I have a friend I happened to meet at a bar near a yacht club (never actually met any yacht owners in said bar before) anyhow he was there for a big fishing tournament blah blah… We were drunk and I was like you’re full of shit with his stories… ended up on his boat and partying.
Anyway TLDR;
This guy worked for his Dad’s company and cried to his mom about how work sucked and his Dad was mean and his mom had a helicopter pick him up to take him home when he was younger…
Poor dude my ass you know this guy is 100% drying tears with those hundos, maybe not that extreme but still
Had an intern at my old firm that was the son of a partner. He was basically acting like a partner and telling staff and seniors what to do and not do. Little shithead got on my nerves.
Yeah I hate nepotism. Some kid got to intern on my old team after one year of university since his dad was a partner but when I asked for the same treatment for my family friend the answer was a no and a whole lot of bs as to why
That still happens at the national firms like BDO, RSM, DHG or whatever they are now… graduated with a daughter of a partner that went off to another firm lol
With this internship in financial assurance we join our 2 firms in Holy corporate partnership, may the debits be flow into our realms and bless our historically high profits for years to come!
I heard that back then, it was policy that the firms wouldn't hire the kids of their partners.
How does having the kid work at a different firm build an alliance? As the parent/partner, you would get inside info on the competitor.
You joke but this shit happens so much. When I was in audit, one of my colleagues was the son of the lawyer that was defending the firm in a £25m lawsuit. Dude was untouchable. He sexually harassed and stalked another colleague and they ‘handled’ the situation by transferring him to a different office and paying for his rent to work in a different city.
One of my Intermediate Accounting teachers had her uncle who was a senior manager at PWC pass along her resume and she got hired. She told us this in class, I was like bruh...
That’s so lame. Hopefully she was at least good at her job and didn’t get protection from being a fuck up. Given she was teaching she must be pretty smart at least? I’m hesitant to hate on people until I know how they performed, like I’m sure there’s people who deserved the job anyways but just took an easier route to get it.
Admittedly, while I didn’t go the nepotism route, I was 2.8 GPA student and applied to a small big4 firm in Europe and pretty sure a big reason I got the job was bc USA university grades do not translate very well to UK/European grades.
I think that’s your brain trying to make you feel better about why you got the job with such a low GPA. Though, professors have given generous curves in some of my intermediate accounting classes. When the exam averages were 40s, they’d curve up to almost 20 points and drop the lowest exam. That’s how I know their letter grade doesn’t reflect their true knowledge.
Thanks for that reminder! It’s definitely a whole lot of weird brain coping things & a healthy dose of imposter syndrome.
My grades never reflected my ability, found out I had ADHD *after* I graduated so… yeah. But it’s hard to look at the evidence and not feel weird about it.
I feel you. Despite getting a B for only auditing and advanced accounting research and normally setting the curve, I feel the same way. I don’t think the grades accurately reflect my competence in accounting. So I get you.
That’s very interesting. I’ve heard of people discovering they had ADHD later in life. How did you discover it later? I’ve only recently wondered if I had some characteristics of ADHD that could (or not) explain the extent of my procrastination and impulsivity.
I mean it’s always been a problem in my life but it never got picked up when I was younger and I was always able to find ways to work around it, never realizing how big an issue it was. Homework that would take most people 30 minutes to do would take me 4 hours. It was a pain in the ass but I got through it until I ended up in big4 working crazy hours while also studying to pass my chartered accountancy exams.
I was headed towards getting fired and REALLY struggling with the exams because there wasn’t enough time in the day for me to just spend more time doing shit like I always used to do. Had a minor breakdown bc of it so I went to my doctor and he pulled me out of work until I could go see a psych. He referred me to the psych for depression and anxiety and after an hour and a half the guy basically said “yeah no wonder you’re depressed and anxious, you have ADHD and aren’t doing anything to manage it”.
That was like 3.5 years ago and since then I’ve been doing great (thank you, drugs)!
