PwC Celebrates Global Diversity Week With a Talk Amongst Themselves About Diversity

Posted on by Adrienne Gonzalez

Those of you who could not possibly care less about diversity can disregard the following. Those of you who enjoy mocking the ridiculousness of "diversity initiatives" are invited to read on:

At the beginning of the year we shared that we had a lot of exciting diversity activities planned for 2014 and I am thrilled to let you know that we are currently in the midst of delivering ‘Global Diversity Week’.

This week, we take a significant step in our diversity journey as our PwC firms all over the world celebrate Global Diversity Week.  This is a wide-scale inclusion intervention that will touch every single PwC professional across the globe, that’s over 180,000 people.

I know you guys are really excited about this. Unfortunately, PwC is excluding anyone who doesn't work for PwC from the festivities, which sort of goes against the whole core idea of diversity, ya know. Inclusion, blah blah:

Continuing with the theme of development we have also released a number of global tools for all of our people. 

Wait a second, what do you mean our people?

We have provided our people [emphasis mine] with access to a number of PwC specific implicit association tests, which create awareness of unconscious biases. These tests will drive greater levels of self-awareness, allowing our people to gain a better understanding of their attitudes and preferences regarding different kinds of people with different attributes, for example women and men with family and career.

I will give a crisp $20 bill to the first person who can explain what the hell the last part of that last sentence means. Just come out and say "people who are not caucasian workaholic males" so we can have a good laugh and go home. I think what this means is they're offering a test to find out if you're a racist, sexist, non-inclusive dickwad but don't quote me on that, I'm having trouble gleaning any context from the above jumble of buzzwords. And then when you are fully self-aware of the fact that you're kind of a racist, somehow this will help you be less of a racist and therefore a better person with which to work.

Anyway, that's what PwC has going on this week. Don't you feel a whole bunch more inclusion-y already?

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Allegedly, a Few Ernst & Young Partners Just So Happened to Join PwC

Never having the pleasure of attending a partner-only soiree, we don’t have much knowledge about the haps at these events but we do imagine catering slightly better than what you would find at an in-house training but served by oompa loompas. And an open bar, natch.

Likewise, we’ve never heard about Big 4 partner mixers where, for example, an PwC partner might chat up a E&Y partner talking IFRS, where they fall on the staff’s hottie list and “oh by the way, waddaya say you join our firm?” To save face, we imagine said E&Yer responding with a “No, I will not make out with you” retort followed by open-faced slaps and ripped Jos. A. Bank until the beefy security pulled the two apart (at which point the P. Dubs partner gives his target the “call me” sign).


We bring all this up because the Times Online reports that there has been a fair amount of defection from Ernst & Young to PricewaterhouseCoopers in the Middle East (no sissies allowed). PwC’s Middle East practice was purchased by the UK firm last year and now the Times reports that 20 E&Y partners have been poached by P. Dubs:

According to people familiar with the situation, the defections — amounting to almost a fifth of Ernst & Young’s partners in the Middle East — were in several locations across the region. Most were from Ernst & Young’s consulting business, The moves began last summer but were kept secret because of a settlement between the two firms. PwC agreed that it would not approach any more Ernst & Young staff in return for Ernst & Young agreeing not to take legal action to block the departures.

Neither firm would comment for the Times article except to boast about their numbers in the region, “PwC confirmed that it had recruited 25 new partners and 400 staff in its Middle East offices in the past 12 months,” and “A spokesman for Ernst & Young said that it remained ‘easily the largest’ of the Big Four in the Middle East,” so both firms’ communication departments seem to be operating as normal.

Whether such (alleged) deliberate defections have happened in the States, we don’t know but we hear it is quite the spectacle (marched out by the OMP the second the news got dropped) when one partner notifies his/her intent to leave for a competitor, so all out war could reasonably be expected.

PwC raids rival before Middle East step [Times Online]