Earlier in the year, AAR announced a voluntary redundancy scheme. It was revealed over the weekend that some 100

An AAR partner concerned at an employee’s departure

What was not reported was the following rumour we received from an Allens Arthur Robinson spy over the weekend:

I thought the spy would be interested in the strange coincidence that many (but certainly not all) of those ‘accepting’ the voluntary redundancies at Allens were those perceived to be underperformers… Speculation is rife that in many circumstances staff were ‘invited’ to accept the voluntary redundancy package and I have heard rumours to this effect on several occasions in respect of particular employees…

If true, the ‘invitation’ to volunteer for a redundancy would be an effective way of getting rid of workers who might otherwise be performance-managed out of a job. We invite Allens staff to add comments or anonymously email us with further details.

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I am an employee of Deloitte … I have been actively involved in “counselling” out under-performers…  We’ve had about 6 people leave our team in the last 6 months because of this. Partners will be giving themselves bonuses for FY 2009.  Yes, that’s right!  Despite all the gloom, pay freeze for us shit kickers

don’t be fooled by his good looks, Toadfish is a juvenile delinquent

and all the cost cutting to training and development, Partners will be getting bonuses.  Depending on their performance, Partners will receive between 5% to 20% of their base pay as a bonus… Only people getting a promotion will receive a pay rise in July.  Latest news is that the new base is about 15% less than what was paid to a similar person just 6 months ago. Well, I guess some-one needs to fund those bonuses.

Deloitte’s Vessa Playfair, the same character who took a pot-shot at other Big 4 accounting firms by saying ‘they have been prepared to retrench and we haven’t’ when the firm instituted a pay freeze, has denied claims that the firm is ‘performance managing’ people out of their jobs.

In the AFR (12/06), Playfair is quoted as saying:

We continually lift our performance bar to ensure we challenge, stretch and develop out employees and this year is no different.

a performance review caught on camera

Fair play!  Last year, a 70 hour working week was apparently ordinary, so if the ‘performance bar’ is lifted this year, what will the figure be?

Playfair’s denial comes just days after rumours that workers have been let go of, despite no official announcement.  It’s hard to know who to believe.

It would be difficult for a firm boasting ‘double digit’ growth to justify widespread sackings, so it makes sense (to us, anyway) that a more calculated method of reducing numbers would be implemented. This is certainly what our spies have been saying. Is it time for Vessa to play fair?

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Ever since we revealed rumours that suggested Deloitte has been underhandedly managing people out of the firm, rather than

Underhandedly sacked Deloitte workers

We received the following on the weekend:

I am working in Deloitte Risk Services Division and over the past few weeks a hand full of people have left (or asked to leave, they have not been not officially fired, but i am sure they have left unwillingly). The reason is unknown. I have heard different stories from different people, e.g. not meeting sales target, under-performed, internal politics and etc.

Then this:

I currently work at Deloitte and I can say that there are significant numbers of people being ‘performance managed’ out of the firm. This process has been going on for a number of months and is their way of reducing headcount without having official redundancies.

If true, this new era of ‘performance-management’ could be a short one for some. Now back to work already!

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