Rating: 
Summary: A solid follow up to "The McKinsey Way"
Review: I do agree that this book is very similar to the author's first offering "The McKinsey Way". However, I enjoyed both. A great read for people in business. Straight forward advice and practical application tips. Recommended reading for the plane...
Rating: 
Summary: no content
Review: I had to read this book and there's only one thing I can say about it: You read the table of contents? You read the book.
There is nothing more than superficial drivel and McKinsey canticles. No methods, do frameworks, nothing in-depth. Don't waste your money.
Rating:
Summary: Pretty Superficial
Review: I purchased this book with the hope that it would refresh my memory from business school on the various techniques for problem solving. What a disappointment. No cases, worthless quotes from associates that provide no insight, no details, a compilation of useless consultant gibberish. The book comes across as arrogant as a real life consultant. I agree with others ......save your money.
Rating:
Summary: amazingly shallow, specially coming from McKinsey
Review: I was desiring and willing to learn from the McKinsey approach. I can't overemphasize how dissapointed I am with this book. Lots of comments on what to do and why to do it but all presented at a very conceptual level without any information regarding the "how". I doubt many will find anything new in this book they haven't heard before, not to mention its poor layout and presentation. If the authors had follow the book's suggestions, the end reult would have been better.
Rating:
Summary: Rasiel and Friga write like Company men through and through
Review: I've tried in several sittings to try to extract insights from this book. Unfortunately, I keep getting thrown off by the excessive fawning by the authors about their McKinsey experience. Their tone reeks of insecurity. It reeks of employees who's sense of self worth and validation is tied up in McKinsey. Like a Harvard grad who keeps raving about the 'caliber' of their education and how superior it was to other institutions. Pretty sad...People bought this book for nuggetts of insights. The authors forgot their own advice: "tailoring" their advice to their audience. Save your money.
Rating:
Summary: This book was a waste of my time
Review: If you have ever taken a one or two day Problem Solving/Project Management class, this book will be a waste of time for you. It is a watered down (way down) version of Problem Solving/PM 101. This is particularly ironic because the authors comment on how much better the McKinsey approach is when compared to other successful companies (e.g. GE,GlaxoSmithKline, and others). My experience is that GE's Six Sigma and other "tools" blow the McKinsey approach away. It is very hard to believe that McKinsey became a successful consulting firm by implementing these very elementary principles. Either the authors were too scared of violating their Proprietary Information Agreements to write anything of substance OR McKinsey simply has no practices, tools, techniques, or methodology that contribute to their success. Either way, this book will do NOTHING to increase your knowledge of how to solve business problems.
Rating:
Summary: Dont Waste Your Money on This One
Review: If you really want to get an insider's view about McKinsey and some of the basic consulting skills instilled and refined into the work style of its consultants, buy the McKinsey Mind. The author has worked in the firm for some time, and therefore he can at least describe what he learned adequately. However the author really bit more than he could chew in trying to flesh out how McKinsey partners and senior consultants really solve problems and build their practices. In this book many of his points are simply wrong, based more on personal bias and wrong perceptions. It is like a junior manager trying to 'imagine' how the CEOs think and run their businesses. I think the author knew his limits and therefore tried to stay very 'high level' and common-sensical, which made the whole book useless. It would be great if the author was consistently wrong. But he was only 60% wrong and it would be hard for readers to see which part of his comments are wrong. I hope there would be a great book on strategy consulting and McKinsey out in the market (especially when the industry experiences its toughest two years in the past three decade, and therefore some quality consultants should be available to write), but before that happens, do yourselves a favor and skip this one.
Rating:
Summary: Yes, Jeff Skilling is the most famous McK alum right now
Review: In the introduction the authors cite three McKinsey alums (those that left McKinsey to pursue other careers) who became famous in the biz world: one of them is Jeff Skilling, the ex-CEO of Enron who lied without blinking at Congress hearings! I work as a member of the CSS at the McKinsey NYO and find that the book won't help you a bit whether you are looking to find a job at McKinsey, looking to enhance your position at the firm (and thus to avoid getting "counseled out"), or just wanting to learn how "the Firm" discovers magic pills for corporate diseases. The book follows the same hollow structure as Rasiel's first book and is half a rip-off of McKinsey's BCR training program (plus the ILW and some from the ELW) and half useless interviews with McKinsey alumni who boast after they received the latter end of the "up-or-out" policy they were able to show how inferior their new employers were on the management IQ scale. If you want concrete case studies -- which is why I picked up the book -- it contains none. It does contain more words than the "McKinsey Way" book, but nothing that will set fire to your imagination or career or profits.
Rating:
Summary: Underwhelming to say the least
Review: Simply put this was one of the worst books that I have read in quite some time. I purchased the book expecting to learn more about structuring, analyzing and solving ambiguous business problems. I was also interested in the discussion of structuring/presenting solutions and managing teams and the client. What I got lacks any real content or depth. For example, gems of wisdom from the analysis section include: find the key drivers, look at the big picture, and don't boil the ocean. This book did not live up to my expectations and I would NOT recommend it to those who are looking for tools to help sharpen their analytic and problem solving skills.
Rating:
Summary: Simple, easy to read and good learning
Review: The book is easy to read, some of the lessons learned, good tips, and concepts worth the book. I enjoyed reading the book.
| 
