Inspiring our people

People and talent management

Our people are at the heart of our organisation, and we invest significant resources into making PwC a great place to work. With over 5 000 professionals around South Africa, we come from many different backgrounds and places. Guided by our purpose, culture and values, we work together to build trust in society and solve problems for clients and the communities in which we live and work.

These values and culture define the shared aspirations and expectations we have for dealing with our clients, stakeholders, communities we operate in and each other. They also impact how we behave, make decisions, treat each other and deliver to all our stakeholders. Act with integrity, make a difference, care, work together and reimagine the possible.

At PwC we support our people by:

Creating a positive workplace
Agreeing expectations upfront and managing performance continuously to ensure that everyone knows what’s required to meet our goals
Upskilling our people by providing learning and development opportunities tailored to individual needs
Ensuring we have enough of the right people to perform the work we do, at the quality required.

Creating a positive workplace

We aim to create a workplace where everyone feels included, supported and safe. Every year we conduct a survey to find out how our people feel about working at PwC. This year 86% of our people took part in the survey.

At 72%, our SA engagement score reflects the extent to which employees feel passionate about their jobs and are committed to the organisation. The PwC global engagement score is 75%.

The vast majority of the 4,482 of our people who completed the survey told us that the people they work for support and demonstrate high standards of ethical conduct (76%), that the leaders they work for act with integrity (76%) and that they encourage ‘one-firm’ collaborative behaviour to provide quality service to our clients (71%).

Our people also tell us that PwC is a place where they can grow and achieve their career ambitions, with 70% saying that they are involved in work that is meaningful to them.

There are also opportunities for us to improve. The percentage of our people that feel that the people they work for are considerate of their life outside of work is 57%. On the upside, 73% of them say that their team leaders trust them to perform their work using flexibility options without compromising the quality of their work. We continue to invest in programmes to help our people to work flexibly and manage their energy and personal wellbeing so they can be their best selves at home and at work.

Agreeing expectations and managing performance

At PwC every employee has a team leader and a coach to support them in the delivery of their work, their development needs and wellbeing. All people are expected to set annual goals agreed with their team leader and coach and to obtain continuous feedback on their performance and development areas.

We’ve invested significantly in technology to digitally enable our people to receive real-time feedback that’s focused on improving their skills and performance. Tools used for this include Snapshot and Workday.

Snapshot is used to capture feedback on work, and assesses progression against the five dimensions of the PwC Professional Framework, identifying development actions where appropriate and highlighting examples of differentiated performance. Our people are expected to obtain continuous feedback throughout the year. During FY19, 13 565 Snapshots were completed.
Workday, our cloud-based global people management system, is used to capture and track progress on our performance goals.

Feedback forms a key element of our annual appraisal process. Partners and staff assess their performance against their agreed goals and against grade-related skills and capabilities based on the PwC Professional. The appraisal process covers technical competence and quality, and consideration is given not only to what an individual has achieved, but also how he or she achieved it. We continue to place particular focus on the contribution and impact our individuals and teams have made to the firm.

Our top performers have the opportunity to progress faster and to receive higher reward and recognition through pay progression and bonuses. Individuals who perform below average will progress more slowly, and where performance is unsatisfactory, corrective action is taken.

Global People Survey results

Training programmes

Assurance

We pride ourselves on knowing that we add value to South Africa’s economy by developing talented CAs that grow into the leaders of tomorrow, whether they remain in the profession or not. One of our key highlights was celebrating our 328 successful Assessment of Professional Competence (APC) candidates. The pass rate for our African, Coloured and Indian (ACI) candidates of 69% was higher than the national average of 85%. We congratulate all our candidates on reaching this key milestone in their careers.

Assessment of Professional Competence results

- Written in November.

Initial Test of Competence results

PwC candidates vs total SAICA, June 2019

SAICA learnership

Active learners: 1 394 (2018: 1 239)
ACI 54% (2018: 54%)

Audit Development Programme

The Audit Development Programme (ADP) is a period of specialisation undertaken by professional accountants intending to become registered auditors (RAs). It provides a context wherein the consolidated capabilities developed in the training programme can be refined in a more complex learning environment and in performing roles more senior to those undertaken during the training contract. There are currently 12 managers registered on the ADP.

