WPP brings in McKinsey to advise on strategic review

WPP has appointed management consulting firm McKinsey to advise on its much-anticipated strategy review.

The UK-based agency group is under growing pressure to reboot its strategy after issuing two profit warnings in three months in July and October.

WPP first said in August that it was planning a strategy review under Cindy Rose, the new chief executive of WPP, who took over from Mark Read on 1 September.

She told shareholders at the Q3 results in October that she would provide details of her strategy review in early 2026.

WPP’s senior leadership is leading the review and it is understood that McKinsey’s management consultants are helping to “facilitate and stress-test” the planning for the new strategy.

Leading companies, including rival agency groups, often hire management consulting firms to advise on a strategic review or significant restructuring.

WPP reportedly used McKinsey for advice on strategy in 2020. WPP Media also recruited Emily Del Greco, a former partner at McKinsey, to be its global chief operating officer in February.

Rose gave little detail about her plans at WPP’s Q3 results but said its recent performance had been “unacceptable”, with annual revenues set to decline by between 5.5% and 6%.

She said the review is set to cover several areas:

• “Simplifying and integrating our client offer” and using AI “to deliver growth and business outcomes for our clients”.
• “Significantly improving our execution and building a high-performance culture.”
• “Expanding our addressable market through enterprise and technology solutions.”
• Improving finances through “operational efficiency and a disciplined approach to capital allocation”.

Analysts at Bank of America said the narrative around the strategic review points to “likely deep and bold restructuring actions”.

WPP has already carried out a series of major restructures, including the internal merger of Wunderman Thompson and VMLY&R to create VML at the end of 2023 and the simplification and rebranding of Group M as WPP Media in May 2025. Headcount fell by 7000 to 104,000 by the end of H1 versus a year earlier, although WPP also sold FGS Global in the period.

Asked on a Q3 call with journalists whether WPP is going to need to make further cuts, including to people, Joanne Wilson, the chief financial officer, said: “The agency business is a variable cost base, and when the top line deteriorates, we do have the levers therefore to take cost out, and that’s what we’ve been doing this year.”

She added the efficiency drive, including the restructuring at WPP Media, “is not at all impacting our client service” and “we are serving them [clients] incredibly well”. Last week, WPP won Reckitt’s consolidation of its $700m European media account.

Rose, a former Microsoft executive, has been on the WPP board since 2019. She was a non-executive director while serving as chief operating officer for global enterprise at Microsoft, before landing the CEO’s role at WPP. Philip Jansen, the former chief executive of BT, has been chair of WPP since January.

WPP declined to comment on McKinsey’s involvement in the strategic review.