Category: Big 4

If it happens at a Big 4 accounting firm, we’re talking about it here.

Bob Moritz Is Happy To Address Your FAQs on PwC’s New Logo That Don’t Concern Colors or Shapes

Okay people. By now some of you might be sick of hearing about PwC’s new logo that incorporates the beauty of autumn and your first Atari (look it up, young people). However, based on what we’re seeing in the traffic patterns, many are not, so we’ll truck on with Extreme Makeover: PwC Edition.

As we mentioned earlier this week, at least one person felt compelled to share their feelings on the switcheroo with PwC’s U.S. Chairman Bob Moritz. Whether that particular employee got their questions/concerns addressed is currently unknown, however Bob did address many popular questions in an email to the rank and file.

In his email, Roberto said that he’s perfectly okay with the feedback, even the negative stuff. But he implores that you don’t get hung up on the colors or building blocks because, well, it really has no bearing on anything and it’s silly to get caught up on something like appearances.

By now you’ve likely checked out the new PwC brand. Not surprisingly, I’ve gotten strong feedback from around the firm. Many love it. Some don’t. Few are neutral. With a firm of 30,000 smart people, there are going to be lots of opinions…and that’s okay. I ask that you don’t get caught up in the colors and logo; these changes to our visual identity are simply what we think reflects the evolution that has taken place within our firm as we continue to build a relationship-based, value-driven culture. The most important thing is that each of us understands what we’re doing and why, and can articulate what our brand means to our clients and to one another. And, it’s in line with what we’re doing around the network to create a more consistent brand worldwide. You’re going to hear more about the changes starting October 4, so stay tuned. In the meantime, click on FAQs below to read my responses to some of the feedback I’ve received.

Brand Frequently Asked Questions:

Q: Are we changing our name, and when do I use pwc instead of PwC?
A: First, our name is still PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP. That’s what we’ll use on formal and legal documents, and it will accompany the new brand in an appropriate manner in external materials. What we will call ourselves in day to day communications, though, is PwC. That’s really just acknowledging what people typically call us, and it’s easier for everybody than typing out our full name. In writing, we will still use PwC (uppercase “P,” lowercase “w,” and uppercase “C.”)

Just jumping in here: PwC appears to be assimilating to the idea that capitalization is irrelevant in this day and age of texts, IM so on and so forth.

Q: What is the timing of the change to the new brand?
A: Although we have kept the details under wraps to help us maximize the impact in the market, this transition has been in the planning stages for some time — and is part of our overall network strategy. The transition began gradually with the PwC network’s global website (pwc.com), which changed on September 20. On October 4, the official brand launch date, there will be a number of highly visible changes here in the US, from building signs to new stationery. Beyond that, though, we expect the transition to take time. Network firms will have the option to change at their own pace. In the US, we are moving faster because we see it as an opportunity to engage in dialogues with our clients and the market about the very real changes we are making in how we build relationships and create value. The changes to our logo, colors, look and feel are symbols of the broader changes being made to the firm and the global network.

In terms of visible changes, we will have most of our building signs replaced by the end of this calendar year. We have been working with our EAs and TAs, Document Production, and Graphic Design to tackle the thousands of printed and electronic documents that will need to be converted, looking first to those with the greatest impact on our interaction with our clients. This process will take time, and we’ll need everyone’s patience and support as we make the changes.

Q: Will we get new business cards?
Yes, all partners and staff (and that includes client service staff, IFS staff and EAs/TAs) will receive business cards, which will provide each of you with a great resource to help you connect with others, build on the relationships you have and help the firm deliver value. More to come on when and how to order business cards following our October 4 launch date.

Whether this affects the pace of greenness at PwC isn’t entirely clear.

Q: With the economy just climbing out of a recession, why are we spending money on this change now?
A: Timing was clearly a consideration. We have set ambitious goals for our network of firms–and we are counting on our brand to work harder for us as we distinguish ourselves from our competitors. There will never be a better time to begin the transition to our new brand, and by starting now, we will be well-positioned as the economy improves.

