A week ago, I came across an FB wall post that linked to an interview of Eric Schmidt of Google who was speaking on ‘business culture, technology and social issues’.
I was excited by the subject, and clicked on the link.
This is where I landed up:
As you can see, the website was the McKinsey Quarterly that promised ‘ Hundreds of Free Articles’ as a FREE member.
Hmmm…. Why do I need to be a ‘FREE’ member to read some public document anyway?
Having grown up to some instilled obeisance to McKinsey, I volunteered my time and keystrokes and went ahead to become a ‘FREE’ member.
The results of that effort are circled in the RED OVAL.
McKinsey was back in business – INSTRUCTING me how to get a Password that MET THEIR APPROVAL!!! So – it had to be ‘ 8 characters in length with at least One Capital Letter, One Lowercase and One Number’!!!!
Oh I am so sorry – King of Consultants, Emperor of Solutions, Czar of Strategy that I HAVE STILL NOT LEARNT HOW TO GET A PASSWORD ON THE INTERNET!!!
When I saw this, I laughed like a Jackass and fell off my chair!!
This was CLASSIC McKinsey right? TELLING THEIR SUBJECTS WHAT TO DO – and following their way or the highway…
This is not a rant about some stupid ill structured website (oops its the Mck Quarterly) that I will never ever visit again…
Its to pinpoint how OLD AND STALE these stuffy, suited, one way trafficked consultants THINK.
Dear McKinsey – from a frumpy, marwari socks knitter turned Internet entrepreneur, here is some ADVICE YOU could glance over:
– The world no longer lives in the JUNGLE! We can see things far away coz the INTERNET allows us to travel the world we live in with a mouse click. So please accept that YOU are NO LONGER the window to the world to small businessmen like me.
– LEARN the ways of the NEW WORLD. Firstly, to read some one page Interview, you dont need to make me give you my Janam Patri (personal details). Even if you have convinced me to do so, please allow me to do so on MY TERMS!! Most mortals like me have common passwords for all sites and we DO NOT remember combinations like Jewel Thieves for various websites. Saying REGISTER FOR FREE – sounds so medieval..
– ADAPT to partnerships – Rather than asking me to REGISTER, why cant you allow me to sign in via Facebook or Twitter (now dont tell me that since they dont pay you millions, you wont host them on your biblical website)!!
– Get the RIGHT CONSULTANTS to work for you – hahahaha – sounds like a familiar line right?? Well, to someone like me who has never used your services before but has the potential and a reason to, you have JUST PISSED ME OFF. If you cant Understand my medium – how can you ever consult me on the same???!!!
Finally – McKinsey – will you send me 7120 US$ for the advice I just stated above?
*********
Rakesh Sidana
@Alok. You are crazy writing posts on anything 😉
Aditya Singh
If they kept it simple, someone will hack my mckinsey password, hack into my account and take all my wealth away. 🙁 ….
Rakesh Sidana
😉 McKinsey has not done anything wrong keeping things simple and guiding on password combination.
@Jyoti, actually i wanted to read about news on Eric Schmidt and end up with this post. You know what i am saying 😉
Jayesh Gopalan
“ADAPT to partnerships” is good solution.
I think McKinsey will be having Ego issues.
Abey John
LOL!
Munish Goyal
Your account holds your bill statements as well and other few options like plan change etc.
Its not just for paying bills. But yes, if someone wants just to pay the bill then there should be separate
guest walk-in flow.
And yes, there could be something more simpler.. remembering all those passwords is not done ! thats why many are coming up with single-sign on. like myopenid, or via FB, google
Munish Goyal
Well truly as this Mck example being reflected on..
It flows from the top and to everywhere. haha. so even the IT dept. of Mck will be flooded with similar thought waters as are the boardrooms.
Bharat Agrawal
Seriously Munish, the webdesigners should think about simple guest walk in flow. ICICI credit card payment has one. No need to login, just enter the details and you are done
Shridhar Thoda
Hahaha…
I’m going to forward this to my faculty colleagues at IIM-A, one of the main “vendors” for McKinsey.
Regards
Shridhar