Deloitte just laid off a bunch of people. Some of these people were 100% utilized and booked throughout this/next year. Many of these people also had good ratings. They rated some, who were decent performers and had great project snapshots and high utilization, as Business Confirmed Low Performer (BCLP). Deloitte comes up with their own vernacular for everything. They don't put people on Performance Improvement Plans (PIPs). Instead, people are notified they are BCLP and under "observation". When many companies put people on PIPs they state what you have to do to get out of it (whether that is achievable or not is another story since most people don't make it past the PIP period). The difference between Deloitte's BCLP and other firm's PIPs is Deloitte does not specify what you have to do to get off of it. They don't even tell your coach what you need to do to get off it. They don't even tell your coach that you were going to be put on a BCLP status before they do it. Your fate is basically decided by a group of Partners, Principles and Managing Directors (PPMDs) who give you a rating during your evals. In addition to all this at Deloitte you are required to do, and evaluated on (you have to get snapshots for them) Firm Initiatives. Firm Initiatives are a way for Deloitte to get free work out of you. They are not extra credit or optional they are required. In addition to your regular client service hours (minimum of 45 hours a week) you are required to do 100-300 hours (per year depending on the rating you want) of Firm Initiatives. This means participating in recruitment, doing things to support sales (writing white papers, etc.) and/or doing eminence activities (i.e. volunteer work, ESG, participating in Deloitte impact day, etc). The other things with Deloitte, way more than the other firms, is there is very little help from Resource Managment in staffing you. The Deloitte firm culture is networking. You better be networking to find your next job. It is your responsibility to stay fully utilized. They seem to even expect this from first years and new hires (when you don't know that many people). Out of the 4 Deloitte seems like its the most prestigious of the firms to work for. If you are into this "prestige" and/or really want to pursue a consulting career (vs audit) Deloitte might be a good place to be. If you're just looking to get some Big 4 experience under your belt, particularly if you want to focus on attestation type work, and don't care about the Big 4 prestige one may be better off going to one of the other three firms. If one's goal is to get a job in industry, after Big 4, I don't think it matters which firm you join. I think most people (not all) in industry view the four firms as similar/same.
The "AI" hype at Big 4 is funny. Feel like they all say the same thing about it. I've been at more than 1 B4 and when you bring it up and ask how it is going to affect hours/budget/utilization they all say the same thing. The same thing when they started shuttling work over to India. They say, "This is not going to affect utilization. The hours you spent doing the work that is being absorbed by work shuttled off to India and/or AI will be reallocated for you to put those efforts into higher risk controls." There could not be any bigger BS statement these firms could come up with. Wait. Where we not putting enough effort into high risk controls? Were they initially shaving hours from high risk controls in the name of firm profits? This would be a lawsuit waiting to happen. My opinion - I feel B4 partners, MDs, Principals, and Senior Managers are split into two categories regarding AI. The first group are those with their heads in the sand. No. Nothing is going to happen. There is still going to be plenty of audit work to do. Remember before the days of Excel they told us that Excel would take our jobs. I still have a job and love Excel! The second group know that AI will have a big impact, but they just keep there mouths shut and tow the firm line and lie to the staff. Look at IBM. Heard they are getting rid of 30% of their staff/back office and replacing them with AI. Anyone who knows anything about audit knows that automated controls are lower risk than manual controls/processes. Let's think about this. AI is automation. With companies using AI that is going to lower risk. Also, when the B4 start using AI I think a lot of the manual processes that they hire entry level Associates and even Senior Associates to do such as ticking and tying AP transactions, testing IT changes, testing system access/segregation of duties, is going to be automated on both sides (at the clients and testing done by the firms). B4 is slow to adopt to this technology but it's not a question of if they want to. They will have to use it. Also, the way I see it AI will be able to test an entire population (or at least a lot bigger of a sample) than any humans could ever do and more accurately. Also, AI doesn't get sick, doesn't get burned out, and never gets tired so it's definitely going to have an impact. I brought this up to a Senior Manager and he said there is no way the government would allow AI to be used to that extent. I could see the government/regulators having some concern, but I could also see them seeing the benefits to AI in that it can test entire populations and it's accuracy. Perhaps they will require its accuracy to be tested/calibrated by having an auditor test a sample of the items tested by AI. This would take us from full on testing to doing some reperformance (like when workpapers from an internal auditor are reperformed). This will take significantly less hours and could even be shipped overseas to be done. There is no way AI is not going to have an impact on hours/utilization in the future. Is this the end of college hires for audit? Will the audit industry transform like the legal industry did? Back int he day lawyers, making over $100K, were hired straight from law school to do research, etc. Those lawyers are no longer needed because that type of work is done though computing applications such as Lexis-Nexis. Those that preach AI will have no impact on audit work are BLIND.
