Related Posts
More Posts
Cheers to the long Memorial Day weekend 🇺🇸🥃🙌🏼
First ride on my new Core-5 this morning
Bowl Leader
Where have you been ordering takeout?
Do I send a Thank You email to the recruiter?
Additional Posts in Australia and NZ Consultants
Pro
Repeat after me - Market Adjustment
New to Fishbowl?
Download the Fishbowl app to
unlock all discussions on Fishbowl.
unlock all discussions on Fishbowl.
This is a perfect storm for consulting - global economic headwinds from back to back wars and a pandemic / national economic headwinds with AUS GDP on the downturn / political left leaning to create jobs in the public sector / some state governments almost broke / public relations big 4 crisis spectaculraly played out for us one after another / tech revolution creating a skills demand supply crisis like we haven’t seen in our lifetime - you seriously could not have designed this storm any better if you had tried. The market is correcting demand and salaries as a normal cycle (over correcting post pandemic), but the big 4 are licking their wounds after their PR crisis and Gvt slap downs at the same time. As the owner of a growing boutique consulting firm this provides great opportunity to hire great talent based on culture not rem, position ourselves to support clients who need help but can’t be seen to be engaging / over engaging the big 4, and survive and potentially even thrive through to the next economic wave where the perfect storm will be over! Having said all that - the consulting industry is ripe for disruption and this is likely and hopefully a trigger for it!
Culture and good rem I think you meant to say. Paying people their worth is a green flag for good culture, not free Pizza.
Won’t get great talent unless we pay at market, pizza never a substitute it does not provide for sustainable workforce nor strong wellbeing
Consulting is not in good shape in public sector. There is a growing witch-hunt for consultants in government departments, while simultaneously public sector employees show no intention of taking on responsibility for delivering work. Relatedly, the public service still has no interest in giving people a decent pay increase, growing skillsets internally or improving its employee value proposition to realistically entice consultants to switch.
The Australian Government Consulting internal consulting function will fail because the value of consulting as a risk sharing and transferral function has been undervalued. It was a decisive failure in the UK and so it will be here in Australia.
Feel free to DM.
I am not staying. Accenture has damaged its culture due to a lack of transparency and covert redundancies, simultaneously cutting pay increases and showcasing 8 billion profits. It outwardly portrays to the market that everything is fine, despite the reality being starkly different internally. Our CEO, Pete, even circulated a note about the "Best Places to Work" survey, expressing a desire to be among the top five this year. This only illustrates his tone-deafness and disconnection from the people.
Pro
LOL that reminded me that I am yet to do that survey. Not for the lack of follow up emails though - all of which have sat neglected; though I did open the survey about three times.
I plan on staying as the job market isn't as strong as it was 1-2 years ago but also proactively updating my CV in case a great role comes along (either consulting or industry) or I get made redundant as it seems prevalent in the consulting industry
In terms of the current sentiment, a lot of folks (including myself) are pretty disappointed and jaded with the way we're being treated. Firms are reporting record revenue but promotions, pay increases and work events (+ culture) have taken massive hits to achieve it. I feel that companies are aware that they can get away with it as we have nowhere else to go due to the current job market.
I do however believe that this is a cycle and I have no doubt that the consulting industry will pick up again in the future. However, a lot of consulting firms have overhired and overpaid for talents during the boom, which adds a new layer of complexity that probably didn't exist in previous consulting downturns (e.g. GFC), so it'll be interesting to see how each firm tackles the over-inflation in headcounts.
Of course! Go for it. Love your work on the AFR. Keep up the good work!
Pizza has moved from Crust to Dominoes and beers from craft to mainstream brands so definitely can feel belts getting tightened.
Planning on staying, am in an in-demand area of the firm with a strong culture. I do feel this is a resetting of supply - crazy hiring, wages, etc.
Tech
Very much looking to exit in the new year. Massive cuts in social events & team spending which has only furthered the terrible morale that seemingly everyone is experiencing. Frozen promotions also isn’t helping. Happy to discuss in more detail via dm
Nope, planning on leaving if things don’t get better
What will your signpost be to leave? A new role? Or post Xmas?
I'm feeling a bit concerned about the macroeconomic headwinds but I'm planning on staying - I work in an in demand field, for a firm that's expanding in the region, with good pay and WLB. I think it's cyclical, things will bounce back after some reshuffling (e.g. maybe Canberra will try to hire more boutiques instead of Big 4), and I'm decently insulated from the headwinds.
That said, things could change very quickly and people way above my pay grade could make decisions that would be negative for me, so that's always in my mind and I try to prepare for that by saving money, periodically browsing job postings, and so on.
I would be happy to talk more in DMs.
That's interesting about war on consultants. Do you share the above view about the gov consulting team?
Regrettably, it seems that the grass isn't greener in any of the top 5. Accenture is keen on projecting stability to maintain their share price. Moreover, Pete has a reputation to maintain outwardly. Without a doubt, Julie Sweet has had a detrimental negative impact on Accenture.
Sure. Fishbowl is nameless.
I'm staying, it's awesome here. Honestly, we are doing fine and are largely unaffected by everything so far.
Hi Bain - Could I quote you?
Interesting to consider whether this phenomenon affects engineering consultants.
There are spending cuts such as asked to be diligent of non-client billable travel. However we are here to face this together.. those who want to leave will leave anyway.
Yes
Definitely getting out, just waiting for the new year and when the job market opens up. There's way too much pressure for trying to bring in business, there isn't much work going around since all our clients are on the same cost-cutting mode. Most clients have begun floating out RFQs to see where they can get work done for cheaper, so that in turn puts a huge strain on us. That, adding to a super top-heavy and demoralising work culture, there doesn't seem to be a lot of incentive to stick around.