|
Quotes
"What role can the Professional Services Industry play in designing global, regional and industry solutions to the crisis?" 
"All of us in the professional services industry can play a critical role in responding to the current economic crisis. Our organization’s particular focus on financial reporting, tax exposure, or transactional opportunities, means that we help our many stakeholders understand better their own financial condition, the risks they face, the obligations they must meet, and their options in meeting new challenges. One of our most important goals is to bring informed confidence to those stakeholders, since that confidence supports healthy and well-functioning markets at the root of all prosperity. We cannot do this work alone. We must and will work with investors, executives and policymakers to create the kind of dialogue around possible solutions, promoting common global standards, preventing the rise of self-defeating economic nationalism, and re-establishing public trust in private enterprise and our economic system. We have to think and act with an eye on how our individual actions and the actions of our many stakeholders can return confidence and prosperity to our economic system."
James S. Turley, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Ernst & Young; Co-Chair of the Professional Services Governors Meeting 2009 
"Everyone across all industry sectors is acutely aware of the fact that we are living in times of high uncertainty. In such times, the professional services industry has a uniquely important role to play along multiple dimensions. First, the industry is well positioned to help other organizations reduce their levels of uncertainty and to manage the residual uncertainty better. It is important to remember that the bulk of uncertainty in companies and organizations is created internally, not externally. It is also important to note that many organizations do not manage external uncertainties well. Professional services firms can help in both regards. Secondly, times of uncertainty compel most organizations to return to fundamentals to improve their competitiveness and to defend and increase their advantage. And, again, the professional services industry can assist in honing the capabilities of companies to survive and even prosper in tough times. Lastly, times of uncertainty are often and legitimately considered times of risk and, oftentimes, times of unusual opportunity. The professional services industry can help organizations chart to chart a balanced course, both avoiding the downside or unnecessary risks and seeking possibly favorable risks, but also in identifying the special opportunities which such times present." Mark B. Fuller , Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Monitor Group, USA; Co-Chair of the Governors Meeting for Professional Services 2009 
"In such a diverse industry grouping the main activities to assist in a recovery should focus on future prevention of a similar recession. Governance issues should rank highly in our order of priorities - governance of our own sector and governance recommendations for governmental / financial monitoring agencies.We should make it a priority to nominate a “credit rating” agency to the PS Governors Board and engage them in constructive improvement processes. In addition any members of the Board engaged in audit/advisory services should be encouraged to agree to new standards of transparency and supervision."
David Arkless, President, Corporate & Government Affairs, Manpower Inc. 
"Unprecedented times create the opportunity for professional services firms to add real value not only in helping clients adjust to rapidly changing market conditions, but also to emerge on the other side of the economic cycle more competitive and stronger than ever.In tough times, there isn’t the same resistance to change that occurs when times are good. We have a role helping companies look at their human capital and their retention and recruiting strategies, in order to assess and reward the top performers who will help sustain revenue and profitability in a downturn, and also to identify or recruit those who will be critical to success long term. Effective management of benefit costs is essential. Pension plan investment strategies need to be assessed. For many companies who need to reduce staff, outsourcing non-core functions becomes a high priority. Finally, we have a role in helping our clients ensure that they are following the highest standards of compliance, control and integrity as they take these steps." M. Michele Burns , Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Mercer 
"The professional services industry is known above all else for its human capital. The combined expertise of lawyers, accountants, consultants and others should now be deployed not only to articulate the concerns of their clients but to contribute original thinking shorn of political rhetoric and long on real-world analysis.Governments are demanding rules-based solutions. In circumstances where professional status is generally underpinned by rules, the professional services industry is well placed to find sustainable regulatory responses calculated to enhance public confidence." David Childs , Managing Partner, Clifford Chance 
"Professional services firms, especially in the accounting and legal disciplines can provide greater global coherence in codes of conduct and international conventions on "best practice" norms in their respective disciplines.In addition, professional services firms can also provide guidance on effective ways to cultivate inclusive human capital strategies that can achieve a "step change" in performance and increased mobility across markets."
