A.T. Kearney Inc-The Push To Become A Management

W20848
A.T. KEARNEY INC.: THE PUSH TO BECOME A MANAGEMENT

CONSULTING TITAN1
Florian Wiesner, Jonathan Chen, and Christopher Williams wrote this case solely to provide material for class discussion. The authors
do not intend to illustrate either effective or ineffective handling of a managerial situation. The authors may have disguised certain
names and other identifying information to protect confidentiality.
This publication may not be transmitted, photocopied, digitized, or otherwise reproduced in any form or by any means without the
permission of the copyright holder. Reproduction of this material is not covered under authorization by any reproduction rights
organization. To order copies or request permission to reproduce materials, contact Ivey Publishing, Ivey Business School, Western
University, London, Ontario, Canada, N6G 0N1; (t) 519.661.3208; (e) cases@ivey.ca; www.iveycases.com. Our goal is to publish
materials of the highest quality; submit any errata to publishcases@ivey.ca. i1v2e5y5pubs
Copyright © 2020, Ivey Business School Foundation Version: 2020-10-23
In February 2019, Alex Liu, the managing partner and chairman of the board of directors of A.T. Kearney,
was warning about global pressures on growth rates in the consulting industry.2 Liu and his colleagues were
themselves facing the challenge of how to grow A.T. Kearney to become one of the titans in the
management consultancy industry. Almost one year earlier, in April 2018, Liu had succeeded Johan Aurik
as A.T. Kearney’s managing partner—the ninth person to hold that title since the company was founded.
Before his appointment, Liu was a member of the board of directors and had been named to Consulting
magazine’s list of The Top 25 Consultants. He had also been global lead of A.T. Kearney’s
Communications, Media, and Technology practice.3 Upon becoming managing partner, Liu announced that
A.T. Kearney would continue to be committed to helping its clients with their biggest and most important
challenges.4 However, the company had an important challenge of its own: how to grow from a US$1.3
billion5 management consultancy firm to enter the elite $2 billion club as quickly as possible.6 Liu and the
other A.T. Kearney partners had a major task to accomplish.
THE BIRTH OF A MANAGEMENT CONSULTANCY—EARLY YEARS OF THE FIRM
The age of management consulting started on October 1, 1886 with the founding of a chemical analysis
office in Boston by Massachusetts Institute of Technology professor Arthur D. Little.7 In 1919, more than
30 years later, Edwin G. Booz started his own research company in Chicago, which he named Edwin G.
Booz, Business Engineering Service. That firm would eventually develop into the major consulting brand,
Booz Allen Hamilton Holding Corporation.8
The first consulting firms were purely research companies. However, management consulting firms began
developing in Chicago during the 1920s and 1930s. With the 1913 introduction of income taxes and profit
and loss statements, cost accountants emerged and grew with the goal to improve their clients’ internal
decision processes. These new management engineers, as they were known, were focused on “organizing,
planning, and operations rather than squeezing more productivity out of shop-floor workers.”9
In 1926, James O. McKinsey, a professor at the University of Chicago, started a company that he claimed
consisted of “accountants and management engineers.”10 McKinsey had already published two books
recommending that accountants should not solely track expenses but work with budgets as a new
This document is authorized for use only by Reangelo Jarvis (reangelo7@gmail.com). Copying or posting is an infringement of copyright. Please contact
customerservice@harvardbusiness.org or 800-988-0886 for additional copies.
Page 2 9B20M180
management tool to help with the decision-making process. McKinsey had an outstanding analytical talent,
but he lacked the equivalent level of social skills. In contrast, his first partner Andrew Thomas Kearney
was focused on the client side of the business, with a personality described as warm and congenial. The
two men became a complementary team. McKinsey developed approaches to analyze clients and structured
new professional processes. Kearney’s responsibility was to put those processes into action.11
In 1935, McKinsey’s company merged with rival Scovell, Wellington & Company, although the cultures
of the two companies were not a good match. When McKinsey died in 1937, the problems developed into
a crisis, resulting in the company’s separation two years later into two new firms—one in Chicago and the
other in New York. The Chicago office was named McKinsey, Kearney, & Co.; the New York office
became McKinsey & Company. The separation deal offered two advantages to the Chicago company. It
was freed of both the expensive lease for the New York office and the high cost pension commitments for
partners retiring in the near future.12
In 1947, the two companies (both with McKinsey in their name) considered remerging to expand
geographically. By that time, however, the cultural differences of both firms had become evident. Their
highly held values of ethics, standards, and professionalism were interpreted in different ways. Kearney
focused on advising industrial clients in the Midwestern United States from its Chicago home base. He
hired experienced senior staff and built trust through stable relationships with clients to secure repeat
business. He ensured that problems were solved theoretically and solutions were implemented properly. On
the other side of the negotiation table was former corporate lawyer Marvin Bower, who had reformed the
New York office by following the so-called “white-shoe law-firm” model. Bower, who was focused on
consulting to the financial sector, recruited outstanding MBA students for a more intellectually-based
consulting approach. Conversely, Kearney used an experience-based approach.13 With contrasting
consulting models and company cultures, their merger proposition was declined by the Chicago office
partners. To eliminate future confusion from the similar company names, the two companies officially
became known as McKinsey & Company in New York and A.T. Kearney & Company in Chicago.14
Not only did Kearney commit to the values of his firm when serving his clients, he also helped the United
States and China with pro bono projects during the Second World War to help them mobilize their industry
for support of the war efforts. Kearney was later distinguished with the Chinese Victoria Medal and the
Medal of Freedom by the United States for his efforts.15 After the war, Kearney began expanding his
business internationally.
In the late 1950s, A.T. Kearney & Company started developing informal partnerships with consultants in
European countries such as Denmark, Britain, Switzerland, France, and Germany. As American firms started
expanding into European markets in the 1960s, management consulting firms soon followed. In 1964, A.T.
Kearney & Company’s partner Art Kelly opened the first office abroad in Düsseldorf, Germany. At that time,
Düsseldorf was seen as an industrial headquarters, positioned in the middle of the Ruhr district, which was
also the industrial heart of Germany. A.T. Kearney & Company’s successful operation in Düsseldorf helped
