Was the McKinsey report just a marketing exercise that was never supposed to see the light of day?
A Reader writes in …
A quick review of the McKinsey survey makes me pretty sure it was created as an internal market research tool — to assess the need for healthcare consulting services and help the firm design and sell those services. Someone got the bright idea of publicizing some of the results and, since the survey wasn’t designed to predict or even describe the effect of reform on the healthcare system, the published report was highly misleading. I can see why they didn’t want to release the tool or the raw data — the stuff looks very valuable from a market research point of view. I’m sure the other large consulting companies have assigned analysts to this data and are all writing reports to guide their healthcare practices — while giggling at their good fortune and McKinsey’s gaffe.
