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From: [email protected] To: <[email protected]> Cc: <[email protected]>, <[email protected]> Date: Thursday, January 23, 2003 6:47 PM Subject: Cov Sty 23covs08.txt END Tri b u te The MarvinLast Bower and his Quest for Pro f e s s i o n a l I n d e p e n d e n c e L ionBy Jac k Sw e e n e y 12 Fe b ruary/March 2003 C o n s u l t i n g Tri b u te Before En r o n bought $27 million in c onsulting services from its audi t o r ... before Eliot Spitzer, New York State attorney general, subpoenaed the e-mails of research analysts at Merrill Lynch ... before the audit and compensation committees of dozens of major corporations had their own inherent conflicts exposed to an irate investing public ... Marv i n Bower was pleading the case for independence to James O. McKinsey onboard a New Yo r k - bound Pullman car. Or was it Chicago-bound? No matter — it was still Bower who nearly seven decades ago bellowed the battle cry for independence, and it was he who filled the trough where corporate reformers seek to satisfy their thirst. McKinsey was dead, to begin with. There is no doubt drudgery of bookkeeping, and arguably helped fuel the rise of whatever about that. the age of the accounting consultancy. It is just such a revelation On Wed n e s d a y , December 1, 1937, The Chicago Daily that begs this question: If McKinsey had not died, would the Tri b u n e ran the words “Head of Field’s Store Dies” across the story of the consulting profession, and for that matter the top of its front page in 70-point type. accounting profession, be different? For those who belong to And that rainy December day is as good a place in time as the cult of McKinsey, the answer is an emphatic “Yes.” any to begin telling the tale of his quest. For it was likely that Still, you can’t help but wonder whether Bower’s quest to on this day and not before it, Marvin Bower finally expunged have McKinsey & Company occupy his profession’s high the fanciful notion that his brilliant and charis- ground would have in some way been com- matic mentor, James O. McKinsey, would p r o m i s e d had he continued to operate under someday soon return to his firm, and that they the spell of the enchanting Mr. McKinsey. In a would together build a management consultancy wa y , McKinsey’s death fired the starter’s pistol unlike any before it. of a competition that would be scored not by Those familiar with McKinsey & greater revenue or profits, but by the professional Co m p a n y ’ s history up to this point can likely ambitions of both accounting’s and consulting’s attest to just how doleful a day this must have leaderships. Over the decades that followed, been for the 34-year-old Bower. You wonder di f ferent champions of professional standards how it did not become the proverbial third and would emerge in both fields and attempt to final straw of Bower’s fledgling consulting move their respective occupations to a plane M a rvin Bower career — the first being his mentor’s initial (1903-2003) above other forms of business, a level where departure from the firm, and the second being people aspire to something more than money- the firm’s subsequent merger with another. making, and where a person is entitled to a This last had been a move that vastly altered degree of respect or honor. the firm’s makeup, and seemingly challenged the widely held Among those business leaders courageous enough to lift belief that the two men were of one mind when it came to the the sword of professionalism in the first half of the 20th century, field of management engineering — or what later became many would lose heart early, others would passively watch th e i r known as management consulting. visions wither away, and still others would persevere only to lose “T oday is not very different from then,” Marvin Bower told their professional fortunes in the industrial carnage that Enron Consulting Magazine, some four months before his recent wrought. In the end, hardly a champion has been left standing. passing. Bower’s thought is not an original one. Phalanxes of pundits have routinely put forth the notion that the post-Enron era — punctuated by business failures and investor outrage — The Emancipation of the Bookkeepers shares much in common with the early 1930s, a period when Marvin Bower was born August 1, 1903, in Cincinnati, Ohio. the harsh lessons of the Great Depression began to chasten the He grew up in Cleveland, where his father worked closely with greedy revelers of the 1920s. the legal community, a healthy network of attorneys that But when issued by Bower, the idea packs a wallop. For it played no small part in influencing the future career aspirations was “then” that he first voiced his objections to the marriage a father held for his son. of consulting and accounting — a point of view that some- And so it was that after graduating from Brown University times put him at odds with his esteemed mentor, a man whose in 1925, the book-minded Bower took his father’s advice and thoughtful books had helped emancipate accountants from the headed off to Harvard for law school. During the summers he C o n s u l t i n g Fe b ruary/March 2003 1 3 Tri b u te worked at a Cleveland law firm, where he recalls discovering that it foreshadows Bower’s future path — where he meets how “dull” he found most legal work. Nevertheless, as and is recruited by one of the great minds of business. The g r a d u a t i o n neared, Bower applied for a job with a top law firm second reason is that it subtly links Bower’s name with one in Cleveland — Jones Day Revis & Pogue. The firm turned credited not only with founding a firm, but also with helping him down, so back to Harvard he went. This time he returned to establish a profession — a higher calling, and one that likely for a degree in business, and it was at the conclusion of his first appealed to Bower’s maturing ambitions. year of business school that he began telling friends that “Mr. By the early 1930s, Arthur Andersen had one of the best- Arthur Anderson” had offered him a job. known names in business given he had been managing the firm This oft-told anecdote had to do with Bower landing a he founded for more than 20 years. In 1932, the 46-year- o l d summer job at Morgan Stanley in New York. Not having contacts a c c o u n t a n t served as president of the board of trustees of at Morga n ’ s Wall Street address, Bower lifted the name Ar t h u r Northwestern University, where he lectured on such provocative Marvin Anderson out of the company’s directory and asked a topics as “The Accountant and his Clientele.” M arv i n B o w e r, McKinsey & Co m p a n y , 1933 1935 1 9 4 2 and ¥ While visiting a Jones Day client in ¥ James O. McKinsey leaves the ¥ A rth u r Chicago, Bower meets James O. firm upon accepting appointment A n d e rs e n M ile s tone s McKinsey, who invites him to join his as chairman and form a l i z e s seven-year-old consulting firm with chief executive co n s u l t i n g in the Quest for offices in Chicago and New York. of Marshall function Inde p e n d e n ce Field & with the establishment of its Company. Administrative Accounting Division. 1903 ¥ Marvin Bower is born August 1, in ¥ James O. Cincinnati, Ohio. McKinsey & 1946 Company ¥ Pr ice Wate r house & Co. form a l i z e s merges with consulting function with th e Scovell, Wellington & Company, a e stablishment of non-audit fir m largel y focused on accounting. s e rvices department. The n ew fi rm's manage m e n t c o n s u l t i n g business will operate under the name McKinsey, Wellington & Company. 1926 1947 ¥ James O. McKinsey & ¥ Upon the death of Co mp a n y, Acc o u n ta n t s Arthur Andersen, and Engineers is 1937 Leonard Spacek, a es tab l i s h e d . ¥ James O. McKinsey dies in partner known to champion Chicago of pneumonia independence, is named AA’s upon returning from a tour second managing partner. 1928 of Marshall Field’s mills. ¥ Bower graduates from Harvard Law School. 1934 1939 1950 1930 ¥ Bo wer is named manager ¥ The eastern offices of ¥ Bower is named McKinsey & ¥ Bower joins the Cleveland office of of New York office, where McKinsey, Wellington break off Company’s fourth managing law firm Jones Day, where he works he expunges audit work to form McKinsey & Company. director. During his tenure as MD, for fabled legal giant Frank Ginn, a f rom its menu of serv i c e s . The Chicago office becomes the firm will see vas t national and champion of independence.

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