Category: Announcements

GC November Survey: Last Call

beer.jpgThis will be our final request for you to participate in our completely harmless, yet immensely helpful, one question survey.
Thanks to everyone that has already taken the survey. If you haven’t taken the survey, are you aware that for ten seconds of your time, you can win a $50 AMEX gift card? Do the math, it’s worth it.
We suggested that we should hand out gift cards to everyone but we don’t call the shots around here.
Have a great Friday and thanks for participating!

GC Reminders: November Survey and Caption Contest

Thumbnail image for ben bankes at the NYC marathon.jpgGood morning servants of capital markets. We don’t mean to impose upon you while you engage in your morning routine but we’re here to remind you of two matters of critical importance going on at this fine publication:
• November survey – One question. One email address. A chance to win a $50 AMEX gift card.
• Caption Contest Poll – You’ve got until 11:59 pm EDT tonight to throw support behind the most suitable description for the AICPA spokesswine. Don’t scoff. It’s important.
Thanks for your participation.

GC November Survey

conspiracy.jpgTurns out TPTB haven’t been able to parlay the information that you provided into world domination.
Please take this one question survey to assist them in their efforts. Your help is appreciated.
UPDATE: We left out the part where we’re giving away a $50 AMEX gift card.

Hump Day Reminders: Polls and CPA Exam Question of the Week

Thumbnail image for RL-Stine-and-kids_350.jpgWe think it’s important to remind you that voting ends tonight at 11:59 PDT for our two polls from Monday:
• Caption Contest Poll: KPMG Scary Stories
• Satisfied with Your Salary?
So jump over and vote in both the polls. We’ll give you the results tomorrow.
Also don’t forget to submit your questions to us for this week’s CPA Exam Question of the Week. You can submit your questions to tips@goingconcern.com through tomorrow. Anything received on Friday will be considered for next week.

GC Weekend: Don’t Get Spooked by Crackdowns on Leaks

secrets.jpgHappy Halloween spreadsheet zombies! The scariest (not to mention tragic) thing we’ve heard today is that there plenty of you working today. Hopefully you’re in costume at least.
Tricks and treats aside, on this final day of October we thought we would impend some legal wisdom upon you from our sister site, Above the Law.
We realize that some of you may be hesitant to send us tips for fear of retributThat’s a legitimate worry but luckily, this issue was addressed specifically, just yesterday, by a post on ATL.


The post relates to a law firm, Wilmer Hale, that was warning its associates about leaking information about the firm:

Meanwhile, in other firm news, we got our hands on the WilmerHale warning memo that we mentioned earlier this month. Truth be told, it’s a little disappointing — not nearly as scary as we were led to believe…
…If you’re at a law firm thinking about swearing your employees to secrecy regarding their workplace conditions, proceed with caution. A reader advises us:
[I]t might be useful to note that, if the firm has put a blanket prohibition on associates discussing their working conditions, they’ve clearly violated federal law — namely, Section 8(a)(1) of the National Labor Relations Act, 29 USC 158(a)(1). See Cintas Corp. v. NLRB, 482 F.3d 463 (D.C. Cir. 2007) (“confidentiality” rule that could be viewed as banning discussion of working conditions violates §8(a)(1)); Stanford Hosp. & Clinics v. NLRB, 325 F.3d 334 (D.C. Cir. 2003) (same w/r/t rule that banned discussion of working conditions with non-employees); Brockton Hosp. v. NLRB, 294 F.3d 100 (D.C. Cir. 2002) (same w/r/t rule that banned discussions of working conditions with other employees).

If you go to the original post that is linked in the blockquote, you will see many comments from Wilmer Hale associates that are similar to some of the comments we see here:

Ifyou [sic] don’t know already, KPMG leadership has assigned an employee to monitor this website, so you might reconsider where you’re posting from.
I heard it from someone who heard it from someone that KPMG has people trolling this site to try to determine where the layoff leaks are coming from so they can can their asses too. OK so it’s double hearsay but I believe it, after all would we expect any less?

We’re positive that this Orwellian environment isn’t a concern just at KPMG. Right now people are simply scared of losing their jobs by sneezing in the wrong direction. But let’s not forget that it’s virtually impossible for your firm to monitor every communication that you send. As Lat and Elie attest:

If you think your firm even has the ability to monitor every communication that you send — including calls, texts and emails sent from your personal cellphone — then you’ve been reading too many John Grisham novels. As for your work computer, if your firm monitors everything you do on it — using a key capture program to every keystroke you type, then reviewing said keystrokes — your firm probably isn’t a very nice place to work (and needs more real work for its IT people, so they don’t have time for cyber-witch hunts).

