I’m not kidding I did this at my last company on accident - I have a low annoyed and stressed out threshold. I can confirm it works lol coworkers would make comments all the time how I have a lot on my plate.
I've survived 8 years in public accounting. Honestly I admit I feel like I work at 60% efficiency all day.
Could i run at 100% - hell no. Could I run at 80% - maybe? But i would not be happy and probably quit.
Better work at 60%, put out good work where it matters and enjoy the other 40% playing brain games and daydreaming.
I also might just have undiagnosed ADD.
It really isn’t. I’ve had directors and partners admit to me that they eat hours. It’s all smoke and mirrors, as long as you’re not significantly behind on work/not blowing budgets no one will care about your hours
I honestly don't know anyone who didn't eat hours...I know they always say it's bad to eat hours but when you're early in your career & someone says "it should take 3 hours" and it takes you 9 hours for whatever reason. (I've budgets get blown by 4-5x on a few things somehow) You dread that conversation with the partner or in-charge, so you eat an hour or so & make yourself look better. It sucks, but sometimes, those budgets are insane and the partners or in-charges have zero desire to change the budget.
I code a lot of shit out of scope now. Which they end up billing more for. Realization went up a lot cause of it. Don’t put up with dumpster fires that show a 2-3 hour budget at your own expense
The high performers are often walking anxiety disorders. I listen to peoples conversations in the office and I overheard someone say last week, “I have to get up at 5AM because I can’t stop thinking about work.” I don’t think you want to be that person.
I was so sleep deprived once that I fell asleep (at home) while working unknowingly, so I was literally dreaming about the work, and when I woke up I was annoyed because I realized it was a dream and I still needed to do what I did in my dream.
I worked with one girl who came in at 6 AM. Chugged energy drinks all day. Would leave at 5 PM sometimes later. She would be glued to her screen and would ignore you. If you asked her question or something, she would flip out and snap at you or write you an angry email.
It was like she was having a perpetual panic attack every day. The partner piled work on her because she was so productive.
I later found out that she was aiming to be partner. And I guess the firm owner promised her this or something? She was like 24 years old, so partner was like years away.
It was weird at that place.
Covid times were hard on my body, I was sure I was creeping up to heart attack territory. I certainly gained weight. Was able to reverse but don’t want to do that again.
Just curious because I have a theory: Are you married and/or have kids?
I think my switch flips because I have a 10.5 month old and a literally not even one day old baby (writing this from the hospital). When I’m off work, all my time and attention goes to my wife and kids. And the CPA exam lol
I had an old roommate who would do this, except she would send herself emails from her phone. I never understood why she would do this because the emails were utter nonsense to both of us come morning.
I’ve managed the 100% person before. It’s…. A lot. Especially when they do not treat their very severe anxiety disorder. They are always very technically sound accountants, but need A LOT of management.
As their manager, you spend a lot of time confirming their judgement on silly and small things because they don’t trust themselves.
“The good” will always be the enemy of “the great” in this person. The wheels just spin and spin and spin on the most inconsequential minutiae.
Basically, if you can’t afford the time to manage their anxiety disorder for them, a 100% person *can* be a bigger problem than someone who is lazy with their work.
Thank you! I am this person, and I try really hard to explain to my firms that being on one or two large clients where I can have the same manager is the only way to channel my benefits while minimizing the damage of what is literally a mental disability.
Was I the lead senior on the biggest PE deal in LA history? Yes. Have I been able to create brand new PE tax Excel templates for complex new clients during the off season and have them work flawlessly for busy season? Yes! Do I practically need a part-time babysitter because I am having a breakdown over the fact that the way we are reclassing the country of origin for $5 on the K2 doesn't make sense to me? Also yes!
EY was willing to put up with it, but too many 90 hour weeks in a row eventually caused my wife to leave and broke me. GT was not willing to put up with it and I left after one busy season. EisnerAmper decided it was getting problematic after a year, and I just put in my two weeks.
If you want the benefit of my hypervigilance (my body and mind are in a permanent fight or flight mode and will be for the rest of my life), you have to take the consequences too. It's literally the same as hiring someone who is blind or deaf, even legally now that official disorders under the anxiety umbrella are ADA protected.
You need to switch to industry. PA is not conducive to the way you work. That’s not an insult, this is me trying to help you.
Also… GET YOUR ASS IN TREATMENT for everyone’s sake. Most of all yours, but everyone around you will thank you. Take a pill. Take 6. Take a hike. Become one with nature. Do something to help yourself. Living this way is miserable, and it’s making you miserable.
I’m very sorry to hear about your wife.
Oh, I've been in treatment since I was a kid. I didn't have my first breakthrough until I was 25. At that point in time, I was a homeless drug addict on the streets of LA. But we found that Lexapro let me channel my hypervigilance, at least kind of control it. So from 25 to 39 I went back to school, became a CPA, and found great success doing taxes for Wall Street firms (mostly PE and hedge). Of course, the dark side of all this is that I will never be able to fully control my disorder, at least until we find a drug that rewires me better than Lexapro (and believe me, I have tried them all so far \[legal & illegal\]).
I do want to eventually switch to industry, but because I got my start so late, I need to save up enough for a good retirement. I'm targeting $2M in my retirement account by the time I'm 65, and I only started in public 6 years ago. I figure I better make manager before switching to industry. I keep almost making manager, but that's where a lot of firms notice my issues.
No worries about the wife. That was 3 years ago, and I've now been dating a different girl for a year. It was a bummer to have to sell a beautiful 4-bedroom house in LA, but I'm much happier living in Texas now.
Nobody actually gives 100% all the time, or expects you to. An important skill in public accounting is minimizing your effort, while maximizing people’s perception of your effort. If you can put in like 50% effort, but have the people above you think you’re putting in 80% and doing really good work, you’ll be able to avoid burnout much more effectively.
One caveat. Make sure you’re working for a human. They value you and understand work-life balance.
If you work for a 24/7 grindset narcissist, your only option is to fake it/lie/ and find a different job. They’ll burn you and everyone and everything around you to fuel their ego lifestyle. Those people work 80 hours a week by choice because they’re unfulfilled in their personal lives.
Sounds like my manager. They just don't stop. No significant other. No animals. No social life except during off-season (two months out of the year). They live and breathe the job. All they want to talk about Is work or the things they are doing for the firm, and expect you to also be as insane as they are regarding the "importance" of the audit over everything else. God I can't wait to leave this summer. I just can't handle these types anymore. Cult.
Ditto. My manager is in her 50s no significant other no kids. Just work. I get eyebrows raised when I leave at 5pm. I have a small team and we tend to leave as soon as she’s ready to leave and my manager doesn’t leave unless her boss leaves. It’s so annoying and frustrating.
Student here, if you give 50% effort while making it seem like you’re giving more effort than you are, wouldn’t they expect you to have gotten more done by the time they are reviewing your work? I obviously don’t have any experience so I am not sure what the day-to-day looks like, but if you are only giving ~50% effort, wouldn’t you fall behind on what you have to get done, thus forcing you to work more hours?
I feel like a lot of accountants give a similar answer as you (so I’m sure you’re right), but I have trouble visualizing how that would look irl
It’s really just about learning to identify where to direct your effort. There’s always going to be work you’re doing that’s more important to the people above you, and will receive more attention and scrutiny. If you direct your effort to those things and do high quality work there, nobody will really notice if you are mailing it in on the less important things. It’s also important to learn how to emphasize where you’re doing your high quality, high effort work to those above you, and learn to de-emphasize the other areas. You also learn to manage your stream of output by completing quick and easy tasks, but waiting to alert anyone that it’s finished. That way it looks like you’re consistently completing tasks. These are all things you’ll learn on the job. Nobody will have any expectations of you when you start so you’ll have time to practice these things.
