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Scott Woodruff

PartnerChicago

Helps clients transform their product portfolios to drive margin and revenue growth, leading them from idea through implementation and impact

Scott is a partner in McKinsey’s Chicago office, a core leader in our Operations Practice, and global leader of Growth by Design (GxD) program efforts in the consumer sector. His background in product development and marketing—across corporate, startup, and consulting environments—has enabled him to drive success for clients in consumer spaces over the last 20 years.

Examples of Scott’s work include the following:

  • guiding a multiyear product portfolio transformation with a consumer-packaged-goods food client, delivering >$100 million margin growth, revenue growth, improved sustainability, and building important product development and marketing and sales capabilities for the organization
  • establishing a center of excellence for product development and innovation within a consumer health organization, including deploying a robust training and capability-building curriculum spanning product development, procurement, and marketing topics
  • accelerating growth into new market categories for a consumer durables client, shaping a roadmap of product innovations and executing from idea through launch
  • introducing new sustainability tools, methodologies, and capabilities with a consumer-packaged-goods client to set a bold aspiration and strategy for global sustainability leadership

Published Work

Generative AI fuels creative physical product design but is no magic wand,” McKinsey & Company, March 2024

How product design can yield ‘triple wins’: Growth, margin, and sustainability,” McKinsey & Company, January 2024

Skinny design: Smaller is better,” McKinsey & Company, March 2023

Five-star growth: Using online ratings to design better products,” McKinsey & Company, April 2021

Modern CPG product development calls for a new kind of product manager,” McKinsey & Company, October 2020

Past Experience

Farm Design
Leader, Product Management

MOTIONwear LLC
Cofounder

Johnson & Johnson
NPD, Innovation Leader

Adidas
Designer

Education

Babson College
MBA, entrepreneurship & entrepreneurial Studies; marketing

University of Cincinnati
BS, industrial design