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Long hours is the name of the game in accounting
By Dong Zhen |
April 23, 2011, Saturday
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Print Edition
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Editor's note:
Pan Jie, 25, an entry-level auditor at the Shanghai office of PricewaterhouseCoopers ,died on April 10 of acute cerebral meningitis, igniting public discussion on whether extremely long work hours contributed to the woman's death.
THERE's a well-known saying in China these days as everyone is dashing to get ahead and get rich: "Before 40, you exchange your life for money, but after 40, you have to exchange your money for your life." It can be too late.
And everyone knows it, but the race goes on. They, especially college students, also know - and are undaunted by - the saying about the Big Four accounting firms where so many seek well-paying, high-status jobs to launch their careers.
"At the Big Four accounting consultancies, they use women like men and use men like beasts of burden," the saying goes. That hasn't kept people from joining.
But it's time to reflect again in light of the tragic death on April 10 of 25-year-old Pan Jie, an entry-level junior accountant, who worked inordinately long and volunteer hours of overtime, as much as 100 or 120 hours a week, according to media reports.
Complicated picture
Some local media are all worked up, blaming the death of the young accountant at PwC on exhaustion from long hours of overtime and call for legislation to prevent "exploitation" of young, ambitious white-collars by foreign firms.
The picture is more complicated.
Some employees from the Big Four accounting firms, including PwC, say overwork is not the culprit. They say many young people think a Big Four job is a glamorous, high-status, high-paying fast track to success.
Overtime, compensated or not, is common and necessary for promotion. Those who don't like it can always quit, they say.
It is also well known that many young men in the Big Four eagerly seek the long hours. They're living at home, so they have virtually no expenses. They can earn a lot of overtime, more than their salary, and they bank it all, saving up for a car and house, prerequisites for marriage. Maybe they don't have time for dates, but it's worth the sacrifice. Travel expenses are well compensated and then there's the slack period when they can relax a bit.
PwC declined comment and employees would not grant interviews, so Shanghai Daily spoke to four or five former employees who had attained relatively senior status and left one to three years ago. Everyone said employees must take care of themselves and learn to avoid working beyond their physical and mental limits.
"There wasn't a single time I was refused by a supervisor when I asked for a leave for private or health reasons," said a one-time PwC auditor. She worked there for nearly six years and was an assistant manager when she quit. She is still employed in the financial consulting industry.
Former employees said there was great pressure during the peak auditing seasons from the end of the year through April, but they said PwC provided fairer and better overtime compensation than many other firms where uncompensated OT is an open secret. They said reasonable OT hours were all recognized and, according to a specific quota policy, some of the extra work would be financially compensated, while the rest would be compensated by additional time for annual leave.
"A busy auditor at PwC could be entitled to a month or two for annual leave. That's unheard of in many other companies, where your OT is either unpaid or not acknowledged at all," said a former female auditor.
She and other former senior PwC staff had been discussing Pan's death and said they were "shocked" by media reports of overwork. The junior auditor was said to be working between 100 and 120 hours a week before falling ill with acute cerebral meningitis. PwC veterans said her workload was exceptionally high, even in the hectic tax season.
Very busy
But at KPMG, another Big Four firm, some younger auditors were unsurprised by the reported long hours and said they worked similar hours.
"I see it (Pan's death) as a natural outcome of that intense level of overwork," said a junior-level female auditor at KPMG, surnamed Xu. "Unlike senior-level employees who could concentrate on their projects, juniors were multitasking with much more diverse projects, especially in-house. It's usually only trivial tasks but it seems every senior employee wants you for small errands. Juniors are kept very busy."
Another junior-level KPMG female auditor surnamed Zhang recently quit, citing what she called excessive workload. "Before I quit, it had become common for me to leave at midnight or 1am and walk to the long lines of waiting taxis," she said. "Delivered fast-food became our regular dinner. My parents were increasingly worried that my work was undermining my health and was not appropriate for a young woman."
Xu, the other junior auditor at KPMG, said, "You always have to watch out for yourself and make a decision to give yourself a break or quit if you can't handle the pressure at the big Four. No one forces you to work OT, not one will stop you from volunteering for it."
Juniors said they were mostly not compensated for overtime at KPMG but said quality OT work is part of the standard performance assessment, which is important for promotion. Everyone knows the importance of demonstrating commitment and doing quality overtime and senior auditors get annual bonuses that depend on performance, including OT.