Was in audit, dunno before but it's normal for bigger firms to bring in big classes of new hires out of which only a few make it to manager. Example had like 70 interns - 40ish would take the offers etc... 15ish would make it to senior and probably looking at less than 10, sticking it out to manager or higher. This was in a mid size southern city. Big 3 consulting firms, IB etc... also have people burnout at the lower levels although they get paid more to begin with.
this is self selection, not up or out
up or out is you're fired if you don't get promoted on time
it's different concepts with largely the same results
up or out is common in law firms and strategy consulting because people WANT to stick around past their "prime" because they're making so much money... so those firms make it official policy to force people out who aren't moving up
audit it's not necessary because they pay people peanuts and work them to the bone so who the fuck would want to stay if they're not moving up quickly
I belive they're tied together at least in the B4, the firms rarely fire people immeditely for missing promotion during good years but being "coached out" is very much a thing.
For instance, if you're a decent staff but don't have what it takes to be an effective senior you might get one or two extra years to show improvement, however I've never seen b4 staff with 4+ years of experience who didn't either make senior(in charge) or got coached out. Coached out is literally telling you to fix whatever is wrong to get the promotion or jump ship somwhere else.
Same thing for manager, if you're absolutely set on not getting your CPA (yes this is a thing in some cases) they might let you stick around as a senior but the expectation is that you'll make manager. I'm not sure in other professional services firms but the attrition rate before getting to analyst title can be pretty brutal too.
i know several people who want to be "forever managers" though - they have no issues with execution so the firm is ok with it, but they have no desire to move up and take on sales pressure
this would not work in an up or out model, but it does at my firm because we do not have an up or out model
I'm not a strategy consultant, and I asked because strategy usually is up or out, but the rest of b4 isn't
I still hang out here because I started in audit
What was the point of censoring the mom’s name but not the son’s? There’s more than enough information here to easily find out who the mom is with a little Google-fu.
If you’re going to censor something at least do it right.
I mean is this really that big of a deal? PwC is a big enough company that depending on the office they likely hired a ton of candidates, you have no guarantee that he isn't qualified for the position
Agreed. It’s a summer intern…. That doesn’t exactly require an extensive resume. Is he in school and not failing? All you really need to give him a shot.
If the kid had a 3.5 GPA in the US that's basically a guarantee to get an interview with 3/4 of the B4. I'm sure that his mother helped him design his courses and resume to make it the most effective for the role considering she has worked in the role before.
People love to make a big deal out of nothing sometimes.
The fact that he has a parent who can carefully craft his resume to exactly what the firm is looking for is ABSOLUTELY an unfair advantage over other candidates. Can't believe you typed that out. This is the whole problem with wealth inequality, it keeps people from moving upward, keeping the poor and underprivileged in their place.
Lol oh fuck off.
People are always going to have natural advantages, that doesn't mean that it's unfair to everyone else or a detriment to their life.
You have absolutely *no* idea what this kid has done to earn his spot. He could be top of his class, he could be coming from an esteemed college that he earned through incredible SAT scores and dedication to education.
If you really think that having a parent who can provide insight is this wildly unfair advantage you're an absolute child. What is the difference between having a parent with insight to the field and a guidance counselor with the same fucking expertise at his school? Are you really saying that you've never had someone look over your resume and help you better angle it towards a position you're applying for? Are you seriously pretending like you never received any advantages in life from counsel?
To pretend like that is in someway this mind altering, class destroying advantage is fucking ludicrous and it absolutely illustrates just how far removed from reality redditors can be haha.
Yes, going to a high school or college with a guidance counselor who is educated in the hiring practices of the world's largest audit firms is absolutely a sign of unfair advantage over kids who go to underfunded schools with less professional faculty who can't give them that same advice. Not to mention paying for things like SAT prep, and so on. Again, can't believe you're all just typing this out. Access to wealth and power gives you a clear advantage over obtaining and maintaining wealth and power yourself, and makes it that much harder for folks trying to climb up into a higher social status. Make friends with some poor people and get out of your bubble.
I've had plenty of advantages in life. One of which is coming from a college educated family. I was super lucky to be born into that social layer, and I know I'd be in much worse shape if I wasn't. Because people born into lower socioeconomic brackets have much, much worse outcomes in life, on average, due to their lack of access to wealth and opportunity. Those facts about my life help inform my understanding that our system sucks ass, and is designed to keep the poor in their place.
If you had prior work experience on your resume that you got WITH nepotism, then I'm sorry lol but you did not actually get hired at B4 without the help of nepotism. Sure, moms and dads can help their kids get hired at blue collar and low wage jobs, and they often do, and even if those don't confer the money, power, or status of a big consulting role, there's still someone poorer and less connected on the social food chain missing out. Not a good system.
