Makeover for the 'Old Lady'

McKinsey consultants working at the Bank of England are competing with the ghosts of their predecessors.

Bank governor Mark Carney is giving the United States firm another shot at transforming the three-century-old institution, more than four decades after the bank first hired it to conduct a full-scale examination of operations. The impact of the original review was "limited", according to former bank official Guy de Moubray, who took part in the study.

"The bank doesn't like other people telling it what it ought to do," de Moubray, 88, said. The work McKinsey did in the late 1960s "brought changes on which wouldn't have happened without them coming, but it certainly wasn't a revolution".

Carney wants the new strategic review to guide investment decisions, working methods and allocation of resources after the bank took over financial regulation and swelled its staff numbers. The engagement of McKinsey marks the latest stage in the governor's makeover of the so-called Old Lady of Threadneedle Street, which began with the introduction of forward guidance on monetary policy in August.

The review is being overseen by chief operating officer Charlotte Hogg, a former McKinsey employee. In a sign of how the bank can wince at radical change, the governing body described a list of Hogg's proposals for human resources as "daunting".

In the '60s, the bank found itself under pressure to evolve amid calls for greater transparency, according to Forrest Capie, author of The Bank of England: 1950s to 1979.