What about compensation matters? Funny you should ask:

This is also true with respect to compensation matters — a subject of keen interest to ATL readers, especially around bonus time. From a second reader, a labor and employment lawyer (not at WilmerHale):
FYI: to the extent WilmerHale precludes the ability of associates to discuss compensation information, it may be a violation of Title VII and/or the Equal Pay Act (and possible state and local equivalents). The ability of an employee to discuss and learn about compensation issues, which allows a potential claimant to discover what others are earning and if their jobs and compensation are essentially similar so as to qualify for “equal pay” under the statute (or if illegal discrimination occurred), is an essential need…. It can also be viewed as illegal retaliation if a policy was implemented after the fact, e.g., after someone cooperated with an investigation.

So as you can see, the law is on your side. You have every right to discuss your professional lives and your employment without fear of retribution.
Thanks to everyone that has provided us with tips since we’ve gone live. We want to hear from more of you so don’t hesitate to send us any information that you think will be great to share with the rest of our readers.
We’ll run down all the ways that you can send us tips so you can contact us however you prefer:
• Our tips email: tips@goingconcern.com
• Direct message on Twitter: @going_concern
• You can direct message my personal account on Twitter here.
• Send me a message on Facebook here.
• Join the GC group on Facebook and drop a line there.
If you still have doubts, check out the posts — in their entirety — at ATL.
Have a Happy (and safe) Halloween!
Congratulations to WilmerHale on a Major Pro Bono Win
(Plus the WilmerHale warning, and thoughts on law firms trying to crack down on leaks.) [ATL]
WilmerHale Warns Associates Against Talking to ATL — But Has It Worked? [ATL]

Survey Says…

Thumbnail image for RichardDawson.jpgThanks again to everyone for humoring us and taking our survey. Some of the highlights:
• 76% of the respondents work in public accounting.
• 41% of the respondents work for a company with more than 100,000 employees.
• 44% of the respondents describe themselves as “auditors”, 22% describe themselves as “tax professionals”. Some of the “other” responses include: marketing, attorney, financial modeler, teacher, engineer, professor, and of course, unemployed.
• Nearly 84% of the respondents are CPAs, 14% have a JD (with a handful of LLMs), along with a few CIAs, CFEs, CMAs, and one CFA but no CVAs. “Other” responses include: CISA, CISSP, CGFM, FRM, CLU, and CPCU.
• 47% of the respondents answered they work in the “accounting industry”, 13% in “banking/finance”. 19% responded “other” including: publishing, oil & gas, construction, real estate, forensic and litigation consulting, federal consulting, entertainment, law, and education.
Some of the comments and suggestions we received:


• I think you should speculate more on rumors. Add some fuel to the flame. but don’t go overboard and scare everyone.
• More professionalism. the foolishness of some stories is great and well taken as a break from work, but i am interested in hearing more about the industry and the dirt accompanying layoffs.
• ATL writers know how to be witty without being juvenile. This site, not so much.
• Not as snarky/funny as, say, above the law, but accountants just aren’t (as) interesting (as almost anything that’s not an accountant).
• Stop being so negative. I know the Big 4 aren’t perfect but the constant bad mouthing is out of place on a website devoted to them.
• More focus on the big 4.
• Suggestions: It would be interesting to see posts about sexual harrassment stories and stories about times our firms have asked/encouraged us to do illegal things…
• Maybe there are too many articles?
• Please have more posts per day and more information “after the jump”
• Language formality will improve overall credibility.
• I heart Caleb and Pomeranians.
So based on some of these responses, we will try to do the following: post more, post less, avoid dick and fart jokes (or maybe just grow up), find out if ATL does workshops, and get a Pom. Got it.
Seriously, thank you for all your feedback and suggestions. We also need you to keep sending us ideas and tips. In fact, it’s imperative that you do so, in order for us to inform you about all rumors, gossip, and chicanery going out their in the bean counter universe.
Here’s where we make like your performance counselor and ask you to double your efforts, step it up, or whatever the hell it is they say to you. Let’s take it to next the level, people. Ugh, we just managed to creep ourselves out with that…
Thanks again!

Survey Reminder: Our Intentions Are Good, We Swear

integrity.jpgRegardless of how you feel about a certain editor’s grammar or questionable mental state you’ll be doing us a huge solid by taking our reader survey.
This isn’t like those big firm surveys where we’ll shamelessly exploit the good feedback and present the bad feedback as a terrible joke at the end of the presentation.
No, we’ll only use your personal information for the forces of good. Your ideas will help GC reach new heights of useful and occasionally funny information.
Plus, since you have a chance to win a $100 AMEX gift certificate, it’s totally worth a fraction of just one your chargeable hours today. We don’t know what the return is on that but it beats the hell out of an ice cream scoop.
Besides, it’s not like we have diabolical plans to brainwash you all to form some sort of bean counter army. What would be the point of that? Start our own firm?
Thanks for your participation.