As Director of Global Mobility for an international accounting firm, analyzing the compensation and benefits packages for auditors and consultants on assignment in Singapore — while creating developmental exchange opportunities for staff in Mexico City — is all in a day’s work for Annette Phillips. While Ernst & Young International thrives on the expansive, global marketplace to bring solutions to its clients, Annette designs and implements human resource programs to enable E&Y personnel to live and function in foreign countries.

Not an easy task for this 35-year-old former auditor who swims in a sea of human resource professionals. But for Annette, it’s a perfect way to marry her analytical skills with the desire to work with what she terms “the people process.”

Making the Career Change
After attending the University of Texas in Austin and interning with E&Y in Dallas in the early-80s, Annette quickly moved to New York City to seek the traditional manager/partner track … but that’s where most notions of “traditional” ends. She found herself with less desire to stay on the fast track and more zeal in working with people. While working with audits of law firms in the professional services sector, Annette volunteered her free time to recruit new hires to the firm, and ultimately found herself questioning her own long-term aspirations of staying in audit.

Not a consolation to leave the audit arena, but rather a boon to her career, Annette was drawn to the human side of the audit in hosting, mentoring and developing staff — and E&Y recognized that talent. While she continued to serve in the recruiting process, her business unit’s managing partner suggested she reduce her client load to assume even more HR responsibilities. Annette soon found herself suspended between the day-to-day audit experience she felt she needed to succeed as an audit manager — and a position in HR in which she could contribute to the firm in other ways.

“About the time I was promoted to manager, I knew I could do the work, but was concerned on a long-term basis in keeping up technically with the responsibilities that go with being an audit manager because I was spending less time in the field,” she says. “Your role is to manage the risk associated with the engagement, but so much of how well you do that job comes from experience — and you just can’t get that from a book. Because of the shift in responsibilities, I felt that I only had about a tenth of the experience I needed to assist in this area.”

However, she did not make the decision to completely depart from audit until five years ago when the Global Mobility position was created and she moved to E&Y International. Annette says she chose this path because she found it to be a more unique position, and a way to add incredible value to the firm based on the notion of a CPA working in human resources.

“Compared to some HR people who have come into the organization and do not have an accounting background, working in an HR capacity provides me more opportunities because I understand the intricacies of what CPAs do on a daily basis and the challenges that go along with the environment,” she says. “If nothing else, it gives me the credibility with partners around the organization that you might not have if you’re not one of them.”

Challenges and Opportunities
Annette is part of a 10-member team that enhances and strengthens the HR function in member firms. She ensures that E&Y International has the appropriate programs, policies and processes in place so that the firm can mobilize an international cadre of service providers to serve multinational clients. No day is typical for Annette, although the “people process” is a running thread throughout each assignment that centers itself on implementing a core set of diagnostics.

“Usually, there is a need for someone with a certain set of skills or background for work in a country,” she says. “We define that situation and then source people from a pool of candidates who have identified themselves to the firm in wanting to work outside the United States. Instead of taking a candidate and finding the position for him or her, we work from the perspective of the engagement and country, and then see who is the best fit.”

From the start, Annette found that structure within the human resources function is necessary to bring order to cultural arena that varies greatly across the globe. In her first assignment, she created an umbrella approach to the allowance, benefit and support program within one policy framework that applies no matter where a candidate is assigned. Annette works from eight different categories in a matrix approach of allowance and benefits that, depending on the assignment category, works well in most situations.

Annette admits her expansive knowledge of HR did not come overnight, and much like her interpretation of the audit manager who must remain skilled, she, too, has had to learn much of what she does with on-the-job training. In addition, she seeks learning opportunities outside of her firm and industry because no one really specializes in helping CPAs to become HR professionals. However, in almost every situation, Annette finds herself falling back on her knowledge and experience in accounting.

“In client service, the role of the manager is to wrap up an engagement and bring it to a conclusion. What I’m doing in HR really is no different because I have the ability to get to the root of any issue, get the parties together to quickly determine what the problem is, and facilitate the situation. I am truly using my background to make a difference.”

Professionals who want to contact Annette may send her e-mail at annette.phillips@ey.com.