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Rising Star
Don’t all big 4 have up or out?
Rising Star
Accenture is not B4 but yes, all B4 have up or out culture now.
Chief
Big 4 practices equivalent of MBB are up and out. You cannot survive in high margin practices by hoarding expensive individuals with high rates, who are not going to generate new revenue themselves. While clogging the partner pipeline.
You can be a manager forever in a tech implementation practice or an SM that runs a multi year implementation team year over year. Managed services is another one where you can afford to keep people at level. Rates are on the lower side end, Margins are not extreme and comp raises are not comparable to MBB. That’s how a lot of B4 practices operates- where they have a combo of US based centers and offshore , basically to keep the cost down.
Big 4 definitely has up or out but not as aggressive
Would be curious if they also have higher voluntary turnover due to the lower pay lol
Big4 is a version of up or out, but more prove yourself at the next level before I move you up and the comp to match and you are expected to work like a dog for peanuts until you do. You could potentially stay as a jr. forever, but its not a fun life.
Rising Star
B4 has some serious up or out culture. like EM1 said above, can’t pay someone more than market rate because of competitive rates. But companies like Accenture, IBM will leave you alone if you are happy in your current role. They have those L1-Lx levels made up to give you a sense that you are up but still being a consultant. I don’t mean any offense to anyone, just stating what it looks like from outside.
...B4 is up or out. The way they keep (or at least try) to keep the pyramid balance:
- mandatory partner retirment age
- sales and profit/margin targets start final year of manager to go up for Senior manger and increase YoY
- target promotion years at each level (with referrals/ failure to promo at target likely leading to PIP + slowly shown the door)
Its definately slower/ less strict at lower levels -- but, up & out nonetheless