Company: EY
Date: 2017-06-22
Overall rating: 4/5
Employment status: former

Manager
Pros: - Interesting projects, particularly if you're on the consulting side (can't speak for the accountants, tax advisors, and IT auditors).
- Your experience is in "almost-dog years", i.e., 1 year at EY is equal to 3 years a regular corporate job. (And that doesn't mean 3x the work; just 3x the exposure to new clients, new issues, new experiences.)
- Excellent for independent types who don't need/want micromanagement, depending upon who's your direct boss, the managing partner of your group, and which group you're in.
Cons: - Structured exactly like the military: name, rank, serial number is uniform across the entire organization, e.g., an entry level "Consultant/Associate" is considered like an Army private no matter which EY geographic location; likewise a Partner in Dallas is treated like a visiting general in the Boston office.
- Backroom politics and annual closed-door promotion hearings with no transcript (just like the US Congress!). A lot of excellent people eventually leave because of this lack of transparency (ironic of an accounting firm).
- Lots of "frenemies" and cliques (yep, like high school).
-"Billing" is all that matters to partners--no matter what is claimed internally. Billable hours is your internal scorecard upon which you're judged, not quality of service, client satisfaction, etc. The promotion path is this: either 80% billable hours per year or out. As such, there are a lot of "lifers" that are basically tenured bureaucrats.