You probably all know by now that the Firm Spy has a certain soft spot for wanker corporate idioms. So we spat our coffee out with glee this morning as we thumbed our way through the current edition of BRW (21/4) to find a handful of Deloitte chief executive partner Giam Swiegers’ “favourite management mottos”.
The first one:
“try new things, but fail fast and fail cheaply.”
No wonder Deloitte allegedly has the following policy in relation to its firm-subsidised CA education policy:
if you fail 1 subject you get a warning, 2 subjects a written warning and 3… you’re fired!
Fail fast… and GET OUT! Giam’s second “management motto” also published in BRW is:
“soft on people, tough on performance.”
Yes, we certainly know about the “tough on performance” ethos Giam! We reported various rumours last year that Deloitte was systematically managing employees out of the firm, based on their performance. To this day, Mr Swiegers denies our allegations. As noted by BRW:
Deloitte maintains it made no mass retrenchments. Confronted by claims [presumably ours] that partners actively managed people out of the business during [the GFC] Swiegers: “I don’t have to answer to the outside world. I know what the facts are and a March survey of 2200 staff, half our total workforce, shows they believe I live up to my commitments.”
So… greater than 50% of the 50% of staff surveyed gave Giam “the commitment tick”? Congratulations Giam! This must mean you’re being true to your “tough on performance management motto”!
Rounding out Giam’s management mottos published in BRW is the following:
Leadership is not about taking people where they want to go, it’s about taking people where they should go. It’s not a popularity contest.
Hmmm … where is Giam’s leadership taking Deloitte staff? An article published by News yesterday suggested there will be a “mass exodus of unhappy accountants” in the near future:
A major revolt appears to be stirring among finance and accounting staff across the nation that could threaten a mass exodus from the industry … research by financial recruitment firm Robert Half found that 50 per cent of finance and accountancy staff planned to quit their jobs, and were either already seeking a new job or thinking about taking the plunge.
If this were a popularity contest, would it be fair to say Giam’s leadership is leading workers out the door? And those surveyed, are they the same 50% of Deloitte staff who were not invited to give Giam the “commitment tick”?
Send the Firm Spy your news and views!
Loading...
News hot off the press!!! 3 Tax partners fired/performance managed out of Deloitte effective immediately. One of the partners has been with Deloitte for over 30 years and is the “national leader and Asia Pacific’s regional leader of Deloitte’s International Assignment Services (IAS) practice”. Surely now Mr Swiegers cannot deny that Deloitte does not performance manage people? Over to you Mr Swiegers, pls comment?
Oi – that’s my nom de plume you ingrate!!
Green Dotter if you knew anything about how Partnerships worked you would know that Partners cannot be fired from a Partnership agreement. Im sure that you would also want your Partner performing well and bringing in the clients and cash so you can then get the bonus, benefits and rem review that every employee wants. If Partners dont perform you dont get the benefits, it’s not rocket science!
Hi Meredith – I have no doubt that every partner is in it for the profit and getting rid of a bad sheep means less people to share the pie. The irony is how Mr Swiegers continues to boast about Deloitte’s track record of not retrenching/realigning/restructuring/removing employees in the face of the GFC while doing the very same thing it claims not to have done.
Again, Partners cant be fired/retrenched/realigned so your statement doesnt make sense!!! Frankly im sick of working long hours to pull the weight of others in my team who dont want to hard work or have the competent technical skills but still want the salary and benefits of working in a professional services firm so am very happy that Giam has finally started to use the peformance management system to its full effect.
Meredith, you seem to think that a partnership is some Utopian state where all the partners love each other. You need to have a reality check. A partnership the size of Deloitte is very much a corporation like any other. The partnership agreement contains very specific provisions about ‘termination’ rights in many circumstances including ‘at the absolute discretion of the CEO’. Also the first thing a new partner signs is a Power of Attorney that grants the CEO the ability to bind all partners in whatever way he sees fit in order to run the firm.
Reality check; all very true, however if you undertake further research you will see that the CEO cannot undertake any of these actions without the consent of the board. I dotn think it is a utopian state at all and ive certainly seen that first hand. Im simply saying that a lot of employees at Big 4 adopt a “whats in it for me” and expect the great client work, salary and benefits to be served on a platter to them rather than doing the hard work themselves. And no, im not a Partner, just a senior whos sick of hearing the whinging in my team.
Meredith, since you seem to have some insights into the partnership agreement. Please refer to clause 11.1 which provides that the board approval is only required if he expels more than 5% of the partners in a single financial year.
I don’t disagree with your sentiments just your factual assertions as to the operation of a major partnership and its legal implications.
Reality Check; valid points, i think we may be referring to different Partner contracts in the contecx of equity vs non-equity Partners
ins