Mckinsey marks digital shift with change of headquarters

THE management consultancy Mckinsey has abandoned its headquarters in London’s fusty St James’s area, as it looks to ditch its image as a provider of clipboard-wielding suits and rebrand as a digital-savvy agent of change.

Mckinsey has been based for the last 25 years in offices on Jermyn Street, an area best known for bespoke men’s formal shirts.

It said the move to the Post Building in the so-called Knowledge Quarter, around Holborn, would help it to expand its influence with clients, going from “traditional strategy consulting” into providing advice on “digital transformation, advanced analytics, capability building and design”.

Google and Facebook have also based their British headquarters nearby, and the area is home to some of the UK’S leading universities as well as the national institute for artificial intelligence.

The new offices are located in a former Royal Mail sorting office that was recently refurbished.

The attempt by Mckinsey to broaden out the services it can offer to clients, and appeal to new types of companies, comes as it looks to draw a line under recent controversies.

The company has for years been embroiled in a bitter battle with turnaround specialist Jay Alix over its bankruptcy work, spanning multiple courts. Earlier this year, it agreed to pay $15m (£12m) to end an investigation by the US Trustee into complaints by Mr Alix.

It also faced questions over its ethics last year, when a report in The New York Times linked a study by Mckinsey to a crackdown in Saudi Arabia.

It claimed the consultancy had released a report into how the Saudi public had responded to austerity measures, in which it had named a number of Twitter users who had been vocal in their dislike of the measures. One was reportedly later arrested.

Mckinsey responded at the time by saying it was “horrified by the possibility, however remote, that [its report] could have been misused in any way”.

It said it was investigating the claims, although added that the report had not been commissioned by any authority in Saudi Arabia, and that it was intended primarily for “internal” use.

‘The move to the Knowledge Quarter, around Holborn, would help it to expand its influence with clients’