Corporate workers know what it means when cost-cutting consultants come to the office. Jobs will be eliminated. Employees who remain may have to do more work with less help. And new processes will reshape the organization, often from top to bottom. Although it can be an intensely disturbing event, bringing in consultants is not an exercise in cruelty. Often it's a last-ditch effort to save a company from ruin. But what if a university is facing financial hardship? In December 2008, Cornell University was dealing with a $215 million budget deficit. Cornell President David Skorton enlisted consultants from Bain & Co. to advise the university on cost-saving measures. By mid-2009, the entire Ithaca campus was engaged in a budget-saving upheaval and restructuring, known as "Reimagining Cornell," that is ongoing. Despite the painful measures that the university had to enact, the lessons learned--and the savings gained--have made a positive impact both on the leadership of Cornell and on the university itself. This article describes how a crisis leads to historic restructuring at Cornell University.