Sorry We Helped Kill Hundreds of Thousands of People

Claude Singer

It’s hard to estimate the damage done to McKinsey’s brand in light of the recent $650 million Justice Department settlement the consulting firm will now pay for its work with infamous opioid maker Purdue Pharma. Selling a client marketing schemes to push deadly painkiller OxyContin onto doctors and patients cost the famed consulting firm far more than a huge fine: it exposed the heartless practice of duping, bribing and corrupting doctors and regulators to make obscene profits while addicting and killing hundreds of thousands of patients.

McKinsey’s apology—it didn’t get away without being forced to grovel, as guilty parties often do—was cool and matter-of-fact. “We are deeply sorry for our past client service to Purdue Pharma and the actions of a former partner who deleted documents related to his work for that client,” the consulting firm announced. “We should have appreciated the harm opioids were causing in our society and we should not have undertaken sales and marketing work for Purdue Pharma. This terrible public health crisis and our past work for opioid manufacturers will always be a source of profound regret for our firm.”

Let’s face it. This apology reeks of PR and lawyerly over-deliberation. It only goes so far: “We should have appreciated the harm opioids were causing our society”? The words make its lucrative services for Purdue seem like a simple transactional oversight, like when a clerk overcharges shoppers for items that were supposed to be on sale. “We should have appreciated that chicken is only $3.26 per pound, not the $4.26 we made the customer pay.”

In Japan, as we often see, executives apologize publicly, in person, by bowing in humiliation before cameras so the world can see the tops of their heads.

Yusuke Kamimura, CEO of ShapeWin, a cross-cultural PR firm based in Tokyo and Vancouver, explained that, “The importance of apologizing in Japanese culture cannot be overstated … Because we are a collectivist culture, we emphasize shame and regret, but also collective responsibility. Thus, apologies are seen less as an admission of wrongdoing and more as a way of showing integrity and responsibility.”

Have we no sense of collective responsibility here in the Wild West of American commerce? McKinsey’s apology for colluding with Purdue’s deceptions would seem to say none or little.

McKinsey isn’t any company, of course. It sells guidance for behavior, not widgets. It is a powerful influencer for other companies. It is, without a doubt, the world’s most prestigious consulting firm, creating value for clients and producing many luminaries of the business and political elite. McKinsey’s home page is pumped up with appropriately bombastic claims: “Our clients are always striving for the change that changes everything.” “We partner with bold leaders, pinpointing the strategy that will reshape tomorrow …” “Together we’re accelerating toward a more sustainable, inclusive, and growing future for all.” But not a more responsible and humane future, it seems.

As a brand consultant, I occasionally encounter a situation that’s not a brand communications problem insomuch as a brand behavioral problem. Branding can’t revive a bank that over-charges retail customers and is willing to fund the hostile takeover of its institutional clients. In the case of McKinsey, a better apology letter—I could write one in my sleep—or bowing before MSNBC’s cameras wouldn’t wipe away the stain of colluding with Purdue Pharma.

But these would be a start: Book a room and get some cameras. Comb your hair. Bow and count to thirty. Now, try to imbed the McKinsey culture with a sense of business morality (if that’s not an oxymoron). Heck, even schedule a workshop on how to properly market opioids.

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Claude Singer is Managing Partner at Brandsinger.