Help with this silly question please?!

lauramarie13

Hi all,

I am due to start a position with a Big 4 firm in September and have just been sent some on-boarding documents to fill in. One of the questions asks me “what percentage of your week would you prefer to work from home, 0-100%?” and (according to their form) this question is being asked with the aim of enabling people to get the right work-life balance. I am not sure what percentage to put down, like I would appreciate being able to work from home every now and then as needed, but, as this is my first job, I would also be looking forward to spending time physically in work (which probably sounds naive of me haha!), however, with the current covid-19 situation, I suppose they want us to be as available as possible to work from home in order to facilitate social distancing in the office. Basically, I don’t really care that much so I’d like my answer to be the easiest option for them to facilitate and I want to appear flexible.

Any insight ye could give me on this would be so appreciated, I know this is such a silly question but I’m just a little bit nervous heading into this Big 4 world (I didn’t do an Big 4 internship either, which doesn’t help haha!)

Thanks so much!

Jim2007

lauramarie13 wrote: »

Hi all,

I am due to start a position with a Big 4 firm in September and have just been sent some on-boarding documents to fill in. One of the questions asks me “what percentage of your week would you prefer to work from home, 0-100%?” and (according to their form) this question is being asked with the aim of enabling people to get the right work-life balance. I am not sure what percentage to put down, like I would appreciate being able to work from home every now and then as needed, but, as this is my first job, I would also be looking forward to spending time physically in work (which probably sounds naive of me haha!), however, with the current covid-19 situation, I suppose they want us to be as available as possible to work from home in order to facilitate social distancing in the office. Basically, I don’t really care that much so I’d like my answer to be the easiest option for them to facilitate and I want to appear flexible.

Any insight ye could give me on this would be so appreciated, I know this is such a silly question but I’m just a little bit nervous heading into this Big 4 world (I didn’t do an Big 4 internship either, which doesn’t help haha!)

Thanks so much!

If you are working for a big four it is unlikely that you will be in their office very much of the time....

I once spent an entire year living in the Talbot hotel in Wexford!

Daisy03

As the previous poster said you may be out on site a lot depending on what dept you are in. FS is normally in the office more.

If i were you I would ring the HR dept and talk to them. Normally there are induction programmes. The year i joined we had around 8 weeks in a conference centre for training. Obviously with Covid19 these will probably go online but they will want to make sure the intake gets to know one another.

orlaxxx

Also starting big 4 but maybe with a different firm because haven’t gotten any onboarding forms. Perhaps say 50 percent ? Maybe the easiest answer.

Any word on when the intake will be this year for these firms? One of my friends in another firm has gotten a start date for November but we have heard nothing yet and starting to get concerned.

fishy_fishy

I'd want to be in work/on site 100% of the time as a new associate. It'll be difficult to pick up what to do remotely and also if you're not well set up with a separate home office it'll just be a nightmare. Remote working for management is fine, for new starts it's far from it.