What do the CEOs of Alphabet (No. 7 on the Fortune 500), Citigroup (No. 21), DoorDash (No. 394), and Novartis (Global 500 No. 287) have in common?
They all formerly worked for consulting giant McKinsey.
The famed firm, it turns out, is a bit of a future-leader finishing school; today, 28 CEOs of Fortune 500 and Global 500 companies are run by McKinsey alumni.
Fortune’s Ruth Umoh set out to learn what’s in the water at McKinsey, and shared what she found in her feature here. It boils down to how the firm teaches staffers to methodically break down even the thorniest of problems; how it offers stretch roles for rapid learning; and how it provides future-proofing skills training throughout its organization (including, increasingly, around AI).
Additionally, Fortune’s Lila MacLellan and Geoff Colvin have dug into Intel (No. 86), with a real-time case study in how a formerly great American company missed the boat on a major trend (AI) and is trying to pull itself back from the brink of irrelevancy. They interviewed current and former Intel executives to get their takes on the high-stakes turnaround efforts, which now include cash infusions from Nvidia (No. 31) and the U.S. government.
“Depending on how its leaders execute, it will go down in history as a turnaround for the ages or a case study in mismanagement and government overreach,” the pair write. “Saving Intel isn’t just vital for the company’s stakeholders. Its survival will have a profound effect on America’s national security.”
Read more below.