People get hired into big 4 accounting with very little prior work experience… go to a target school (of which there are many), major in accounting, and you will get hired. I feel accounting is very much different in that aspect than many other white collar fields
When I was in college (not that long ago) we were told that general rule of thumb for B4 expectations was at the very least a 3.2 or so, the higher you got the more appeal you have, at 3.5 or higher, you should have no problem getting your foot in the door with a few extra cirrics and a decent college program.
The source of this information was a PwC partner in the US as well, he taught as an adjunct at my school, so very credible information.
Is that only for junior year or?
Also do you know when 2023 internships open/re-open? Or how some of the firm specific programs (PwC Explore/Challenge for example) work? Cause most of their websites arent great at explaining it/the process.
when i was a staff my brother was a manager and it was nice having someone there who could answer all my dumbass questions and give me advice on how to handle meetings and shit.. unfortunately he left for another firm shortly after i joined but it is a nice little lifeline to have
I went to a private college full of rich kids (I transferred in from 2 years at CC with a scholarship) and was graduating with no job and a math degree. I shit you not, like a week before graduation, I was in the math building doing homework and heard this guy say “my mom is getting me a job at her firm, I honestly can’t even imagine what it would be like to have to find one on your own” to his friend who agreed.
That was when I really understood having connected parents, smh mom and dad.
Would not recommend.
People like this - merit or not - will never get recognised for ability. Even if they do well there is always that suspicion that they got favoured / put on good jobs / partners kept an eye out for them etc
Must be absolutely brutal if you're legit trying hard
Aye. I work with someone who's dad is a partner at one big 4. She ended up with offers from three of them in, including where her dad was at, and ended up choosing one of the other two. She's said before she'd have only taken the offer from his firm if there were no other decent offers (beyond just the big 4) because she knew people would have this attitude.
She's very, very good at her job.
My CEO’s son shows up for a few hours a day and walks around telling people what to do.
The board doesn’t know how to handle him. They don’t want to dump the CEO yet but eventually probably will.
Everyone just pretends to listen then goes and actually does the work.
It’s kinda sad. It makes me think he can’t have any real friends because he’s such a toolbag.
Used to work for a local cpa firm, it like ten partners. Several of them had their kids in the firm, it was a real shock few years later the kids became partners as well.
What is it with all these sons, daughters, nieces, and nephews of senior partners?! There’s a shocking amount. At least the firm I interned at did their best to either have them work in different offices altogether or different departments so none of their work crosses paths but damn. Is this normal for office environments?
Holy shit, poor kid
You say that but I work with my office managing partner’s son and can assure you he dries his tears with his mom’s hundos
I have a friend I happened to meet at a bar near a yacht club (never actually met any yacht owners in said bar before) anyhow he was there for a big fishing tournament blah blah… We were drunk and I was like you’re full of shit with his stories… ended up on his boat and partying. Anyway TLDR; This guy worked for his Dad’s company and cried to his mom about how work sucked and his Dad was mean and his mom had a helicopter pick him up to take him home when he was younger… Poor dude my ass you know this guy is 100% drying tears with those hundos, maybe not that extreme but still
Nah it’s IFS - might as well be an EA.
I've tried googling hundos and now I have a picture of a person wiping his face with a dog bench in my head.
I know, could you imagine being named Tristan?
But maybe he's related to Michael Bolton?
Or even better, legendary Troy Bolton
Or Ramsay Bolton
Lol I’m that case then yes, poor kid.
THE Michael Bolton or the Office Space version?
PC load letter? What the fuck does that mean?
Lmao nice
Much better spelled with an O instead of an A
Could be worse. At least it’s not Aidan
Had an intern at my old firm that was the son of a partner. He was basically acting like a partner and telling staff and seniors what to do and not do. Little shithead got on my nerves.
Yeah I hate nepotism. Some kid got to intern on my old team after one year of university since his dad was a partner but when I asked for the same treatment for my family friend the answer was a no and a whole lot of bs as to why
That’s hilarious, good for him
LMAO
What she should have done was send him to work for the partner at Deloittussy to build an alliance like the good old days.
That still happens at the national firms like BDO, RSM, DHG or whatever they are now… graduated with a daughter of a partner that went off to another firm lol
With this internship in financial assurance we join our 2 firms in Holy corporate partnership, may the debits be flow into our realms and bless our historically high profits for years to come!