strengthen the industry’s expansion strategy. The company enhanced its expansion plans with new offices in
Milan in 1965 and in Paris in 1967, as well as the 1968 acquisition of the U.K. firm Norcross & Partners, with
offices in London and Birmingham. By the end of 1969, the European offices had contributed 15 per cent to
A.T. Kearney & Company’s total revenues. With 60 consultants, the company had become the third-largest
overseas consulting firm, behind McKinsey & Company and Booz, Allen & Hamilton.16
However, A.T. Kearney & Company was not the only consultancy firm investing abroad. McKinsey &
Company had opened its first foreign office in London much earlier—in 1959. Within 10 years, its business
grew to 10 offices over three continents.17 Other firms, including the Boston Consulting Group (BCG) and
Roland Berger, were founded later in the 1960s and would internationalize in the years to follow.18 During this
time, the consulting industry started to shift its focus from restructuring organizations to strategy consulting.
Page 3 9B20M180
INTERNATIONALIZATION AND GROWTH
Between the mid-1960s and the end of the 1970s, BCG and McKinsey & Company developed a set of
theoretical approaches and analytical tools, such as the BCG Matrix, that would become the standard for
every consultancy to follow.19 During that time, public opinion about firms that hired consultancies
changed. No longer was hiring a consultant considered an indication of a struggling business. With the help
of consultants, managers could legitimize their business decisions, even if they were unpopular.20
In 1964, with a growing number of staff at A.T. Kearney & Company, the 25 partners elected Jim Phelan
as president. Phelan had been the company’s managing partner since A.T. Kearney’s retirement in 1961. In
1972, the company name was changed to A.T. Kearney Inc., and the first two non-American partners were
appointed: Hans Naumann and Michele Azzarello. To maintain the culture of a close partnership, the
partners met three times per year. Those meetings supported the spirit of the firm and helped it thrive, unlike
most competitors that were commonly acquired by other companies after the founder retired. In 1972, the
company also opened its Tokyo office, the first one based in Asia, in a partnership with Mitsubishi.21
The next three decades were times of extremely rapid growth for the company. Fred Steingraber became
managing partner in 1983, and led the company through ambitious growth targets. In 1989, Steingraber
announced his plan to grow the firm from the current $100 million in revenues to $750 million by the end
of the millennium. To help reach that goal, he requested feedback from all clients to learn and improve the
quality of services the company delivered. From 1980 to 1997, A.T. Kearney Inc. opened 52 offices around
the world. Steingraber’s revenue target of $750 million by 2000 was surpassed three years early—in 1997,
when the company reached the milestone of $1 billion in revenues. The company had experienced double-
digit growth for 18 consecutive years, at an average annual rate of 25 per cent. A.T. Kearney Inc. hired its
1,000th employee in 1989, and then doubled its work force within the next six years. By this time, the
company’s services had diversified to offer a wide range of management consulting in all industries. To
maintain the company’s defining culture, new internal programs were developed that helped secure the
founder’s original mission of honesty, integrity, and hard work.22
The firm expanded its consulting services into new practice fields, such as organizational transformation,
business strategy, and strategic information technology (IT). To further strengthen the collaboration among
the different offices, A.T. Kearney Inc. unified the various different profit centres in the United States and
later in Asia and Europe. During the 1990s, the firm successfully helped former communist countries
transform their economies. The decades old commitment to quality, integrity, and implementation of the
solution increased the value of the brand and helped A.T. Kearney Inc. attract new clients.23
ACQUISITION AND ROLLERCOASTER RIDE
Problems Despite its unprecedented growth under Steingraber’s leadership, A.T. Kearney Inc. was facing two key internal
problems. Ownership of the firm was concentrated among only a few partners, and a significant financial burden
would result by changing the company ownership structure. Also, its capabilities in the area of information
technology were too limited to compete in the new economy that was emerging in the late 1990s.24
To resolve both of these issues, in 1995, the company was considering an acquisition offer from Electronic
Data Systems Corporation (EDS) that would enable the company to pay out the retiring partners who held
a large financial stake in the firm.25 The EDS offer was refused in a first partnership meeting but accepted
in a second vote one month later. The prestigious consulting firm sold its independence for $600 million,
half in cash and half in stock. The benefits seemed clear; as an IT firm, EDS was able to not only support
A.T. Kearney Inc.’s future growth ambitions with cash but also help A.T. Kearney Inc. close its knowledge
gap on IT services. Before this acquisition, EDS had already acquired multiple smaller consulting firms and
attracted nearly 1,000 consultants from other firms, which were integrated into A.T. Kearney Inc.26
Page 4 9B20M180
In the beginning, the acquisition created strong synergies for both sides. EDS invested in the development
of A.T. Kearney Inc.’s infrastructure, marketing, and intellectual knowledge base and helped its new
subsidiary develop stronger IT capabilities. The idea behind this development was the one-stop-shop
approach, where EDS could sell consulting services on top of its core outsourcing and system integration
skills. Clients could purchase all their required services from one provider. Meanwhile, A.T. Kearney Inc.
continued on its successful development path without being closely managed by EDS. However, the
financial resources that EDS provided helped A.T. Kearney Inc. grow its revenue to $1.3 billion in 2000,
when the company’s workforce consisted of approximately 5,000 employees, to claim the title of the
second-largest management consultancy in the world.27
However, the “honeymoon period” (or initial favourable phase) came to an end when Dick Brown took
New CEO-problems over as chief executive officer (CEO) of EDS in 1998. Aiming to improve EDS’s stagnating profits, Brown
previously voting for
decisions
followed a top-down cost-cutting approach, which collided with the partnership framework at A.T. Kearney
now: orders from top
Inc. that was used to voting on decisions, rather than enforcing orders from the top. The conflict resulted in
former managing partner
the replacement of Steingraber by Dietmar Ostermann as new managing partner of A.T. Kearney Inc. This
was asked to leave was the first appointment of a managing partner without an election. The leader that had guided A.T.
Kearney Inc.’s growth from a firm with annual revenues of $30 million to a global organization with
revenues of $1.5 billion and 68 offices in 40 countries was asked to leave. As part of the rationale for his
departure, he was accused of submitting false expenses of more than $100,000.28
new ceo: Jordan

