Gumbiner Savett Reviews

Pros

People, experience, growth, and work-life balance

Cons

Benefit package, bonus, profit sharing.

Pros

Good work and life balance.

Cons

Many times prior year work was wrong and you had to take time to fix it. In comparison to last years billable hours, you may end up looking inefficient.

Pros

Interns are able to have freedom to learn

Cons

not much upper level contact

Advice to Senior Management

It might be better to maintain a more dynamic internship program

Pros

Stability- Accounting is a really stable field
Nice Offices-located in a great location, about a ten minute drive from the beac
Admin Staff-very friendly people, good peers to work with

Cons

Accounting- pretty boring industry
Social- not a very good place for a fresh college graduate, not many people to socialize with, most people are involved in their families and work etc....

Advice to Senior Management

I really couldnt say I didnt work much with Senior Management

Pros

GS is well rocognized among its competitors (other CPA firms) in the Los Angeles area; I still believe it's a good place to work, and everyone gets along really well.

Cons

As others have written, the firm management the past 2-3 years have slipped and have made bad choices. For example, the move to transfer the work into a less paper environment could have been handled better - - the move to Sureprep was not great. Among partners and principals, the work was not distributed fairly. This has left some in upper management a little perturbed and caused others to leave.

The worst thing that could have happened is the move to hire non-locals among the staff. I understand the cheaper rate that they can pay, but I rather have someone who speaks better English and knows American customs.

I think it started to go down when they were examining being bought out by a larger national firm.

Advice to Senior Management

There are some who shouldn't be in Senior Management.

Pros

PROS

Good mid-level firm to start off from college. There is growing support at this level, and I believe it continues to get better. There's a range of great clients and exposure to all industries is certain.

Cons

CONS

The management was lacking, and the direction the firm was heading was not good. People were leaving, and they were being replaced by Indians. I termed it "Reverse Outsourcing." Certain new partners were changing the culture to one that was negative for a smaller firm.

Advice to Senior Management

There are some partners who have no business being partners. The cold attitude needs to be thawed out. There needs to be greater structure.

Pros

I initially liked working with the different people, and I thought it would be a place where I can get great experience.

Cons

After having worked here for close to 18 months, I feel like I need to move on. I have not been able to get the audit experience that I want. It seems like there's a lot politics involved in getting a job. Certain managers and seniors want to work with certain staff. On the other side, the tax department doesn't really have any good programs for instruction. Their training method is to throw you in the deep end, and let you figure it out yourself.

There's a lot of poltics in the firm, even among managers and partners. It seems like there's no true leader.

Advice to Senior Management

More structure involved in the training of staff.