Ernst & Young Reviews in Washington, DC Area

Current Employee – been working at Ernst & Young

Pros – Offers great benefits and is supportive of education.

Cons – Mentoring and communications could be better.

Advice to Senior Management – It is important to make sure that upper management practices the values of the company.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

Current Employee – been working at Ernst & Young

Pros – *Compnay name recognition
*Place to strat your career

Cons – Loong hours
Unpredicatble workload
Hard to reach work/life balance

Advice to Senior Management – Show more appreciation of the work done by staff and seniors

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

Current Employee – been working at Ernst & Young

Pros – Networking, pay, quality of people you work with, interaction with officers at Fortune 500 companies, signing bonus, CPA bonus, name recognition

Cons – The hours are very long. The firm touts flexibiity, but it's not very flexible. A co-worker was dealing with a family issue and the firm showed little compassion. I needed to get my car registered when I moved and the scheduler designated the time as "vacation". There is very litte sense of satisfaction. You could be working at a client an hour and a half from your home.

Advice to Senior Management – Sometimes the business model is questioned. Morale is horrible. Why would you hold a celebratory event at the main office during busy season that no one can attend?

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

Current Employee – been working at Ernst & Young

Pros – Grassroots training is available for the uninitiated and people are compationate enough to provide guidance when sought or asked for.

Cons – Training is grassroots at best. There is also organized training but is not frequent enough. Anything else besides chargeable hours is seen as a conflict to your job, including work-life balance.

Advice to Senior Management – Please perform national working sessions or bull sessions before rolling national initiatives out. It is more effective to hammer out differences in the earlier stages of development than after roll-out.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

Current Employee – been working at Ernst & Young

Pros – You gain exposure to a number of industries. Also, you have a slight degree of flexibility in your ability to transfer between offices (although area management will resist). E&Y is a good place to begin a career, or work towards partner if you have no life and enjoy monotonous, boring work.

Cons – Offices tend to be very cliquish. As much as management likes to promote a "work/life balance", there is absolutely none. Even if you have no work to do, you are expected to meet your minimum number of hours. The work is extremely tedious and boring. The client doesn't respect you or go out of their way to help you. You represent nothing more to them than additional work that they must do. As you advance through the firm, the normal people will drop out and the only people left will be the tools who are bent on becoming partner.

Advice to Senior Management – Due to the nature of accounting, the job has inherit limitations as to how interesting it can be. Be more willing to let employees switch between service lines in order to limit the boredom.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

Former Employee – worked at Ernst & Young

Pros – E&Y provides a tremendous ability to see different organizations and learn new things. The organization puts its people into some very good opportunities and provides some good services to its clients. It is a great place to start your career.

Cons – Leadership is taking a disturbing turn toward a consulting culture. Many of the new hires are from places like BearingPoint (a disturbingly poorly run organization). The focus is on how much you can milk from the client prior to the organization removing E&Y as it's service provider.

Leadership talks a great game when it comes to People First, but ultimately it is people first unless the client needs something.... then work all weekend. People are promoted not base on their abilities to do work, but rather on their ability to make sales.

Though the firm has a decent system for feedback, the people delivering it provide only the positives, and gloss over the developmental opportunities until they are going to hold back promotion, then they use them to slam the individual very publicly.

Advice to Senior Management – Focus on what you do best. You are an audit / tax firm. Worry less about growth and more about keeping your clients happy and doing what is best for them.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend