Drew

Careers

I came back to McKinsey to have impact

I had worked at McKinsey as a summer associate and after that I did a bunch of different things, including working at a top-tier investment bank. But I realized that I wanted to have a much more tangible impact on companies and people—dramatically improving performance, not just the bottom line. So I came back to McKinsey.

"McKinsey is made up of an incredibly eclectic and passionate group of people. Individuals who care about making a difference and are extremely impact oriented, but understand that we are not working with big companies, we are working with people."

Maintaining relationships with clients over time

My first real study was with a large retail company. I became very good friends with one of the executives there. He then went on to work for a big New York hospital. I worked with him six years later in his new role there and that was rewarding for me – to maintain relationships over time and to advise the same client in a different industry.

I found my "home"

McKinsey is a pretty big firm and everyone needs to find their place in it, whether it’s a particular office, a practice, a function, or an industry sector. It depends on what really excites you. I eventually became really passionate about operations work—making things run better. The best way for me to do that was to follow the expert path—I am now what we call an expert principal. I’ve done everything from banking and media to health care and retail. And I now do 80 percent of my work on operations transformations. It’s still my passion.

A great mentor

A partner here in the Dallas office connected me with the people who could help me get into the kind of work I wanted to do. We worked on several projects together and the partner really helped me chart my career. That was very special for me, but I don’t think it’s an unusual experience at McKinsey. He took an interest in my personal life as well—like helping me when I had some health issues.

I want to do good beyond financial impact

We work with hospitals because they have an impact far greater than their revenues—they are literally saving lives and developing cures. We partner with them because we share their value of wanting to improve the world well beyond financial impact—to truly make the world a better place. The greatest thing is to walk around these hospitals with their executives, helping them to improve their operations so they can invest the gains back into patient care and research. It’s very rewarding.