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Beware Management Consultants
- sscaryterry 2mo agoThis is nice big fat fuck you to the mercenaries that come and destroy companies. Well done Iceland.
- deleted 2mo ago[deleted]
- dzonga 2mo agoscary shit is this is out there for people to read & learn. but the same thing keeps happening. top heavy organizations.
- arjie 2mo agoPrivate firms are entertainingly idiosyncratic in ways only founder-powered public firms barely approach. The other big one I find entertaining is Dr Bronner’s soap which has a massive label full of dense text that is totally stream of consciousness sentences. Amazing. Perhaps it’s a characteristic of closed groups. SQLite has its moral code that is the Ten Commandments++. Good stuff.
- rwmj 2mo agoWeird story ... Dr Bronner also appeared in the greatest unreleased movie ever made. With Bill Murray and Dan Ackyroyd and Liz Taylor's ex husband. And it was the only movie Dr Bronner appeared in according to imdb: https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0111462/ https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0111462/
- wat10000 2mo agoDr. Bronner lost his family in the Holocaust and it seems to have broken his brain a little.
- brandall10 2mo ago"After escaping from a mental institution in 1945, Bronner went into business" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dr._Bronner's_Magic_Soaps https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dr._Bronner's_Magic_Soaps
- wat10000 2mo agoI don't imagine doing time in a 1940s mental institution did his brain much good either.
- ajkjk 2mo agoI imagine that Dr Bronner's unhingedness is a net asset for the brand. I always prefer to buy things that seem less sterilized by corporateness.
- jbs789 2mo agoIf a public co CEO acts differently than others and then underperforms the market, shareholders then look at rhe idiosyncrasy as a bad thing. So they naturally all start to act like each other. Buffett had a similar idea he termed the institutional imperative. If you’re the private owner/CEO you just get to be steered by the customer, and can even stop growing if you want.
- taneq 2mo agoHaha my friend buys that stuff and the label text reminds me of Timecube.
- vostrocity 2mo agoActually had no idea Dr. Bronner's was this weird. The guy started it as a tax-exempt religious organization!
- pdntspa 2mo agoDr Bronners is local to me and they are very active in the burner scene (I believe the founder is an OG burner). I have a few friends who work there and Bronners often has a presence at local burner events (and Burning Man) -- notable because these are environments where commercial expression is generally forbidden. Yet they sometimes get a pass, I think because they embody the burner spirit and often supply a needed service (showers) totally free and in a way that fits in with the culture. It is the most guerilla marketing you ever saw and I would not be suprised if that wasn't their intent -- rather its just the company gifting itself and embodying the spirit of the ten principles. They remind me a lot of Valve in that they are able to chart their own path and find success. Bronners certainly isn't without its problems as a company. But I find it to be very inspirational that companies can find success without having to devolve into the bland milquetoast mediocrity that feels like 95% of US business culture. We need more people being visibly, authentically, and unashamedly weird.
- recursivecaveat 2mo ago> Larry would do these big usability studies and demonstrate beyond any shred of doubt that nobody can understand that frigging website, but Bezos just couldn't let go of those pixels, all those millions of semantics-packed pixels on the landing page. They were like millions of his own precious children. So they're all still there, and Larry is not. https://gist.github.com/chitchcock/1281611 https://gist.github.com/chitchcock/1281611
- unfunco 2mo agoThat's why mums go to Iceland.
- mkoubaa 2mo agoPE turning a beloved brand into a soulless skin suit exhibit no. 63631
- dvaplima 2mo agoThats a good point of view of the traditional Managment consultants, now for the "AI era", this type of interventions will not exist Maybe now the Big coorp will finally get closer to real life solutions to the problems companies face
- KaiserPro 2mo agoI wish. My company is "AI native" in the sense that even though we are not a tech company we are using it heavily to build a bunch of tech that makes us more efficient. Think building better SaaS products around our actual process rather than whatever bespoke niche SaaS product provides. this has yielded real savings in both software costs and efficiency. Compared to our peers, we are light years ahead. Even the supposed "leading AI readiness consultants" hired by the group board agreed. our board have still hired kpmg[1] or some other vague merchant to come and help us deliver "efficiencies" [1] its not them, but I want to keep some level of mystique about where I work
- hahahaa 2mo agoMaybe GMPK should do a protection racket of sorts. Pay us 1% of revenue and we wont send the consultants j/k
- amarcheschi 2mo agoI'm curious to know what they have been providing in suggestions up to now, can you tell us?