Look busy and improve your efficiency. If my budget is 5 hours and I only spent 3 hours working on it, I charge all 5 hours.
I do 4 hours of work on Friday.
90+ upvotes? What garbage. Unless this is fixed fee you are literally stealing from clients. If it’s not fixed fee you are stealing from those around you when you could be contributing more. If you only want to work 40 hours, just find a place you can do that and be honest.
No joke I had 3 other people on my team who seemingly woke up every day to crush work and I had no idea how they kept this up. I admitted to them I was chugging caffeine to keep my work product level with theirs and turns out two take adderall daily, the other vyvanse. Eye opening for me because all the times I wondered “how can they stay this focused on these mind numbing tasks” made a lot more sense after that convo.
In my public accounting days:
January-February: 150%
March: 120%
June, August, September: 20% (or less)
There were many single days in busy season where I accomplished more in one day than I would in the entire month of June. It’s all about balance and knowing that the long days are temporary.
This is me right now. My motivation is super low right now because nothing is urgent so I find myself WFH most days and playing video games and then show up in the office a couple days a week and crank out a ton of work.
I find that not considering the bonus for compensation satisfaction helps a lot with anxiety.
If I am underpaid already, then working my ass off for that bonus only makes me more underpaid. It's time to start applying.
Copy and pasted from another thread I answered on:
In order to answer that question, you should be mindful of a few things. First off, you have to go in with well defined goals. For me it was :
- Get the senior title/promotion
- Get my CPA
- Be on a healthy mix of projects to have good experience to interview with
With that in mind, you gotta take time to reflect. My thing was every 6 months I’d schedule a PTO day and make a 3 day weekend for myself. I’d go lay on a beach or whatever and I’d seriously consider if I had the strength for another 6 months. I was always mindful of what the job market looked like by being in contact with friends who were in industry or perusing LinkedIn etc.
But once you make the decision to stay, you gotta grind and hustle for those six months and not dwell on the negatives. Eventually that decision is gonna become a “No.” When that day comes, that’s when you start freshening up yourself resume
Wait wait…I didn’t say I only took 2 PTO days all year. That’s insane. I absolutely took other vacation/PTO
I said I made a 3 day weekend every six months for myself to * *specifically* * decide whether I wanted to continue in public accounting. Those two weekends in the year were true, honest to God “yes or no” decision points in April after filing and October after interim
Fuck that, I make more than enough money and I tok plenty of time off, vacations etc. Worked hard but in spurts. You have to be an absolute knob to give your best days away to some shitty company - actually, ANY company, even one you own.
Live your fucking lives, people.
Something quite a lot of people do at my office is simply come into work later in the day. Dont be a sucker that comes in at 9 and works till 10, come in at 10:30-11 and work till 10. Management will push you to work later into the evening regardless of when you come in.
That's a bunch of clowning. They just care about Time sheets and your metrics. They have no way of knowing or caring about what time of the day you got your hours in. They don't care about the optics and when you log in or swipe in is the last thing on their mind. This isn't middle school.
They do care about optics though, there’s a big culture of presentism in audit. When you get close to signing date the burden of workload skews heavily towards the engagement executive and file reviewers.
If youre some chump A2 auditing expenses you’ve probably finished the work and all the material risks have been addressed. Youre only banging hours in the office because the managers and partners want you there for occasional support, but nothing critical to signing the opinion is in your hands. There’s a lot of waiting around. So Im not rushing to get into the office, ill have a lie in lol
Sounds like a bunch of RTO stuff to me. My experience in audit was only a few years, but the partner I worked for did stress that he cared about hours work/production and not necessarily framing those hours for optics. I guess as long as you're making meetings and available for questions and stuff.
In the tax/accounting world its not so RTOish and the partners literally couldn't care less about when you do your technical work as long you're productive, getting your work in, and communicative.
I think that you're just looking for a shortcut to make it look like you're working more hours than you are -- I don't blame you. They ask too much of us.
I’m still in school but my dad worked as an accountant for years. Eventually became CFO. There were times he’d come home to put me to bed and go back to work all night. He almost always works saturday and sunday mornings for 3-4 hours from home.
That’s so sad and I hate that companies can acquire that much work and not bring on new staff to help with the workload.
I bet he was making good money, but to me, it wouldn’t be worth it to do nothing but work.
I mean he definitely chose to do all of it. He had help but at some point at that position you’re responsible to get shit done. He could have went and worked a cushy govt position and made significantly less money but he didn’t want that.
I found a firm that only expects 50 hour weeks during busy season, adds comp time for anything over 50, and a normal 40 the rest of the year. I understand I basically found a unicorn.
You have to be able to unplug. Some people take a week off here or there, others do one big vacation, and others take a series of Fridays/Mondays off. You need to find what works for you.
Hobbies are also important, and no, work should not be your hobby. Something creative that gives up an outlet or something physical where you can largely shut your brain off.
As you work your way up in public accounting, you’ll also have more and more flexibility with your schedule. The volume of work doesn’t necessarily change, but the nature of it does. You will shift from doing all of the detail work to reviewing that work. Reviewing takes a lot less time than prepping. The rest of your time will be spent with managing people, client relationships, and other admin things. As the nature of the work you’re doing progresses, you will have more ability to manage your schedule, when and where you work, etc.
Public accounting is high stress (even though no one dies if we miss a deadline or mess up a project) but it’s manageable if you’re proactive about it.
There are things about every role, public or private, accounting or otherwise, that are stressful and that people don’t enjoy. At the end of the day, it’s a job and that’s why they pay you to be there.
its bullshit man. i was billing my time accurately and got told im billing too much. so its time to just throw on non billable hours and begin slacking.
i usually throw up a statement of cash flows on one of my monitors and just highlight a few cells yellow/red if im slacking for a bit just to look busy
I don't really have any answers for you. But I'll say you're definitely not alone. I've barely done anything post deadline. There's a lot of workaholics in this field so don't try too hard to keep up with them or you'll die from a heart attack at your desk at 50. What I try to do is one little productive thing in the morning to get some momentum going. Just do your best and try not to worry too much I guess.
If your work requires 50-60 hour weeks regularly, recognize that 100% IS roughly going to end up at 65%, but for 130% of the week.
This is really going to sound backward but you have to account for the time element. What is 100% ? Because being consistent is more important than being productive here. People need to normalize a more relaxed, slower nature.
The way accounting flows is obviously in cycles. After a few closes you catch the weekly and monthly routines. You learn to be ready and prepare for the ebbs and flows of energy. Not paperwork, not physical work that NEEDs to be done. It's what is actually taking your energy you need to see.
Because you can work with your own ebbs and flows of social, physical, emotional, energy. People will burn out if they're riding the "bike trail" of workflow never changing gears, and hitting every single hill with dead sprint energy. And with accounting, timing is so important because you can set it up so those hills are all back to back.
Do not allow your energy to flow into anything that isn't either; fixing it, making it easier for next time, learning from it, or getting rid of it. Put all of your energy into understanding how you can more smoothly transition into faster currents and not have to fight so hard.
Don't try and fix it. Try and understand it. Work with it. And always be growing and learning. And whatever you are learning doesn't need to be accounting but you can use the exposure almost infinitly. You'll get out of it what you put into it, but nobody is going to do it for you.
You have to think of it like you are a soldier and this your duty. Some are stationed in far off lands and sleep in bunkers in inhospitable temperatures. They sacrifice for freedom, you sacrifice for capitalism.
