20110603 ~ Workrazy!

Should anyone of you happen to be religiously reading my blog – which I figured shouldn’t be a lot of you – I should apologize for not updating you on what’s-ups and what’s-downs for the month of May. Not because nothing happened during that month but because I had been a busier than your average bee lately.

I admit. I’ve gone a little crazy workaholic-y since we moved into our new office space. It was like a curse. One day we were in this easy breezy (needless to say eerily old and dirty), nine to five-thirty workspace, and the following day we moved to the city’s business district and all just spiralled into this competitive, eight to ten pm job like I was back in my old auditor days.

And yeah, I got promoted. So that’s another reason why I stay in the office so late. Promotion = more work ≠ higher pay.

I guess it’s the Japanese way (I work for a Japanese company – take your pick at which one) where they try to pack as much work on one person as much as he can take. I guess it’s me not being able to say no to the things that needed to be done. I guess there are a lot of higher paid people who don’t do their job properly and I have to “make it work for the team”. I guess the line between being responsible and being workaholic is so thin it’s almost invisible.

Or maybe I do like – and enjoy – my job.

(I cannot believe that I’ve finally managed to put that into words.)

Regardless of the hours I’ve spent late unpaid nights finishing my and other people’s work and thinking about it even after I get home, I still manage not to hate the company that feeds me (and the boss that grades me). Where I am now, I feel, is like a puzzle broken into a million different pieces that I strongly think I can put together to make some sense out of – even for just a tiny corner of the picture. It’s challenging and much, much more demanding but I have to – I want to do it.

And I guess I won’t be leaving my work until I do just that.

Death by Audit!

News of the death of an auditor in a big 4 firm went viral today as thousands of auditors scramble to meet the April 15 deadline of filing financial statements and tax returns.

Angela Pan, an associate auditor for PricewaterhouseCoopers in Shanghai, China is said to have succumbed to what looks like cerebral meningitis that could have been caused by an infection due to poor immune system – most probably caused by lack of rest. She was working 120 hours a week, based on hearsay from friends.

This story may or may not be true, but it does strike a chord for everyone in the profession. Can someone really die for living the FF (“For the Firm”) mentality? For those who have little or zero knowledge of the business cycle of an audit, here’s a simple, too good to be true runthrough: At the end of the year, companies make their financial statements, auditors come in to check if the fs are more or less correct (or free of material misstatements as they say), auditors issue their opinion, and – depending on their contract – they may also assist in filing of income tax returns. Finally, auditors get paid. Done!

Sounds simple enough – but nobody’s that perfect. Some clients are decent, considerate and near perfect, but some just don’t really give a hoot as to what they’re presenting to the auditor. They think they’re paying the big bucks for the auditor to magically fix everything that’s wrong with their financials. A lot of them don’t even bother making the FS and preparing the ITR because the auditor can do it themselves. They slack off when they know they still have enough time, not giving the auditors what they need immediately, thinking that as the tax deadline nears it’s not the accountants who have to burn the midnight oil – the auditors can easily take care of it. Some even ask the auditors to start doing fieldwork even if the fs (or the trial balance) are still a mess – or not even close to decent. They just want to be able to say that they started the audit on time and expect the audited fs to be released as scheduled. For the price they are paying, clients don’t just want a signed piece of paper – they want to see auditors work through their professional fees.

Likewise, some auditors also do slack off.  They go to work at 11am, have lunch at 12nn, maybe watch a movie or two. Fact is most of the auditors today are young and fresh out of school so they tend to want to enjoy their first few years of work hanging out with friends. As the deadline nears, that’s when they start to cram on all sorts procedures. Though they do get the job done, it’s usually a photo-finish event and not without sleepless nights in the office.

Back to the question of whether or not you can die by being an external auditor. Maybe. If you choose to make clients depend on you like you are their personal accountants. If you choose to have only 3 effective hours during your first eight hours in the office – and spend the rest of the period socializing or dozing off. If you choose to ignore materiality and do a 100% audit even if it’s not called for. If you choose to make your staff work like a machine and thereby have never-ending, all-nighter reviews. Maybe yes, if you choose to forget that there is life outside the office and would really, really would kill for the job to get overly done.