Read more about our Assurance training programmes in our Transparency Report.

Excellence Academy

In 2018 we welcomed 50 new joiners to our Risk Assurance Excellence Academy.The academy is an intensive five-week training programme run in January of each year that prepares the new joiners for work — equipping them with the business and technical skills required to succeed.

The programme consists of a one-week in-office induction, two weeks of business skills training run in conjunction with the Advisory Foundation for the Future programme, and two weeks of technical skills training. The business skills portion is aimed at building confidence and interpersonal skills.The technical skills training prepares participants from our Digital Audit unit for work on IT audits, which are carried out in support of an external audit opinion.

As the Risk Assurance business grew in 2019, so did our intake of new joiners. We welcomed 84 new participants — an increase of 68% from 2018 — from Gauteng, the Western Cape, and KwaZulu-Natal.

Foundation for the Future

The Foundation for the Future is an 18-month graduate programme focused on developing consulting skills across a broad spectrum of business capabilities in our Advisory practice. We recruit a broad variety of skills to support our client delivery model. The graduates possess a variety of qualifications that support diverse problem solving and innovative thinking. The programme encourages applications from multiple disciplines to nurture diversity in skills.

The programme further encourages diversity, with 60% of graduates over the last five years being female and ±70% being African, Coloured or Indian. Over the same period the programme has evolved to align to the local market and drive our ‘One Africa’ approach to conducting business. This year saw participants from across Africa attend the five-week induction programme in Johannesburg.

After induction, the associates rotate through the various Advisory competencies. The plan is to have them permanently join one of the Consulting competencies upon successful completion of the programme.

The curriculum requires the identification of capabilities for engagements across business units and lines of service, with technology as an enabler. Experience obtained during engagements helps associates build their careers and set a growth path for their futures.

Associates are deployed to engagements that demand skills that often require innovative thinking and fresh approaches to problem solving. With an emphasis on continual learning, both on the job and through a structured curriculum, young associates are equipped to work together to help clients solve important problems.

PwC Deals EMEA graduate programme

Edge is the graduate programme for our Deals business unit across Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA). It offers graduates a unique value proposition with the aim of developing the next generation of market-leading deal advisors. The programme includes international Deals events, rotations through at least three Deals competencies, local and international onboarding, undertaking a globally-recognised professional qualification and receiving PwC ‘Masters of Deals’ certification on completion.

In 2018, 359 participants from 27 EMEA territories took part in the programme, of which 24 were from Africa (six from South Africa, seven from Nigeria, eight from Kenya and three from Ghana). The 2019 programme saw Mauritius join as the fifth African territory, with the week-long EMEA-wide induction event commencing in Madrid, Spain, on 23 September.

The Edge programme is at the heart of our Deals strategy. The aim of the programme is to attract, develop and retain a new generation of diverse, technology savvy, well-rounded and well-networked graduates into our business. Diversity of skills, gender and race are are key to the programme, with 61.5% of the South African participants being female and 77% being African, Coloured or Indian.

Tax Professional learnership

We had 15 trainees registered on the Tax Professional learnership nationally in 2018, based in our Waterfall (Johannesburg), Port Elizabeth and Cape Town offices.

The learnership is three years and our trainees were split as follows for 2018:

1st years: 7
2nd years: 5
3rd years: 3

The trainees rotate throughout the practice and gain exposure to various specialisms. The practice benefits from the organic pipeline that this learnership provides. The firm provides support to the learners through mentoring and training, both formally and on the job, and financial support for their preparatory courses and the qualifying exam fees.

Tax currently has 22 trainees registered on the SAIT learnership nationally, based in Waterfall, Port Elizabeth and Cape Town.

