re: Job with Ernst and Young

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He's an economic major and they didn't give him any details about the job during the interview. He's starting in Austin soon and is worried about the duties/hours...

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He needs to get on that Penske file

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Okay, let's break this down. I'm sure there are excel files at the company that have potentially 50+ sheet, 50+ columns per sheet, and 100+ rows per sheet. 50*50*100 is 250,000. Let's say there is 1 mistake in 1 cell. That's 251,343 out of 251,344 correct. If this is what you make in class, you'd have a perfect 4.0 GPA or actually 4.3 GPA it being an A+ and be valedictorian of your class and likely be attending a Harvard-esque university. It's dumbass managers that have been removed from editing excel or powerpoints that don't stop and take the time to think "Doyhhh, dermmm, 1 mistake mean he fail. Fail no good. He on bad list." Before you judge, actually take the time to think this out.

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Do you think the CFO of a multinational corporation….or any large client…gives a shite that your work is close enough to accurate to make a good grade in college? In accounting and audits? That he has to take responsibility for to Sr Leadership and the BOD?

Make sure to include that in your presentation. “99% of our work will be accurate 100% of the time”

Seriously though, we’re talking about blatant errors in a presentation/proposal that smacks of carelessness. I’ve been in meetings where the presentation actually had the wrong client name on pages that the associate missed. As a young 20 something I got my arse chewed and learned the value of attention the detail very early on. It’s part of the learning process.

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Okay, let's break this down. I'm sure there are excel files at the company that have potentially 50+ sheet, 50+ columns per sheet, and 100+ rows per sheet. 50*50*100 is 250,000. Let's say there is 1 mistake in 1 cell. That's 251,343 out of 251,344 correct. If this is what you make in class, you'd have a perfect 4.0 GPA or actually 4.3 GPA it being an A+ and be valedictorian of your class and likely be attending a Harvard-esque university. It's dumbass managers that have been removed from editing excel or powerpoints that don't stop and take the time to think "Doyhhh, dermmm, 1 mistake mean he fail. Fail no good. He on bad list." Before you judge, actually take the time to thi

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If it’s some type of complex accounting/inventory/financial model that one error could make the outputs totally wrong and useless. Especially formula errors.

Sanity check the freaking outputs before you put it on my desk. And don’t you dare hardcode anything. I’m triggered now. Lol

(no message)

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economic major

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He'll get pushed into transfer pricing if he's not already assigned there. Zzzzzzzz.

Just do 3-4 years and go work for a client if he's already fretting the hours.

That's the department he is in, I don't think it is really accounting.

I started my career on the Advisory side of a Big 4 firm for 5 years and totally burned out.

If I could give advice to a new hire, particularly an econ grad who likely doesn't know if the acctg path is for him, I would say this:

The best thing for an early career professional of any kind is to be a reliable, consistent, and diligent worker with a growth mindset. Nobody expects you to be an expert, but show that you can learn quickly, be receptive to feedback, and be an enjoyable teammate (a necessity for long working days and team travel). Most of all, develop strong habits for yourself that can be universally applied to any job in the future.

While keeping your head down in year one, keep tabs on your well-being, find space to detach, and reassess how the current role and path ahead align with the career and life you want. After one year, you will know which camp you're in:

A) This is a grind, but I trust it's leading me in the right direction.

B) This is a grind, but I am not interested in the path ahead.

C) This is a grind, I loathe coming into work, and I have no idea what to do.

If in camp A, great! Keep going. You'll likely stick around until making Manager and reassess again. I highly advise aligning yourself with the best managers and clients.

If in camp B, earning a promotion to Senior will lend you some level of credibility while positioning yourself for other opportunities. This could be an internal transfer to another service line, going back to grad school, or trying something completely new.

If in camp C, remember that you are young and no job is worth your well-being, especially if you're not on board with where it's leading you. Grant yourself some grace, get back to the drawing board, and do something -- ANYTHING -- other than mindlessly sticking around. If you stay, burnout will lead to your performance slipping, resentment might creep in, life outside of work will be impacted, and all of these things will inhibit your ability to confidently move forward. Most people don't know what the hell they want to do at 22. There's no shame in admitting your first job wasn't the right fit.

Working for a Big 4 firm can make your world very small, almost cult-like in its pressures not to question what the majority of people would consider an absurd working culture. However, it's a really unique and often fun experience to start your career working alongside other young people who are driven and intelligent. If you're bought into the path it puts you on, it's a great place to launch your career.

I’m not involved in this argument at all but

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I hope your drink of choice tonight goes down well.

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Has got to be the most uppity, slapped-with-a-glove insult that I’ve ever heard.

Goddamn baw that was cringe.

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That's the department he is in, I don't think it is really accounting.

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Yeah, you don't really need to know debits and credits to do TP analysis. You need to understand value creation and entrepreneurial risks. In theory, econ majors understand that better than accountants. All the OECD initiatives have created a long stream of work but he needs to find out if he actually likes it first.

That’s good advice