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Rising Star
What skills lead to success in M&A?
Anyone negotiate severance?
How do i see my utilization?
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Wisdom is knowing that not everything you wish to say needs to be heard.
Wisdom is knowing your need to have the hard conversations even if the recipient doesn’t want to hear it rather than letting them just get blindsided when they are on the chopping block.
No one should ever be surprised when they get cut. If they are then management hasn’t been doing their job correctly.
Pro
Thank God I no longer work in public accounting . In my industry job , we have people here 10, 15 and 20 years including "forever Seniors " that some managers in public accounting like to joke about . We have job stability and we are happy. We have NEVER had a layoff and we all leave at 5pm year round. Can't say the same for public accounting . People like the original poster can stay in public accounting . I know many "high performers" including Senior Managers who were let go in public accounting. It's not worth it folks.
Pro
TS, have you ever considered the pipeline information you’re stating above is a more complex issue than the PA gossip column headlines you’ve been reading?
1) 28.6 million baby boomers left the US workforce in 2020, 12.6% more than in 2019
2) the US has a labor shortage of 2 million (8.5m openings vs 6.5m unemployed workers), per chamber of commerce;
3) 15% decline in undergraduate enrollment between 2010 and 2021, although there was an increase in spring 2024 of 2.5% (accounting major enrollment increased 6% in 2024)
4) many accounting majors change majors due to course difficulty, or boredom.
5) of students who didnt consider accounting, the top reasons are for lack of interest or passion (a shame) or lacked the necessary skills.
6) of students who considered and chose otherwise, 32% cited a lack of interest, 29% cited higher STARTING salaries, 28% cited the 150 credit barrier, which is tied with not being good at math, which IMO is a misconception. There are a plethora of other reasons but thats what the data tells us and the profession and universities are working to respond to changing preferences.
7) the number of cpa exam test takers was partially affected by covid and has fluctuated throughout the years. The percentage of accounting graduates taking the test the first time dropped below 50% for the first time in 2018 and was even lower from 2020-2022. That percentage increased to 63% in 2023, which is the highest its been since 2010 (70%). Well see what 2024 lands out to be.
And to be clear, the talent shortages you are referring to are more concentrated in industry and small accounting firms. There are many mid-large firms (including my own) that are overstaffed as there are less people leaving compared to expectations. Hence the layoffs in PA, which you repeatedly have been linking throughout FB. Although most of these are in the consulting arms.
And yes, i already know your response will be these are “useless statistics” because you’ve already said this when I responded to you claim that PA hours are equivalent to slave labor.
And guess what, there is someone working harder than you and getting the same pay. So that means you should be purged also?
What is the point of this post?
Some of the people that were purged were high performers though. At least according to their performance reviews. There was a person that was on track to be promoted to manager based on partner discussions and performance reviews, but was laid off instead.
That “trimming” isn’t normal in audit. Bad performers getting fired yes. But regular layoff’s no. And at some point, considering the size of the audit workforce, they start cutting down to the meat, and even the high performers aren’t safe.
Well that’s just dumb on management’s part. Given the portability of our jobs, high performers should never be cut due to geography.
I don’t know about audit. I would think that would be a relatively stable space unless they are counting on automation to pick up the slack. But given audit flipped a while back to more qualitative based metrics that just quantitative ones I would think automation would be of less help than more.
Rising Star
Its not fine if the volume if work is increasing and those trimmed people’s roles are shipped overseas
Rising Star
Those 1-5% are typically replaced with new onshore staff, that is no longer the case
I agree...you're the bomb. Let's purge all the medium performers so you can do all the work!
You'll learn there are 2 people in this world...people who do the work and people who don't. The key is a learn to get as much as you can from the people that dont, else it's all on you to do it which is in no way a better outcome for the people that work.
Who is decide the performance and what basis? It all depends the the person who is doing the reviews which is not all fair in KPMG. 2 person doing same job and the performance is same, but one of the reviewer gives good point and the other gives different point which is unfair
Why don’t you make MD/Partner if you’re so good bruh
Since when can’t partners and MDs be fired?
