Company: KPMG
Date: 2021-03-12
Overall rating: 1/5
Employment status: current
Experience level: Junior

Still Not Getting It...
Pros: Brand name
Project exposure
Security and stability a large firm brings
Starting to clear out the sub par male, pale, stale leadership
Cons: Pay is awful
Bonus is embarrassing 
L&D opportunities aren’t there - unless you want to do CIMA or ACA there’s no chance of anything meaningful, no masters sponsorship etc
This is no exaggeration, five - ten years behind on the digital agenda. Utterly clueless
Fragmented - partners scrapping for revenue and status. 
Partners are generally nothing special, very few intellectual powerhouses in the firm, mostly sales focussed individuals that were fortuitously aligned to a big-revenue client earlier in their career 
Some partners genuinely view the world in terms of ‘winners’ and ‘losers’ - it would be cringe if it wasn’t so toxic 
Politics are unbearable 
If a partner takes a dislike to you, you may as well resign, seen many careers ruined
Promotions are a joke - there are people who are performing for 1 yr + at the grade above and still cannot get promoted. There have been people selling a lot of work that still get turned down
When you do go for promotion you are put through an interview process and have to provide a business case at even Manager level (something you literally cannot control, given it depends on the work you are aligned to)
Systems are so outdated and lead to a ton of admin
Very much a conform or leave agenda in terms of culture
D&I initiatives more oriented towards protecting partners from embarrassing headlines than actually addressing D&I issues - there have been no substantial policy changes in recruitment for example. 
The consulting practice is basically an advisory firm - generalists do not progress. If you want to progress you need to specialise in a certain, very specific area, which kind of defeats the reason why many people go into consulting in the first place. 
Quality of work is painfully variable - I’ve seen some work that can rival MBB and other work that is so poor I’m almost embarrassed for the client receiving it