Company: PwC
Date: 2009-04-07
Overall rating: 3/5
Employment status: former

Great for your resume. Work/life balance questionable. Office politics, Type-"A"s, and narcissism reign supreme!
Pros: Brand name is great for your resume. Free coffee... to minimize the need to leave the office and help keep you up for the many late nights you're likely to work. When you're on the road, which is a ton for most client-facing PwC employees, you get to spend a decent chunk of your client's money on dinner, upgraded airfare, limos to/from the airport, and staying in the best hotels. Most of the people are very interesting, intelligent, and hardworking people and as such, "the people" (for the most part- certainly the large number of individuals that I was able to connect with personally and professionally) are definitely what I'll miss most about PwC.
Cons: Work/life balance, like most things at PwC, depend on who you are, who you work with, and which workgroup and office you happen to be in. They never say it, but management across the board doesn't really want you to take advantage of a lot of the programs and benefits that earn them "Great Place to Work" or "Best Company for Working Mothers" titles. They also offer a lot of community service and volunteer opportunities through the company, but it's not as if you're really given the time to go volunteer--- you volunteer your time to the organizations they list their name as serving and then you still have to get your 10-12hours per day in somehow. Same applies to Holidays, Vacations, Bereavement Days, (unlimited!) Sick Days, etc... take all you want (and definitely be noticed if you somehow manage to take all the Vacation you've accrued), but know that you still have to average 50+ hours per week when all is said and done.

Office politics, Type-"A"s (see Bob Sutton's book for a different definition/meaning of Type-"A"s), and narcissism reign supreme. As a result, most people at PwC are more concerned with image and perception than actual results or substance in their client interactions and deliverables. It also tends to be a bit top-heavy organizationally, so there's a little less room to advance, too many chiefs butting heads while promoting their initiatives/ideas, and a bit too much turf-fighting/competition for an organization that promotes and should be teaming a lot better than they do. Definitely a "me" first culture overall, as what's measured and managed tends to be what gets done, and teaming is not generally recognized or rewarded.

The biggest caveat I have would be that the specific organization, office, and team you work with can play a very big role in your overall satisfaction/engagement. If you end up with a micro-managing, command-and-control, beat-you-down-to-build-you-up "bad boss" who believes he/she is really "superior" to you (and everyone else they meet for that matter) as one of the dozen people you might be reporting to (in their heavily matrixed org chart), they can and will make life miserable for you, kill your performance review, and drive an otherwise engaged high-performing employee, with several years of tenure, to leave -- even in the worst of economic times.