Annual BP MS 150 Bike Tour

On Saturday and Sunday, April 17 - 18, 2010, Team Protiviti had over 21 registered riders who joined forces with approximately 13,000 other cyclists riding 180+ miles from Houston to Austin in the annual BP MS 150 Bike Tour. This was Protiviti – Houston’s 8th year of participation. The tour is a charity fundraising event supporting the National MS Society's fight against multiple sclerosis.


Team members asked their fellow co-workers, friends and family to contribute on their behalf to the National MS Society. Team Protiviti achieved their fundraising goal of $10,000 and will contribute $12,555 towards the fight against MS through continued research, programs and education! While fundraising is wrapping up to date the entire event has raised over 12 million dollars!

We are proud of the Houston team members!

And The Winner Is...

As the spring semester winds to a close, so does Protiviti’s Unlock Your Potential sweepstakes. Below is a summary of our winners from the spring season.  Congratulations to all -- and to all of you who are finishing another successful semester on campus! Be sure to check back in with us in the fall for more exciting opportunities to enter the sweepstakes and unlock your potential with Protiviti.

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Congratulations to David Bozard, the grand prize winner of the 2nd round of the Unlock Your Potential Sweepstakes! David is a student from The University of Georgia and will be a proud owner of a brand new iPod Touch!

What are you most excited about winning the iPod Touch?

David: The most exciting part about winning the Grand Prize is simply that I won. Up until now, I have never really won anything. Maybe I should buy a lottery ticket soon :-) I can't wait to be able to enjoy listening to music between classes on campus with my new iPod Touch.

How did you first hear about Protiviti and the Unlock Your Potential Sweepstakes?

David: I had heard a presentation made by Chris Manning about Protiviti at The University of Georgia and wanted to find out more about the company. When I decided to attend the career fair in Athens, GA I knew that the Protiviti table was at the top of my "Tables to Visit" list. I was able to meet and talk with Chris Manning once again which is where he introduced me to the "Unlock Your Potential" sweepstakes. If it wasn't for Chris or Protiviti, I couldn't have won so a big thanks to Protiviti and Chris Manning!

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Congratulations also to the following students who won prizes in Protiviti's Unlock Your Potential Sweepstakes this spring!


March 19th Drawing

iPod Touch Winner - David Bozard, University of Georgia

March 12th Drawing

iPod Shuffle Winner – Phi Phi Huynh, University of Houston

Starbucks Gift Card Winners: Benjamin Reese, University of Houston and Megan Hafner, Texas A&M University

March 5th Drawing

iPod Shuffle Winner – Carmella Favor, University of Houston

Starbucks Gift Card Winners: Katherine Fletcher, Louisiana State University and Stephen Montellano, Baylor University

February 26th Drawing

iPod Shuffle Winner – Robert Lee, University of Texas at Austin

Starbucks Gift Card Winners: Lakshmi Archana Mahindrakar, Northern Illinois University and Yufang Koh, University of Southern California

February 19th Drawing

iPod Shuffle Winner – Matthew Leung, University of Southern California

Starbucks Gift Card Winners: John Stern, Northern Illinois University and Ravi Mendpara, University of Georgia
February 12th Drawing

iPod Shuffle Winner – Stephanie Qin, University of Texas at Austin

Starbucks Gift Card Winners: Matthew Gilbert, University of Southern California and Matthew Clifford, University of Texas at Austin

February 5th Drawing

iPod Shuffle Winner – Jeff Anderson, Louisiana State University

Starbucks Gift Card Winners: Jennifer Wedgeworth, Texas A&M and Elizabeth Dyer, University of Texas at Austin
January 29th Drawing

iPod Shuffle Winner – Kyle Krajcir, Purdue University

Starbucks Gift Card Winners: Raymond Yan, UC Berkeley and Rimon Abaskharon, Rutgers University
January 22nd Drawing

iPod Shuffle Winner – Matthew Hughes, University of Florida

Starbucks Gift Card Winners: Shannon Wang, Santa Clara University and Steven Eddy, Florida State University

January 15th Drawing

iPod Shuffle Winner – Vanessa Gonzales, Loyola Marymount University

Starbucks Gift Card Winners: Michael Williams, Loyola Marymount University and Shawn Gong, University of Southern California

Volcanic Ash and the Consulting Profession

I am in Ireland right now, where the topic on everyone’s minds these days is volcanic ash. This is because flights in this country and other countries around Europe have been grounded for days due to a cloud of ash from a volcano in Iceland. The ash has stranded millions of travelers and reminded this Protiviti recruiter about the importance of being adaptable.

As consultants, our professionals help clients solve various problems within the business environment. Consulting requires patience, creativity, and the ability to think on your feet. In a profession such as consulting, it is critical to be prepared for the unexpected – a change in the deliverables of a project, a delay or acceleration of a deadline, or conflicting opinions on the best approach to the task are all daily challenges for our team.

As you consider your ideal career path, think about this important part of the job. Do you thrive on change? Are you able to roll with the punches? If so, you are well on your way to a successful career as a consultant! The next step is sharing experiences with employers that highlight this quality – the ways that you have already demonstrated your cool under pressure, be it a difficult class project, a previous internship, or an altered travel itinerary as a result of Icelandic volcanic activity.


