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The Fortune 100 Best Companies to Work For: PwC #38 (2021)

Next up in the 2021 F100BCTWF are the darlings of the Big 4, PwC. Somebody on one of the chatter sites said recently that the reason why PwC attracts so many new recruits, capital market servants from other Big 4 firms, and has such a good reputation is because it has a charismatic and very visible chairman in Tim Ryan. And I think there’s some truth to that.

Ryan hasn’t met a TV camera or microphone he didn’t like, and he has done several interviews for cable news outlets and major print and online publications during the pandemic, especially about race and diversity, but also how PwC made it through the worst of the health crisis last year.

In one interview Ryan said:

We promoted 230 new partners last year. We paid raises to our promotees. We honored 7,000 full-time and intern commitments. Happy people are going to do great things for our clients and I honestly believe that. It’s easy to have a purpose in good times, it’s a lot harder to have a purpose in challenging times and we lived our purpose in the challenging times and we did the right things for our people and I’m very proud of that.

Because Fortune is placing a large emphasis on how companies dealt with the pandemic in its rankings this year, here is what the publication said about P. Dubs, its 38th best company to work for:

For PwC, preserving staff well-being was paramount amid the pandemic. “Leadership was clear in both messaging and actions that top priorities were employee safety, avoiding layoffs, and promoting well-being,” says one employee. That included paying performance bonuses even amid a difficult year financially, expanding child- and family-care benefits, and expanding options for employees to work flexibly—including the ability to take six months off work with 20% pay and return to their jobs afterward as they would with parental leave.

OK so about that no layoffs thing. You can tell that is a big talking point of Ryan’s during interviews. He told the New York Times recently (bold emphasis added):

Our business took a dip and, and we sat down every week and looked at the numbers, asking ourselves along, “Can we do this? Have we made the right decision?” And we held on. Outside of performance-based layoffs, which is a traditional part of business, we got through it.

And he told the Korean Times (bold emphasis added):

I’m incredibly proud that we’re the only firm in the United States that didn’t lay off people as a result of the pandemic.

You can tell by that employee comment Fortune referenced that the Kool-Aid guzzlers at PwC are parroting what Ryan is saying.

Did PwC do mass layoffs during the pandemic like Deloitte? No. Did PwC do more performance-based layoffs during a pandemic year than in previous years? From what we’ve been told, yes. A lot of people did lose their jobs. And it was shady how PwC did it, as we reported last July.

Anyway, here are some stats of note:

  • Employees: 50,000
  • Number of job openings: 1,849 (as of March 2021)
  • Number of job applicants (last 12 months): 378,994
  • Average number of applicants per opening: 25
  • Number of new graduates hired: 4,173
  • Percentage of women: 46.3%
  • Percentage of minorities: 33.8%
  • PTO limit (days): 15
  • Number of sick days: N/A

PwC was ranked 36th in last year’s F100BCTWF.

Related article:

The Fortune 100 Best Companies to Work For: Deloitte #34 (2021)