roughly 30% of value between what their strategy intends and what they actually deliver.
“we lose value between what we set out to do and what we actually do to the order of 30%.”
Undated
Dickie Steele says McKinsey has long used the equation that delivered performance equals full potential minus organizational interference.
“delivered performance is your full potential less organizational interference”
Undated
Julie Goran says the research compared six organizational structure types and found that no type made companies more likely to perform well.
“We looked at six different types of structures and we said, Hey, do companies of one type of structure perform better than others?”
Undated
The research classed the business unit, matrix and functional structures as the three traditional organizational structures.
“familiar with a business unit structure, a matrix structure, a functional organization”
Undated
In McKinsey's executive interviews, higher-performing companies were more likely to see AI, digitization and data as tailwinds, while underperformers saw them as headwinds.
“Higher performing companies were more likely to find opportunity to feel that AI, digitization and data, uh, were going to be real tailwinds for them.”
Undated
Dickie Steele says traditionally organized companies rated their readiness to capture value from AI, digitization and data significantly lower than emerging-structure companies, by as much as twenty points.
“organizations that were more traditionally organized, um, rated their preparedness to capture value from these tailwinds of AI, digitization and data significantly, um, at lower levels than people in emerging organizations.”
Undated
Rich Isenberg is a former chief information security officer and a partner in McKinsey's Atlanta office.
“A former chief information security officer or CISO, Rich brings his extensive knowledge of operations, vulnerabilities, and remedies across multiple industries”
Undated
Reid Hoffman says a McKinsey study found top-tier Silicon Valley venture firms do not collaborate directly but signal to and draft off each other.
“the top tier Silicon Valley venture firms. They didn't deliberately, they don't directly collaborate with each other, but they tend to to to signal and draft off each other.”
Undated
The McKinsey article describes four AI archetypes: pragmatic adopters, functional reinventors, business pioneers and internal transformers.
“four archetypes are mentioned the pragmatic adopters, functional reinventors, business pioneers and internal transformers.”
Undated
Lari Hämäläinen described a scenario in which a company with 100,000 employees has 50,000 employees in three years, alongside 500,000 AI agents.
“If you have 100,000 employees as a CEO today, and let's say three years from now, which is actually in our projections, a viable scenario, you might have only 50,000 employees”
Undated
McKinsey and Company began tracking each initiative in its large value creation plans weekly about 15 years before this episode.
“some 15 years ago, we started tracking every initiative on a weekly basis for our large value creation”
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David Pralong says McKinsey's tracking produced millions of data points on initiative value and how fast initiatives ramp up.
“we have now millions of data points about not only the value of each one of these initiatives, but also how quickly these initiatives ramp up in value”
Undated
Will Bundy says McKinsey's tool can take an uploaded confidential information memorandum and list the initiatives, checking management's claims against McKinsey data with citations.
“if you upload a, uh, a confidential information memorandum, it will actually that it'll actually provide you all the initiatives.”
Undated
Chase Covington says 88% of organizations McKinsey talks to have launched AI or digital transformation efforts, but under 25% of those feel meaningful progress.
“88% of organizations we talk to have launched some sort of AI or digital transformation effort. Of that group, less than 25% really feel honestly that there's been meaningful progress.”
Undated
Chase Covington says McKinsey surveyed 40 global general partners and investment managers and analyzed operations across 200 investment teams to assess AI's impact in diligence.
“we surveyed forty global general partners, um, investment managers, analyze operations across 200 investment teams.”
Undated
Chase Covington says McKinsey records, logs and catalogs many of its expert interviews so they can feed its gen AI tools.
“I don't think any firm does as many expert interviews as we do. Many of those we record, log and catalog”
Undated
Will Bundy says McKinsey's data includes 1,600 transformations, 500,000 initiatives and 250,000 expert interviews.
“a treasure trove of data, 1,600 transformations, 500,000 initiatives, uh, 250,000 expert interviews, right?”
