Related Posts
Career changers. Anyone?
posting my doggie to unlock my DMs, ☺️
Additional Posts in Accounting
Heading into busy season like
New to Fishbowl?
Download the Fishbowl app to
unlock all discussions on Fishbowl.
unlock all discussions on Fishbowl.
That's unfortunate. If the comment is truly reflective of partners and managers (and teams as a whole) in your office/region, then I would suggest it's a sign of a dysfunctional culture and a potential roadblock to success.
There are many firms/regions/offices/teams where people on flexible and reduced schedules are sought after high performers and advance.
I suggest you also follow up to see if the partner was covering up a message that you are not a high performer. Not everyone is a direct communicator.
Good luck
Agreed, some but not all, long time partners have that belief.
OP....hopefully in your office, with current partners and managers, that is an anomaly and not the norm.
A FWA certainly adds complexity and requires great communication for success, but such arrangements are necessary and we need to make them work.
Good luck
I’m an OMP with multiple folks on FWAs ranging from 50% to 95% everything in between. As stated above, these arrangements do require communication, and planning to execute effectively. I can tell you it takes effort from all stakeholders but the benefits to all are great. @SM 2- a number of these folks are our highest performers and at least one is not. Has nothing to do with the FWA..
I agree that this is an old school way of thinking. In my previous group, we had a woman on an FWA and a lot of the older PPEDs assumes she wasn’t devoted to work. She was fantastic and proved them wrong but did have to fight the perception issue. I think most younger managers through partners have a more modern view, so hopefully this is a challenge that will be eliminated when the stuffy old folks retire.
I am on FWA, I get great feedback on quality all the time and a lot of people want me on their teams. However, most of the partners do not respect my FWA and even afraid to tell the client that the SM on the engagement is out of office one day a week. I am also perceived as someone not “on partner track” as I am not devoted to work 24/7...
EY4, it is very different to be one of many on FWA and the only one in your group.
EY 1 - flex work arrangement, reduced hours, etc.
Partner 1 - he recently retired, so there will be no follow up. I had one person tell me he was very old school and thought that it should be an all or nothing sort of job. :-/ I was really just wondering if the majority of higher ups see it that way. I don’t think it was a performance issue
Is that attitude really that surprising? All things equal - do you want someone on your team who is willing to work at 120% all the time, or someone that has formalized a plan to work less?
What exactly does FWA involve?
It may be generational. I used to work for a partner (he retired 4 years ago) who insisted that everyone work in the office all the time. His assumption was that if you aren’t in the office then you’re not working. He also talked about how people were (maybe still are) expected to be in the office the afternoon of Thanksgiving. Even if you had nothing to do, you still have to create the impression that you were devoted to work, and showing up was key to this. Thank God we’re moving away from those times!
FWA or flexibility for anyone in my office is frowned upon. Shouldn’t be that way, but it is
I’ve been on FWA since day 1 as a staff and I’ve never had any problems with not being assigned or people not putting me on their team. It’s actually the opposite because I’ve learned to work efficiently in the 4 days a week I am at the client/office and my managers like that
I think part of it depends on how many engagements you have. If you work on one thing, people will perceive you as less committed because they’re there all the time and you’re not. If you’re juggling multiple accounts, it’s a lot easier. Just trade an account or two for the FWA. Treat it the same way you would any other client commitment - meaning, sometimes other clients have to take priority over your FWA. FWA works best when you’re shooting for a target over a long time period; e.g., I want to work a 75% this year. It doesn’t work that well if you want a set schedule. Our business (at least my business) doesn’t work like that. But I work with tons of people on FWAs and usually I don’t even find out until we’ve been working together for a while