Brown also ordered the relocation of A.T. Kearney Inc.’s head office to Plano, Texas, where EDS had its
bonus cuts
own headquarters. However, when revenues dropped at both EDS and A.T. Kearney Inc., Brown was
decline in revenues replaced by Michael H. Jordan, a former McKinsey & Company consultant. Conflict continued under
Jordan’s leadership. Rather than funding for new investment from its parent company, A.T. Kearney Inc.
was presented with bonus cuts and orders to cross-finance EDS divisions with its profits. Tensions between
the two firms led to a crisis of low morale, decreasing revenues, poor performance, and slashed bonuses.
The original values instilled by Kearney, the company’s founder, were no longer observed.29
Changes began to take place when Henner Klein was elected managing partner in 2003. He immediately
started to work on a management buyout of A.T. Kearney Inc. After extensive negotiations, Jordan accepted
an acquisition offer for the firm by the much smaller Monitor Group although the offer was withdrawn after
the due diligence process was completed. The firm continued to experience declining revenues, which
persisted for 11 consecutive quarters, and profits that turned into losses for the last three of those quarters.30
With a growing number of employees leaving the company, A.T. Kearney Inc. was reduced to half of its
former size by the end of 2005. Pressure mounted for Klein and his management team to make some
changes.31 In August 2005, EDS finally agreed to a buyout from A.T. Kearney employees and the senior
staff met in Atlanta to discuss and vote on the deal the next month. In the end, 177 partners across 26
bought back the firm
countries had bought back their firm.32
INDEPENDENCE AND REBUILDING
The firm was once again independent but had half the revenue and labour force it once enjoyed, with only
2,500 employees across 47 offices. No longer the second-largest management consulting firm, A.T.
Kearney Inc. had become significantly smaller than McKinsey & Company, Boston Consulting Group, and
Bain & Company—the new market leaders in the consulting industry. With 80 years of history, the
company had to restart building a reputation among former clients.33
The first step was to re-establish trust among the firm’s different offices by allowing them to keep a majority
of the profits they made in the first years. By the end of 2006, the general future outlook was positive. Focus
Page 5 9B20M180
was on selected services, such as operations, where the company was particularly strong. Client ratings
were improving as were profits. Trust among the different offices had also started to develop. A loan from
EDS to finance the management buyout was repaid within only one year, and many former employees who
had left the company during the EDS era were coming back to the firm.34
Having regained its initial value system, A.T. Kearney Inc. managed to successfully sail through the 2008
global financial crisis. In 2010, the management board entered negotiations with competitor Booz &
Company, which had been spun off from Booz Allen Hamilton Holding Corporation two years earlier. The
combined size of A.T. Kearney Inc. and Booz & Company would have challenged Bain & Company for
third-largest company in the industry by revenue. However, considerable cultural differences, revealed
during the due diligence phase, led to the partners voting against the merger.35
In 2013, Aurik (A.T. Kearney Inc.’s managing partner at the time) launched the company’s plan for the
future called Vision 2020, which contained three major targets: transform A.T. Kearney Inc. into the
industry’s most admired firm, double revenues to $2 billion, and become one of the top three management
consulting firms worldwide. However, Aurik’s plans did not go as planned. In 2018, when Aurik’s term
was due for renewal, he was superseded by Liu36 (see Exhibit 1).
THE MANAGEMENT CONSULTING INDUSTRY 1990–2015
During the period that A.T. Kearney Inc. was a part of EDS, the rest of the global consulting industry was
booming. The boom was driven by factors such as growth in emerging markets, privatization in former
global consulting
industry was rising communist countries, globalization, enhanced IT services, and rising computing power. Most established
firms were able to sustain growth at annual rates of 20 per cent. With revenue growth, the demand for new
consultants also increased, causing competition among the industry leaders for the best talent on university
campuses worldwide.37
In the early 2000s, some interruption resulted from the temporary bursting of the so-called “Internet
bubble,” but the consulting industry generally continued growing. By 2004, when A.T. Kearney Inc. was
still recovering from the aftermath of the EDS years, the three industry giants—McKinsey & Company,
Boston Consulting Group, and Bain & Company—were dominating the global strategy consulting market.
In specific segments of the market, several other firms seemed to gain considerable strength, including
L.E.K. Consulting in the due diligence sector, Roland Berger in Europe’s restructuring market, and Oliver
Wyman in the financial services area.38
diversification of big firms
In the 2010s, to help clients that faced ongoing waves of disruption, some leading firms diversified their
consulting portfolio. For example, Boston Consulting Group created various subsidiaries including BCG
GAMMA for advanced analytics and data science consulting, BCG Digital Ventures for corporate
investment and incubation, BCG Platinion for strategy implementation, BCG Henderson Institute for think
tank services, and BCG Turn for transformation, restructuring, and turnarounds. The idea was to provide
services to Boston Consulting Group clients that could not be offered through traditional consulting
structures.39 McKinsey & Company followed a similar strategy by opening its own set of subsidiaries,
including McKinsey Analytics to provide strategies and tools for clients to create data-based insights,
McKinsey Digital Labs to turn ideas and strategies into technical applications, and McKinsey Design to
create new products and services. The firm aimed to create necessary insights that provided helpful advice
to its clients.40 These diversification strategies helped boost revenue and employee growth in the industry.41
Page 6 9B20M180
In a 2018 survey of client organizations, A.T. Kearney Inc. ranked fifth globally in terms of differentiated
offerings that set it apart from competitors,42 below L.E.K. Consulting, PA Consulting Group, Roland
Berger, and Strategy&. In January 2019, the Financial Times ranked A.T. Kearney Inc. highly (i.e., in the
silver position) in two areas: the operations and supply chain category, and the strategy category. However,
the company was unable to achieve a gold rating in any category, earning bronze ratings in six of 15 areas
but failing to rank at all in nine industry sectors.43
In April 2018, revenue numbers provided clarity on which major strategy consulting firms were leading the
market and who were the main competitors. With annual revenues of $10.0 billion, McKinsey & Company
was by far the largest strategy consulting firm in the world at the time, followed by Boston Consulting
Group with $7.5 billion and Bain & Company with $4.5 billion.44 The next four spots in terms of annual
revenue were held by Oliver Wyman with $2.0 billion, A.T. Kearney Inc. with $1.3 billion,45 Strategy&
with approximately $1.3 billion,46 and Roland Berger, the German strategy consulting firm with $670
million for lowest annual revenue among the top seven companies.47
DISRUPTION IN THE MANAGEMENT CONSULTING INDUSTRY