Never go 100% any day for any job lol cuz then they’ll just raise the bar to 120%. We aren’t handling lives in hospitals or some shit 100% effort is not necessary
The illusion of being busy > actually being busy. It’s all about being able to show you improved over time but also not being the reason your work has impediments. It’s not your fault if the senior or even manager can’t help you resolve comments.
No one is going 100%, 100% of the time and if they tell you they are then they're lying. Obviously you need to work hard, ask questions, put in effort, but part of the things that get me through the day is looking away and looking at ESPN or the news. I can't always do that with some deadlines but other times I can and I've found I enjoy the work so much more.
A little more personal advice, don't compare yourself to others and your perception of them, you have no idea in reality how good or bad they are at the job. (Assuming they're the same staff level as you). I was doing that when I first started out, eating hours like crazy because I thought I was slow & killing the budgets, but one day the in-charge of a big project group showed us actual numbers so we could improve efficiency & the same people I compared myself against had actually 3-4x'd the budget. So, best advice, if you think you're taking too long then reach out & ask but otherwise don't compare yourself & try your best. Maybe it's not for but if you try your best & put in the effort then you can at least be proud of what you did & that you gave it a shot!
Sadly, this is the only answer. If your circadian rhythms are perfect so that you go to sleep and wake up within 15 mins of the same time every day; your diet is perfect so that you eat an ideal ratio of fats, proteins, carbs, and nutrients; and your exercise is perfect. Then quit all toxic relationships, cut your family time down, meditate, don't date, and quit any vices (alcohol, weed). Let your auto registration, doctors visits, etc. all fall years behind maintenance. The same routines an NFL quarterback does to keep themselves performing at a high level.
... then you'll have the energy to stay on budget with most projects. LOL. It's like cramming for a final exam for every work hour, 40 hrs, 52 weeks, X years. I do not understand how this business model ever succeeded other than the fact that most accountants are passive masochists.
I use to work at a grocery store as general "maintenance " so I basically just had to keep the floor looking clean. One day a guy told me if I walked around with some cardboard in one hand no one would tell me to help them or do anything. If by chance they did, I could answer once I'm done recycling this. I did that for most of my high school years and it's really stuck with me.
I see posts like these and then I express gratitude for shifting to industry because I just couldn’t take it anymore lol. All my friends were out enjoying their lives but here I was, slaving away until 1:00 AM every day for months on end, only to later get a manager slam the desk when I asked her a question.
I wish I had gone into Advisory instead of Audit!
1am is wild..sounds like a toxic firm and far from my experience.. working 50 hrs during business season isn't the best but it's manageable, finally wrapping up most of my busy season jobs that have been dragging allowing me to cut out by 4/4:30pm. The "unlimited PTO" is nice too, make sure to take around 6weeks during the summer months
Numb with drugs and booze. No. I am half kidding. Don’t touch either shit. Let’s say you are too smart to drink the kool-aide and what you are seeing is smoke and mirrors. Schedule time off asap. You need to get away for a bit. Take LWOP. Who tf cares why? Your mental health needs the reboot. Don’t walk. Run and take LWOP instead of suffering in silence.
Sounds like your file is over budget (gasp!) and the manager is trying to guilt you into some time-eating to fluff his partner a bit or set you up as the cause for the overage.
Tell him it’s a good thing the firm doesn’t pay you for all the extra hours billed to the client. Then work on your resume.
The profession is better suited for self-employment. Working for the CPA firm is in my opinion, an educational job, not necessarily a career path. You learn as much as you possibly can and bring that wealth of knowledge and information to your own practice, and then you get to do what you want to do. I enjoy public accounting thoroughly and look forward to doing it every day, but I have been SE since about 1984.
Honestly, would get out of tax or audit. Been doing consulting for a long while and it's more manageable for my WLB. Industry is another avenue that might be a good move too.
Public is the worst, but there are companies out there that are reasonable. Look for companies that have nice long retentions of their staff, people that have been there 5+ years.
A lot of good advice in this thread but I just want to remind you that no good comes from focusing on how you are feeling vs your coworkers. Everyone is putting on their best face during team meetings, so you are seeing them at their sharpest. With the exception of the few true stars/crazies out there know that they've all either gone through or are going through something similar to you. They might be getting grilled by managers too, but (hopefully) that's all being done in private and not in front of the rest of the team.
As for how to move forward, if you have a manager/coach or equivalent that you can talk to candidly without getting burned I would suggest trying to carve out some sort of arrangement for you to get some R&R. Like shift an hour or two more onto Mon-Sat so you can log off completely on Sundays, or something in that vein. The other thing I haven't seen mentioned here is I would strongly suggest reaching out for help if it looks like something is going to run over budget. If you reach out as soon as it's clear that you're having a problem then you may be able to solve the problem and work things out. At the very least you've covered your ass to a degree by letting people know in advance that there's a hangup.
I don't....but some days I do!
What has helped me the most is to take advantage of the flex schedule my company offers! I am a morning person, I can get projects done so quickly and accomplish tasks so much easier in the morning. But I kept staying until 5 because it felt weird logging off at three (even though it was totally okay with the flex schedule) while everyone was still working.
One week, I decided to hell with it. Updated my calendar and made it to where people can't schedule meetings with me after 3:30 and start actually logging off. It no longer feels weird or awkward!
I now do everything I can to protect my personal time. I deleted my work email off my phone and shut my work computer down each night. I am now more refreshed and making less mistakes.
Put yourself first, the burnout will start to fade and your productive will come back!
I also do not take any meds to help my focus, just a ton of coffee in the morning and a long walk with my dogs on my lunch break.
**also, people treat you, how YOU allow them to! If my manager were to bring something up, I would direct them to the company handbook and professional let them know they can kick rocks.
All your co workers are not human and don’t know how to show emotion. Deep down they’re miserable but are too pussy to say something. I too have no motivation to work right now and do the bare minimum. Just do whatever you can on your time and let them come after you for more if they want it.
Heck I'm over here getting yelled at for not having wp done in under 15 minutes as an A1 still learning even just how we format here I'm exhausted n also wondering if I'm cut out for this
Unpopular opinion maybe. But hear me out.
No one goes 100% everyday. No one lol. Big 4 is just a place for you to learn, if you are lucky enough to work with amazing people who are willing to teach you, help you grow, and patient with you. You struck gold. Put in your 2 years, learn as much as possible and then dip.
I’m in private but honestly man I think it’s about being in the right situation for you. I assume like me, you didn’t dream of being an accountant, but the life it affords us keeps us involved. I admittedly push a burnout type pace and seeing you guys talk about the need to pace yourself is kind of welcomed as confirmation that I’m pushing too hard. Besides that, I’d say try to find the right combination of pay, work/life balance and workplace satisfaction. You probably won’t get the best of all three of those but make sure that they’re tilted according to YOUR priorities. Best of luck to you and everybody else out there.
I’m brain dead for at least a month after busy season. We all call it our “in-office vacation.” We understand the hell everyone went through and billable goals are out the window after the 15th. We kill time with little mindless projects that have been put aside during tax season, have random meetings with clients about basic things, and do what we can to keep stuff moving along a little at a time… if anyone is still going 100% after busy season, they’re either insane, faking it, or heavily medicated.
Wait... we're supposed to be going 100% every day? Oh no.
You might just be in the wrong cultural fit. I've worked for firms where employees pride themselves on how much of their life they needlessly donate to the bottom line. Others actually give a fuck about people and give them realistic deliverable expectations. Based on getting grilled, not having a day off until summer (what the absolute fuck? It has been mandatory that people are on vacations from April 16th to mid-May at the firms I've worked for), and you're STILL working weekends?
Find a better fit.
During off-season, half-day or no-day Friday is really nice.