Undated
Will Bundy says McKinsey's tool can turn a downloaded data room into a value creation plan in about ten minutes, covering five to six major levers.
“put together a value creation plan in about ten minutes. It's going to hit the five to six major levers, initiatives, relative sizing, typical timeline to achieve, and actual cash flow impact.”
Undated
Davide Grande said that in McKinsey's experience more than 50% of the time spent on strategic planning and control goes into creating reports that nobody reads and crunching data.
“according to our experience, more than 50% of the time of strategic planning and control is typically spent in creating reports that nobody reads, crunching data, et cetera.”
Undated
Andrea Tricoli said McKinsey benchmarks show organizations often lose between one and four percent of value because contract terms such as discounts, rebates and hourly rates are not reflected in invoices.
“Our benchmarks show that often organizations leave on the table between one and four percent of value in leakage because complex terms, discounts, rebates, or specific hourly rates are not always always reflected in invoices.”
Undated
Meagan Hill says the average transformation engages only about 2% of employees, while top-quartile transformations activate 20 to 30% of the organization.
“the average transformation engages only about 2% of employees, and the most successful top quartile transformations activate twenty to 30% of the organization.”
Undated
Mathew Lee says successful transformations follow a three-part arc of setting a high aspiration, executing, and building mechanisms to sustain the change.
“A three-part arc, starting with setting a high aspiration, then moving to execution against those plans”
Undated
Kurt Strovink serves on McKinsey's shareholders council and leads its global CEO services practice.
“He currently serves on our shareholders council and also leads our global CEO services practice.”
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Meagan Hill says McKinsey has a specific hub that studies the performance of the thousands of transformations it has done.
“we actually have a a specific hub within the firm that looks at how those transformations perform.”
Undated
Inside the Strategy Room has a library of more than 300 episodes, released weekly.
“our entire library of more than 300 episodes.”
Undated
Alexander Sukharevsky says fewer than 100 companies have captured more than two thirds of AI transformation value, working in two or fewer domains with a one-to-three return ratio.
“Less than hundred companies so far have captured more than two thirds of the value. They did it in two or less domains with one to three return ratio.”
Undated
Sukharevsky says companies that boosted their bottom line or overall value by at least 20% followed the same transformation journey.
“All the companies that managed to get boost of at least 20% on their bottom line or the overall value of the company actually went through this journey.”
Undated
Sukharevsky says companies that successfully transformed focused on two or fewer business domains.
“what you see that the companies that transform themselves actually focused on two or less domains, so it's really about focus.”
Undated
Sukharevsky says some companies featured in the first edition of the McKinsey book are leaders in the second edition after applying agentic AI on the same foundation.
“if you look at the companies in our book that featured in the first edition, some of them are the leaders in the second edition because now they apply agentic using the same chassis.”
Undated
Sukharevsky says McKinsey's State of AI research found successful organizations have boards that are fluent in technology.
“the organizations that manage to do so successfully have full board being extremely savvy and fluent around various technology topics.”
Undated
Sukharevsky says winning companies earn a return of roughly three dollars for every dollar invested in transformation.
“ROI is pretty much going to be one to three, meaning on every dollar invested in transformation, the return is around free dollar.”
Undated
Sukharevsky says McKinsey's analysis covered what he believes is the largest empirical sample globally, over six years.
“we looked at, I think, the largest empirical sample globally over six years, and this is what it says.”
Undated
Sukharevsky says once a company establishes the foundational chassis, its likelihood of success rises to about 80 to 85 percent.
“once you establish the chassis, the likelihood of success is getting closer to eighty, 85%.”
Undated
Sukharevsky says top-performing organizations set up governance and digital trust frameworks from day one.
“if we look at the top performing organization, the governance is properly set from day one, and another part that a lot of digital trust frameworks are implemented also from day one.”
Undated
Sukharevsky says the fewer than 100 champion companies pursued efficiency savings, top-line growth and new business models together.