In 2018, various threats of market disruption began emerging in the management consulting industry. One
threat originated from the work of A.T. Kearney Inc.’s own alumni. These consultants had transferred from
the firm directly to former clients. They understood the services that consultants normally provided better
consulting only
for complex tasks
than the clients did, so they took relatively simple tasks in-house and hired expensive consulting firms for
any complex issues that they could not resolve on their own. The demand for this format of specialized
services, rather than all-inclusive packages, triggered a broader shift toward a more modularized consulting
approach. Another threat came from the Internet and simplified access to management consulting
easy access
to consulting info:
information. Low-cost providers offered access to information databases, which threatened the existing
internet! business model of the traditional management consulting firm.48 Various other newcomers, such as Eden
McCallum LLP and Business Talent Group LLC, attempted to lower fixed salary costs by working mainly
decrease fixed
salary costs with freelance networks hired as independent contractors only for the duration of the project.49
by working with freelacers
To face upcoming challenges, industry leaders developed their own response strategies. McKinsey &
Company, Boston Consulting Group, and Bain & Company shifted their focus to the digitalization of their
client’s business model. Unlike their competitors, they not only provided conceptual ideas to the client,
they also helped execute their recommendations. By 2019, the new approaches had considerably lowered
the level of traditional strategy consulting from 60–70 per cent 30 years earlier to approximately 20 per
cent.50 In this new analytics-based environment, the work was less concentrated on strategy advice and
more focus on execution more focused on execution. In 2019, as supplement to its execution-based approach, Bain & Company
of ideas
rather than providing
ideas
launched NPS Prism. McKinsey & Company had already rebranded its 2007 knowledge asset subsidiary
in 2012 as the new McKinsey Solutions Office. These companies were offering tools for data analytics,
big firms offered
tools for data analytics: which clients could implement in their software systems to find insights without having to wait for an
not hiring expensive
consultants expensive consulting team to do the work. By offering the necessary software directly to the client, the
firms found a way to hedge against disruption risk. Instead of billing clients per hour, they had found a way
to bill for use of their software.51
Although the source of market disruption in the industry was mainly from new companies, considerable pressure
on the management consulting business model was also coming from the big four auditing organizations:
Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu Limited (Deloitte), Ernst & Young Global Limited (EY), PricewaterhouseCoopers
(PwC), and KPMG International Cooperative (KPMG). In 2013, Deloitte acquired the independent strategy
consulting firm Monitor.52 In 2014, PwC acquired Booz & Company and rebranded the 100-year-old firm to
Page 7 9B20M180
Strategy&.53 EY acquired Boston-based Parthenon Group in 2014 to form the backbone of its new consulting
business.54 All four giant accounting firms were acquiring and integrating smaller consulting firms on an ongoing
basis. At the same time, other like-sized consulting firms (e.g., Oliver Wyman and Roland Berger) were
becoming premium firms within their specialized disciplines or specific region.55
McKinsey & Company, Boston Consulting Group, and Bain & Company had not necessarily found a
blueprint to defend their existing business model to its full extent against market disruption. However, the
three management consulting giants had made a decision to confront ongoing disruption in their industry.
The board of directors at A.T. Kearney Inc. was aware that to stand a chance of becoming one of the big
three in their market, the firm would have to develop and adapt to the new business environment. To that
end, the firm acquired the analytics and data management consultancy Cervello Inc. in January 2019.56 This
was a relatively rare move for the company; its previous acquisition was completed back in 2011, for the
Netherlands company Quintel Strategy Consulting. A.T. Kearney Inc.’s managing director Liu described
the new culture and passion to deliver results to clients as the firm’s “connecting element.”57
OPTIONS FACING LIU
By 2019, A.T. Kearney employed more than 3,600 people with 57 offices in 40 countries (see Exhibit 2).
Overall, the company was considered a leading consultancy for operations with a focus on more traditional
industries, such as industrials, process industries, retail, and energy. Financial institutions and government
entities were less of a focus area. The firm was the fourth-largest pure management consulting firm
worldwide in 2018, with total revenues of $1.3 billion. A.T. Kearney Inc. had a think tank unit within the
firm known as the Global Business Policy Council whose major goal was to provide CEOs and governments
with the insights to help them anticipate and plan for future developments. The think tank was ranked third
among the best for-profit think tanks worldwide.58
However, the future for A.T. Kearney Inc. looked uncertain. Reports suggested that a consulting firm with
less than $2 billion in revenues would find it difficult to compete in the market. With revenues of $1.3
billion in 2018, A.T. Kearney Inc. was falling well below that figure.59 However, three key growth options
were available to Liu and his firm to attempt to bridge that gap: (1) remain independent and specialize in
areas of excellence by investing in sales strategy and boosting revenue from existing competence areas; (2)
build strategic long-term alliances with other consulting firms in different markets or geographic domains
to offer complementary resources and market access; or (3) strategically transform the firm into an industry
disruptor with an entirely new model, such as using freelance services for specific projects.
Liu and the partners at A.T. Kearney Inc. had to find the best option for the future of their company.
Page 8 9B20M180
EXHIBIT 1: ALEX LIU PROFILE
Alex Liu is the managing partner and chairman of A.T. Kearney Inc. A trusted advisor to chief executive
officers and boards of directors, Liu joined A.T. Kearney Inc. as partner in 1996 and later served as global
lead of the firm’s Communications, Media, and Technology practice and as a member of the board of
directors. He was elected as the firm’s ninth managing partner in 2018. He also serves as the firm’s chief
diversity officer.
Liu has worked with leading firms in communications, media, and technology sectors in more than 50
countries. In 2015, he was named to by Consulting magazine’s list of The Top 25 Consultants. His
leadership of client service teams led to multiple Great Client Work awards, the most coveted global
recognition within A.T. Kearney Inc..
Alex has served as both speaker and co-chair at World Economic Forum (WEF) events, including the
Annual Summit in Davos and the WEF on Africa Summit, sharing his perspectives on global trends across
a range of fourth industrial revolution and future-workforce topics. He is also a member of the WEF
International Business Council (IBC), an advisory body that consists of 100 chief executives and chairs
representing cross-industry global organizations.
Experience
Managing Partner and Chairman, A.T. Kearney Inc., 2018 to Present