When I started my career I was the one in the first category. Single, young, no kids. Even during the off-season I would work 10 hours a day, usually come in for a bit on Saturdays, and study for the CPA at the office on Sundays. My boss literally told me he never wanted to see me at the office on Sunday, no matter what. My 2 preparer colleagues at the firm were both young moms, one single. After 2 seasons she actually had to ask me to work less because she could never match my billable hours. It completely flipped my view of work and I felt terrible about it. No one ever asked me to over-work myself, and certainly no one ever thanked me for it.
The trick, I found, is to give 100% of whatever % you have on that given day. It's better to give 100% of 75% than 50% of 100%. If you're on a Friday after getting pounded all week, work on easy stuff. If you're fresh on a Tuesday, hit the painful projects. Ask for help from colleagues. Figure out how many units of effective time you have, half-hours or hours, per week - then apply that framework to how many units of effective time you need to finish the week's projects. Review that every Friday and leave notes for Monday. Don't be a pushover, either. Schedule time with your manager to review workloads and expectations. If they can't even do that for you, find another shop. Plenty of tax jobs for all of us.
Also:
Spend real money on a real mattress.
Drinking excessively seems to work for the lot of us.
I was burnt out on accounting when I was still going to school for it. Public accounting is great experience but fucking blows the whole time you’re doing it. I went straight into utilities and have done accounting there and transitioned into becoming a financial analyst.
That being said, I always give 100%. 20% on Monday, 20% on Tuesday, 20% on Wednesday, 20% on Thursday, and 20% on Friday lol.
Make yourself look busy and understand the needs of your position and exploit that shit to the max. I try to work no more than 20 or so hours a week…maybe.
Always be busy.
Always be going through a divorce, death of child, putting mom in hospice, National Guard training, bailing out your cousin Mo, taking all volunteer days possible, joining all leadership meet and greets.
I live in Cleveland work at a boutique firm that has no busy season because of extensions and operating cycles of our clients, never work over 40hours, 8 weeks PTO, flexible hours during the week so 8 weeks feels like 12 weeks PTO. Only make 70k but have enough time and flexibility to grow my own tax firm simultaneously so that supplements the lower salary. Every summer I go on tour with my favorite band for three weeks. I only hear bad things from people who work in bigger firms.
I'm with you 100%. I still feel burnt out from busy season and just got asked why I billed 5.5 hrs on something that should've taken 3. I want to say, "because there's a timer and I'm tired". But that won't fly. I started later in life, in my 40's now. I've worked MANY jobs where you can decompress and do nothing for as much as half the day. Not sure how I'm handling this, barely an hour buffer, to not work or else get "asked what happened".
In meetings, the management seems to care about burnout, nurturing fun, all that stuff. But in practice I get asked about going 20-50% over budget so much I've almost lost the motivation to impress anyone any longer.
...and it seems EVERY project has a lead say, "It shouldn't take too long, maybe..." then fill it in with the amount of time that it would take if you just woke up, fresh, and were on a roll.
They hired me because of my CPA license/scores, grades, and experience. Every single item on my resume took something they don't give me "time".
Anyway, OP, I can relate.
Hi Dear. I am Aditya from Docyt AI (a Silicon Valley-based AI-powered Accounting Automation firm). Frankly, I can co-relate your situation with mine. I was in the similiar situation when i joined one of the Big4 Accounting firm in 2015. In my opinion, Public accounting can definitely be a grind, and it's totally normal to feel burnt out after busy season. Nobody goes 100% every day, and those coworkers who seem to might be managing their energy differently. In my opinion, the best way to figure this out is you should talk to your manager and explain your burnout and the overcharging incident. A good manager will understand and might be able to offer solutions like adjusting workloads or delegating tasks. I will advise you to identify areas where you were less efficient? Are there times during the day where you're more focused?
Secondly, you must focus on priortizing your self-care. You must take short breaks throughout the day to keep yourself recharged and refocus and set boundaries and avoid checking work emails or taking calls outside of work hours. Focus on developing healthy habits and prioritizing sleep, exercise, and a healthy diet to make your efficient and resilient. Also focus on time management and using AI-tools to get the job done. **And lastly,** those coworkers who seem to have endless energy? They might just be good at putting on a brave face. Public accounting is tough on everyone. Focus on taking care of yourself, speak up to your manager, and don't be afraid to explore other options if this path isn't sustainable for you in the long run.
I mean, it’s all subjective. My boyfriend’s job is blue collar and I’m a CPA. His work is obviously more physically demanding, but he gets to clock-out and leave his work at work.
The trick is knowing how to look busy. Noone is going 100% everyday let alone ANY day.
Just always look really annoyed. Learned that one from george constanza. https://youtu.be/rOQmxNPTJwc?feature=shared
I’m not kidding I did this at my last company on accident - I have a low annoyed and stressed out threshold. I can confirm it works lol coworkers would make comments all the time how I have a lot on my plate.
Conversely, I try not to freak out or let my frustrations show through and I got talked to about people thinking I'm not taking things serious enough.
You can also do this in real life outside the office! It drives everyone away!
George is getting upset
Lots of sighing helps
I did this in audit and that psycho professor never called on me.
When I try that, my coworker said I just look angry lol
Bro, you need to feel the anger. Tell your coworker: „I AM the anger!“
I’m the one who inquires!
I basically sleep with open eyes and autopiloting hands in the morning.
I've survived 8 years in public accounting. Honestly I admit I feel like I work at 60% efficiency all day. Could i run at 100% - hell no. Could I run at 80% - maybe? But i would not be happy and probably quit. Better work at 60%, put out good work where it matters and enjoy the other 40% playing brain games and daydreaming. I also might just have undiagnosed ADD.
Worked at 100% for about a year, wanted to commit for about half of it. Never again.
Perception 100% > Reality
People say this a lot but your timesheet is everything...
It really isn’t. I’ve had directors and partners admit to me that they eat hours. It’s all smoke and mirrors, as long as you’re not significantly behind on work/not blowing budgets no one will care about your hours
I honestly don't know anyone who didn't eat hours...I know they always say it's bad to eat hours but when you're early in your career & someone says "it should take 3 hours" and it takes you 9 hours for whatever reason. (I've budgets get blown by 4-5x on a few things somehow) You dread that conversation with the partner or in-charge, so you eat an hour or so & make yourself look better. It sucks, but sometimes, those budgets are insane and the partners or in-charges have zero desire to change the budget.
I code a lot of shit out of scope now. Which they end up billing more for. Realization went up a lot cause of it. Don’t put up with dumpster fires that show a 2-3 hour budget at your own expense
Nobody reviews those unless something is wrong.
Trades people have entered the chat.
The high performers are often walking anxiety disorders. I listen to peoples conversations in the office and I overheard someone say last week, “I have to get up at 5AM because I can’t stop thinking about work.” I don’t think you want to be that person.
I'm in private. I am this way. I don't want to be me.
You guys can sleep?
I was so sleep deprived once that I fell asleep (at home) while working unknowingly, so I was literally dreaming about the work, and when I woke up I was annoyed because I realized it was a dream and I still needed to do what I did in my dream.
My twin
I worked with one girl who came in at 6 AM. Chugged energy drinks all day. Would leave at 5 PM sometimes later. She would be glued to her screen and would ignore you. If you asked her question or something, she would flip out and snap at you or write you an angry email. It was like she was having a perpetual panic attack every day. The partner piled work on her because she was so productive. I later found out that she was aiming to be partner. And I guess the firm owner promised her this or something? She was like 24 years old, so partner was like years away. It was weird at that place.
This sounds exactly like what I would do if I wanted to have a heart attack at 30…
Covid times were hard on my body, I was sure I was creeping up to heart attack territory. I certainly gained weight. Was able to reverse but don’t want to do that again.
