Poor management and communication - Anonymous employee BDO Employee Review

1.0
Jun 10, 2024
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

I was well paid. The junior level staff is largely excellent. A week off between Christmas and New Years.

Cons

TLDR: Bad communication, bad management, no feedback, frequent layoffs. 1) Despite specifically asking about my on-boarding plan during the interview process and being assured there was one, there was not. My on-boarding plan was to read a 70 page legal document. I was never trained in a single task. 2) There is a culture of having lots of meetings, but decisions or action items are rarely determined in these meetings. I believe they are just to increase billing. I was told by junior staff they liked working with me because when I scheduled a meeting with them, they actually understood what the action items were, which was unique among people of my level or above. 3) I was lied to about receiving a bonus my first year. I was told to be eligible for a bonus in my first year, I had to join by a certain date in November. I set my start date specifically to meet this deadline, but I did not receive a bonus my first year. Had I known I would not have received a bonus, I would have taken more time off between jobs. When I raised this with my career advisor, he said he would try to resolve it, but he never followed up. 4) My career advisor was completely absent, often canceling check-ins at the last minute. 5) The circumstances of my departure were rude, cruel, and shady. My performance reviews had all been Successful, including my most recent mid-year review. Since that time, I had taken on numerous new responsibilities and a new project. I had developed what I thought to be was a good rapport with my project manager, and she was actively continuing to assign me new tasks and responsibilities. Then I was called out of the blue to inform me that I was being let go for performance reasons. I had never once received any negative feedback from my career advisor, and my project manager had indicated that I was largely succeeding in my role. I do not claim to be perfect, but I performed my work on time and accurately. I have no idea where this came from, and attempts to reach out to my project advisor to ask for clarification were ignored. I have since received out reach from many colleagues offering support, to indicate they believed I was treated unfairly, and that they would happily vouch for the quality of my work. 6) They had three layoffs in the 18 months I worked there. Not stabile.

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5.0
Jun 2, 2026
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Pros

Strong team culture and they offered great flexibility throughout the internship.

Cons

High workload during busy season (although that is expected)

1.0
Jun 22, 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
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Pros

Compensation is OK. There are some really nice people in the organization to work with, but you have to find them.

Cons

If you are not part of the SWC "club" (company name prior to them joining BDO), good luck. Poor leadership!!! Practice lead talks to everyone like they are talking to a CEO, not relatable in most cases. No clear employee development plans. You are held accountable for things completely outside of your individual control. They stress incorporating AI into work strategy, but have no plan on what that looks like or how to do it and want everyone to formulate it because leadership has no roadmap. One has no control over where you want to take your career, yet you are expected to know everything, about everything. As a result, you become an expert of nothing! Work assigned rarely leverages skills, almost as if they throw darts to see who works on what.

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