Pan Jie, 25, an entry-level auditor at the Shanghai office of PricewaterhouseCoopers ,died on April 10 of acute cerebral meningitis, igniting public discussion on whether extremely long work hours contributed to the woman's death.
THERE's a well-known saying in China these days as everyone is dashing to get ahead and get rich: "Before 40, you exchange your life for money, but after 40, you have to exchange your money for your life." It can be too late.
And everyone knows it, but the race goes on. They, especially college students, also know - and are undaunted by - the saying about the Big Four accounting firms where so many seek well-paying, high-status jobs to launch their careers.
"At the Big Four accounting consultancies, they use women like men and use men like beasts of burden," the saying goes. That hasn't kept people from joining.
But it's time to reflect again in light of the tragic death on April 10 of 25-year-old Pan Jie, an entry-level junior accountant, who worked inordinately long and volunteer hours of overtime, as much as 100 or 120 hours a week, according to media reports.
Complicated picture
Some local media are all worked up, blaming the death of the young accountant at PwC on exhaustion from long hours of overtime and call for legislation to prevent "exploitation" of young, ambitious white-collars by foreign firms.
The picture is more complicated.
Some employees from the Big Four accounting firms, including PwC, say overwork is not the culprit. They say many young people think a Big Four job is a glamorous, high-status, high-paying fast track to success.
Overtime, compensated or not, is common and necessary for promotion. Those who don't like it can always quit, they say.
It is also well known that many young men in the Big Four eagerly seek the long hours. They're living at home, so they have virtually no expenses. They can earn a lot of overtime, more than their salary, and they bank it all, saving up for a car and house, prerequisites for marriage. Maybe they don't have time for dates, but it's worth the sacrifice. Travel expenses are well compensated and then there's the slack period when they can relax a bit.
PwC declined comment and employees would not grant interviews, so Shanghai Daily spoke to four or five former employees who had attained relatively senior status and left one to three years ago. Everyone said employees must take care of themselves and learn to avoid working beyond their physical and mental limits.
"There wasn't a single time I was refused by a supervisor when I asked for a leave for private or health reasons," said a one-time PwC auditor. She worked there for nearly six years and was an assistant manager when she quit. She is still employed in the financial consulting industry.
Former employees said there was great pressure during the peak auditing seasons from the end of the year through April, but they said PwC provided fairer and better overtime compensation than many other firms where uncompensated OT is an open secret. They said reasonable OT hours were all recognized and, according to a specific quota policy, some of the extra work would be financially compensated, while the rest would be compensated by additional time for annual leave.
"A busy auditor at PwC could be entitled to a month or two for annual leave. That's unheard of in many other companies, where your OT is either unpaid or not acknowledged at all," said a former female auditor.
She and other former senior PwC staff had been discussing Pan's death and said they were "shocked" by media reports of overwork. The junior auditor was said to be working between 100 and 120 hours a week before falling ill with acute cerebral meningitis. PwC veterans said her workload was exceptionally high, even in the hectic tax season.
Very busy
But at KPMG, another Big Four firm, some younger auditors were unsurprised by the reported long hours and said they worked similar hours.
"I see it (Pan's death) as a natural outcome of that intense level of overwork," said a junior-level female auditor at KPMG, surnamed Xu. "Unlike senior-level employees who could concentrate on their projects, juniors were multitasking with much more diverse projects, especially in-house. It's usually only trivial tasks but it seems every senior employee wants you for small errands. Juniors are kept very busy."
Another junior-level KPMG female auditor surnamed Zhang recently quit, citing what she called excessive workload. "Before I quit, it had become common for me to leave at midnight or 1am and walk to the long lines of waiting taxis," she said. "Delivered fast-food became our regular dinner. My parents were increasingly worried that my work was undermining my health and was not appropriate for a young woman."
Xu, the other junior auditor at KPMG, said, "You always have to watch out for yourself and make a decision to give yourself a break or quit if you can't handle the pressure at the big Four. No one forces you to work OT, not one will stop you from volunteering for it."
Juniors said they were mostly not compensated for overtime at KPMG but said quality OT work is part of the standard performance assessment, which is important for promotion. Everyone knows the importance of demonstrating commitment and doing quality overtime and senior auditors get annual bonuses that depend on performance, including OT.
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