If you have worked at PwC, Deloitte, KPMG or EY, you have worked with this type of person. The financial statement terrorist. The person that cannot let a financial statement, tax return or client proposal go out the door without having their impact. I call them terrorists not to make light of terrorism but because of the metaphor of holding something hostage. They hold financial statements, tax returns and other projects up at the last second with meaningless comments. I  mean meaningless to you and me. To them, they are the comments with the utmost importance. IN their mind, they don’t let anything go out the door that has a mistake in it.

 

 

These people can seemingly face down clients and other partner yelling at them. Just people berating them and telling them that they are destroying the firms reputation with XYZ client. They don’t care. You aren’t going to penetrate their thick skulls.

Do you know why. Because in their minds, you are just a numskull. You are one of the dumb masses. They are the white knight at the gates of a golden fortress. They are the last guard holding the kingdom together. They are willing to face down whatever comes their way. No matter what project you put in front of them they will hold it up for some meaningless comment.

The biggest client of the firm wants to slightly reinterpret the rules, sorry too bad. This person will not accept that. They are willing to destroy their reputation and the firm’s reputation. You can recognize these people because they normally have titles like managing director. They have long careers at the big 4 without every making partner. They also switch clients very often because they get thrown of all their engagements at some point.

Stand Up Against Big 4 Terrorism Like I Did

This is the person I dealt with today. It wasn’t the first time and it won’t be the last. The difference this time is that I’ve seen too many rodeos with these people and working with them is a waste of time. Why risk destroying my reputation just so that I can say that I can play nice with everyone? Why get yelled at by clients and other partners just for these people. I won’t anymore. I don’t want to keep having these devastatingly low points in my career anymore. You shouldn’t either. If you work for these type of people, stand up and say NO MORE!!!! The only way we are going to change big 4 culture is by standing up against it.

These people can wipe out weeks and hundreds of hours of work with their endless review comments. Oh, you already spent 100 hrs reviewing a project, it doesn’t matter. This person is “smarter” than you and will provide an endless amount of comments that are immaterial. They will even ask questions that are common knowledge. They don’t remember anything from last year, so don’t even bother telling them that this is how it was done in prior years.

They’ll also make you ask dumb questions to the client. All because they feel like they have to ask the questions to get to the 100% right answer. The problem is there is no 100% right answer ever. If you work in accounting, you know that everything can be interpreted in different ways.

In conclusion, I hate working for financial statement terrorists. I am developing a policy today of not working with financial statement terrorists. You should as well.