McKinsey’s announcement on Tuesday that its most serious transgressions in the Eskom-Trillian episode amounted to a lapse in administrative processes and some errors of judgment has not gone down well with the South African public. It found no one guilty of acting in bad faith, no one was fired, an undisclosed number of people left the firm, among whom the only one named was key figure Vikas Sagar, and an undisclosed, unnamed number were sanctioned. McKinsey, it seems, intentionally ignored the public mood and did things "the McKinsey way". This included conducting its own investigation and providing only the barest glimpse of how and why it arrived at its findings. It was determined that in an environment where the public wants to see heads roll, it would not bow to the collective desire for retribution. If this was the only problem with its response, though, then public anger would dissipate and its reputation would be easily recovered. But it wasn’t. The problem is much bigger: f...
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