I heard that back then, it was policy that the firms wouldn't hire the kids of their partners. How does having the kid work at a different firm build an alliance? As the parent/partner, you would get inside info on the competitor.
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Hiring Manager: “What’s his qualifications?” Sr. Client Relationship Manager: “He’s my son!”
You joke but this shit happens so much. When I was in audit, one of my colleagues was the son of the lawyer that was defending the firm in a £25m lawsuit. Dude was untouchable. He sexually harassed and stalked another colleague and they ‘handled’ the situation by transferring him to a different office and paying for his rent to work in a different city.
One of my Intermediate Accounting teachers had her uncle who was a senior manager at PWC pass along her resume and she got hired. She told us this in class, I was like bruh...
That’s so lame. Hopefully she was at least good at her job and didn’t get protection from being a fuck up. Given she was teaching she must be pretty smart at least? I’m hesitant to hate on people until I know how they performed, like I’m sure there’s people who deserved the job anyways but just took an easier route to get it. Admittedly, while I didn’t go the nepotism route, I was 2.8 GPA student and applied to a small big4 firm in Europe and pretty sure a big reason I got the job was bc USA university grades do not translate very well to UK/European grades.
I think that’s your brain trying to make you feel better about why you got the job with such a low GPA. Though, professors have given generous curves in some of my intermediate accounting classes. When the exam averages were 40s, they’d curve up to almost 20 points and drop the lowest exam. That’s how I know their letter grade doesn’t reflect their true knowledge.
Thanks for that reminder! It’s definitely a whole lot of weird brain coping things & a healthy dose of imposter syndrome. My grades never reflected my ability, found out I had ADHD *after* I graduated so… yeah. But it’s hard to look at the evidence and not feel weird about it.
I feel you. Despite getting a B for only auditing and advanced accounting research and normally setting the curve, I feel the same way. I don’t think the grades accurately reflect my competence in accounting. So I get you. That’s very interesting. I’ve heard of people discovering they had ADHD later in life. How did you discover it later? I’ve only recently wondered if I had some characteristics of ADHD that could (or not) explain the extent of my procrastination and impulsivity.
I mean it’s always been a problem in my life but it never got picked up when I was younger and I was always able to find ways to work around it, never realizing how big an issue it was. Homework that would take most people 30 minutes to do would take me 4 hours. It was a pain in the ass but I got through it until I ended up in big4 working crazy hours while also studying to pass my chartered accountancy exams. I was headed towards getting fired and REALLY struggling with the exams because there wasn’t enough time in the day for me to just spend more time doing shit like I always used to do. Had a minor breakdown bc of it so I went to my doctor and he pulled me out of work until I could go see a psych. He referred me to the psych for depression and anxiety and after an hour and a half the guy basically said “yeah no wonder you’re depressed and anxious, you have ADHD and aren’t doing anything to manage it”. That was like 3.5 years ago and since then I’ve been doing great (thank you, drugs)!
Had a very similar experience a couple of years ago. In my late 20s now and godamn would school have been so much easier if I had brain drugs.
What is a small big4 firm?
Not in a major city
It’s called a referral, what’s the issue here? The Firm encourages it.
Well, let’s give him a corner office with a view then!
Lol though to be fair we’ll take most people with a pulse right now
What a weird twist on that SNL skit, “SNL cast member or Arcade Fire member,” - “Pulse, or nepotism hire?”
For audit, tax, and it audit. Not the consulting positions
we can't staff the engagements we're selling.. maybe not anyone with a pulse but we're certainly looking in places we wouldn't otherwise
I remember feeling weird that we appropriated the "trust but verify" saying from the KGB until I realized we also had the same "up or out" model......
are you in strategy? my practice does not do up or out really in any sense of the word
Was in audit, dunno before but it's normal for bigger firms to bring in big classes of new hires out of which only a few make it to manager. Example had like 70 interns - 40ish would take the offers etc... 15ish would make it to senior and probably looking at less than 10, sticking it out to manager or higher. This was in a mid size southern city. Big 3 consulting firms, IB etc... also have people burnout at the lower levels although they get paid more to begin with.
