Hopelessly Compromised or Just Hopeless?

In a recent client call we were discussing the continuing PWC scandal and the implications for his business.

My client had written a Master's Thesis on business ethics in the 90s, following years of scandals at the intersection of corruption between State government and business that we fondly call the "WA Inc" era. So he has some big things to say regarding the Big 4.

He said his business is impacted because the exec and the board has for decades gone to the Big 4 for all kinds of services. As his business is very highly positioned in the financial sector, managing scores of billions in assets, they have relied on the Big 4 as the "standard" safe vehicle for all kinds of investigations, reports, audits, etc.

He has, however, delighted for a number of years in holding to account the consultants at those firms when they come and report on his own business's practices. He merely mentions their own scandals and the consultants go instantly quiet. Unfortunately, in the position he is in and with some direct government involvement in their industry, he was not able to extricate them in the past from their contracts.

He is now pushing up and out differently: PWC is so hopelessly compromised that even if the local consultants are "good people", you can't trust the machine.

My client says he's advocating that State and Federal government make immediate moves to cancel contracts and move to smaller contractual sources with greater integrity and accountability. His own business must take immediate action. Waiting for a several month investigation by Ziggy Switkoski is a fundamentally flawed and conflicted approach that will yield nothing. In the meantime, will you spend half of a financial year waiting for some report and the slow enactment of its contingent recommendations that will undoubtedly absolve key partners, etc, of their responsibility?

My client thinks it's all a bad joke and leaves their business AND THEIR CLIENTS exposed. They need prompt and sensible action and strategy to ensure their business's safe continuity.

And herein lies a lesson: As a consultant, I go in to make action happen. Quickly and with import. I can do it, not by spending years analysing a problem to death, with reporting that by the time it is released the people and the world has already moved on, but by using my expertise to quickly ascertain the situation and needs and then assist in the rapid implementation and ongoing adjustment of response, as we - my client(s) and I - navigate the demands of the moment.

And I can do that without direct authority!

If you are "leading" your people by waiting endlessly for reports and committees and for a host of others to make and implement decisions, then what are you there for? You may as well ask chatgpt to do all your thinking and implementation for you. You'll get lousy results, but what's the difference?! But that's the way, incidentally, that PWC has approached this "crisis" of their own making. In fact, it's how they got there.

If you're doing anything remotely similar, you need help! And I know just to whom you should not go for assistance.

Use expertise to achieve better results, not endless reports.

(c) 2023 Peter J. McLean

Get in touch with me for executive advising and leadership concierge services, strategy, performance, transformation and, most importantly, when you want great results, not more reports.

https://www.dhirubhai.net/in/petermclean