EY reviews

The biggest mistake that someone especially accounting/MIS/CS majors early in their careers can do by joining EY Tampa Media & Entertainment (M&E)/Media Rating Council (MRC) team is to DESTROY their career. Literally, no other company does what this team does and the MRC standards that the team works on is not even a regulatory standard, so the experience is not relevant outside this team (not even in the industry). There have been a couple of instances where the employees moved to the clients but it gets extremely difficult if you have experience in only MRC standards. Proof: Search how many jobs are open that require MRC knowledge/skills. You will find 0-2 jobs open in the whole country so it shows how irrelevant is the experience to the industry. The team itself have contradicting interpretation of the standards. I saw so many instances where even senior managers and directors get in an argument on how to interpret a single standard. This is because there is only one guy from the MRC body (in NYC) who writes the standards based on his discussions with the clients who voluntarily want themselves to be audited on MRC standards. And the standards are so generic in nature (no technical knowledge needed) that everyone can interpret them differently. This results in 4 things: one, clients are always confused on what to provide and expect even if its an year on year audit because if its a different manager on the project than last year then he will have his own interpretation (Proof: just google ey mrc reddit and you will see what clients have to say). Secondly, because of lack of clarity of controls understanding within the team and the clients, there is always a delay in the meeting the deadlines. This results in engagements going out of budget most of the times and then seniors/managers always try to blame interns/staff. I have seen interns being blamed for the delay in deliverables when in fact its not their job to keep the budget under control. But, oh well, some senior/manager needed to save himself and someones needed to be blamed. Secondly, interns/staff/seniors have nothing to learn because there is no standard understanding. Third, if you don't click with the senior management then they can hold you on to what you have understood and since there is no standard understanding, be prepared to hear - you need to work on knowing the standards. This will affect the yearly reviews (even promotions, doesn't matter how hard you've worked throughout the year) Last point about the team - its work environment is completely based on how you click with the senior management. If they personally like you then even big mistakes like screwing up client relationship (which is one of the EY 4 pillars of work ethics) are ignored. If not, then be prepared to loose your promotion because of a small thing like a spelling mistake. Senior management has least interest in employees' career path; I have seen people spending as much as 4 years at staff level which is unseen in other EY teams (I have experience working in other teams in EY and have friends/relatives working all over united states and know how progressions and promotions are made). There are multiple examples in the team where an employee was denied promotion in one year saying his performance was not at par, then he continues to work the same way and next year he is promoted with the real reason being people leave this MRC team left and right throughout the year and management had lack of resources at that particular level in that year. The promotions are totally dependant on whether you are the manager's mouthpiece and lick his boots (they call it getting yourself a mentor). Couple of other small sad things about the team - you will hear senior management quoting this all the time - 1. your career is not a race but a marathon. This is quoted in many team meetings and reviews which actually is a way of saying keep slogging and donot expect us to recognize you through promotions/progressions. 2. There is something called EY bravo award which is a monetary recogintion of good work. Although the minimum is $50 (which is nothing when you are getting it 1-2 times in a year on an average), I know other EY teams giving away $100 as bravo award. This team is so stingy that it sticks with the minimum of $50. I got to know the level of stinginess of this team when suddenly they stopped giving out donuts on Fri. The reason being those Fri donuts were the leftovers from another team sitting on the same floor all these days and that team stopped ordering extra donuts. 3. The office is in downtown and you need to pay $8-11 everyday for parking and $20 whenever there is an event in downtown (which is every other day because its tampa downtown and private parking places need reason to charge more). So you are looking at $2000-2400 per year directly from your pocket. Good thing: Free starbucks coffee that you have to prepare if the coffee pot is empty (spending 15 minutes waiting for the coffee to be brewed from the machine) Bottom line: DO NOT join this team unless you really don't have any other option. Interns who didnt get full-time, feel lucky about yourselves because otherwise you would have joined this team thinking about the EY tag and then have gotten stuck. Staff get out of there if you want to do something relevant in life. In my experience with EY for almost 4 years working in various team, this post is not directed to EY as a whole but only at the EY tampa MRC team. I think EY as a whole gives a lot of relevant experience that industry cares about but not this team. I have seen and learnt a lot from amazing leaders in EY but NONE of the partners/exec. directors in this team is a leader. Leaders are different than managers, some of them might be able to manage projects well but none of them is a leader.