- KaiserPro 2mo agoSadly I'm not privy to the internal workings, they are due to report in the new year (got knows how much this is going to cost) I have a steer that people, process and services are all in scope, but again thats vague-as-a-service™
- dvaplima 2mo agoYeah, in the short term the delivery of "efficiencies" will still be masked, but I think looking into the real potential of AI Agents and Tools It will become harder to hide "fake" solutions, but It can be me just being optmistic
- notahacker 2mo agoNot gonna lie, the website of a remarkably ordinary frozen food supermarket found on most UK high streets is not where I'd expect to find this kind of content :)
- zaphod12 2mo agoand here I thought it was from the Nation of Iceland and was very impressed by the volume of their anti-management consultant stance.
- outofpaper 2mo agoI wish I new of more gems like this. Company sites that go into detail where they went wrong and how they turned things around make for both amazing reading and great educational material.
- Taikhoom10 2mo ago[flagged]
- nonameiguess 2mo agoWith all respect, I just downvoted you because you're becoming recognizable. Your account is scarcely a year old with almost no karma, and checking your profile right now, the first page of comments is all but one you posting a link to your own app. You gotta slow down. This is a discussion board, not a growth hacking mixer. Plenty of people become known for popular products and companies they're associated with, but it can't be all you ever talk about. The world at large isn't a sales conference and doesn't find that interesting.
- Taikhoom10 2mo ago[flagged]
- RobotToaster 2mo agoNever thought I'd see them posted on here, but I honestly have a lot more respect for them after seeing this.
- jldugger 2mo agoI think I'm missing a _lot_ of context here. Obviously management consultants are sycophantic but why post this now?
- ferngodfather 2mo agoThey saw it commented on another thread.
- kristianc 2mo agoScore-settling by the ousted (and then returning) CEO Malcolm Walker. After Iceland merged with Booker in 2000, Walker was pushed out and a new management team led by Bill Grimsey took over. Sales declined, head office staff ballooned and they hired a lot of McKinsey types. Walker's point is that they'd overcomplicated what was basically quite a simple business.
- mikepurvis 2mo agoInterestingly the "dark ages" subpage is not linked from the parent page: https://about.iceland.co.uk/our-story/ https://about.iceland.co.uk/our-story/
- kristianc 2mo agoReading between the lines, you kind of get the picture... 2006 A spectacular turnaround sees a 10% sales decline turned into growth of 20% year-on-year by March 2006, making Iceland the UK’s fastest-growing food retailer. 2005 The Big Food Group is taken private and Iceland returned to the management of Malcolm Walker and other senior executives who had been ejected in 2001. 2004 The Big Food Group is nearing bankruptcy as provisions made in 2001 come close to exhaustion. 2002 Iceland-Booker is renamed The Big Food Group and launches a grandiose recovery plan (Click here to read the saga of ‘The one, two, three, four, five year recovery plan’) but customer numbers and sales remain in steady decline while costs escalate. 2001 New Iceland chief executive Bill Grimsey issues a massive profit warning, and Malcolm Walker and other senior managers are forced to leave the company
- 2mo ago
- sillywabbit 2mo agoThe antique illustrations on this are fantastic.
- cjs_ac 2mo agoThey’re a set of clip art provided with Microsoft PowerPoint called ‘Screen Beans’.
- hadrien01 2mo agoThe entire section of the website about 'The Dark Ages' is priceless. They don't pull any punches: https://about.iceland.co.uk/our-story/the-dark-ages/ https://about.iceland.co.uk/our-story/the-dark-ages/
- afavour 2mo agoThe operating profit chart too, oof: https://about.iceland.co.uk/our-performance/ https://about.iceland.co.uk/our-performance/
- chiph 2mo agoThat's pretty shocking.
- Taikhoom10 2mo agoYeah, except profits are down from the peak. I do not know enough about the market, but my suspicion is that they basically benefited by focusing on a specific market, "Focus," and will basically see this erode over time as more companies in the high end move into their market.
- afavour 2mo agoIt’s been twenty years. What’s the timescale that makes it worth wrecking your company in anticipation of a competitor moving in… some day?
- Taikhoom10 2mo agoWell I mean you have to pivot to survive, they likley should just sell to a larger dominant omnichannel retailer.
- p91paul 2mo agopivoting is useful if you are doing several things, one well and the others badly. You stop doing whatever it is you are bad at and focus on what you are good. If your company is going strongly overall, you can just continue doing whatever you are doing (adapting to the market is still necessary, but not with huge changes)
- bmiekre 2mo agoClass
- ang_cire 2mo agoAm I misreading something, or was it not in fact the corporate leaders who torpedoed the reorg suggestions they knew were coming, who were at fault? This is a classic hierarchy-brain/ bureaucracy problem, where "leaders" think the top is more important to the org than the bottom.
