1. Pay. They are very quick to tell you the pay is based on "market level" and not company earnings. I say a world class company should pay world class salaries. Average companies pay average salaries. If you are working your employees to the bone and the results of that work makes you a billion dollar company, share the love...I was recently approached by a defense contracting company in the DC area and they offered a salary that is $40k more than I am making now to do essentially the same work. Former junior colleagues of mine left the firm in the last year and are making $10 - 20k more than what ACN was paying them.
2. Flexible working schedules. The company has policies that support flexible working schedules. However, supervisors tend to develop their own interpretation of what's allowed and not allowed and like to blame it on "the client" (i.e., "The client would never agree to letting you work a 4-day week")
3. Performance reviews. Pay is tied to performance. However, the only definition of performance is the review your supervisor writes. If you and your supervisor don't see eye to eye...well, you can kiss that decent rating good bye and don't expect him/her to go to bat for you in the laddering sessions. We have so many other additional ways to measure performance (i.e., the results of the 360o evaluations, client feedback from QA sessions, recognition through the Celebrating Performance program) - why can't those feedback mechanisms be incorporated into a more holistic view of someone's performance and base the final rating on that?
4. Experienced hire knowledge not always appreciated, especially by those who "grew up" in the firm (i.e., started working there right out of college and have now made it to the executive level). If you are an experienced hire you should expect to be brought in at a level or two below where you think you should be. If you have ideas and experiences that are different from what the Accenture Delievery Methodology framework prescribes you are unlikely to be able to use them. (i.e., "where did you get that (insert document/template name here)? Did it come from the ADM? Well, use the version in the ADM")