- Bridget

A day in a life of an internal audit professional - an interview with James Weicher

James Weicher is an internal audit senior consultant in Protiviti's Chicago office. We asked him the following questions to get an idea of what his day to day responsibilities are as a internal audit professional. Below you will find his responses and advice if you are thinking about entering into this profession.

What was your college and your major?
I attended the University of Notre Dame and majored in economics.

What courses did you find the most helpful to prepare you for your current position? What advice do you have for students about choosing a major and choosing courses?
There are not any courses I can specifically point to that contributed the most to my current position. An understanding of accounting principles is required, but I wouldn’t say that it ends there – most of what we do involves being able to learn and understand a business or business processes quickly, and that’s not something one course teaches more than another.


For choosing courses, there is no reason you can’t study the things you’re interested in along with those that may more likely be considered “practical.” If someone is interested in business, then having an accounting and finance background is helpful, but as an economics major, working in an accounting and finance dominated industry, one doesn’t necessarily have to major there.

What are your primary work activities on a day to day basis?
When I am working on an internal audit engagement, my responsibilities typically include the execution of the work plan and job administration. This involves talking to the client managers and process owners, understanding and documenting what’s going on, and reviewing documentation of what they do to test how things are operating. This fieldwork we then use to develop our report to deliver to the client.

If I’m not working on a client, there’s always work to do performing research, helping with proposals, and other activities to assist around the office and help develop the pipeline.

What industries have you worked in?
Since starting with Protiviti, I’ve worked mostly in financial services – banks and a capital management company. I have also had some interesting engagements in retail, logistics and distribution, newspaper publishing, and a wireless telecommunications company. All were great experiences.

What do you enjoy most about your profession?
Mostly, I appreciate that I have the opportunity to focus on the industries and areas I’m most interested in, but also get exposure and experience in other kinds of industries and work. Protiviti offers such a wide variety of solutions and services to clients, there’s no real excuse to not find something you’re interested in, stay engaged, and keep learning.

What I enjoy the least is that it can be frustrating or discouraging to be “the auditor,” although I prefer to consider this aspect a learning opportunity. People tend not to like auditors, because to them we take their attention away from their “real” job, by asking questions, looking for documentation, and generally critiquing what they do. Although, consultants are there to help the company and not get anybody in trouble, that dynamic is sometimes not appreciated from the client’s perspective. That in itself is a learning experience because it requires a certain sensitivity, demands that you develop interpersonal skills, and makes it all the more important to forge healthy working relationships.

What advice would you give to students interested in the internal audit/risk consulting business? Anything you would do different or change? Any success strategies to share?
I would say come work for Protiviti (seriously). In audit – audit consulting in particular, you get to see all kinds of businesses, industries, different companies and cultures, and are able percolate throughout these organizations the way someone even working for that company wouldn’t be able to. The most important thing in the industry is not to allow yourself to stagnate – every new project, and even every day on a project, the primary job requirement is to understand and analyze something new, so you’ve got to keep learning. You have no idea how little you know coming out of college until you start working in an industry like this. Be open to that, and accept it as a challenge.

 - KnowledgeLeader

Celebriti Blog: Ashley and Darren

Heather, Clint, Darren, and Anthony from the Bay Area Protiviti offices

As the days get longer and the sun gets stronger, our consultants in the Bay area took some time to enjoy the best that winter has to offer.  Here is their report, straight from the slopes!

To Tahoe and Back Down

Last weekend, the Bay Area Protiviti offices made the trip to South Lake Tahoe to close out this year’s winter ski season!

The Protiviti Ski / Snowboard Weekend in Lake Tahoe, CA has been a tradition for the Bay Area offices over the past four years.  For those who identify with winter sports, you would definitely recognize Heavenly Ski Resort as one of the premier ski destinations. The resort is located on the California / Nevada border and has some of the best views around. You can’t beat the wide open ski trails, terrain park, and back mountain tree runs.

Despite the different opinions to who has the fastest run, who caught the most air, or who had the best wipe out, I’m sure everyone would agree that spending time off the clock with fellow coworkers was by far the best part of the weekend. Participating in Protiviti events, both formal and informal, is one of the best ways to further develop your relationships with not only those that you interact with on a daily basis but also those that you are unable to connect with as often, given client commitments.

Thanks again to all those who participated! See you next year!

One Shining Moment

For many, the wonder of March Madness culminates in tomorrow’s Final Four games. There’s still enough variety of teams to keep all of us interested, and another round in the tournament to look forward to. For fans of the underdog, there’s still an element of surprise as to who will make it to that championship game. For bandwagon types, there is still time to get acquainted with a team and feel like you helped them get to the finals. And finally, most of our brackets are sufficiently annihilated by now so as to abandon all previous inclinations and follow a team simply for the love of the game.

In the many unlikely comparisons that I have made to the great sport of campus recruiting, this one is a slam dunk. The thrill of March Madness is the idea that all of the participating teams have the same opportunity to achieve greatness. As a campus recruit, I advise you to view the job search with this same kind of excitement, casting a wide net with the employers that interest you and then narrowing them down until you have come up with a clear victor. And if the tournament teaches us anything, it is the importance of being open-minded with your options, as it is rarely the obvious choice that makes it through the process unscathed.


- Bridget