- ivanbakel 2mo agoMy interpretation of the parable is really just that management consultants are paid to tell you what you already know and give you the conclusions you want to hear - hence why their "solution" is non-specific and the retrospective analysis vindicates what upper management already wanted. It's also a criticism of management-heavy offices who have lost touch with reality, but consultants are a byword for such things, so I guess the title is succinct at the cost of accuracy.
- pjsg 2mo agoWhen I was a consultant, the saying was: A consultant is someone who borrows your watch, tells you the time, and keeps the watch.
- throwawayffffas 2mo agoYou have a watch and don't know what time it is, you clearly need help.
- yibers 2mo agoYou are afraid to tell the time to other people, as the time is unpopular. So you hire someone to do it for you.
- bigmattystyles 2mo ago"What would you say you do here?" - The Bobs
- magicalhippo 2mo agoOffice Space[1], for those who somehow haven't seen it yet. [1]: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0151804/ https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0151804/
- gadiyar 2mo agoIsn’t this the same company that had the trademark dispute with Iceland the country? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iceland_v_Iceland_Foods_Ltd https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iceland_v_Iceland_Foods_Ltd
- justeoghan 2mo agoThis is a great read thank you.
- dijksterhuis 2mo ago> The ruling stated that the supermarket chain founded in 1970 "cannot reasonably trademark the name of a country that has been around since the 9th century" amazing
- LadyCailin 2mo agoSo does this mean I can start a supermarket chain named Iceland, and that’s fine?
- afavour 2mo agoNot in the UK. This was an EU ruling. In the EU you could theoretically open your own store named Iceland but you’d have to be careful about doing absolutely anything that might be intepreted as impersonating the existing store.
- etiennebausson 2mo ago> Iceland Foods' managing director Richard Walker said the supermarket will "vigorously defend its intellectual property rights" Some people have no shame at all. This is so absurd it read like a comedy sketch.
- Taikhoom10 2mo agoI think generalizations are usually bad. I genuinely am weirded out by management's fascination with consultants. It really is about incentives, and consultants usually do not have the right ones, at least the big ones. Also, there are management which feel like companies always need change, but really you have to examine the competitve position within the broader industry not just a vacumm. Things honestly stay the same for a long time. IBM had more revenue then Microsoft all the way up to the early 2010s. Switching costs are powerful - https://s-1.vercel.app/posts/why-dropbox-is-a-obvious-pe-target/ https://s-1.vercel.app/posts/why-dropbox-is-a-obvious-pe-tar... I think a key takeaway is the human nature to constantly act, and not just sit and do nothing. Lot's of value in sitting around, especially in investing.
- smt88 2mo agoGeneralizations can be bad, yes. Everyone knows about management consultants ruining companies and governments, contributing to the opioid crisis, etc. But what else do they do? Let’s crowdsource examples of management consultants delivering a huge amount of value to a company or society in a way that the company couldn’t have accomplished without them. I’ll start:
- Taikhoom10 2mo agosent you a email :)
- arbitrary_name 2mo agoi was a management consultant. sometimes, employees are bad at their jobs, or organizations are unable to solve their own problems. people who have no long term loyalty or political agency within the organization can help resolve internal issues, provide external validation and new perspectives, and solve problems. I tire of the snide arrogance of people like you; you think you can solve everything if you cared to. not every organization can afford to hire people as amazing and all knowing as you. making talented people available on short contracts, for employers with terrible reputations who cannot hire the right people able to deal with ambiguity and short timelines can be a win win arrangement for both sides. Are there issues across the industry, including misaligned incentives? absolutely. but that isn't a reason to dismiss the entire industry out of hand. perhaps we should be equally dismissive of all software devs given the sheer amount of terrible software and predatory revenue models? or are we also going to blame some other faceless group for that as well?
- schnevets 2mo agoI smirk and laugh this little slideshow and then remember that my own work involves internal tools to promote governance and productivity while formalizing requirements to two outsourced developers. I don't think I'm one of the red team's 7 captains, but I don't exactly have my hands on the paddle every single day. After all, I can find the time to lollygag on HN between 9-5.
- ownagefool 2mo agoI'd probably consider how the Red teams 7 captains feel about themselves and their own work though. It's always part of the critical path, no?
