Author: Caleb Newquist

Founding editor, Going Concern.

Hopefully the IASB Gets the Point

stephen-colbert.jpgAfter learning yesterday about the Accountancy Age Awards we thought that the celebration of accounting couldn’t get any better. And by “better”, we mean incredibly lame.
Satire being a common theme here, we definitely appreciate Christian Aid‘s attempt to help accountants, most specifically the CRAPASS IASB, to reconsider their indirectly screwing of poor countries:
Continued, after the jump

The International Accounting Standards Board (IASB) has been handed a tongue-in-cheek award from Christian Aid, after winning the charity’s Greatest Potential for Tax Reform award…PriceWaterhouse Coopers (PwC), KPMG, Ernst & Young and Deloitte & Touche also collected awards…Campaigners want the Board…to instigate urgent and far-reaching reforms – including forcing companies trading internationally to report profits made and taxes paid in every country where they operate. Christian Aid estimates that countries in the developing world are deprived of $160 billion annually in lost revenues by companies disguising their tax liabilities.

This is probably the closet thing to a Razzie that exists for the accounting industry so we’re happy to support them for the sake of argument.
If you’ve got other ideas about other awards that accountants deserve and who the recipients are, submit them in the comments.
Accounting Standards given tongue-in-cheek reform award [politics.co.uk]

The IASB is Getting Serious About Convergence

Trying to get accounting standards to converge is hard work. It’s so difficult, in fact, that the International Accounting Standards Committee is considering changing the name of the International Accounting Standards Board to the IFRS Board.
This critical move will obviously speed up a process that has been going on, seemingly, since Luca Pacioli was in short pants. We’re definitely in favor of putting your agenda out in front but this still seems to be typical accountant passive-aggressive behavior.
Since we’re sure you have much better ideas for the what the IASB’s new name should be, submit your suggestions in the comments. The best we could come up with appears in the tag line.
IASB Could Be Renamed IFRS Board [Web CPA]

PwC’s Recruitment of MBA’s is Good News on the Hiring Front, Sort Of (UPDATE)

pwclogo.thumbnail.jpgFINS.com has a piece on the Big 4’s recruitment of MBA’s that serves as lukewarm encouragement for those of you have considered the painstaking thought of going back to school.
More, after the jump

PricewaterhouseCoopers is ramping up its hiring of M.B.A.s, with plans to recruit 75 to 100 business-school graduates in 2010. [The Firm] planned to bring on 60 to 90 graduates from master’s degree in business programs in 2009, up from 40 last year…An improving economy and the need to make sense of new regulatory guidelines in the financial sector are what’s driving the trend

As you might expect, the hiring occurs in the advisory practices of the firms while those of you with that went back to get a master’s in accounting will most likely end up in audit or tax practices.

At PWC, most M.B.A. recruits have three to seven years’ experience and fill senior associate posts in its advisory practice. The M.B.A.s that it hires are recruited to work in finance, operations and supply-change management and human-capital management.

The article is less enthusiastic about the other firms, however:

Big Four rival Ernst & Young is hiring about 20 b-school grads into its performance-improvement practice this year, dipping from a peak of 25 in 2007 when it began hiring M.B.A.s…While KPMG does not actively recruit M.B.A.s since its consulting practice spun off in 2002, it does targeted M.B.A. hiring, according to Malana Sanders, a KPMG recruiting director…Deloitte does hire M.B.A.s, though, said Diane Borhani, head of U.S. campus recruiting for Deloitte in Chicago, who declined to provide specifics

So we’re at a loss on how we feel about this. On the one hand, it’s good to see at least one firm ending the slash and burn that’s been going on for the last 12-15 months (even if this is just advisory) but are you ready to go back to eating cup o’ noodles, no keg stands, and more school debt to do it?
Since it sounds like layoffs will occur regularly at the firms and BW says that two-thirds of you leave the firms within five years anyway, going back to school may be in the cards for a lot of you.
For those of you that fall in the 3 – 7 years experience range, discuss what, if any, thoughts you’ve had on going back to school and if would you go with a Big 4 firm. Scary thought, we know.
PricewaterhouseCoopers and Rivals are Recruiting More M.B.A.s [FINS.com]

