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About once every nine years, management consulting used to go through a ritual; the world would hear that McKinsey was electing a new global managing partner. Like the devout worshipers flocking St. Peters square, all eyes would turn upward awaiting the burning of partners’ ballots. White smoke or black smoke? Who would wear the shoes of Marvin Bower?

At least that’s how it used to be. The election of Kevin Sneader this past week caused barely a ripple. Gossipy media stories that put bets on the internal candidates and chronicled unspoken politicking were non-existent. The election came and went, and McKinsey’s 12th global leader in its history will be, by all accounts, a fine steward for the firm.

So why does any of this matter?

Unlike many other democratic institutions, where only a majority of constituents can claim their elected official as “truly representative,” partners at large consulting firms actually try to elect manifestations of themselves. That’s how firms maintain unanimity and culture.

Look around the industry and note the leadership at the major firms. Nearly all share the same profile — 20+ years of upward mobility with the firm, increasing levels of responsibility and leadership, culminating in an abbreviated horse race to the top. On the surface, the path appears very corporate, with scant surprises or deviation in grooming heir apparents.

Dig deeper, though, and you see that unlike those public companies, consulting firms rarely exhibit a twitchy finger as the result of poor quarterly earnings or shareholder activism. Consultants disrupt businesses, but consultants don’t elect disruptors to run their firms. Partners will not oust their leader absent egregious acts of moral turpitude.

McKinsey, as much as any firm, knows how this plays out. Former MP Rajat Gupta’s terms were marked with significant changes in the firm’s persona. His retirement/departure and subsequent move into the investment world came back to stain McKinsey when he and few rogue McKinsey executives were implicated for insider-trading.

After that episode, both then-MP Ian Davis and his successor, Dominic Barton, doubled down on strengthening the firm’s core. Expect Sneader to maintain that discipline, even as the firm’s expansion of digital and analytics offerings puts it even more into mainstream consulting.

Clients hire firms like McKinsey and others because they’re viewed as agents of change. But the truth is, what makes consultants good at advising others is the fact that the culture of their own consulting firms doesn’t really change that much.