- paulorlando 2mo agoThat last line: "...to demonstrate fiscal and HR dexterity for stockholders..."
- danesparza 2mo agoI mean, the movie "Office space" could have taught you that lesson almost 30 years ago.
- haunter 2mo agoFunny because the tier list sub on reddit had a vote just a week ago about the UK supermarkets and Iceland only got a D https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fi.redd.it%2Fhyhe3cy2ylih1.jpeg https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fi.redd.it%2Fh... (not that it matters considering Tesco got an A)
- inquirerGeneral 2mo ago[dead]
- cadamsdotcom 2mo agoThey got a D in "willingness to pay for a certificate for their shopfront"..
- throwawayffffas 2mo agoIcelands products are legit trash. Tesco is marginally better. The best supermarket in the UK is Waitrose but the price premium is excessive compared to the quality.
- whattheheckheck 2mo agoWhy is there still a single captain, why isnt he rowing, why are we rowing and where are we rowing to?
- antonvs 2mo ago> Why is there still a single captain Because he beat up all the other captains. > why isnt he rowing Because he’s the Captain and he doesn’t want to. > why are we rowing, and where are we rowing to? The Captain knows. Don’t you trust the Captain?
- Ekaros 2mo agoMetaphor is that in rowing the rowers face backwards they don't see where the boat is going. So you need at least single person to look forwards. And to steer you have to command rowers. It is a valid role to have in large row boat. But you only need one of them.
- tempay 2mo agoYou also want them to be the person with the most ideal weight: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coxswain_(rowing) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coxswain_(rowing)
- orf 2mo agoThis is great: https://about.iceland.co.uk/our-story/the-dark-ages/the-chief-executives-handbook/ https://about.iceland.co.uk/our-story/the-dark-ages/the-chie...
- squidi 2mo agoEspecially because further down the page is a link to, “ Sir Malcolm Walker CBE Biography”. I assume the irony is intended
- p_l 2mo agoConsidering the biography having lines like: > Malcolm has only ever had three paid jobs, and so far he’s been fired from two of them. the irony is definitely intended
- mr_big_bowls 2mo ago[dead]
- sdevonoes 2mo agoI won’t lie. I want to be Captain/Director, not the rower. It’s very satisfying to get rich by doing pretty much nothing. And there’s some sadness when some rower does their best but doesn’t even come close to directors/captain positions. Some excellent rowers can make it sure, but we all are not excellent. Oh well, I stop
- deleted 2mo ago[deleted]
- sublinear 2mo agoI'm not sure how serious you are with this comment, but I'll give you another perspective. You don't know what other roles that try-hard "rower" has outside of your imagined scenario. There's nothing even stopping them from being the "captain" of another more impressive boat when he's not on yours. Sure he's not the best, but he's doing the job and you're not. He has more experience than someone who never gets their hands dirty. More experience always makes better leadership. You'd be surprised how easy it is for someone else to steal your little hat and how often it can happen. It's definitely easier than the rowing, which I guess was your point? I really don't mean this in a sour grapes kind of way. I'm totally serious. You'd never know that until it's too late if you're being disrespectful to the rowers. Don't let ego squander opportunities.
- yipinwong 2mo agoThe intentional bad UX made me read the whole thing, instead of skimming through. In this day and age, bad UX is great for preventing ADHD users
- kevin_thibedeau 2mo agoThey may want to secure the services of a consultant.
- nativeit 2mo agoI specialize in replacing all company I.T. with a subscription to “Reader’s Digest”. The cost savings are phenomenal but we currently don’t have enough data on how it affects productivity, that should come in Q429. In the meantime, we cancelled the company’s vision insurance plans, and replaced it with a subscription to the large-print edition of “Reader’s Digest”, and once again the vast reduction in overhead expenses has induced a lot of very encouraging enthusiasm. That Dave Barry is a hoot and a half. We expect to double executive compensation off the savings from these dual-thrust “Reader’s Digest” campaigns.
- dominicrose 2mo agoa bad UX would be the same thing with new ad prints on each page
- zkmon 2mo agoAnd then they came up with a brilliant term called "agile methodology". The word "agile" was a big selling point. Under the new methodology, there will be standup meetings and introspection every 5 minutes during the race.
- hintymad 2mo agoI see a disconnection here. Every once in a while we see a article criticizing management consultancy, yet the business is still booming and very powerful and sophisticated corporations still hire them. So, I'd assume that the consulting companies do offer some value, in fact billions of dollars of value. What are those values, then?