Partner, A.T. Kearney Inc., 1996 to Present
 Global Lead of Communications, Media, and Technology Practice, A.T. Kearney Inc., 2015–2018
 Member of the Board of Directors, A.T. Kearney Inc., 2011–2016
 Board Advisor, Etisalat, 2015–2017
 Chief Executive Officer, oCen Communications, 2000–2001
 Region Lead of Communications, Media, and Technology Practice, A.T. Kearney Inc., 1996–2000
Partner, Boston Consulting Group, 1985–1996
Brand Manager, Richardson Vicks, 1980–1983
Education
MBA, Harvard Business School, Boston, MA, United States

BA, Economics, Yale, New Haven, CT, United States
Awards and Recognition
Board of Trustees, Episcopal High School (2019 to Present)
Source: “Alex Liu: Managing Partner,” Kearney, accessed October 3, 2019, www.atkearney.com/alex-liu; “Alex Liu,” LinkedIn,
accessed October 3, 2019, www.linkedin.com/in/alexliu7.
Page 9 9B20M180
EXHIBIT 2: OVERVIEW OF LEADING MANAGEMENT CONSULTING FIRMS
Name of Company Number of Number of Revenue (in Date Location of

Employees Offices US$) Founded Head Office
McKinsey & 27,000 130+ $10.0 billion 1926 New York, NY,
Company USA
Boston Consulting 18,500 90+ $7.5 billion 1963 Boston, MA, USA
Group
Bain & Company 10,500 58 $4.5 billion 1973 Boston, MA, USA
Oliver Wyman 4,700 66 $2.0 billion 1984 New York, NY,

USA
A.T. Kearney Inc. 3,600 57 $1.3 billion 1926 Chicago, IL, USA
Strategy& 3,000 74 $1.3 billion 1914 New York, NY,

USA
Roland Berger 2,400 51 $670 million 1967 Munich, Germany
Monitor Group 1,500 27 N/A 1983 New York, NY,

