Comments on: Where In The World Is The Revenue?

By: re: The Auditors » Blog Archive » PwC’s “Bundler” Outlives His Usefulness

Sat, 12 Sep 2009 15:51:14 +0000

[...] and troubled companies?” Well, we may be getting warmer. Between PwC’s clients and PwC Advisory itself, there’s going to be a lot of work for him, but I’m not sure how lucrative it will [...]

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Fri, 17 Oct 2008 17:47:00 +0000

Moving 60 or so people from SPA into Advisory hardly constitutes a movement of the entire business, as you’ve said.

It seems your views are, as usual, overly simplistic and naive. The SPA practice is comprised of individuals who assist on assurance engagements, individuals who work on advisory engagements, and many individuals who do both. It is impossible to draw bright lines on where the SPA practice should fall, as they cross many borders. You can’t just cram them all into Advisory, or cram them all into Assurance. And frankly, why does it matter?

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Sat, 04 Oct 2008 05:29:00 +0000

Francine

Way way off topic, but it looks as if your Chicago baseball teams are about as competent as the Big 4. Looks like yet another long dark winter for the Cubs. With respect to the White Sux, lowered expectations were in order anyhow.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Fri, 03 Oct 2008 01:33:00 +0000

I was told only about 60 people moved from SPA to Advisory. That number jives with the number of people I know who came over. It was mostly a realignment to get professionals focusing in the same areas into the same group – somewhere along the line some redundancies developed, especially around the security and ERP controls practices. Most of SPA stayed in Assurance and continues to focus on the audit.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 19:45:00 +0000

@2:27…i’ll second that on the size and scope of projects. Or ones that were in the pipeline are shelved all together.

It’s going to a long, cold year.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 19:27:00 +0000

Francine – your comment “going to see fewer engagements, smaller, shorter scopes, and tighter budgets for approved projects” is DEAD ON.
I don’t work in the client service side of the house, but I do work for a Big 4 firm and can attest to that statement. We are putting projects on hold or cancelling them all together. We are also feeling the after shocks of the recent financial crisis.
I enjoy reading your blog and being able to better picture what our auditors do on the daily. I know see more clearly what the affects of their decisions have on all of us. For all our sakes, I hope they have been doing the “right thing” this whole time…

By: Francine McKenna

Francine McKenna — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 18:04:00 +0000

@ I Just Work Here
Thanks for the clarification. I, of course. know it was called Systems and Process “Assurance” but was making a joke, given what I understood to be the transfer of most of this crew to Advisory. But didn’t a lot of these folks get let go too? Many reports from all over on that subject, including individuals contacting me directly. So, some of the long time, IT audit and security partners suddenly became consultants, some stayed in Assurance and some folks left. So where do you think the revenue for this “practice” will be recorded in PwCs Annual Report? In Assurance for some, in Advisory for others or wherever it makes sense for PwC? I may get an answer from PwC’s PR person, but I doubt it.

By: Dennis Howlett

Dennis Howlett — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 17:46:00 +0000

OK – so I know GRC is often positioned as technology but as we both know, there is a lot more to it than that. I’m thinking that the current crisis gives companies an opportunity to re-examine what they’re doing at multiple levels.

It *may* not be the Deloitte’s of this world that get the meat of the work but the work will be there.

It’s a topic I’m exploring at TechEd Berlin so it will be interesting to see what customers have to say. They’re the final arbiters although I do know the s/w vendor in this case is very interested to see what transpires. I’m not surprised.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 17:34:00 +0000

There are 2 problems with this statement, "recently transferred their Systems and Process Advisory (SPA) practice from audit/assurance to advisory."

1) It is the Systems and Process Assurance" group,
2) The SPA practice is still firmly embedded in the Assurance practice, although a few SPA professionals did move to Advisory.

-IJustWorkHere

By: Francine McKenna

Francine McKenna — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 04:03:00 +0000

@Dennis Howlett I agree that GRC work is additive, just that it won’t ever get to be as big as SOx for the Big 4. Clients will keep it in check. And so much of it is technology and the Big 4 , other than Deloitte, don’t do technology for big bucks. Their GRC projects are dwarfed by the ERP and enterprise software implementations that go to real systems integrators. Big 4 are just getting the functional work and that may be squeezed due to loss of so many of the biggest compliance consulting buyers, the banks.

My comment on auditors and shades of grey was that the typical accountant is trained to apply rules. They are usually most comfortable, at least in US with black and white. But as you know, I am in favor of IFRS and using judgment because I believe the auditors should finally be forced to use and be held accountable for judgments rather than being able to hide behind rules.