McKinsey Taps AI to Build PowerPoints and Draft Proposals, But Says Young Consultants Are Still Safe

McKinsey & Company is now leveraging artificial intelligence to streamline presentation creation and proposal drafting.

The global consulting powerhouse despite concerns about technological disruption, maintains a reassuring stance, emphasizing that AI will augment rather than replace human expertise—particularly for junior consultants whose strategic thinking and client engagement skills remain irreplaceable.

Its consultants are leveraging own artificial intelligence platform to handle tasks previously carried out by entry-level staff.

Kate Smaje, McKinsey's global leader for technology and AI, informed Bloomberg on Monday that the employees are increasingly utilising Lilli, their in-house AI platform launched in 2023.

Lilli: McKinsey's Internal AI Powerhouse

While their staff can use external tools like ChatGPT, Lilli is the sole platform enabling secure input of sensitive client information. Smaje revealed that over 75% of McKinsey's 43,000 employees engage with Lilli monthly.

The platform was named in honour of Lillian Dombrowski, who joined McKinsey in 1945 as its first female hire. McKinsey consultants can use Lilli to generate PowerPoint presentations from simple instructions quickly and fine-tune the delivery of the content using a 'Tone of Voice' feature, ensuring consistency with the firm's style.

Automating Core Consulting Tasks

The platform also enables them to develop client project proposals that adhere to company standards, identify internal specialists, and investigate current industry trends. Despite Lilli's ability to handle tasks traditionally given to junior staff, Smaje says McKinsey doesn't plan to recruit fewer entry-level analysts.

Reshaping Roles, Not Reducing Headcount

'Do we need armies of business analysts creating PowerPoints? No, the technology could do that. It's not necessarily that I'm going to have fewer of them [analysts], but they're going to be doing the things that are more valuable to our clients,' Smaje told Bloomberg.

McKinsey informed Business Insider that Lilli was developed using the firm's complete intellectual property, which includes over 100,000 documents and interviews from its nearly century-long existence. A McKinsey senior partner also shared with BI that employees who utilise Lilli access it, on average, 17 times each week.

According to a case study featured on McKinsey's own website, Lilli responds to over half a million prompts every month, leading to a 30% reduction in the time employees spend gathering and organising information.

AI's Expanding Footprint Across Industries

Consulting firms have been incorporating artificial intelligence for several years. For instance, Bain consultants utilise Sage, an AI chatbot developed by OpenAI. Meanwhile, employees at Boston Consulting Group leverage an AI tool, Deckster, to refine their PowerPoint presentations.

Meanwhile, in other companies, AI performs tasks once handled by human staff. For example, IBM CEO Arvind Krishna stated last month that the Company replaced hundreds of human resources personnel with AI and then reallocated those freed-up resources to hire additional programmers and salespeople.

During LlamaCon in April, Microsoft's CEO surprised Mark Zuckerberg by revealing that AI now generates a substantial 20-30% of their code, with predictions suggesting this figure could reach 95% by 2030.

Shifting Trends in Entry-Level Hiring

A report from SignalFire, a venture capital firm monitoring over 650 million employees on LinkedIn, revealed that new graduates comprised only 7% of new hires at large tech companies in 2024. This marks a 25% decrease from 2023, as artificial intelligence increasingly handles entry-level tasks.