There will be some costs associated with the change. In the US, they will include the cost of building signage and consumable items such as stationery, business cards and printed materials. Overall, this spend is minimal in relation to our size and is certainly not significant to our annual operating budget. If we treat the brand re-launch as an important opportunity to engage with our clients and each other–to discuss how together we will improve relationships and create value–the money we spend on the launch will be paid back many times over.

Anything not covered above can be asked below but if you must, further comments, questions, concerns about the colors and/or geometry of the logo will not be dismissed.

KPMG Asks Alumni to Consider Taking the Firm Back

KPMG knows that many of you left the firm under less-than ideal circumstances. You found a younger, vibrant, more attractive employer who made you swoon. Or maybe you were cast out with the other lepers in the layoffs of ’08 or ’09. Either way, the firm would like you to think about it:

More Than 2000 Experienced Hire Positions to be Filled

KPMG Connect invites you to take advantage of the firm’s emerging growth as the alumni program expands its resources. To show our appreciation for your service to the firm as well as the experience you have gained since your departure, we have assembled a dedicated team to help bring alumni like you back to KPMG.

Join the alumni who make up 15% of our experienced hires each year. Contact [redacted] at us-recruitingalumni@kpmg.com to make a direct query or click here to view KPMG job opportunities across the U.S.

Openings in certain strategic and high-demand practice areas include:

• Audit: Financial Services, Commercial.
• Tax: AMCS, EVS, Federal Tax, Fed Tax – Alternative Investments, ICS, IES, M&A, SALT Sales/Use & Income
• Advisory: Operational & Financial Risk Management, Regulatory & Compliance, IT Audit, IT Strategy & Transformation, Business Intelligence, ERP, Business Process Optimization, Financial & Transactional Due Diligence
• CSS: SAP Implementation, Operations, Administration, Marketing, ITS, Tax Processing, and other Practice Operations

In case you don’t have tour in you, the House of Klynveld would still like you to refer anyone that’s remotely qualified for any of the positions listed. And if you just so happen to know someone worthy of the blue squares, you’ll be rewarded with five Benjis.

Sure, that doesn’t hold a candle to the $3,000 and $1,500 the current mini-Flynns are get for referring experienced SAs and Associates but all you have to do is rejoin the firm and that referral bonus could jump six-fold!

Good Times at PwC: Supporting the iPhone and The Return of Christmaskuh

As you know, it’s been rebrand-orama in land of P. Dubs recently. With all that going on, you may have been distracted from the fact that there are more important, less controversial decisions being made. For example, employees will be celebrating the birth of Christ/The Festival of Lights/whatever it is you do by enjoying an open bar and finally making awkward sexual advances on co-workers.

From the mail bag, some communicado from Bob Moritz:

Holiday celebrations were clearly a casualty of the challenging economy. Many of you told us that while it was the right decision given the economic environment—especially when we repurposed our holiday spending to give back to our communities—you missed getting together with colleagues to celebrate during the December holiday season. While we will continue to focus on charitable giving, we’re pleased to see a return to office holiday celebrations this year. Look for more from your market leaders on events happening locally.


Additionally, PwC has finally caved to moxie of Steve Jobs:

Many of you are already using iPhones or have been holding off purchasing one because the firm doesn’t support them. I’m pleased to announce that, later this fall, we’ll be offering iPhones from AT&T, and at least one Android model from each of our approved cellular carriers (AT&T, Verizon, Sprint and T-Mobile), as part of PwC’s smartphone and cellular program.

How’s that for good news? Express your glee (that means break out in song) below.

Deloitte Adding 11.5k New U.S. Employees in FY11; 5k Campus Hires

FINS has more details on Deloitte’s hiring bonanza, reporting yesterday that the firm will add 11,500 new U.S. employees during fiscal year 2011.

The company expects to hire 11,500 in the country, which includes 5,000 campus hires. The U.S. numbers are part of the more-than 40,000 hires the company anticipates in FY 2011, said Patty Pogemiller, national director of talent acquisition.

The company is hiring across all of its major businesses in the U.S., particularly in its financial services industries. According to Pogemiller, the company is looking for candidates with “superior analytical and problem-solving skills” as well as and team-building abilities.