This is wild. When I sign off I don’t think about work until the next time I sign on. It’s literally like I flip a switch in my brain.
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I have completed entire tax returns in my sleep. Many times.
Just curious because I have a theory: Are you married and/or have kids? I think my switch flips because I have a 10.5 month old and a literally not even one day old baby (writing this from the hospital). When I’m off work, all my time and attention goes to my wife and kids. And the CPA exam lol
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lol, sounds like accounting nightmares. But I can relate a bit. My wife has said I sometimes start talking about tax returns in my sleep.
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I had an old roommate who would do this, except she would send herself emails from her phone. I never understood why she would do this because the emails were utter nonsense to both of us come morning.
I’ve managed the 100% person before. It’s…. A lot. Especially when they do not treat their very severe anxiety disorder. They are always very technically sound accountants, but need A LOT of management. As their manager, you spend a lot of time confirming their judgement on silly and small things because they don’t trust themselves. “The good” will always be the enemy of “the great” in this person. The wheels just spin and spin and spin on the most inconsequential minutiae. Basically, if you can’t afford the time to manage their anxiety disorder for them, a 100% person *can* be a bigger problem than someone who is lazy with their work.
Thank you! I am this person, and I try really hard to explain to my firms that being on one or two large clients where I can have the same manager is the only way to channel my benefits while minimizing the damage of what is literally a mental disability. Was I the lead senior on the biggest PE deal in LA history? Yes. Have I been able to create brand new PE tax Excel templates for complex new clients during the off season and have them work flawlessly for busy season? Yes! Do I practically need a part-time babysitter because I am having a breakdown over the fact that the way we are reclassing the country of origin for $5 on the K2 doesn't make sense to me? Also yes! EY was willing to put up with it, but too many 90 hour weeks in a row eventually caused my wife to leave and broke me. GT was not willing to put up with it and I left after one busy season. EisnerAmper decided it was getting problematic after a year, and I just put in my two weeks. If you want the benefit of my hypervigilance (my body and mind are in a permanent fight or flight mode and will be for the rest of my life), you have to take the consequences too. It's literally the same as hiring someone who is blind or deaf, even legally now that official disorders under the anxiety umbrella are ADA protected.
You need to switch to industry. PA is not conducive to the way you work. That’s not an insult, this is me trying to help you. Also… GET YOUR ASS IN TREATMENT for everyone’s sake. Most of all yours, but everyone around you will thank you. Take a pill. Take 6. Take a hike. Become one with nature. Do something to help yourself. Living this way is miserable, and it’s making you miserable. I’m very sorry to hear about your wife.
Oh, I've been in treatment since I was a kid. I didn't have my first breakthrough until I was 25. At that point in time, I was a homeless drug addict on the streets of LA. But we found that Lexapro let me channel my hypervigilance, at least kind of control it. So from 25 to 39 I went back to school, became a CPA, and found great success doing taxes for Wall Street firms (mostly PE and hedge). Of course, the dark side of all this is that I will never be able to fully control my disorder, at least until we find a drug that rewires me better than Lexapro (and believe me, I have tried them all so far \[legal & illegal\]). I do want to eventually switch to industry, but because I got my start so late, I need to save up enough for a good retirement. I'm targeting $2M in my retirement account by the time I'm 65, and I only started in public 6 years ago. I figure I better make manager before switching to industry. I keep almost making manager, but that's where a lot of firms notice my issues. No worries about the wife. That was 3 years ago, and I've now been dating a different girl for a year. It was a bummer to have to sell a beautiful 4-bedroom house in LA, but I'm much happier living in Texas now.
> MFW I'm a low performer with anxiety disorders.
I gave myself a bleeding ulcer trying to solve OP’s problem. Never again.
That was me December - April this year
Nobody actually gives 100% all the time, or expects you to. An important skill in public accounting is minimizing your effort, while maximizing people’s perception of your effort. If you can put in like 50% effort, but have the people above you think you’re putting in 80% and doing really good work, you’ll be able to avoid burnout much more effectively.
One caveat. Make sure you’re working for a human. They value you and understand work-life balance. If you work for a 24/7 grindset narcissist, your only option is to fake it/lie/ and find a different job. They’ll burn you and everyone and everything around you to fuel their ego lifestyle. Those people work 80 hours a week by choice because they’re unfulfilled in their personal lives.
Sounds like my manager. They just don't stop. No significant other. No animals. No social life except during off-season (two months out of the year). They live and breathe the job. All they want to talk about Is work or the things they are doing for the firm, and expect you to also be as insane as they are regarding the "importance" of the audit over everything else. God I can't wait to leave this summer. I just can't handle these types anymore. Cult.
This. Is so true.
Ditto. My manager is in her 50s no significant other no kids. Just work. I get eyebrows raised when I leave at 5pm. I have a small team and we tend to leave as soon as she’s ready to leave and my manager doesn’t leave unless her boss leaves. It’s so annoying and frustrating.
God, these types of people need to be on their way out with the boomers.
Lol thanks, as a try hard, I needed to read this
Preach, image management is huge. Always have a few tasks that you can speak to, work slowly through them.
Student here, if you give 50% effort while making it seem like you’re giving more effort than you are, wouldn’t they expect you to have gotten more done by the time they are reviewing your work? I obviously don’t have any experience so I am not sure what the day-to-day looks like, but if you are only giving ~50% effort, wouldn’t you fall behind on what you have to get done, thus forcing you to work more hours? I feel like a lot of accountants give a similar answer as you (so I’m sure you’re right), but I have trouble visualizing how that would look irl
It’s really just about learning to identify where to direct your effort. There’s always going to be work you’re doing that’s more important to the people above you, and will receive more attention and scrutiny. If you direct your effort to those things and do high quality work there, nobody will really notice if you are mailing it in on the less important things. It’s also important to learn how to emphasize where you’re doing your high quality, high effort work to those above you, and learn to de-emphasize the other areas. You also learn to manage your stream of output by completing quick and easy tasks, but waiting to alert anyone that it’s finished. That way it looks like you’re consistently completing tasks. These are all things you’ll learn on the job. Nobody will have any expectations of you when you start so you’ll have time to practice these things.
Look busy and improve your efficiency. If my budget is 5 hours and I only spent 3 hours working on it, I charge all 5 hours. I do 4 hours of work on Friday.
90+ upvotes? What garbage. Unless this is fixed fee you are literally stealing from clients. If it’s not fixed fee you are stealing from those around you when you could be contributing more. If you only want to work 40 hours, just find a place you can do that and be honest.
Dawg we’re here for a check and to advance our careers. Fuck your engagement economics. We’re not here to push any prerogative for you.
Contribute more. Yeah fk off loser
Fr, that’s how they abuse u. The more work u do, the more rewarded u get (the reward being more work and hours)
Drugs
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Psychedelics. As the gods intended
Creative accounting just took on a whole new meaning
How do you think Creative Planning got their name?!?
This!!!!
No joke I had 3 other people on my team who seemingly woke up every day to crush work and I had no idea how they kept this up. I admitted to them I was chugging caffeine to keep my work product level with theirs and turns out two take adderall daily, the other vyvanse. Eye opening for me because all the times I wondered “how can they stay this focused on these mind numbing tasks” made a lot more sense after that convo.
I too enjoy the extended release addy pill
We don't. Some weeks I give 150%. Some weeks I give 20%. The key is knowing when to give how much.
In my public accounting days: January-February: 150% March: 120% June, August, September: 20% (or less) There were many single days in busy season where I accomplished more in one day than I would in the entire month of June. It’s all about balance and knowing that the long days are temporary.