The life of a User Acceptance Tester for Ernst & Young at the SDC of Jacksonville. Coming into this position I believed I was aligning my career with a Big 4 company that could help guide me to a long prosperous career. The SDC did the exact opposite. It may be the most corrupt useless place for a company with such a great standing in the world. I will be referring to EY as “Real EY” and the “SDC” separately to establish the difference between the two. The SDC may have EYs name over it but you are treated as if you are a subsidiary. Before I begin with the scenarios, let me express, that the people you meet in the crappy situation that is the SDC are the only reason worth going to work. They will be all shapes of people. Some extremely intelligent people who got tricked into thinking they got a job at Real EY. But, also people that have art degrees that don’t know how to operate in a normal functionable manner. You will find a happy medium of the people that will express the same displeasure for working at the place. You will laugh and cry together, dreaming of your year to be up so you don’t have to give up some of your signing bonus for leaving. This people will accompany you to the local watering hole that is Bee Bar (Applebees Bar 2 feet from the office). Find these people the second you start working, it will make the next part that I am about to explain less miserable. Your time at the Service Delivery Center can either go one of two ways. You either sit on the bench, which is where you are bored till the end of time and you just stare at your computer screen, praying for it to explode. You will get excited just to receive an a skype message or an occasional email, proving to yourself that you are actually employed. There will be days you think if you jumped out the window; would you survive. And, honestly this is the best situation, because you collect a paycheck to do absolutely nothing. You can really utilize this time to do whatever. You can work on developing your career for a different position not at EY. You can watch every episode of Game of Thrones 3 times. The possibilities are endless. The other situation is you get worked like a horse. Often, we referred to these select individuals as the “Show Ponies”. They will be worked till you can’t stand the work load they are tasked with. They will be doing the mundane work that a monkey does. But, they will do the same exact work as a normal Real EY employee but, don’t ever think you are equal. You will be working long hours, leading meetings, and working weekends but, your salary will be grossly less than Real EY employee doing your same role. You will have interns working at Real EY making more than you if you are a straight out of college. You will be directing people higher ranked than you, and they will be making way more than you. Oh!!! You want to stick around for the chance at being promoted to senior. This process could take 3 to 7 years. The three-year chance is if you really, really, really, really get lucky, and you are also a great worker on top of it; to possibly get skip promoted. It will usually be 7 because in the SDC there is a fake position called Analyst, which is a rank higher than Associate Analyst. This Position is not in real EY but, is present in the SDC. Here is where the SDC makes their bread. You do the same role as a Senior, but you lose your overtime, you don’t get a bonus, and this stage has an undisclosed amount of time before you are promoted to senior. So, they work you overtime and now you make less money than when you first started (The interns are still making more than you btw). So now you get promoted to senior in the SDC. Your salary has slowly grown. There is associate analyst in the SDC and interns in Real EY making more than you still. Real EY seniors in a similar geographic location are making 25 k more than you and only took them 3 years guaranteed. DO NOT! I REPEAT, DO NOT BE THIS KID. You thought you could avoid this whole situation and transfer to Real EY like they said you could do after a year of tenure. Yeah, well you can’t. The leaders of the corruptness that is the SDC, is Higher Ups of Management SDC. They have teamed up with HR, to make it nearly impossible to transfer out. They will say “Oh yeah, for sure bro we can arrange that”. Lying to you every second of the way. They recently just announced, you can only move to Real EY after making senior. So you will be waiting longer than a year. GUARANTEED! You will get thrown through a ringer to have a 3% chance of getting out. And if you are a lucky person that made the right connections to get out. Since you came in at a grossly low salary, they will be able to justify paying you 20k less than everyone in Real EY when you get there. Why, you ask? Because never forget you are an SDC PONY and you will never be anything to them.