So to all the auditors out there who haven’t slept for days, congratulations for having reached the 15th of April with your sanity intact. You have managed your job well enough to remain alive until now. Being an auditor is a terrific profession if you know how to handle it right. Don’t let it eat you alive.

25-year-old Shanghai PricewaterhouseCooper employee worked to death? – Shanghaiist.

Brandon Boyd Art!

For those who lived in the 2000′s alternative music age, you would know Brandon Boyd as that guy who is the lead singer for the band Incubus. If you’re a little older, you’d know him as the guy son of the Marlboro man. Or if you’re just a plain girl watching MTV, you’d know him as this gorgeous piece of man in the video of “Wish You Were Here” or “Drive”.

Those are all correct. But for me, Brandon Boyd is simply one, fine artist.

Brandon Boyd’s work is simple and raw and needless to say, eccentric yet he uses conventional tools from watercolor and acrylic to plain markers. What’s most notable is the detail that he puts in each work and the story he has to stay about each of his pieces.

His name just popped in my head this morning as I was rummaging through my dusty art stuff. Google helped me find his art and what he’s up to now.

His gallery is one not to miss – if only I could be in California.

Drive Safe Dubai!

Driving in Dubai is horrible – not in an infrastructure sense like in Manila (all roads here are close to  immaculate). It’s the other drivers who make it that way.

Just this morning, a terrible accident occured at a highway going to Abu Dhabi. It occupied a 2km stretch of road and involved 127 vehicles, 59 hospitalized and 1 unfortunate casualty.

Thanks Gulf News!

The culprit? Fog has significantly reduced visibility to only 5 meters. But that doesn’t mean it’s entirely the weather’s fault (investigation is ongoing so there’s no one main reason that can be pointed out yet).

Only the driver can tell if the weather conditions are “driveable” so to speak. When driving through fog, the vehicles fog lamps and hazard lights should be turned on (and headlights in low beam). Drive slowly. And if I were to travel through that same condition, I would’ve just pulled over at Mickey D’s, grab some breakfast and read the paper at a petrol station while waiting for the road to clear up. It’s better to just prevent an accident from happening, dont you think?

Because when you’re in doubt, just stop. Drive safely everyone!

The Color Ping!

Today, Senator Ping Lacson re-surfaced after the Court of Appeals dropped the warrant of arrest against him related to the controversial Dacer-Corbito double murder case.

He went into hiding becase he thought that the whole case being pinned against him was just a way for the then President GMA to get back at him for his exposes of the President’s alleged corruption. If that’s the case, why didn’t he go back after PGMA’s term, at the moment P-Noy stepped into Malacanang? Why did he wait for the CA’s decision on his case?

As a Senator he could have been the perfect person to demonstrate trust on the government and the judiciary. Maybe he knew that somehow someday that arrest warrant was bound to get overturned so he decided to just wait for that day to come.

But the thing that most puzzles me about Ping Lacson is this: why does he wear make up? Pink blush on? C’mon, he could’ve at least picked an earth tone. Di bagay dude.

Racing Grannies!

Meet the racing grannies.   They’re one of those useless things you spend money on.  How can I help it? It gives me hours of fun just getting them to stand up and walk straight.

I bought this pair over at Debenhams in Manila. Aren’t they just adorbs!

Lady Gaga was born that way.

Everybody’s talking about Lady Gaga’s new single Born ThiS Way. She herself added to the hype to it, not releasing the song until it was ‘perfect’. I’m not exactly a big fan of her but I’m open to whatever’s good to my ears.

When she finally performed the song on stage, I was a bit…I don’t know. I was snickering. Born This Way was anthem-ish. The beat, the lyrics, the tempo. Everything. LGBT’s everywhere loved it. It’s not a bad song, it was ok. And I don’t have anything against LGBT’s so the lyrics are fine too. It’s just that I think it’s a bit of pop from the early 90′s. With a touch of Madonna’s Vogue. Maybe someone could try to mash both songs up. Madonna after all was the Queen of Pop at one point in time.

And the video is simply bizarre. Like a lot of funds were put into the effects, maybe not much on costume (were they wearing any?).

I don’t know. What do you think?