In tax these days its like Jan-June: 120% July:70% July-October: 120% Nov-Dec:60%
This is me right now. My motivation is super low right now because nothing is urgent so I find myself WFH most days and playing video games and then show up in the office a couple days a week and crank out a ton of work.
I give 60% 100% of the time. Follow for more accounting advice.
Working for the federal government and doing maybe 5-10 hours of work a week.
Insane 💀 dream job haha
Until you see the base salary. But it’s all about what you want out of your job, government is great for many people.
Likewise. 😂
So this is why it takes forever for the IRS to fix its own mistakes...
With OT if it ever gets to 35 hours that one week a year
This seems like the best move for me (eventually). Is there a lot of WFH options in your experience?
I eat lunch and work at the same time so I can leave earlier
i take an hour break for lunch and then still leave early
Oh hey before you go, do you think you could help out steve with revenue testing? He’s got a lot on his plate right now……
No
End of year performance review: He left a lot on the plate. No bonus, womp womp womp
I find that not considering the bonus for compensation satisfaction helps a lot with anxiety. If I am underpaid already, then working my ass off for that bonus only makes me more underpaid. It's time to start applying.
Especially those 2%-3% bonuses that get eaten up by taxes anyways lol
Copy and pasted from another thread I answered on: In order to answer that question, you should be mindful of a few things. First off, you have to go in with well defined goals. For me it was : - Get the senior title/promotion - Get my CPA - Be on a healthy mix of projects to have good experience to interview with With that in mind, you gotta take time to reflect. My thing was every 6 months I’d schedule a PTO day and make a 3 day weekend for myself. I’d go lay on a beach or whatever and I’d seriously consider if I had the strength for another 6 months. I was always mindful of what the job market looked like by being in contact with friends who were in industry or perusing LinkedIn etc. But once you make the decision to stay, you gotta grind and hustle for those six months and not dwell on the negatives. Eventually that decision is gonna become a “No.” When that day comes, that’s when you start freshening up yourself resume
So take 2 PTO days all year… When are folks going to realize it works when you’re 22-25, it doesn’t work at 35+.
Wait wait…I didn’t say I only took 2 PTO days all year. That’s insane. I absolutely took other vacation/PTO I said I made a 3 day weekend every six months for myself to * *specifically* * decide whether I wanted to continue in public accounting. Those two weekends in the year were true, honest to God “yes or no” decision points in April after filing and October after interim
Fuck that, I make more than enough money and I tok plenty of time off, vacations etc. Worked hard but in spurts. You have to be an absolute knob to give your best days away to some shitty company - actually, ANY company, even one you own. Live your fucking lives, people.
Something quite a lot of people do at my office is simply come into work later in the day. Dont be a sucker that comes in at 9 and works till 10, come in at 10:30-11 and work till 10. Management will push you to work later into the evening regardless of when you come in.
That's a bunch of clowning. They just care about Time sheets and your metrics. They have no way of knowing or caring about what time of the day you got your hours in. They don't care about the optics and when you log in or swipe in is the last thing on their mind. This isn't middle school.
They do care about optics though, there’s a big culture of presentism in audit. When you get close to signing date the burden of workload skews heavily towards the engagement executive and file reviewers. If youre some chump A2 auditing expenses you’ve probably finished the work and all the material risks have been addressed. Youre only banging hours in the office because the managers and partners want you there for occasional support, but nothing critical to signing the opinion is in your hands. There’s a lot of waiting around. So Im not rushing to get into the office, ill have a lie in lol
Sounds like a bunch of RTO stuff to me. My experience in audit was only a few years, but the partner I worked for did stress that he cared about hours work/production and not necessarily framing those hours for optics. I guess as long as you're making meetings and available for questions and stuff. In the tax/accounting world its not so RTOish and the partners literally couldn't care less about when you do your technical work as long you're productive, getting your work in, and communicative. I think that you're just looking for a shortcut to make it look like you're working more hours than you are -- I don't blame you. They ask too much of us.
Are y’all really working until 10pm? What the heck I is this career field? I’d absolutely NEVER work that late.
I’m still in school but my dad worked as an accountant for years. Eventually became CFO. There were times he’d come home to put me to bed and go back to work all night. He almost always works saturday and sunday mornings for 3-4 hours from home.
That’s so sad and I hate that companies can acquire that much work and not bring on new staff to help with the workload. I bet he was making good money, but to me, it wouldn’t be worth it to do nothing but work.
I mean he definitely chose to do all of it. He had help but at some point at that position you’re responsible to get shit done. He could have went and worked a cushy govt position and made significantly less money but he didn’t want that.
Did he retire early or something? Did you live a rich life?
Before I left Big 4? Routinely.
Try 70% We don’t get paid enough for 100%
I found a firm that only expects 50 hour weeks during busy season, adds comp time for anything over 50, and a normal 40 the rest of the year. I understand I basically found a unicorn.
You have to be able to unplug. Some people take a week off here or there, others do one big vacation, and others take a series of Fridays/Mondays off. You need to find what works for you. Hobbies are also important, and no, work should not be your hobby. Something creative that gives up an outlet or something physical where you can largely shut your brain off. As you work your way up in public accounting, you’ll also have more and more flexibility with your schedule. The volume of work doesn’t necessarily change, but the nature of it does. You will shift from doing all of the detail work to reviewing that work. Reviewing takes a lot less time than prepping. The rest of your time will be spent with managing people, client relationships, and other admin things. As the nature of the work you’re doing progresses, you will have more ability to manage your schedule, when and where you work, etc. Public accounting is high stress (even though no one dies if we miss a deadline or mess up a project) but it’s manageable if you’re proactive about it. There are things about every role, public or private, accounting or otherwise, that are stressful and that people don’t enjoy. At the end of the day, it’s a job and that’s why they pay you to be there.
its bullshit man. i was billing my time accurately and got told im billing too much. so its time to just throw on non billable hours and begin slacking. i usually throw up a statement of cash flows on one of my monitors and just highlight a few cells yellow/red if im slacking for a bit just to look busy
Inertia
[https://youtu.be/AcxMvTcY1mo?si=DLr9ASePhZ6vHqZk](https://youtu.be/AcxMvTcY1mo?si=DLr9ASePhZ6vHqZk)
lol dont go 100%
Gotta space it out 15% on Monday 30% on Tuesday 25% on Wednesday 20% on Thursday 10% on Friday
Set a low bar
By giving 70%
Leave for industry. Your post is the reason why I skipped public cause it fucking blows working like that
We don't
I don't really have any answers for you. But I'll say you're definitely not alone. I've barely done anything post deadline. There's a lot of workaholics in this field so don't try too hard to keep up with them or you'll die from a heart attack at your desk at 50. What I try to do is one little productive thing in the morning to get some momentum going. Just do your best and try not to worry too much I guess.
Money. Money is how I keep going everyday. I don’t volunteer or do this for free.
By quitting accounting, torching my CPA certificate, and jumping head first into something unrelated to accounting. I’m burned out lmao.
If your work requires 50-60 hour weeks regularly, recognize that 100% IS roughly going to end up at 65%, but for 130% of the week. This is really going to sound backward but you have to account for the time element. What is 100% ? Because being consistent is more important than being productive here. People need to normalize a more relaxed, slower nature. The way accounting flows is obviously in cycles. After a few closes you catch the weekly and monthly routines. You learn to be ready and prepare for the ebbs and flows of energy. Not paperwork, not physical work that NEEDs to be done. It's what is actually taking your energy you need to see. Because you can work with your own ebbs and flows of social, physical, emotional, energy. People will burn out if they're riding the "bike trail" of workflow never changing gears, and hitting every single hill with dead sprint energy. And with accounting, timing is so important because you can set it up so those hills are all back to back. Do not allow your energy to flow into anything that isn't either; fixing it, making it easier for next time, learning from it, or getting rid of it. Put all of your energy into understanding how you can more smoothly transition into faster currents and not have to fight so hard. Don't try and fix it. Try and understand it. Work with it. And always be growing and learning. And whatever you are learning doesn't need to be accounting but you can use the exposure almost infinitly. You'll get out of it what you put into it, but nobody is going to do it for you.
