Ted Wilm is closing in on four decades at PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP, the New York-based Big Four accounting firm with a significant stake in Orange County. The local office in Irvine employs 375—making PwC one of the Big Four in OC as well.
The time and the talent has naturally entwined to illustrate some serious maxims on serving clients. Maybe not at the Marcus Aurelius mountaintop level but in the same neighborhood, amid the focused context of professional services work.
He offers the well-worn line about a firm being a family—in this case, “PwC Orange County.” But he fleshes that ethos out in the next breath.
“As a family we take care of those around us,” he told the Business Journal. “Those we love, those we work with, those we serve as clients, and those in our community.”
Treasure Maps
So add serving OC to serving PwC clients and add treasure to the time and talents Wilm’s office deploys to do so.
PwC’s work in these realms brought it recognition as the large local workforce honoree in the Civic 50 listing this year, the third annual compilation (see page 31, and related stories in this issue and Special Report).
It’s a philosophy backed by commitment and execution.
Internationally, PwC is based in London, with annual revenue eclipsing $41 billion and a global workforce topping a quarter of a million. At such size, civic initiatives begin under the corporate umbrella.
From 2013 to 2017, the bean-counting behemoth branded their worldwide effort Earn Your Future, and played to its strengths in financial literacy, bringing those skills to those who otherwise might not learn.
Big Waves
Then in more well-worn and quite welcome fashion, it put its money where its mouth was, making its next five-year foray, now underway, a $320 million push, Access Your Potential, to cultivate tech-savvy in 10 million students.
The overall effort looks to enhance the ever-in-development “diverse, tech-skilled workforce” as the company puts it—and this will surely benefit the firm and its clients down the line, as well as the broader economy.
Initiatives include providing teachers a smartphone app to assess digital knowledge; a robot that travels to schools to show how technology can be used in daily life; and free, open-sourced curriculum on coding, data analytics and, once again, financial skills.
Local Motions
PwC-OC helps move these global glacial efforts into specific local opportunities for involvement. An internal team reviews volunteer options. The company starts new employees with a $25 giving credit they can direct to a favorite charity; 95% do so, and 60% come back with more contributions of their own through the firm’s giving program.
“Put your heart into it, your head will follow, and great things will happen,” Wilm said. “Doing good for others is a contagiously, wonderfully warm feeling.”
The OC office gave more than 7,000 volunteer hours in 2018 with more than half of office staff involved in some way. It values that time at about $1.75 million.
A local favorite of the staff is Big Brothers Big Sisters of Orange County & the Inland Empire, in Santa Ana, with $7 million in local revenue and 3,200 volunteers.
A PwC-OC partner, Gary Wilson, has been on its board for a decade and office staff hosts “Big for a Day” events, for subjects that have included, yep—financial literacy.
“Someone likely helped each of us along the way,” Wilm said.
“Make a difference … in someone else’s life,” he said. “You will love the feeling.”