“if you look at the less than hundred champions, the recipe was always the same.”
Undated
Sukharevsky says McKinsey's data show no correlation between industry and transformation success, only with leadership team commitment.
“there is no correlation to the industry, but rather to the leadership team that decided to go on this journey.”
Undated
Sukharevsky says McKinsey's differentiator is combining value-lever understanding, domain reinvention, technology use and change management.
“Our secret sauce is the combination of few skills that allow the transformation to flourish”
Undated
Per McKinsey's CRO flash survey, only a quarter of banks can map their fourth and fifth parties end to end.
“only a quarter of the banks can map end to end their fourth and fifth parties”
Undated
In one client pilot, McKinsey identified almost 200 concentration risks, including one provider supporting more than thirty processes.
“in in one pilot with a client, we identified almost 200 concentration risks, and we identified one provider that was supporting more than thirty processes”
Undated
Whitney Zimmerman says she has led McKinsey's work counseling chief strategy officers and speaks with three to five of them a week.
“over the last couple of years, I've I've led our work counseling two strategy officers on how to succeed in the role.”
Undated
Andy West is a McKinsey senior partner in Boston who co-leads the firm's global strategy and corporate finance practice.
“Andy is a senior partner based in our Boston office and co-leads our strategy and corporate finance practice globally.”
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Tobias Lundberg says private equity holding periods have increased by about two and a half years over the last decade.
“Well, within holding periods, I think are up about two and a half years over the last decade or so.”
Undated
Tomer Slaney said a four-person transformation office team studied by McKinsey spent 80% of its time on reporting, creating materials, preparing for meetings and follow-ups.
“One example team that we looked at four person team. How are they spending their time? And 80% of that time is spent on reporting, creating materials, preparing for meetings, doing the follow-ups”
Undated
Chase Covington said agentic tools let a transformation office reach more employees, and that McKinsey research shows embedding change more granularly raises the odds of success.
“What I think is more interesting is in any company that's using a TO, your TO can reach more employees.”
Undated
Tomer Slaney said the WAVE AI team built WAVE apps, letting teams work with transformation data in WAVE without repeated data extracts and with visibility set to match the audience.
“the wave AI team has built to start building something called wave apps, which allows allow this is it's actually designed for this.”
Undated
Sean Brown said the Inside the Strategy Room library holds more than 320 episodes.
“our entire library of more than 320 episodes.”
Episodes
- 15 Nov 2022Qualcomm2h 28m
- 17 Jul 2026McKinsey: Why Agentic AI Pilots Stall53m
- 18 Feb 2025Building trust in AI: A CIO's perspective | CXOTalk #86956m
- 25 Feb 2026Reid Hoffman: Shaping the AI Era, Investing in Transformation and Calling on Europe55m
- 30 Oct 2026328. Driving agentic transformation: How AI is rewriting the playbook on large-scale change44m
- 16 Oct 2026326. M&A heading into Q4: How AI is reshaping value creation47m
- 2 Oct 2026324. How strategy creates value: The four foundations that drive long-term performance51m
- 4 Sep 2026320. The digital twin: Reimagining non-financial risk management44m
- 2 Jul 2026310. The CEO's role in transformation51m
- 14 May 2026303. How finance leaders are driving value with AI51m
- 30 Apr 2026301. Using generative AI to conduct outside-in diligence49m
- 23 Apr 2026300. The CEO’s agenda for thriving in the agentic age53m
- 2 Apr 2026297. Boards in the age of AI46m
- 29 Jan 2026288. Securing agentic AI: A playbook54m
- 6 Nov 2025276. From strategy to performance: Building a new operating model for a new world34m
- 20 Mar 2025243. A road map to successful transformation45m
- 27 Feb 2025240. Improving strategy with AI40m
- 11 Sep 2025Cracking the code of failed AI pilots46m
- 1 Aug 2025Workforce dynamics in an AI-assisted world44m