USA
Parthenon Group 3,000 43 N/A 1991 Boston, MA, USA
Source: “About Us: Creating Change that Matters,” McKinsey & Company, October 4, 2019, www.mckinsey.com/about-
us/overview; “Overview: About BCG,” BCG [Boston Consulting Group], accessed October 4, 2019, www.bcg.com/en-
us/about/about-bcg/overview.aspx; “About Us,” Bain & Company, accessed October 4, 2019, www.bain.com/about/; “Our
Culture,” Oliver Wyman, accessed October 4, 2019, www.oliverwyman.com/our-culture.html; “About Us,” ATKearney,
accessed May 8, 2020, www.africa.kearney.com/documents/20152/436187/About+A.T.+Kearney.pdf/3ce43068-f1a8-bd7b-
dc91-e324fd8b1114?t=1549645022077; “Strategy&,” Forbes, March 19, 2019, accessed October 4, 2019,
www.forbes.com/companies/strategy/#4644c0a37799; “About Us,” Roland Berger, October 4, 2019,
www.rolandberger.com/en/About.
Page 10 9B20M180
ENDNOTES
1
This case has been written on the basis of published sources only. Consequently, the interpretation and perspectives
presented in this case are not necessarily those of A.T. Kearney Inc. or any of its employees.
2
“‘Near-Term Outlook Remains Cloudy’, Alex Liu Chairman AT Kearney's 2019 Outlook| Exclusive,” YouTube video, 2:40,
posted by “CNBC-TV18,” February 11, 2019, accessed August 1, 2020, https://youtu.be/j7fTHrZXIJw.
3
“Kearney Elects Alex Liu Managing Partner and Chairman,” A.T. Kearney Inc., accessed September 28, 2019,
www.atkearney.com/atkearney-announces-new-managing-partner.
4
“Alex Liu—Managing Partner and Chairman,” Kearney, accessed October 4, 2019, www.atkearney.com/alex-liu.
5
All currencies are in US$ unless otherwise specified.
6
John Gapper, “The Strategy Consultants in Search of a Strategy,” Financial Times, August 28, 2013, accessed July 16,
2020, www.ft.com/content/f15acee6-0f2d-11e3-8e58-00144feabdc0.
7
“About Us: History,” Arthur D. Little: Global, accessed September 28, 2019, www.adlittle.com/en/about-us/history-0.
8
“Our Heritage: The Dawn of Management Consulting,” Booz  Allen  Hamilton, accessed October 4, 2019,
www.boozallen.com/about/our-heritage.html.
9
A.T. Kearney, The A.T. Kearney Story: Our Journey to Becoming Most Admired (Chicago, Illinois: A.T. Kearney, 2005), 11.
10
Ibid, 17
11
Ibid, 11.
12
Ibid, 12.
13
Ibid, 14. ]
14
Ibid, 15f.
15
Ibid.
16
“The Kearney Story,” Kearney, accessed October 3, 2019, www.atkearney.com/the-atkearney-story; “Our Story,” Kearney,
accessed October 3, 2019, www.de.kearney.com/about-atkearney/our-timeline.
17
“History of Our Firm,” McKinsey & Company, accessed October 1, 2019, www.mckinsey.com/about-us/overview/history-of-our-firm.
18
“Right time. Right place. Right vision,” Roland Berger, accessed October 4, 2019, www.rolandberger.com/en/About/Our-
History; “The History of Boston Consulting Group,” BCG [Boston Consulting Group], accessed October 4, 2019,
www.bcg.com/about/our-history/default.aspx.
19
“What Is the Growth Share Matrix?” BCG [Boston Consulting Group], accessed October 4, 2019, www.bcg.com/en-
us/about/our-history/growth-share-matrix.aspx.
20
Jonas Bäcklund and Andreas Werr, “Constructing the Legitimate Buyer of Management Consulting Services,” Journal of
Organizational Change Management 21, no. 6 (2008): 758–772.
21
A.T. Kearney, op. cit., 26ff.
22
Ibid, 35ff.
23
Ibid, 42ff.
24
Ibid, 49.
25
In 1995, EDS was one of the largest providers of computer services to the U.S. government and corporations. Over the
previous nine years, EDS had grown to reach revenues of $10 billion with a profit margin of 8 per cent. The company had
80,000 employees and was serving 8,000 clients; Mike McKesson, “GM Plans to Spin Off EDS,” Washington Post, August 8,
1995, accessed October 3, 2019, www.washingtonpost.com/archive/business/1995/08/08/gm-plans-to-spin-off-
eds/ed5c2ce2-2836-4f1f-9f4a-a1c4b84130ec.
26
A.T. Kearney, op. cit., 49.
27
Vivek Velamuri, “EDS’s Merger with AT Kearney,” Financial Times, July 1, 2013, accessed September 30, 2019,
www.ft.com/content/962f4fe2-d517-11e2-9302-00144feab7de.
28
Steven R. Strahler, “Fred Steingraber, Who Headed A.T. Kearney, Dies at 80,” Crain’s Chicago Business, July 15, 2019,
accessed October 2, 2019, www.chicagobusiness.com/obituaries/fred-steingraber-who-headed-kearney-dies-80.
29
30
Velamuri, op. cit.
31
32
Ibid, 59.
33