Pro
lmao bro get a fking life, there's more to life than your job. do you think ppl are gonna care that you were a high performing tax monkey when youre on your deathbed?
Yikes
Maybe the pple working 60% are the smart ones. Work less, more pay. You gotta be dumb to not do that lol. I enjoy bei g paid to do nothing.
Rising Star
Calm down lol. It’s public accounting… we’re not looking for the cure for cancer.
It’s all fun and games until OP finds out his Indian replacement works 20% more than him for 20% less pay.
Pro
I am told these "Indian tax processors " get paid the equivalent of US$10 per hour. They are going to decimate the employment of US Accountants.
Public accounting is not for everyone, and some will have a better experience than others. That has as much to do with both the firm and office you work in. I'm a B4 partner that has been with multiple of the B4, and there really are differences firm to firm and even office to office.
You’re just a bootlicker. The companies have no problem cutting the “ fat “ but have no problem hiring talent from overseas with barely any English skills absolute clown post
Probably bc people choose to suffer through accounting for the job stability
How many Senior Tax Managers were laid off? The RIF last week was for Audit, not Tax. You are saying that most of your Senior Tax Manager peers aren’t pulling their weight compared to how awesome you are?
I get it now. Y’all think accounting firms should be run with a socialist system. News flash. We don’t just live in a capitalist society, we live in a period of extreme capitalism, where it’s all about the value to the shareholders today, not tomorrow. and the sooner you realize that the sooner you can learn to play the game - and yes it is a game with winners and losers.
Public accounting is tough and not for those who want to just be average, do average. Average means you are at risk. I’ve seen so many on here commenting - yeah we have charge goals but no one reaches them and it’s no big deal. That’s a dumb mindset to maintain. It puts you at risk because the firm makes their money based on your charge hours.
1) Make sure your hours are at or near the goal
2) Make sure your jobs are profitable tole are actively on track to become profitable
3) Take the stuff the partner hates off of their plate.
4) Make sure the clients are relatively happy by keeping up customer service and
5) do something extra that benefits the firm in some way but is visible to the leadership
can a bad thing still happen - yes, firms collapse because a or some partners do something stupid. But that’s an extraordinary event beyond your control.
Stop expecting your firm to owe you stuff just because you show up. That’s not the society we live in. If you don’t want to play their game, get out and find one that you do want to play.
Yes a society where we can do what we want when we want and not have to worry about paying the bills would be nice but it’s not reality. Wishing otherwise is just going to hurt yourselves.
Wow — want to go big on the assumptions here?
My guess is you are a Gen Z who thinks they are entitled to a well paying job just because they went to college and are putting in minimal effort. You grew up getting participation trophies that you were proud of while being told trying your hardest was good enough. I do feel sorry for you guys because you were sold a bill of goods when you were young that was completely not true and didn’t equip you properly for working in the real world.
None of what is going on now is new. You’re just suffering from a reality check.
Two letters: AI. Our jobs are starting to be pushed aside. My peers in other fields knew better. They were unionized. But we accountants—too smart, too independent—will lose our jobs just like those auto PhDs in Detroit did in the ’80s. Now, with automation hitting industries everywhere, look at the recent NYC port strike. Dockworkers were pushing back against automation that threatens to take over their jobs. It’s a fight across industries, but without union support, we’ll be next in line.
Yeah except doing personal taxes is already like 99% automated if you use software like turbotax - which many do. Business tax returns and 740 provisions probably aren't getting automated anytime soon, but I don't know that much about those areas. There will definitely be a place for AI and automatinvolvebe involved, but fear mongering about being replaced by them is just silly
Pro
Based on your title, you managed to avoid the worst job market since 2008, so it was all timing and luck that you started your career when you did. What an embarrassing take.
Not even close kid. Started my career in Big 4 DURING a recession when there was a surplus of accountants and firms were merging in response.
I just do what it takes to make sure I’m near or at the top of the pack, never the bottom.
The information is available, you just have to be willing to use it.
Issue was it wasn’t just low performers. So many senior managers were let go with a very involved roles in their engagements and didn’t appear as low performers. Seemed to be more IBO based this round than competency