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September 29, 2023

How Are You Celebrating the End of Busy Season?

I’ll tell you how I’m celebrating – continuing my successful string of years not celebrating. Adrienne? She’s experimenting with home remedies for a stomach flu. But never mind our problems, you guys have somehow survived the January to April stretch without going nuts, assaulting someone and successfully avoiding awkward sexual advances (the latter two sometimes happening at the same time). That means you deserve to celebrate; whether or not that’s on company dime is another question.


Back in the KPMG days, I attended a pretty good throw-down at the Central Park Boathouse for the Financial Services group but that was in the spring of 2008 when the Bear Stearns embers were still hot and everyone who worked on the Citi still thought they worked for a great client (that’s what I was told, anyway). In 2009, end of busy season soirees were a much more muted with individual team celebrations because the world had basically just ended.

Last spring it sounded like it was more of the same. Nothing too out of control and individual teams were left to celebrate how they saw fit. Of course with a successful fiscal 2010 and fiscal 2011 looking good, firms may be ready to jump into the ostentatious end of busy season blowout parties once again. Maybe your partner(s) is/are taking you to Peter Luger’s; maybe it’s an intimate evening at the his/her home where some entertainment will be provided (hopefully from inside the firm). Or maybe it will just a drinks and awkwardly dancing the night away. We can’t possibly know since we don’t get invited to such things (at least officially), so discuss your plans, send us your invites or come up with your own ideas about how to best celebrate getting your life back.

I’ll tell you how I’m celebrating – continuing my successful string of years not celebrating. Adrienne? She’s experimenting with home remedies for a stomach flu. But never mind our problems, you guys have somehow survived the January to April stretch without going nuts, assaulting someone and successfully avoiding awkward sexual advances (the latter two sometimes happening at the same time). That means you deserve to celebrate; whether or not that’s on company dime is another question.


Back in the KPMG days, I attended a pretty good throw-down at the Central Park Boathouse for the Financial Services group but that was in the spring of 2008 when the Bear Stearns embers were still hot and everyone who worked on the Citi still thought they worked for a great client (that’s what I was told, anyway). In 2009, end of busy season soirees were a much more muted with individual team celebrations because the world had basically just ended.

Last spring it sounded like it was more of the same. Nothing too out of control and individual teams were left to celebrate how they saw fit. Of course with a successful fiscal 2010 and fiscal 2011 looking good, firms may be ready to jump into the ostentatious end of busy season blowout parties once again. Maybe your partner(s) is/are taking you to Peter Luger’s; maybe it’s an intimate evening at the his/her home where some entertainment will be provided (hopefully from inside the firm). Or maybe it will just a drinks and awkwardly dancing the night away. We can’t possibly know since we don’t get invited to such things (at least officially), so discuss your plans, send us your invites or come up with your own ideas about how to best celebrate getting your life back.

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