The breakdown of “hiring across all of its major businesses” remains unclear, although since the consulting business is going gangbusters while audit, tax and advisory are more or less flat, you could reason that the demand for consultants would be be on the rise. Assuming normal (or abnormal) attrition, the other business lines will still have their typical demand for fresh faces but a source close to Deloitte indicated to us that if the hot pace of the consulting biz continues, it could easily outpace the rest of the firm’s services.

Our source also indicated that the recruiting levels of 11,500/5,000 is consistent with those the firm had in the pre-financial crisis years of 2007-2009, which could mean the firm’s demand for new people has normalized.

Deloitte Will Hire 11,500 in the U.S. in FY 2011 [FINS]

AT&T CEO Isn’t Impressed with Deloitte Study That Says Half of iPhone Users Would Switch to Verizon at the Drop of a Hat

Confidential to AT&T BSDs: Steve Jobs may be an asshole, but he’s not stupid.

Close to half of Apple Inc iPhone users in the United States would be “very interested” in dumping AT&T Inc for Verizon Wireless as a service provider, according to a study from professionals service firm Deloitte.

“If another carrier were to pick up the iPhone, you would probably see a number of defections,” said Ed Moran, director of insights and product innovation at Deloitte.

AT&T’S Chief Executive Randall Stephenson played down the potential impact of the loss of iPhone exclusivity at a Goldman Sachs conference on Tuesday.

Stephenson said about 80 percent of AT&T’s iPhone users were either in family plans making it difficult to cancel service or had received their phone through their business. [Ed. note: rumor has it that after making this statement, Stephenson was heard laughing maniacally]

Study finds iPhone owners want to switch to Verizon [Reuters]

BREAKING: At Least One PwC Employee Isn’t Sold on the Rebranding

It’s been just over a week since we broke the story on PwC’s rebranding. Now that everyone else has caught up to the story, we’ll share with you some fresh news on the makeover.

Since today marks the first day of u’re warming up to the new team colors. Then again, you may share the feelings of one P. Dubs employee that took the time to email Bob Moritz to chime in on the new look. Apparently (not really sure how these things happen) the email is making the rounds at PwC and it just so happened to find its way into our mail bag:

To be perfectly honest, I’m not a fan of the new branding. In your email you wrote “…we are altering what we believe is an outdated visual identity to better express the kind of vibrant and relationship-based firm we have evolved into.” I find it ironic that you referred to our former visual identity as outdated when our new brand looks like a throwback – a 70s color scheme meets an IT startup.

I completely agree with the comments on the website where the brand is repeatedly referred to as child-like and unprofessional. I feel like the explanation for the symbol is also very complex. The *connectedthinking brand was simple and easy to understand. With the new symbol, everything has a meaning, from the colors to the solid blocks to the transparent blocks. A symbol should be fairly self explanatory – this one requires too much explanation.

I love the fact that the company has been focusing more on changing behaviors and placing a greater emphasis on building relationships. However, I fail to see where a new brand would affect this. Colors and symbols don’t represent PwC, the staff does. In one of the online discussions it was pointed out that following a salary freeze one year and layoffs the following year, it almost seems foolish to spend so much money to “reinvent” ourselves. To quote a wise PwC employee, “A new brand isn’t going to win business, motivated people will.” I find it hard to believe that this new, colorful symbol will be the motivation that people need to help expand our business and improve relationships with clients. A better way to motivate the staff would be more incentives – bonuses, rewards, raises – positive reinforcement. Pavlov was definitely on to something with the concept. Interactive gallery stations complete with iPads to show off the brand? Activities revolving around the launch of this new brand? Is this really the best method of spending funds?

Also disturbing to me is the environmental impact this could have. I can’t imagine that this won’t set back the Firm-wide goal of reducing our carbon footprint. Letterhead, business cards, report covers, envelopes (to name a few paper products) all need to be reprinted. It seems like an incredible waste to discard everything we already have in favor of this new brand (we received an email letting us know that after October 4th we are not to use any of the old paper products). I hope we are at least planting a bunch of trees to help compensate Mother Nature for the amount of paper that will be wasted with this change.