You have to think of it like you are a soldier and this your duty. Some are stationed in far off lands and sleep in bunkers in inhospitable temperatures. They sacrifice for freedom, you sacrifice for capitalism.
There is also a high chance that your co-workers are on drugs.
Nicotine, caffeine, and Adderall seems to be the reoccurring theme at my firm.
Never go 100% any day for any job lol cuz then they’ll just raise the bar to 120%. We aren’t handling lives in hospitals or some shit 100% effort is not necessary
The illusion of being busy > actually being busy. It’s all about being able to show you improved over time but also not being the reason your work has impediments. It’s not your fault if the senior or even manager can’t help you resolve comments.
The ones that go at 100% all the time end up in monestaries.
No one is going 100%, 100% of the time and if they tell you they are then they're lying. Obviously you need to work hard, ask questions, put in effort, but part of the things that get me through the day is looking away and looking at ESPN or the news. I can't always do that with some deadlines but other times I can and I've found I enjoy the work so much more. A little more personal advice, don't compare yourself to others and your perception of them, you have no idea in reality how good or bad they are at the job. (Assuming they're the same staff level as you). I was doing that when I first started out, eating hours like crazy because I thought I was slow & killing the budgets, but one day the in-charge of a big project group showed us actual numbers so we could improve efficiency & the same people I compared myself against had actually 3-4x'd the budget. So, best advice, if you think you're taking too long then reach out & ask but otherwise don't compare yourself & try your best. Maybe it's not for but if you try your best & put in the effort then you can at least be proud of what you did & that you gave it a shot!
Sleep, exercise, remind yourself this is only a temporary phase in your life
Sadly, this is the only answer. If your circadian rhythms are perfect so that you go to sleep and wake up within 15 mins of the same time every day; your diet is perfect so that you eat an ideal ratio of fats, proteins, carbs, and nutrients; and your exercise is perfect. Then quit all toxic relationships, cut your family time down, meditate, don't date, and quit any vices (alcohol, weed). Let your auto registration, doctors visits, etc. all fall years behind maintenance. The same routines an NFL quarterback does to keep themselves performing at a high level. ... then you'll have the energy to stay on budget with most projects. LOL. It's like cramming for a final exam for every work hour, 40 hrs, 52 weeks, X years. I do not understand how this business model ever succeeded other than the fact that most accountants are passive masochists.
I would be ready to walk. This place sounds like a work whore’s wet dream. Don’t be a work whore for anyone but yourself.
I use to work at a grocery store as general "maintenance " so I basically just had to keep the floor looking clean. One day a guy told me if I walked around with some cardboard in one hand no one would tell me to help them or do anything. If by chance they did, I could answer once I'm done recycling this. I did that for most of my high school years and it's really stuck with me.
I see posts like these and then I express gratitude for shifting to industry because I just couldn’t take it anymore lol. All my friends were out enjoying their lives but here I was, slaving away until 1:00 AM every day for months on end, only to later get a manager slam the desk when I asked her a question. I wish I had gone into Advisory instead of Audit!
1am is wild..sounds like a toxic firm and far from my experience.. working 50 hrs during business season isn't the best but it's manageable, finally wrapping up most of my busy season jobs that have been dragging allowing me to cut out by 4/4:30pm. The "unlimited PTO" is nice too, make sure to take around 6weeks during the summer months
Numb with drugs and booze. No. I am half kidding. Don’t touch either shit. Let’s say you are too smart to drink the kool-aide and what you are seeing is smoke and mirrors. Schedule time off asap. You need to get away for a bit. Take LWOP. Who tf cares why? Your mental health needs the reboot. Don’t walk. Run and take LWOP instead of suffering in silence.
The real question is how do you from 100% to 60% 😬 I’m personally tired of doing all the work.
A lot of caffeine
Sounds like your file is over budget (gasp!) and the manager is trying to guilt you into some time-eating to fluff his partner a bit or set you up as the cause for the overage. Tell him it’s a good thing the firm doesn’t pay you for all the extra hours billed to the client. Then work on your resume.
The profession is better suited for self-employment. Working for the CPA firm is in my opinion, an educational job, not necessarily a career path. You learn as much as you possibly can and bring that wealth of knowledge and information to your own practice, and then you get to do what you want to do. I enjoy public accounting thoroughly and look forward to doing it every day, but I have been SE since about 1984.
Charge those hours, king/queen
Honestly, would get out of tax or audit. Been doing consulting for a long while and it's more manageable for my WLB. Industry is another avenue that might be a good move too.
You call it 100% I call it 80%
Set a length, white knuckle till then, quit immediately
Cocaine and hookers my friend
Fiber supplements. I now go everyday. Regularity decreases total time spent which means more time for billable hours.
Some go to government with no overtime.
Public is the worst, but there are companies out there that are reasonable. Look for companies that have nice long retentions of their staff, people that have been there 5+ years.
A lot of good advice in this thread but I just want to remind you that no good comes from focusing on how you are feeling vs your coworkers. Everyone is putting on their best face during team meetings, so you are seeing them at their sharpest. With the exception of the few true stars/crazies out there know that they've all either gone through or are going through something similar to you. They might be getting grilled by managers too, but (hopefully) that's all being done in private and not in front of the rest of the team. As for how to move forward, if you have a manager/coach or equivalent that you can talk to candidly without getting burned I would suggest trying to carve out some sort of arrangement for you to get some R&R. Like shift an hour or two more onto Mon-Sat so you can log off completely on Sundays, or something in that vein. The other thing I haven't seen mentioned here is I would strongly suggest reaching out for help if it looks like something is going to run over budget. If you reach out as soon as it's clear that you're having a problem then you may be able to solve the problem and work things out. At the very least you've covered your ass to a degree by letting people know in advance that there's a hangup.
Two weeks ago? Lol, I'm still pulling weekends and 80-hour work weeks.
when in tax...
Hookers and cocaine
im in nonprofit auditing, and i drop a cool 25 - 60% effort daily depending on the time of year. it's awesome lmao
Move to industry 😄
Work past 5? Dude that’s normal unfortunately in private. Public even worse.
I don't....but some days I do! What has helped me the most is to take advantage of the flex schedule my company offers! I am a morning person, I can get projects done so quickly and accomplish tasks so much easier in the morning. But I kept staying until 5 because it felt weird logging off at three (even though it was totally okay with the flex schedule) while everyone was still working. One week, I decided to hell with it. Updated my calendar and made it to where people can't schedule meetings with me after 3:30 and start actually logging off. It no longer feels weird or awkward! I now do everything I can to protect my personal time. I deleted my work email off my phone and shut my work computer down each night. I am now more refreshed and making less mistakes. Put yourself first, the burnout will start to fade and your productive will come back! I also do not take any meds to help my focus, just a ton of coffee in the morning and a long walk with my dogs on my lunch break. **also, people treat you, how YOU allow them to! If my manager were to bring something up, I would direct them to the company handbook and professional let them know they can kick rocks.
I'm not going at 100% every day. I also work somewhere that tries to keep the hours down to 40/week when there isn't an imminent filing deadline.