John Conroy, Chairman of the Executive Committee, Baker & McKenzie 
"The Professional Services Industry has provided support to all of the financial services firms which have failed or faltered (Bear Sterns, AIG, Lehman, Citigroup, Merrill Lynch, etc.), as well as to Bernard Madoff, who used an obscure accounting firm. Our industry must do more than be passive providers of services. Our whole industry, including law firms and accounting firms, must have clear standards of accountability to flag impending failures and misdeeds, and to insist that we know about any off-balance sheet accounts, and other non-transparent actions by our clients. We should also insist that rating agencies, which are professional service providers, have clearer, public guidelines they follow in determining their ratings. These rating agencies played a major role in the financial crisis, by often giving AAA ratings to suspect securities. The Professional Services Industry should consider adopting its own Code of Ethics and Conduct in dealing with financial firms. The World Economic Forum has performed an important service in bringing our industry together, and permitting us to debate issues of how we can better serve the public."
Stuart E. Eizenstat, Partner and Head, International Trade and Finance, Covington & Burling 
"Emerging successfully from these troubled times will require a commitment to thinking beyond business as usual. Enterprises must get creative and think beyond short term issues to build more resilient and robust business models for long term success. Professional Service providers can help their clients, and their own firms, seize this opportunity to examine every aspect of their business model and lay the foundation for sustainable growth and improved competitive advantage. The most successful companies will re-examine the ways they develop, sell, market and deliver their products and services to optimize their cost structures and better serve their customers."Timothy P. Flynn , Chairman, KPMG International 
"The global professional services industry represents an enormous aggregation of technical skill, management expertise, and intellectual capital. As such, the industry has the capability to communicate with and provide advice to diverse audiences in government, academia, and all types of business.These intangible assets make the industry uniquely positioned to facilitate and implement multi-stakeholder discussions and solutions, thereby fostering the collaborative mentality necessary in these challenging times."
Paul A. Laudicina, Chairman of the Board and Managing Officer, A.T. Kearney 
"The industry has various areas of expertise that are relevant to the issues being confronted. Our first charge is to offer that expertise to those influencers and decision-makers whose responsibility it is to effect positive change. An open question is whether or not the industry should take public/social policy stances on issues affecting our clients."
Mark Mactas, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Towers Perrin
"One of the most important contributions the profession can make is to help restore market confidence and meet the needs of investors by supporting the ongoing development of transparent financial reporting and the consistent implementation of high-quality accounting standards. Such standards deliver transparency and comparability, and therefore support market confidence. However, they require a robust standard-setting process that permits all stakeholders to participate, even if only on compressed time frames. We can also continue to work with standard setters and regulators to minimize differences in the application of standards and to further the goal of convergence to one set of high-quality global accounting standards. This supports the work plan spelled out in the G20 declaration." James H. Quigley, Global Chief Executive Officer, Deloitte, USA 
"The Professional Services Industry should take an active thought leadership role, helping our clients address the critical issues of our time. We are in a unique position to gather data, observe patterns and provide critical information and insight that cuts across multiple entities, industries and geographies. By helping our respective public and private sector clients succeed in this time of unprecedented turmoil and financial stress, we will be helping industries, regions and the world we all share."
Jeffrey R. Tarr, President and Chief Operating Officer, IHS Inc.
Michael Träm, Global Chief Executive Officer, Arthur D. Little |
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
 |
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
"Human beings have been designed by nature to interact in smaller local groups. How they will interact on a global scale is one of the big questions mankind will grapple with over the next century. International PSCs face these same issues internally and may therefore help in developing ways to interact. The present financial and economic crisis has shown that globally coordinated and enforced rules are necessary to avoid or at least mitigate similar crises in the future. Neither national nor local governments are well placed to create such globally coordinated rules, leave alone enforce them. This is where international PSCs are ideally placed to help with the creation and implementation of such globally coordinated rules."
"Professional Services Firms can provide insights, benchmarks, tool and techniques across different industries and across different countries and regions of the world. So clients benefit from the wealth of experiences with similar situations but in completely different firms. Based on that expertise, cost cutting activities on the one side and growth supporting activities on the other side can be developed with much more creativity, innovation, out-of-the-box-thinking and objectivity which is all needed to find solutions for the crisis."