It’s disappointing to feel like we have taken two steps forward and three steps back. I realize that it is what it is, but I felt that I should voice my opinion from down here on the totem pole.

It’s been suggested that October 4th will be the great PwC Shredding Day that will no doubt involve a convoy of Shred-it trucks out 300 Madison (and offices nationwide for that matter) along with employees dropping their old business cards into every fish bowl they can find.

So mark it on your calendars and definitely document the shredding in action or perhaps a bonfire (done safely and in full accordance with the law) and send us the pictures.

Wife of Ex-Deloitte Partner: Porn-extortion Plot Saved Our Marriage

[caption id="attachment_17969" align="alignright" width="260" caption="The happy couple. SOURCE: Jeff Day/NYP"][/caption]

Remember back in May when we told you about Steven Klig, the former Deloitte tax partner-cum-lawyer who attempted to extort his ex-lover with a sex tape? Klig was merely looking for some additional nude pics of his mistress after she broke it off and when she didn’t comply, Klig started with his devious-randy plot.

Klig thought to do some of his blackmailing while on vacation with the wife in kids at Disney World, which is especially creepy considering he would have been drowning in happiness.

Well, Klig is to be sentenced on Friday after pleading guilty in May to illegally accessing a computer network to threaten his mistress. Yesterday he had a whole host of people singing his praises, including his wife, who told the judge that this whole situation has turned things around for them.

In court papers filed yesterday, Steven Klig’s wife, Ellen, said she “thought our life was over” when six FBI agents showed up at their Great Neck, LI, home last year and arrested her hubby for extortion.

“Instead, it was just beginning again. I got my husband back and my children got their father back,” she wrote to Manhattan federal Judge John Koeltl, who will sentence her husband Friday.

Ellen — who said Klig had “withdrawn from our family” due to job-related stress — noted that they’ve been seeing shrinks “individually and as a couple,” and “really work at keeping the lines of communication open.

“As a couple, we have rebounded to the point that after 20 years of marriage, we renewed our wedding vows and our commitment to each other and to our family,” she wrote.

Oh sure lady. Blame Deloitte! It’s bad enough that they have to take shit from the likes of Marin County California. But now you’re saying your marriage troubles were the fault of a firm that is going to (supposedly) create a quarter of a million jobs and the arrest of your husband for plan he concocted in order to get his rocks off are what turned it all around?

Even Klig himself claims that he was somewhere in between mild-mannered tax attorney and something out of a David Lynch film:

Klig — who has never revealed if he actually had the sex tape — blamed his shameful scheme on a sleep disorder, saying, “I really have no explanation other than I strongly believe . . . I was in a world that existed somewhere between insanity and sanity.”

Several former Deloitte co-workers also penned missives in support of Klig, who left the firm in disgrace after his arrest.

Former colleague Monte Jackel wrote that he “heard no mention of any misconduct of any type on Steve’s part . . . until the story broke in the New York Post.

“I was truly shocked at the allegations . . . but view them as out of character with the Steve Klig that I knew then and know today,” Jackel wrote.

The guy in between, well, who’s to say?

Lusty lawyer bust turned marriage around [NYP]

KPMG Advises Tulsa Police to Get into Arms Dealing

The strangest thing about this story is that KPMG had to tell the City of Tulsa, OKLAHOMA that, you know, maybe they could sell some of these guns to OKLAHOMANS for money.

Selling the hundreds of guns that Tulsa police confiscate each year instead of melting them down is one of several revenue-generating ideas included in the KPMG efficiency report.

But city and police officials said that would have to be done cautiously, if the idea makes it past the evaluation process.

“What (KPMG) is essentially saying is that we are destroying assets that could bring us revenue,” Mayoral Chief of Staff Terry Simonson said.

The report recommends the firearms be sold to certified dealers through the already-established city auction process, rather than incurring $80,000 per year in costs to dispose of them.

Once you’re able to get the idea of Oklahoma actually having firearm dealers around your skull, we will admit that we’re being a tad harsh on Tulsa.