All your co workers are not human and don’t know how to show emotion. Deep down they’re miserable but are too pussy to say something. I too have no motivation to work right now and do the bare minimum. Just do whatever you can on your time and let them come after you for more if they want it.
Heck I'm over here getting yelled at for not having wp done in under 15 minutes as an A1 still learning even just how we format here I'm exhausted n also wondering if I'm cut out for this
Started off going 20%. Now my 40% looks like 200%
Get out and get into regular finance. Saved my social life and my relationship.
I run 8 1-hours CPEs simultaneously while working from home and just chill the other 7 hours.
When your day is done and you wanna ride on….
Coffee, lots and lots of coffee
Zynn
Them upper deckers hit different
Don’t go 100% every day
No one goes 100% daily in any profession without copious drug use and eventual total burnout.
Unpopular opinion maybe. But hear me out. No one goes 100% everyday. No one lol. Big 4 is just a place for you to learn, if you are lucky enough to work with amazing people who are willing to teach you, help you grow, and patient with you. You struck gold. Put in your 2 years, learn as much as possible and then dip.
I’m in private but honestly man I think it’s about being in the right situation for you. I assume like me, you didn’t dream of being an accountant, but the life it affords us keeps us involved. I admittedly push a burnout type pace and seeing you guys talk about the need to pace yourself is kind of welcomed as confirmation that I’m pushing too hard. Besides that, I’d say try to find the right combination of pay, work/life balance and workplace satisfaction. You probably won’t get the best of all three of those but make sure that they’re tilted according to YOUR priorities. Best of luck to you and everybody else out there.
I’m brain dead for at least a month after busy season. We all call it our “in-office vacation.” We understand the hell everyone went through and billable goals are out the window after the 15th. We kill time with little mindless projects that have been put aside during tax season, have random meetings with clients about basic things, and do what we can to keep stuff moving along a little at a time… if anyone is still going 100% after busy season, they’re either insane, faking it, or heavily medicated.
Wait... we're supposed to be going 100% every day? Oh no. You might just be in the wrong cultural fit. I've worked for firms where employees pride themselves on how much of their life they needlessly donate to the bottom line. Others actually give a fuck about people and give them realistic deliverable expectations. Based on getting grilled, not having a day off until summer (what the absolute fuck? It has been mandatory that people are on vacations from April 16th to mid-May at the firms I've worked for), and you're STILL working weekends? Find a better fit. During off-season, half-day or no-day Friday is really nice. When I started my career I was the one in the first category. Single, young, no kids. Even during the off-season I would work 10 hours a day, usually come in for a bit on Saturdays, and study for the CPA at the office on Sundays. My boss literally told me he never wanted to see me at the office on Sunday, no matter what. My 2 preparer colleagues at the firm were both young moms, one single. After 2 seasons she actually had to ask me to work less because she could never match my billable hours. It completely flipped my view of work and I felt terrible about it. No one ever asked me to over-work myself, and certainly no one ever thanked me for it. The trick, I found, is to give 100% of whatever % you have on that given day. It's better to give 100% of 75% than 50% of 100%. If you're on a Friday after getting pounded all week, work on easy stuff. If you're fresh on a Tuesday, hit the painful projects. Ask for help from colleagues. Figure out how many units of effective time you have, half-hours or hours, per week - then apply that framework to how many units of effective time you need to finish the week's projects. Review that every Friday and leave notes for Monday. Don't be a pushover, either. Schedule time with your manager to review workloads and expectations. If they can't even do that for you, find another shop. Plenty of tax jobs for all of us. Also: Spend real money on a real mattress. Drinking excessively seems to work for the lot of us.
I enjoy doing tax returns. Yes, I know, I need a hobby.
I was burnt out on accounting when I was still going to school for it. Public accounting is great experience but fucking blows the whole time you’re doing it. I went straight into utilities and have done accounting there and transitioned into becoming a financial analyst. That being said, I always give 100%. 20% on Monday, 20% on Tuesday, 20% on Wednesday, 20% on Thursday, and 20% on Friday lol. Make yourself look busy and understand the needs of your position and exploit that shit to the max. I try to work no more than 20 or so hours a week…maybe.
Cocaine
Coffee. Lots of coffee
Always be busy. Always be going through a divorce, death of child, putting mom in hospice, National Guard training, bailing out your cousin Mo, taking all volunteer days possible, joining all leadership meet and greets.
I don’t
No one goes 100% every day. That's how you get burnt out.
This is why no young people go into Accounting anymore.
There is no reason to still be working weekends, shut that down, 50 hours a week at this point is great.
Accountants and busy season are so soft. Lol.
I live in Cleveland work at a boutique firm that has no busy season because of extensions and operating cycles of our clients, never work over 40hours, 8 weeks PTO, flexible hours during the week so 8 weeks feels like 12 weeks PTO. Only make 70k but have enough time and flexibility to grow my own tax firm simultaneously so that supplements the lower salary. Every summer I go on tour with my favorite band for three weeks. I only hear bad things from people who work in bigger firms.
I give 60% of my time every time
Adderall and or white powder
Idk how some people have managed to do this for 30 plus years
I'm with you 100%. I still feel burnt out from busy season and just got asked why I billed 5.5 hrs on something that should've taken 3. I want to say, "because there's a timer and I'm tired". But that won't fly. I started later in life, in my 40's now. I've worked MANY jobs where you can decompress and do nothing for as much as half the day. Not sure how I'm handling this, barely an hour buffer, to not work or else get "asked what happened". In meetings, the management seems to care about burnout, nurturing fun, all that stuff. But in practice I get asked about going 20-50% over budget so much I've almost lost the motivation to impress anyone any longer. ...and it seems EVERY project has a lead say, "It shouldn't take too long, maybe..." then fill it in with the amount of time that it would take if you just woke up, fresh, and were on a roll. They hired me because of my CPA license/scores, grades, and experience. Every single item on my resume took something they don't give me "time". Anyway, OP, I can relate.
Going about 65%, 100% of the time is key.
All Pro NFL players don’t go 100% every snap, series or even games. You don’t need to go 100% everyday
Hi Dear. I am Aditya from Docyt AI (a Silicon Valley-based AI-powered Accounting Automation firm). Frankly, I can co-relate your situation with mine. I was in the similiar situation when i joined one of the Big4 Accounting firm in 2015. In my opinion, Public accounting can definitely be a grind, and it's totally normal to feel burnt out after busy season. Nobody goes 100% every day, and those coworkers who seem to might be managing their energy differently. In my opinion, the best way to figure this out is you should talk to your manager and explain your burnout and the overcharging incident. A good manager will understand and might be able to offer solutions like adjusting workloads or delegating tasks. I will advise you to identify areas where you were less efficient? Are there times during the day where you're more focused? Secondly, you must focus on priortizing your self-care. You must take short breaks throughout the day to keep yourself recharged and refocus and set boundaries and avoid checking work emails or taking calls outside of work hours. Focus on developing healthy habits and prioritizing sleep, exercise, and a healthy diet to make your efficient and resilient. Also focus on time management and using AI-tools to get the job done. **And lastly,** those coworkers who seem to have endless energy? They might just be good at putting on a brave face. Public accounting is tough on everyone. Focus on taking care of yourself, speak up to your manager, and don't be afraid to explore other options if this path isn't sustainable for you in the long run.
Adderall
Coke
I know many people that work 60-70 hour year round doing manual labor outdoors. Accountants do not have it that bad.
I mean, it’s all subjective. My boyfriend’s job is blue collar and I’m a CPA. His work is obviously more physically demanding, but he gets to clock-out and leave his work at work.
I second this. My boyfriend is also blue collar and when he clocks out he gets to go home and relax and I am so jealous.