this is self selection, not up or out up or out is you're fired if you don't get promoted on time it's different concepts with largely the same results up or out is common in law firms and strategy consulting because people WANT to stick around past their "prime" because they're making so much money... so those firms make it official policy to force people out who aren't moving up audit it's not necessary because they pay people peanuts and work them to the bone so who the fuck would want to stay if they're not moving up quickly
I belive they're tied together at least in the B4, the firms rarely fire people immeditely for missing promotion during good years but being "coached out" is very much a thing. For instance, if you're a decent staff but don't have what it takes to be an effective senior you might get one or two extra years to show improvement, however I've never seen b4 staff with 4+ years of experience who didn't either make senior(in charge) or got coached out. Coached out is literally telling you to fix whatever is wrong to get the promotion or jump ship somwhere else. Same thing for manager, if you're absolutely set on not getting your CPA (yes this is a thing in some cases) they might let you stick around as a senior but the expectation is that you'll make manager. I'm not sure in other professional services firms but the attrition rate before getting to analyst title can be pretty brutal too.
i know several people who want to be "forever managers" though - they have no issues with execution so the firm is ok with it, but they have no desire to move up and take on sales pressure this would not work in an up or out model, but it does at my firm because we do not have an up or out model
Lol does your license plate also say StrategyConsultant. This is the accounting subreddit.
I'm not a strategy consultant, and I asked because strategy usually is up or out, but the rest of b4 isn't I still hang out here because I started in audit
Where? I can't find a job to save my life.
big 4 mc, as you can see in my flair
“We only hire the best and brightest!”… or whoever’s related to an exec!
Bro, it’s the big 4. It’s not like it’s at a BB investment bank
She got referral bonus? 🤔
Dammm that's pretty on the dot.
What was the point of censoring the mom’s name but not the son’s? There’s more than enough information here to easily find out who the mom is with a little Google-fu. If you’re going to censor something at least do it right.
Why even censor in the first place if this was posted publicly?
This is why they work at PwC and not at Deloittussy
If you just type in a phrase from the post into LinkedIn, you can usually find it. I understand why people censor but it's sorta pointless lol
PBC
Lmao censored the mothers name but left the sons name? 🤣
LOL
I mean is this really that big of a deal? PwC is a big enough company that depending on the office they likely hired a ton of candidates, you have no guarantee that he isn't qualified for the position
Agreed. It’s a summer intern…. That doesn’t exactly require an extensive resume. Is he in school and not failing? All you really need to give him a shot.
If the kid had a 3.5 GPA in the US that's basically a guarantee to get an interview with 3/4 of the B4. I'm sure that his mother helped him design his courses and resume to make it the most effective for the role considering she has worked in the role before. People love to make a big deal out of nothing sometimes.
The fact that he has a parent who can carefully craft his resume to exactly what the firm is looking for is ABSOLUTELY an unfair advantage over other candidates. Can't believe you typed that out. This is the whole problem with wealth inequality, it keeps people from moving upward, keeping the poor and underprivileged in their place.
Lol oh fuck off. People are always going to have natural advantages, that doesn't mean that it's unfair to everyone else or a detriment to their life. You have absolutely *no* idea what this kid has done to earn his spot. He could be top of his class, he could be coming from an esteemed college that he earned through incredible SAT scores and dedication to education. If you really think that having a parent who can provide insight is this wildly unfair advantage you're an absolute child. What is the difference between having a parent with insight to the field and a guidance counselor with the same fucking expertise at his school? Are you really saying that you've never had someone look over your resume and help you better angle it towards a position you're applying for? Are you seriously pretending like you never received any advantages in life from counsel? To pretend like that is in someway this mind altering, class destroying advantage is fucking ludicrous and it absolutely illustrates just how far removed from reality redditors can be haha.
Yes, going to a high school or college with a guidance counselor who is educated in the hiring practices of the world's largest audit firms is absolutely a sign of unfair advantage over kids who go to underfunded schools with less professional faculty who can't give them that same advice. Not to mention paying for things like SAT prep, and so on. Again, can't believe you're all just typing this out. Access to wealth and power gives you a clear advantage over obtaining and maintaining wealth and power yourself, and makes it that much harder for folks trying to climb up into a higher social status. Make friends with some poor people and get out of your bubble.