Deloitte just laid off a bunch of people. Some of these people were 100% utilized and booked throughout this/next year. Many of these people also had good ratings. They rated some, who were decent performers and had great project snapshots and high utilization, as Business Confirmed Low Performer (BCLP). Deloitte comes up with their own vernacular for everything.
They don't put people on Performance Improvement Plans (PIPs). Instead, people are notified they are BCLP and under "observation". When many companies put people on PIPs they state what you have to do to get out of it (whether that is achievable or not is another story since most people don't make it past the PIP period). The difference between Deloitte's BCLP and other firm's PIPs is Deloitte does not specify what you have to do to get off of it.
They don't even tell your coach what you need to do to get off it. They don't even tell your coach that you were going to be put on a BCLP status before they do it. Your fate is basically decided by a group of Partners, Principles and Managing Directors (PPMDs) who give you a rating during your evals.
In addition to all this at Deloitte you are required to do, and evaluated on (you have to get snapshots for them) Firm Initiatives. Firm Initiatives are a way for Deloitte to get free work out of you. They are not extra credit or optional they are required. In addition to your regular client service hours (minimum of 45 hours a week) you are required to do 100-300 hours (per year depending on the rating you want) of Firm Initiatives. This means participating in recruitment, doing things to support sales (writing white papers, etc.) and/or doing eminence activities (i.e. volunteer work, ESG, participating in Deloitte impact day, etc).
The other things with Deloitte, way more than the other firms, is there is very little help from Resource Managment in staffing you. The Deloitte firm culture is networking. You better be networking to find your next job. It is your responsibility to stay fully utilized. They seem to even expect this from first years and new hires (when you don't know that many people).
Out of the 4 Deloitte seems like its the most prestigious of the firms to work for. If you are into this "prestige" and/or really want to pursue a consulting career (vs audit) Deloitte might be a good place to be. If you're just looking to get some Big 4 experience under your belt, particularly if you want to focus on attestation type work, and don't care about the Big 4 prestige one may be better off going to one of the other three firms. If one's goal is to get a job in industry, after Big 4, I don't think it matters which firm you join. I think most people (not all) in industry view the four firms as similar/same.
I just joined GT this month in India and the first news i am hearing about the firm is layoffs 😐😐
You’ll be ok as long as you are utilized
The "AI" hype at Big 4 is funny. Feel like they all say the same thing about it. I've been at more than 1 B4 and when you bring it up and ask how it is going to affect hours/budget/utilization they all say the same thing. The same thing when they started shuttling work over to India. They say, "This is not going to affect utilization. The hours you spent doing the work that is being absorbed by work shuttled off to India and/or AI will be reallocated for you to put those efforts into higher risk controls." There could not be any bigger BS statement these firms could come up with. Wait. Where we not putting enough effort into high risk controls? Were they initially shaving hours from high risk controls in the name of firm profits? This would be a lawsuit waiting to happen.
My opinion - I feel B4 partners, MDs, Principals, and Senior Managers are split into two categories regarding AI. The first group are those with their heads in the sand. No. Nothing is going to happen. There is still going to be plenty of audit work to do. Remember before the days of Excel they told us that Excel would take our jobs. I still have a job and love Excel! The second group know that AI will have a big impact, but they just keep there mouths shut and tow the firm line and lie to the staff.
Look at IBM. Heard they are getting rid of 30% of their staff/back office and replacing them with AI. Anyone who knows anything about audit knows that automated controls are lower risk than manual controls/processes. Let's think about this. AI is automation. With companies using AI that is going to lower risk. Also, when the B4 start using AI I think a lot of the manual processes that they hire entry level Associates and even Senior Associates to do such as ticking and tying AP transactions, testing IT changes, testing system access/segregation of duties, is going to be automated on both sides (at the clients and testing done by the firms). B4 is slow to adopt to this technology but it's not a question of if they want to. They will have to use it. Also, the way I see it AI will be able to test an entire population (or at least a lot bigger of a sample) than any humans could ever do and more accurately. Also, AI doesn't get sick, doesn't get burned out, and never gets tired so it's definitely going to have an impact. I brought this up to a Senior Manager and he said there is no way the government would allow AI to be used to that extent. I could see the government/regulators having some concern, but I could also see them seeing the benefits to AI in that it can test entire populations and it's accuracy. Perhaps they will require its accuracy to be tested/calibrated by having an auditor test a sample of the items tested by AI. This would take us from full on testing to doing some reperformance (like when workpapers from an internal auditor are reperformed). This will take significantly less hours and could even be shipped overseas to be done.
There is no way AI is not going to have an impact on hours/utilization in the future. Is this the end of college hires for audit? Will the audit industry transform like the legal industry did? Back int he day lawyers, making over $100K, were hired straight from law school to do research, etc. Those lawyers are no longer needed because that type of work is done though computing applications such as Lexis-Nexis. Those that preach AI will have no impact on audit work are BLIND.
Congrats to them for no longer being underpaid!