Preliminary Analytics | 09.10.09

oprah-kfc-factory-farms.jpg• The Oprah effect: Winfrey credited with helping boost Michigan Avenue business Tuesday – Oprah encourages us back to irresponsible behavior. Wa-hoo! [CT]
• Madoff Slept Here May Prove Selling Point for NY, Florida Homes – ‘People will be underwhelmed when they see the Palm Beach house — the location is great but the house is so dated it will probably be knocked down.’ That’s a shame. [Bloomberg]
• Brooklyn’s Madoff, Ponzi-schemer Philip Barry, getting public assistance – No surprise here since he was running a business from the stone age. [NYDN]
• Steve Jobs lights up Apple show – In other news, Apple fanboys, he’ll be dead eventually. [BBC]
• Phone transcript reveals Bernie Madoff coached potential witness on duping SEC investigators – “Bernie Madoff once coached a potential witness on how to fool SEC investigators, saying ‘you don’t have to be too brilliant’ to get away with it, it was revealed Wednesday.” So Bern was at least providing training, unlike some people we know…[NYDN]

Review Comments | 09.09.09

ObamaAndGeithner0109.jpg• Geithner Still Pushing For Major Financial Reforms – Wait…There is still a problem? [NPR]
• Obama Says New Tax on Sugary Drinks Worth ‘Exploring’ – You thought the soda was expensive before? [Bloomberg]
• Golden couple refuse to shoulder blame – These people. [FT]
• US economic outlook ‘optimistic’ – Just like every football fan feels about their respective team. Right, Sooners? [BBC]
• The Cassandra effect – What if you can predict the future but no one believes you? [AccMan]
• IRS to Focus on Filling Vacancies – Take note people… [Web CPA]

Rumor Mill: More KPMG Layoffs

Frankly, this is getting ridiculous. We got wind of more staff layoffs going down in the Metro audit practice in New York today. Sounds as though emails may have been sent out last night and meetings are being held today.
One explanation we heard was that associates not currently assigned to a client were let go which seems dubious, even for an accounting firm, but we’ll run with it. If you’re one of the unlucky few, or have details on rumors concerning next week, drop us a line or discuss in the comments.

Sometimes You Need Help Getting Your Game On Track

We’re going to talk about a serious topic people. Many of you have discovered tricks of the trade to hep you focus on work that functions better than any sleeping aid out there.

What it basically amounts to is your focus. Sometimes, just sometimes, you require a little help getting your concentration back on track. It can be anything really. For example, if your plans for meeting your less-overworked friends out for a cocktail are totally blown, you might eat five frozen entreés out of the fridge that aren’t yours to feel better and just get your ass in gear to make last call.

Some of you probably rely on less-proven methods but sometimes this is a mental challenge and you have to take the necessary steps to up your game.

Others of you may take advantage of the discounted, yet ever inflating soda prices in your office or at a client location combined with the Adderall that you swiped from your spastic roommate.

We’re pretty sure some of you have come up with your cocktail of methods that, somehow, allow you to do an insurmountable amount of work in a a freakishly short amount of time. Since time is money, your superiors probably have no problem with whatever approach you’ve discovered so share your favorite method of reigning in the focus in the comments. We’re not encouraging illegal behavior here, so keep it below the felony level.

UPDATE: On the advice of counsel and because we care about all of you (yes, all). If you or someone you know needs help, call 1-877-RxAbuse (1-877-792-2873).