Our trainees are split as follows for 2019:

1st years: 10
2nd years: 9
3rd years: 3

Enhancing digital acumen and business skills

PwC’s Business School offers a distinctive approach to training, focusing on key skills and core competencies to ensure that our people reach their full potential through a personalised learning journey. This enables our workforce to contribute effectively to our business as well as the industry as a whole.

During the year under review we invested R72.1 million in skills development. Employees received an average of 39 training hours per annum. We also invested R14 million towards formal education of our workforce in the form of bursaries. We further invested in an innovative learning experience platform that supports continuous, personalised learning for individuals.

The training we provide is designed to be flexible to meet individual needs and support personal career growth. The curricula we offer ensure our people are equipped with skills and competencies to provide our clients with quality service and innovative solutions. We continually evaluate our programmes for quality and effectiveness and they are consistently highly rated by our attendees.

As a global network, PwC adopts a global approach to learning. This enables us to access quality programmes, which we tailor for our specific market. This standardised approach to learning allows our workforce to have mobility across Africa as well as the rest of the world. This exposure gives our people a unique forward-thinking mindset that ensures quality output.

Our learnership opportunities are highly rated in the industry and we attract a large number of trainees, (1 394 for 2019) and our trainees consistently achieve above average pass rates in their professional exams.

Our distinctive approach to upskilling and continuous professional development contributes to PwC’s reputation as a quality professional services firm.

The implementation of real-time feedback tools and new learning platform, Vantage, have encouraged our employees to develop areas of learning identified as part of feedback and performance discussions. Self-paced learning through Vantage with learner-generated playlists is increasing the development of our people.

Partner development

During the 2018/2019 financial year a number of partner development programmes, in addition to technical skills development and other professional continuous development, were presented to partners. These programmes were focused on developing the business skills of partners at an investment cost of R5.8 million.

These programmes were presented locally by local business schools and specialists as well as internationally through the PwC network.

We also presented several other initiatives in support of the wellness of partners during the year. These were mainly focused on financial, physical and mental wellness. In addition to these programmes, 16 partners also took a two-month sabbatical during the financial year.

During the financial year partners in PwC spent 10 333 hours in total on their technical, professional and personal development — this amounted to an average of 37.4 hours per partner for the 2019 financial year. Of these hours, 3 601 hours (13 hours on average per partner) were concerned with enhancing business skills and ethical behaviour.
(2018 stats)

Training hours per employee

Real-time people feedback

Our new PwC Professional behaviour feedback tool — Snapshot — was implemented in September 2018 and allows all employees to get real-time feedback on their performance. Snapshot feedback was used in the annual performance review process.

Mobility across Africa, and beyond

Our global mobility programme is a key area in our business. The objectives of our global mobility programme are to:

Give our people the opportunity to work, live and develop in a different country
Broaden the global acumen of our staff
Enable our people to develop new skills and expertise and possibly bring these back to their home territory
Share knowledge and expertise across territories
Fill short-term staffing needs for other territories during peak periods

The global mobility programme is split into long-term and short-term assignments. Short-term assignments are for periods of less than 12 months and assignments longer than that are classified as long term.

Outbound assignments
Inbound assignments

During the 2019 financial year, 130 of our staff, mostly assurance staff at the end of their three-year training contracts, went on short-term secondment assignments. The average period of these secondments was three months. The majority of these staff were seconded to the US, Sweden, the Netherlands and the UK. This is a great opportunity for them as they start their careers as qualified chartered accountants.

During the 2019 financial year 359 of our staff were on long-term assignments. Of these, 119 commenced their assignments during the year. Most of these staff were seconded or transferred to the UK, the Netherlands, the US, Australia, Canada and a number of other countries.

PwC South Africa hosted 51 inbound short-term secondees, mainly in our Assurance and Advisory businesses. Most of these candidates were from India, the UK and the Netherlands. Their assignments were for an average period of four months.

There were 99 foreign PwC staff members working in South African on long-term assignments during 2019, of whom 31 commenced their assignments during the year. The average period of these assignments is 40 months. The majority of these staff members are from the UK, Kenya, Nigeria, and the US. A total of 42 staff from other African countries were on long-term secondment in South Africa during the year.