McKinsey Canada alumnus joins Australian bank in executive role

National Australia Bank (NAB) has installed a former McKinsey & Company consultant at the head of its largest division. On September 1st, Andrew Irvine will take over as chief executive of the business & private banking wing.

Andrew Irvine brings over two decades of experience to Australia’s fourth largest bank, including five years at McKinsey & Company. Irvine served the strategy consulting giant between 2002 and 2008 in its Toronto, Canada office, latterly as an associate partner focused on clients in the financial services industry.

Before working in consulting, Irvine worked in investment banking at Crédit Agricole in London, and after McKinsey, he spent twelve years at Bank of Montreal. He held a number of executive roles with the Bank of Montreal, most recently serving as head of Canadian business banking, where he had end-to-end accountability for the division.

Before that, he was head of customer solutions, responsible for leading the bank’s headquarters group for both Canadian personal and business banking. This included the customer segment, product, operations, marketing, and technology teams.

At National Australia Bank, Irvine will lead the bank’s most profitable and largest division as measured by earnings, succeeding Anthony Healy, who left the bank earlier this year. He will be a member of NAB’s executive leadership team, and will report to CEO Ross McEwan, the former boss of The Royal Bank of Scotland.

“Andrew is an experienced banker and talented leader who will play a crucial role focused on our strategic pillars of delivering for customers and colleagues,” said McEwan. “We have an ambition to grow our market-leading business bank by helping our customers grow. Andrew’s deep understanding of customers developed over a career in banking and his leadership in using data, insights, and technology to meet their needs will be important to achieving this ambition.”

Earlier this year, NAB paused or stopped over 100 consulting projects as part of cost-cutting measures and mounting pressures on its margins, which led to an exodus of consultants. One of the projects that did survive the cut was a strategic planning review run in collaboration with Bain & Company.