We Picture the Trophies as Gold Plated 10-Key Calculators

red_carpet.jpgYou may have noticed that we reference a lot of stories from across the pond. Simply, it appears that the British seem to be a little more concerned with accounting world than us here in the States, where we’re virtually ignored at every turn (except when poop + fan).
The Brits are so enamored with accounting, in fact, that Accountancy Age, bless their hearts, has an awards ceremony.
The awards have their own website with a countdown clock, a gallery with last year’s winners, oh and you’re allowed to vote on Employer of the Year and Personality of the Year. Other awards include Audit Team of the Year, Tax Team of the Year, and Accountant of the Year.
The dream, continued, after the jump


There’s a lot of directions we could go with this but this has to be the most obvious case of accountant self-aggrandizement we’ve ever seen. We can’t even fathom the idea of hundreds of bean counters in tuxedos and cocktail dresses accepting hideous trophies under the pretense that the work done demands such recognition.
Perhaps since accountants are so used to an environment devoid of gratitude, Accountancy Age thought they would go out of their way to start showing some appreciation. WTFK really?
In any case, we would request Accountancy Age to assign us as a Joan Rivers role of sorts in order to liven up the bean counter Oscars. Since Accountancy Age’s list is a little ho-hum, come up with some of your own ideas for awards and their nominees in the comments.
Accountancy Age Awards 2009 shortlist announced [Accountancy Age]

Launch Your Career, Part Deux

human-cannonball.jpgWe took another look at BusinessWeek’s Top Places to Launch a Career list because: 1) lists out of business magazines, no matter how trite and meaningless, have a way of sucking us in and B) we figured there may be more information that you would find interesting.
As we mentioned last week, Deloitte knocked E&Y off the mountain by having the best stats in some key categories like salary, three-year retention rate, and lowest drop in entry level hiring.
Here are a few more stats we discovered in BW’s list:
• Only 2% of Deloitte’s new associates received a performance bonus, and the average bonus was $296. This compares to 35% for E&Y, 27% for P. Dubya, 68% for KPMG, and 85% for GT. The respective average bonus was $5,141; $4,900; $3,700; $1,552.
Continued, after the jump


• E&Y really loves their new associates so much that they spent, on average, $18,500 on training for each one. The next hightest was KPMG at $7,689. We double-checked the E&Y number, thanks.
• We mentioned the three year retention rates for the firms last week and Guest 3 noted how this is um, not good. Interestingly enough, the five year retention rate is worse, with all the firms hovering around 34%, except for GT whose five year retention rate was 28%
• PwC had the youngest partner at 30 years with eight years seniority while E&Y and GT both had partners with seniority of seven years with seven years. Deloitte’s youngest was 31 with ten years and KPMG’s was 32 with 9 years.
Unfortunately, the list does not contain happy hour to new hire or hottie to nottie ratios but we figure these fairly close too. So of you’re a recruit this probably leaves you just as confused as before.
Discuss the stats in the comments and try to guide our college friends in the right direction. Recruits, if you’ve got your mind made up, let us know which firm and why. You’re going to have to sell it though.

Who Knew that E&Y had a Creative Art Department?

Zitor.jpgToday, in how your firm spent your bonus news, we present you with Zitor, an alien who somehow ended up in Uncle Ernie’s shop. Zitor then ended up being assigned a counselee for year-end reviews which is fairly realistic considering his lack of expertise and work experience.

Zitor was apparently designed and plugged into the Ernstiverse to demonstrate how to be completely unprepared for a the year-end review process as a counselor.


What’s odd is that most counselors seem to be using logic from another planet so it’s not outside the realm of possibility that this was based on actual methods used.

Regardless of the genesis of this idea, it probably goes without saying that this had to be complete and utter failure for those of you with maturity levels above the age of 13. Nevermind that no one can decipher how accounting firms determine who the best performers are anyway.

Included with this frivolous attempt to relate to the troops, if you were so inclined, you could submit ideas for the line below from Zitor to end up in the next video for this “Coach from Another Planet”. While that sounds incredibly lame and worthy of our ridicule, we’ve decided to let you take a stab at it instead.

The line has been modified slightly to allow your much more creative suggestions to be submitted in the comments:

“At E&Y, we do not give feedback. We give ___________.”

Do your worst.