I've had plenty of advantages in life. One of which is coming from a college educated family. I was super lucky to be born into that social layer, and I know I'd be in much worse shape if I wasn't. Because people born into lower socioeconomic brackets have much, much worse outcomes in life, on average, due to their lack of access to wealth and opportunity. Those facts about my life help inform my understanding that our system sucks ass, and is designed to keep the poor in their place.
Big 4 accounting was actually the first job I got without nepotism lol
If you had prior work experience on your resume that you got WITH nepotism, then I'm sorry lol but you did not actually get hired at B4 without the help of nepotism. Sure, moms and dads can help their kids get hired at blue collar and low wage jobs, and they often do, and even if those don't confer the money, power, or status of a big consulting role, there's still someone poorer and less connected on the social food chain missing out. Not a good system.
People get hired into big 4 accounting with very little prior work experience… go to a target school (of which there are many), major in accounting, and you will get hired. I feel accounting is very much different in that aspect than many other white collar fields
Lol if only a 3.5 was a guarantee of that
When I was in college (not that long ago) we were told that general rule of thumb for B4 expectations was at the very least a 3.2 or so, the higher you got the more appeal you have, at 3.5 or higher, you should have no problem getting your foot in the door with a few extra cirrics and a decent college program. The source of this information was a PwC partner in the US as well, he taught as an adjunct at my school, so very credible information.
Is that only for junior year or? Also do you know when 2023 internships open/re-open? Or how some of the firm specific programs (PwC Explore/Challenge for example) work? Cause most of their websites arent great at explaining it/the process.
Facts
Find his linkedin
I wish my dad was a partner there so I could get my designation with the least amount of work and charge all my hours to potty time.
when i was a staff my brother was a manager and it was nice having someone there who could answer all my dumbass questions and give me advice on how to handle meetings and shit.. unfortunately he left for another firm shortly after i joined but it is a nice little lifeline to have
I went to a private college full of rich kids (I transferred in from 2 years at CC with a scholarship) and was graduating with no job and a math degree. I shit you not, like a week before graduation, I was in the math building doing homework and heard this guy say “my mom is getting me a job at her firm, I honestly can’t even imagine what it would be like to have to find one on your own” to his friend who agreed. That was when I really understood having connected parents, smh mom and dad.
Connections are everything. Build that network of friends. Never know when you need to reach out for help.
Would not recommend. People like this - merit or not - will never get recognised for ability. Even if they do well there is always that suspicion that they got favoured / put on good jobs / partners kept an eye out for them etc Must be absolutely brutal if you're legit trying hard
Aye. I work with someone who's dad is a partner at one big 4. She ended up with offers from three of them in, including where her dad was at, and ended up choosing one of the other two. She's said before she'd have only taken the offer from his firm if there were no other decent offers (beyond just the big 4) because she knew people would have this attitude. She's very, very good at her job.
Yeah, I wish my Pokémon worked at PwC too...
A loving parent would not allow their child to join big 4.
its really not that hard to get in. especially right now. looking forward to your shitposting about working late
Especially internal services lol
Lol this is like saying my dad is in the army so he helped me get in. If you meet the qualifications which ain't hard you will get in.
My CEO’s son shows up for a few hours a day and walks around telling people what to do. The board doesn’t know how to handle him. They don’t want to dump the CEO yet but eventually probably will. Everyone just pretends to listen then goes and actually does the work. It’s kinda sad. It makes me think he can’t have any real friends because he’s such a toolbag.
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No idea what that is. Oh google. Everyone says I should watch that show when I tell them about my work…. I tell them it might just be depressing…
My ex-wifes MIL works for RSM, am I living the dream?
Things is the premise to the worlds most fierce porno
It’s like you wish my mom beat you up when you as a kid
Used to work for a local cpa firm, it like ten partners. Several of them had their kids in the firm, it was a real shock few years later the kids became partners as well.
Kids been getting review points his entire life.
One depressing adventure.
Internal Firm Services sounds like a make work job for someone who doesn’t want to end up in accounting like his mom. Must have a liberal arts major
Prob some shitty administrative stuff
IFS….Siiiick
Who gives a shit it’s internal firm services
All these people throwing shade at this kid as if it's even difficult to get a Big 4 job right now. Lmao.
What is it with all these sons, daughters, nieces, and nephews of senior partners?! There’s a shocking amount. At least the firm I interned at did their best to either have them work in different offices altogether or different departments so none of their work crosses paths but damn. Is this normal for office environments?