Today’s Grant Thornton roasting comes not from the PCAOB (like usual) but from r/accounting, also known as the magic genie from whence a wealth of content is born. We didn’t have time to create a fake resume, apply to one of the many, many open positions at GT, and hope we get the same recruiter to verify its legitimacy, but if any firm is going to talk like this, GT would be it.
The Accounting Today links lend legitimacy as no self-respecting troll would go to the trouble of signing up for an AT account just to find some relevant links. Pretty sure not anyway.
The screenshot has been transcribed below, my commentary in brackets:
I hope things are well for you and yours. I wanted to reach out to you as your work with [redacted] is so…so…dreamy! …>Sigh<… Such SOX. Much GAAP. Aaaand I wanted to see if you might consider Grant Thornton as your next move.
Hold on. It’s too bad I gave up alcohol because DAMN do I need a drink if I’m going to get through this entire transcription. Alright, I’m going back in.
We need someone with the kind of experience you exude! [yo, exude is for things like body odor and confidence, not experience] ….Cause we’re kinda desperate. [LOL we know] We need a blue ton [someone’s been checking out Urban Dictionary!] of Accountants who are unafraid of the squirrely forest of IT, Process and Compliance risk challenges our mob of new customers seem to generate…constantly. HELP! [Dude, we cannot help you. You’re beyond assistance]
We’ll even pay, we promise! [Why does this feel like a known pathological liar telling you “it’s the truth, I swear” while their shifty eyes dart back and forth? I’m disappointed they didn’t end this sentence with “no cap.”]
OK, OK, let’s go there — yes, we hear you, we are not one of the “Big Four”. Rub our noses in it, why don’t you. <Hmmmph!> [for fuck’s sake why do you keep abusing angle brackets like this? <Uggghhh!>] We prefer to think ourselves as one of the “Big Six” — how’s that for Creative Accounting?
Quick side note here. When I Slacked this to my esteemed colleague Bramwell last night, he was quick to point out that GT isn’t even top 6 in the US. “BDO hopped over them,” he wrote with utter savagery. So not only does this person abuse angle brackets, capital letters, and reason, they also straight-up lied about being part of a thing that doesn’t even exist. There is no Big 6 but if there was, GT would not be in it. That’s not just creative accounting, it’s a material misstatement.
Moving on. God please tell me I’m almost done transcribing this.
But more seriously, we are proud of our focus on work-life balance, which, if you dig into reviews of us [don’t mind if I do!], is consistently considered better than our larger peers. [Didn’t you literally just complain about the “mob” of clients generating problems that you desperately — your word — need HELP! with? Are you managing the workload or not? <HUH??>] We are including “Employees First” in our approach to growing GT:
[Accounting Today link]
while steadily increasing our revenue and reach:
[another Accounting Today link]
The screenshot cuts off there THANK CTHULHU because I couldn’t handle much more than that without having to call my sponsor. It’s funny how they came out of the gate strong with the memes at the beginning then slowly but surely let the absurdity of their own email crush their soul and abandoned the memey quips, as any reasonable person would.
This isn’t quite as embarrassing as the time GT stole repurposed a slogan from Friedrich Nietzsche’s The Antichrist but it certainly ranks up there. Whichever book this recruiter read on how to recruit the youfs should be burned immediately and never spoken of again.
Full Reddit discussion is worth a view, it’s at 262 comments and counting. Is the email real? I’ll say this, it’s not the worst recruiting message we’ve ever seen. If this were Snopes, this one would earn a solid Mixture rating. Some truth, some falsehoods, and mostly impossible to prove because there’s no way anyone at GT is going to admit to writing this.
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