@Going Concern: “You’re Hired. You’re Fired. Beware The Big 4 Boomerang”

My new column is posted @Going Concern.

There’s no profession more conflicted about employee retention versus alumni relations than the auditors. On the one hand, the largest audit firms have well-oiled recruiting machines.

Their uncanny ability to identify and sway candidates early is rivaled only by professional baseball’s success at finding talented Dominicans still swinging stalks of sugar cane instead of bats. The firms spend millions of hours and dollars to compete for the top graduates. They love to see their names on lists of top places to intern and to start your career…

Go here for the rest.

6 replies
  1. Anonymous
    Anonymous says:

    Francine, have you heard anything from insiders about Deloitte cost cuts at the PPD and sr. manager levels, while trying to hire managers, seniors, and staff? From their career postings, it sure seems like they are trying to back fill with cheaper, less experienced talent. From friends still there, I understand that there has been demotions and outside placements (example, give you a certain amount of time to look for jobs elsewhere) to hide the people cost cuts that are still going on. Also, there is fear that once the economy improves that there may be a mass exodus, thereby prompting the firms to hire talent now — even though they don’t have the work to justify the headcount. Of course, they could always shift work away from a discontent worker to a newbie.

  2. anon
    anon says:

    Great article!

    If a non-partner needs to do the work of a partner, i.e. pitch and bring in business, what is the point of working for someone else?

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  1. […] Besides, the Big Four Public Accountants really need the work—read Francine McKenna’s recent post at the GoingConcern blog site entitled “You’re Hired. You’re Fired. Beware the Big 4 Boomerang.” […]

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