Company: PwC
Date: 2016-06-15
Overall rating: 3/5
Employment status: current

Intrapreneurial mindset required
Pros: PwC does it ALL. We have strategy consulting, agency capabilities, dev resources, designers, deployment capabilities globally, and so on. There is really not much that PwC doesn't do. So there is opportunity to be had in this environment if you have some idea as to what you want to do and are able to network into the teams that do this type of work. 

You may not win on every project but you are able to get a pretty good batting average and then over time build up the relationship capital to be able to get where you want to go. There is a lot of opportunity for career pivots within the firm so before leaving to get your MBA, I always recommend that people first use the firm as a testing ground to see if they like the proposed area and then build a nice story for your application by demonstrating how you are already starting to move your career in this direction.

We continue to add in new capabilities continuously and there is great opportunity to actually start doing work that in industry you probably wouldn't be given the chance to do because you didn't have the experience yet. I firmly believe that PwC offers a great development opportunity for folks who aren't quite sure "what they want to be when they grow up" as you can continue to test careers without committing while gaining great experience along the way.
Cons: PwC does it ALL. There is a downside to this as well. We are amazingly large now and figuring out who does exactly what you are interested in doing is kind of like the six degrees of separation game with Kevin Bacon. There is a lot of organizational inefficiency to get to where you want to go, and this includes the client delivery side as well. You could be working on an engagement struggling along and then realize some team three doors down is working on the same exact project for another client. You network not just because it's the culture but also because it is a survival skill. 

The net result is that it takes a while to get the relationship capital and organizational understanding together to really know what the opportunities are and then at that point we tend to have lost folks because they feel like they are a ship afloat at sea without a paddle. You really need to work to find the superconnectors to minimize the degrees of separation to enable you to really take charge of your career.