Ibid, 60.
34
Ibid, 63.
35
Ibid, 65.
36
Ibid, 69.
37
Andrew Hill, “Changing Face of Advisers’ War for Talent,” Financial Times, December 5, 2016, accessed October 4, 2019,
www.ft.com/content/dbd794f6-990d-11e6-8f9b-70e3cabccfae.
38
“The 25 Largest Consultants in Germany [in German],“ Manager Magazin, May 24, 2004, accessed July 16, 2020,
www.manager-magazin.de/unternehmen/artikel/a-301253.html.
39
“BCG in the 2010s,” BCG [Boston Consulting Group], accessed October 1, 2019, www.bcg.com/about/our-
history/2010s.aspx.
40
“History of Our Firm,” op. cit.
41
“The 10 Largest Consulting Firms in the World,” C: Consultancy United Kingdom, September 25, 2017, accessed July 16,
2020, www.consultancy.uk/news/14018/the-10-largest-consulting-firms-in-the-world.
Page 11 9B20M180
42
“The Consulting Firms with the Most Differentiated Offering in the Market,” C: Consultancy United Kingdom, April 4, 2018, accessed
August 1, 2020, www.consultancy.uk/news/16473/the-consulting-firms-with-the-most-differentiated-offering-in-the-market.
43
Jerry Andrews, “UK’s Leading Management Consultants 2019,” Financial Times, January 30, 2019, accessed August 1,
2020, https://ig.ft.com/special-reports/rankings/uk-management-consultants/2019.
44
“About Us: Change that Matters,” McKinsey & Company, October 4, 2019, www.mckinsey.com/about-us/overview; “About
BCG,” BCG [Boston Consulting Group], accessed October 4, 2019, www.bcg.com/en-us/about/about-bcg/overview.aspx;
“About Us”, Bain & Company, accessed October 4, 2019, www.bain.com/about.
45
“Our Culture,” Oliver Wyman, October 4, 2019, www.oliverwyman.com/our-culture.html; “About Us,” ATKearney, accessed
May 8, 2020, www.africa.kearney.com/documents/20152/436187/About+A.T.+Kearney.pdf/3ce43068-f1a8-bd7b-dc91-
e324fd8b1114?t=1549645022077.
46
“Strategy&,” Forbes, March 19, 2019, accessed October 4, 2019, www.forbes.com/companies/strategy/#4644c0a37799.
47
“About Us,” Roland Berger, October 4, 2019, www.rolandberger.com/en/About.
48
Clayton M. Christensen, Dina Wang, and Derek van Bever, “Consulting on the Cusp of Disruption,” Harvard Business
Review, October 2013, 1–10. Available from Ivey Publishing, product no. R1310F.
49
“Overview,” Eden McCallum, accessed October 4, 2019, https://edenmccallum.com; “Access the Best,” BTG: Business
Talent Group, accessed October 4, 2019, https://businesstalentgroup.com/talent.
50
Christensen, Wang, and van Bever, op. cit.
51
Ibid.
52
“Deloitte Takes Over the Global Strategy Consulting Company Monitor [in German],” Deloitte (media release), January 14,
2013, accessed October 2, 2019, www2.deloitte.com/ch/de/pages/press-releases/articles/deloitte-completes-acquisition-of-
monitors-global-strategy-consulting-business.html.
53
“Successful Merger: PwC and Booz & Company Become One [in German],“ Wirtschaftswoche, April 3, 2014, accessed
October 2, 2019, www.wiwo.de/unternehmen/dienstleister/erfolgreicher-zusammenschluss-pwc-und-booz-und-company-
werden-eins/9711334.html.
54
Beth Healy, “Accounting Giant to Buy Parthenon,” Boston Globe, July 22, 2014, accessed October 2, 2019,
www.bostonglobe.com/business/2014/07/21/boston-consultancy-parthenon-group-acquired-ernst-
young/ECKVANjyAhbztiIDOxm0DN/story.html.
55
Liz Loxton, “How the Big Four Have Returned to Consulting with a Bang,” Accountancy Age, September 27, 2015, accessed
July 16, 2020, www.accountancyage.com/2015/09/27/how-the-big-four-have-returned-to-consulting-with-a-bang; “The 9 Most
Prestigious Consulting Firms in the World,” IGotanOffer Consulting, February 26, 2018, accessed July 16, 2020,
https://igotanoffer.com/blogs/mckinsey-case-interview-blog/top-consulting-firms.
56
Cervello Inc. was a business analytics and data management consultancy that employed 120 data engineers, data
scientists, and developers. The company had offices in Boston, Dallas, and New York in the United States, as well as
international offices in London, U.K., and Bengaluru, India.
57
“Kearney Acquires Business Analytics Consultancy Cervello,” Kearney, accessed October 4, 2019,
www.atkearney.com/a.t.-kearney-acquires-business-analytics-consultancy-cervello.
58
“About Kearney," Kearney, accessed October 3, 2019, www.atkearney.com/web/global-business-policy-council/about-us.
59
Gapper, op. cit.