You see, they used to sell confiscated guns until some freedom-hating police chief decided that occasionally these guns end up in the hands of bad people and that destroying them was a better solution. The fact that this even occurred in the Sooner State without a populist uproar and nightly vigils for all the destroyed Smith & Wessons is beyond comprehension.

But never mind that. Here we are, 20 years later and KPMG suggests they get back in the gun trade. God knows municipalities need the money these days and spending $80k melting down perfectly fine weapons is just silly. Sadly, not all guns are created equal:

If the city began selling guns again, [Capt. Jonathan] Brooks said, there are still many of the confiscated weapons that would have to be destroyed.

“Obviously, we wouldn’t be able to sell guns that have been modified or altered from the original manufacturer’s specifications, such as sawed-off shotguns,” he said.

“We also wouldn’t want to be selling any assault-type weapons.”

This guy also probably voted for Obama.

KPMG finds asset in guns [Tulsa World]

PwC’s Other New Color: Green(er)

Newly autumnal-hued PwC still has nature on the brain, this time reflecting on the kick-ass job they did by reducing their carbon footprint 20% since FY07.

For those of you scoring at home (read: Al Gore) that’s two years ahead of schedule.

Through a two-fold strategy, consisting of solutions around workspaces, air travel and commuting, as well as through the engagement of its people to make behavior changes, the firm has reduced its carbon emissions by more than 62,000 CO2 metric tons since FY07, its baseline emission levels.

Being a shameless tree hugger, we applaud the efforts of PwC and also KPMG who announced the reaching of their greeny goals – also ahead of plan – back in July.

However, the thing we’re a little skeptical about are the goals that each firm set for themselves. If they are blowing these carbon emission reduction targets out of the water and ahead of schedule it seems like they may have set the bar a little low. You figure that if you throw some recycle bins in the common areas, encourage more video conferencing and replace all the old light bulbs with the long-life version, you’re already ahead of the game.

PwC did a good job at detailing how they’ve been recognized for their efforts but they still remain vague about any future plans to continue their efforts:

“At PwC we take an integrated approach to reducing our waste, emissions, and discharges by elevating our green efforts and embracing new business practices,” said Shannon Schuyler, corporate responsibility leader, PwC. “We will continue to work toward sustaining the reduction we have already made, as well as partner with our experts in the S&CC practice to set new goals and targets in the future. To us, supporting a healthier and more sustainable environment is part of being a responsible leader.”

KPMG, on the other hand, was very specific about their efforts and what they had planned for the future including the Living Green Teams (with uniforms), recycling laptops and taking a stab at this paperless audit idea.

Granted, getting serious about reducing emissions is something that has only been sexy for the last 2-3 years so maybe the firm will ratchet up the goals, along with detailing specific measures, over the long-term.

PwC Meets 20 Percent Carbon-Reduction Goal Two Years Ahead of Schedule [PR Newswire]

Compensation Watch ’10: Is Anyone at KPMG Getting Impatient?

It’s bad enough that KPMG is the last of the Big 4 to announce their compensation numbers.

But here’s the real problem Klynveldians – now that the Fighting Irish have blown two big games, two weeks in a row, to two Michigan rivals, John Veihmeyer is desperate for a Lou Holtz pep talk which means watching the old man on TV. This also means suffering through the shallow diatribes of the horrendous Mark May which we don’t wish upon anyone. But that’s a whole other matter.

What concerns us is whether J. Veih manifests his frustration by going back on his word on merit increases and bonuses from earlier in the summer. While this would be unprecedented show of loyalty to Touchdown Jesus, it probably wouldn’t do much for the morale of the firm.


Gridiron failure aside, it’s our understanding that more than a few people are getting antsy over the compensation news and now that KPMG has announced the new partners, the only thing left is to share the shockingly good or heart-wrenchingly disappointing news to all the mini-Flynns.

We invite those with first-hand knowledge, well-researched theories or wild-ass guesses to share their thoughts on KPMG’s eagerly awaited compensation news. And of course, keep us updated with any weepy communication from John. That is, if he managed to get out of bed this morning.