Company: PwC
Date: 2014-10-29
Overall rating: 3/5
Employment status: former
Experience level: Senior

Satisfying but glad I'm done!
Pros: The people are the best part of working here.  I've worked here for 10+ years straight out of college and you won't find better people at the staff level from an intellectual, hard-working, great group to work with after work, type of people.  This was not an easy job, but the knowledge you learn, the clients you work on, are top notch.  If you're willing to work hard, 50+ hours/week for ~6 months of the year, and want to learn a lot and get your CPA, this is the job for you.
Cons: Management style is ad hoc.  While PwC as a whole has great culture, it really depends on the line of service you're in and what specialty group.  The managers and above in your distinct group set the tone for your experience.  I was in the Assurance and Advisory lines of services and the managers, directors and partners in Advisory had better management style.  Also, revenue is recognized differently which leads to more collaboration vs in-house fighting by partners, and less politics to deal with.  Too much politics and red tape and admin to deal with for managers and above.  You spend a lot of your time dealing with this rather than your work, clients and people - things that really matter. 

Pay - PwC claims to be the trend-setter among the Big 4 but I think they all pay the same.  At the staff level, we're talking maybe a $3-5K difference for same market, same level and same background skill-set.  Above, it really depends on the industry and the value you bring to the Firm.  Just remember, if you go to another Big 4, you can always get a pay bump.

Promotions - I'm ambivalent on this.  People do get promoted here, it's a pyramid model, and you always need new staff who get promoted to senior, etc.  Recently, due to large turnover (due to overworking our people from too much revenue and not enough qualified people), people are expected to do the work of a class above them, yet not being paid or recognized for it.  Unless your evaluations show that you've mastered all the areas at your level well, you wont get promoted even if you've been acting as a senior or manager for half the year.  That being said, I've also seen many cases where people have been promoted early, before they were ready, due to turnover, and a need for more seniors or managers.  In my experience, this is the worst thing to do to a person.  Unreal expectations are placed and in most cases, this person will perform sub-par for about 2 years before they catch up.  But hey, some people don't mind as they get the title and pay increase along with the promotion.

Vacation - A wash.  You get 15 days right off the bat for new hires and after being there for 2-3 years, you get 22 days.  22 days is the max whether you've been there 5, 10 or 20 years.  However, you also get unlimited sick, 10 holidays (7-8 designated and 2-3 for you to pick depending on what day of the week holidays fall on), and the Firm usually has a few extra days off for 4th of July and the break between Xmas and New Year.  The con is that once you make manager, most people stop accruing their vacation because they can't take time off.  And PwC does not pay out for vacation so most people end up just losing their vacation time.  Accounting-wise, you still earn vacation but it maxes out at 22 days.  My last few years at PwC, I probably lost over a week of vacation due to being unable to take it - a new opportunity pops up, a fire drill at one of the clients, etc.

Sales - to succeed at PwC, you have to be willing to sell our services, people, etc to clients.  New clients, existing, whomever, as long a revenue continues to come in.  That's their growth model.  More partners = more revenue.  However, we oftentimes don't have the people to do the work.  PwC is hiring like crazy.  But when they don't have time for proper training, these people struggle and are thrown out to our clients without instructions.  If you don't have strong seniors or managers able to coach you on the job, you're going to struggle.  PwC hiring non-qualified people to do the job is also not helping.  More bodies does not equate to quality work performed.  Catch 22 situation.