McKinsey PEI 2026: Leadership Example by McKinsey Consultant

Welcome to the first video in our four-part series on Mckissi's personal experience interview. In this one,

experience interview. In this one, Allar, an ex Mckissi consultant, shares her answer for the leadership dimension.

This used to be called inclusive leadership, but Mckis updated the name in July 2025. I'm the interviewer here, and after her first answer, I asked a

few follow-up questions. The recording

is completely unscripted, so you will see both the strong parts and where she could improve. I'll share our feedback

could improve. I'll share our feedback at the end. Before we dive in, if you want to improve your own PI answers, you can work with me directly. I've coached

hundreds of candidates for their mechis interviews and you will find all the details on our coaching page. I'll leave

the link below. Let's get started. Can

you share with me an example where you worked effectively with people with different backgrounds despite challenges?

H I can remember of a part-time job I did a few years back uh when I was working

uh with uh people in a different industry than I'm usually used to. I

love dogs and um as a part-time passion project a little bit, I took on uh freelance consulting for a dog grooming salon and salons. they had a few stores.

Um, however, given the culture that grooming salons usually have, uh, most of the employees are not accustomed to, uh, the expectations and discipline that

you might have in some white collar work, the technology that's used with it, uh, such as software, communication principles, deadlines, things are a little bit more on the fluffy side. it's

I'll get it done when I need to or I'll I'll let you know when I'm done.

And so as we were trying to franchise and grow these stores, one of the things that I observed was lack of communication within the departments.

And with the lack of communication came a lack of ownership. And so I, you know, we tried with the owner to implement, you know, deadlines on emails that

needed to be answered. uh we asked them to be more responsive on their phones um use different maybe software systems like task management systems but just

never really worked because it wasn't something that they were used to and so eventually I sat down and I thought a little bit of you know how are we going to work around this problem uh because

it's a big issue as a company tries to scale and so I finally decided that people are creatures of habit and rather than try and change them to what I

thought was right, work around what they believe is right. And so the first thing that I noticed was that a lot of them actually like playing video games and

were on Discord. So they had Discord usernames. So uh rather than force them

usernames. So uh rather than force them to use Slack, which we did and it was not successful, or emails or so forth, I said why don't we just create a Discord channel where you know people are

already used to it. um and then they can sign up for it and we can communicate through there. But the other thing is um

through there. But the other thing is um I had to make sure that uh this didn't feel like a top-down command but instead

was something that was organic within the employees and the team. So we

initially decided to launch this as more of a uh individual store managers had gotten together and they decided that this might be a good idea to put forward. uh we tried it out with the

forward. uh we tried it out with the managers, we set it up together, but then I had the managers convey it as more of like a mutual idea. So uh with

that, not only was the idea more accepted because sometimes people can have adverse reactions to outsiders or consultants, but it also gave the managers the power of creating something

and managing it. And then what we did is that to raise accountability, we created different channels um based on objectives and tasks that needed to be

done and then we subassigned admins um and told them that they would be in charge of the channel and the people in it. So it was able to change a lot of

it. So it was able to change a lot of the communication, improve it, and to this day it actually is really really successful. People love it. They send

successful. People love it. They send

like photos and you know emojis in there and GIFs. So it it's it turned out to be

and GIFs. So it it's it turned out to be really well. But moral of the story is,

really well. But moral of the story is, you know, when you're working with different people, sometimes what you think is best is not the best and uh there's different ways to encourage them

and motivate them to adapt.

Thank you for sharing this example. Let

me just try to better understand the whole team structure. Do you mind just telling me more about how many team members were they, their background?

Yeah. So, um we had about three four stores and each store had about 8 to 10 groom groomers um that worked on shifts.

So, we had a little bit over 40 employees I'd say that were groomers and um the stores had their own general managers as well and then the main

owners. And so, uh, the background of

owners. And so, uh, the background of these people are usually, um, high school educated, um, didn't necessarily go to college, uh, and a little bit more

on the artsy and edgy side of people.

So, they have a different worldview. Um,

very creative, very hands-on, but not very tech-savvy, not interested in being techsavvy. Um, and definitely, uh,

techsavvy. Um, and definitely, uh, little to no experience in desk work or deadlines in the way that we understand.

Mhm.

And just to better understand the challenges that you face. So I

understand that they didn't want to have anything complicated or they didn't give you any positive feedback, but what was the biggest learning out of this that you carried with you?

Culture. Every single organization has its own culture and if you want to provide consulting to a company, you

have to first understand their culture.

And with culture comes motivation for the employees. So there's a style of

the employees. So there's a style of employee that usually works for a company and and there there's usually a common reason most of them work for it.

Unless you understand that you're not going to be able to motivate them to do tasks that you might need for it. It

could be asking for data. It could be asking them for ideas. Um, but unless they feel like you're a part of them, they're never going to let you in to the real problem to see it and to actually work on it.

Makes sense. Okay. I'm glad that you went through this experience. Great.

Thanks a lot. Now, let's break down what she did well and what could be improved.

First, here's why she did well. All

followed the PI structure well. Context,

problem, action, outcome, and learnings.

The example works because it is similar to situations consultants face when they need to lead people from very different backgrounds. She recognized a culture of

backgrounds. She recognized a culture of the salon and the way the team prefer to work adopted her approach instead of forcing a new tool and gave store

managers ownership. So the idea felt

managers ownership. So the idea felt like it came from them. All of this helped the team accept and stick with the change.

And here are the areas where she could make this a stronger make CPI answer Kinsey a strong leadership story needs to feel really challenging. While she

mentioned communication gaps, she could have gone deeper into the everyday difficulties. People missing deadlines,

difficulties. People missing deadlines, not responding quickly or refusing to use new tools. That would have made the challenge feel much bigger. On the

actions, most of the SER was about setting up a Discord channel. She could

have also explained how she motivated individuals as well as managers, what she did when things weren't working and how she kept the project moving. Also,

the example was about 6 minutes. Getting

closer to 10 minutes would give her more space to bring in those details. And

finally, Makisa wants to know exactly what she did, not your team. So,

switching we to I would make her leadership role much clearer.