A.T. Kearney Inc-The Push To Become A Management

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

You might also like

A.T. Kearney Inc-The Push To Become A Management

Uploaded by

Document Information

Original Title

Copyright

Available Formats

Share this document

Share or Embed Document

Sharing Options

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

Copyright:

Available Formats

A.T. Kearney Inc-The Push To Become A Management

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

W20848

A.T. KEARNEY INC.: THE PUSH TO BECOME A MANAGEMENT

Copyright © 2020, Ivey Business School Foundation Version: 2020-10-23

THE BIRTH OF A MANAGEMENT CONSULTANCY—EARLY YEARS OF THE FIRM

INTERNATIONALIZATION AND GROWTH

ACQUISITION AND ROLLERCOASTER RIDE

new ceo: Jordan

INDEPENDENCE AND REBUILDING

THE MANAGEMENT CONSULTING INDUSTRY 1990–2015

DISRUPTION IN THE MANAGEMENT CONSULTING INDUSTRY

OPTIONS FACING LIU

EXHIBIT 1: ALEX LIU PROFILE

Managing Partner and Chairman, A.T. Kearney Inc., 2018 to Present

MBA, Harvard Business School, Boston, MA, United States

Awards and Recognition

Board of Trustees, Episcopal High School (2019 to Present)

EXHIBIT 2: OVERVIEW OF LEADING MANAGEMENT CONSULTING FIRMS

Name of Company Number of Number of Revenue (in Date Location of

Oliver Wyman 4,700 66 $2.0 billion 1984 New York, NY,

Strategy& 3,000 74 $1.3 billion 1914 New York, NY,

Roland Berger 2,400 51 $670 million 1967 Munich, Germany

Monitor Group 1,500 27 N/A 1983 New York, NY,

Parthenon Group 3,000 43 N/A 1991 Boston, MA, USA

You might also like