- tyingq 2mo agoScapegoat as a service. You hire them to put a stamp of approval on any silly idea you have, implement it, etc. Then, if it turns out badly, well...it wasn't your fault.
- szundi 2mo ago[dead]
- gnarbarian 2mo agothis is the correct answer. nobody internal ends up as the "bad guy".
- throwawayffffas 2mo agoNot only scapegoats but also backup as a service. I.e you are an executive with an unpopular plan, you bring them in to carry your message. You can be like see these very smart people that we are paying a ton of money, agree with me, the fact that i hired them is completely coincidental.
- biggoodwolf 2mo agoAlso works if you want to derail someone else's plan
- asdfman123 2mo agoMy working theory is that in many cases, it's one of those absurdities that are actually necessary because the world isn't always rational. If you're the CEO, maybe you know exactly how your org should be restructured. But maybe it means stepping on a lot of toes and hurting people you have close relationships with. If you get the blessing of management consultants you can at least say it's not personal.
- asdfman123 2mo agoWhat is this? A picture book for adults?
- nelox 2mo ago[dead]
- bluegatty 2mo agoIn most cases, the bad application of Management Consultants is 'user error'. Which is quite common. 'Good use' of management consultants are for things like M&A research, some structural issues etc. Most companies are not full of smart people, and even when they do have very smart people, they're usually in narrow roles. Companies can't afford to have 'a strategy team' internally that look at issues broadly. When they try, they end up in 'committee failure'. It makes a ton of sense for a manufacturer to have consultants come in and look at supply chain issues - especially if those consultants are led by someone who just did that for 5 other companies. $1M is 'nothing' to find the issues underlying a lot of nuanced things at scale. The other 'positive magic' of the consultants, is that they are able to put in 'authoritative researched way' what the company might already know broadly but where the knowledge is scattered. CEO wants to make a big change, the consultants can dig deep, scour the data, come up with plans. That's very valuable. It's very destructive when the CEO pays $1M to justify his own egoic delusions; which is common. The consultants will be happy to take the money to find research to justify the delusions though. They are overused, but they're useful when used properly. Even when they are used properly, it can be too expensive. The city of NYC deciding on exactly how to do recycling bins, I think famously cost a few million - but that's not entirely outrageous. You want to spend a lot of energy up front thinking through those, researching what happened in all the other cities, best practices, supply chains, operations etc. NYC is 20 million dam people. It's way bigger than Sweden. And city bureaucracies are not ready to do that kind of hard hitting research. So - the right team, for the right cost (which can seem like a lot, but it might not be in context). But again, what would be a 'very valuable $1M spent' can end up being '$10M' kind of thing, so even when 'it was the right move' it could be disproportionate.
- carlspeaking 2mo agoThe "recovery plan" described elsewhere on the site: https://about.iceland.co.uk/our-story/the-dark-ages/recovery-plan/ https://about.iceland.co.uk/our-story/the-dark-ages/recovery... ...is analogous to the "Friedman unit of progress" during the second Iraq War. The context is that Thomas Friedman, New York Times tenured op-ed columnist, stated that "the next six months" were the most crucial for changing the direction of the Iraq War, justifying the US presence there. He cited "the next six months" repeatedly, over the course of about 10 years. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Friedman_Unit https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Friedman_Unit
- tedggh 2mo agoI spent a few years on and off consulting working for two of the Big 4. I can’t speak for all the teams but the ones I worked with provided good value. Our job was to protect our customers from poor designs and lack of accountability. Some of the projects I worked with were very big involving dozens of suppliers. Our customers didn’t have the capability to coordinate so much work and they also lacked the know-how and expertise in many of the domains. Also many of the big engineering and tech companies out there can be very sloppy. Don’t think because they carry a recognizable name (I don’t want to name them but they are SP500) they always do good work. I have seen stuff that is really really bad, like unsafe bad. That’s where my team would step in and fill those roles on the customer side. Many of the projects I participated were also highly regulated, and that’s a whole additional layer of complexity for which you need people with experience in very particular areas. A bad design that leads to an environmental disaster or even a violation of regulations can be extremely costly.
- rrr_oh_man 2mo agoThe work is important and mysterious
- grayclhn 2mo agoI’ll just point out that the management consultants don’t seem to be the problem in this story…
- deleted 2mo ago[deleted]
- masato_furuno 2mo ago[flagged]
- chanux 2mo agoLooking around, I'm surprised this is common knowledge (j1/2k)
- svth 2mo agoAs an Icelander, I've often thought about starting a chain of anal dildo stores and calling them "United Kingdom" just to get back at those fuckers.