Client Service Award
Patricia Etzold
Advisory Services Partner, International Investigation and Litigation
PwC
Patricia Etzold always wanted to be a veterinarian. However, on career day in high school she realized she didn't have the stomach for it and her guidance counselor suggested accounting. He said bookkeeping was a career that was good for women because it was flexible enough so she could also raise a family. She followed his advice and first joined Coopers & Lybrand as an auditor.
After raising four sons, Etzold contacted one of her former supervisors thinking he was still in the Assurance Practice but he was now a Senior Partner in the Advisory Practice. The rest, as they say…
Today, Etzold is an Advisory Services Partner in PwC's International Investigation and Litigation practice in New York. She provides specialized advisory services to boards of directors, audit committees and internal and external counsel of multi-national companies. She specializes in leading international forensic financial fraud and corruption investigations and remediation programs.
"I would say my greatest professional achievement was being admitted as a PwC Partner, especially in light of the unique path I took to get there," she says. "Working with my clients to solve a problem or enhance their business is challenging but very rewarding. What I enjoy most is interacting with my clients and the fact that no day is the same."
That's for sure: Etzold has assisted the Department of Justice in their prosecution of certain matters and has assisted company's counsel respond to informal and formal Securities and Exchange Commission and Department of Justice inquiries.
Being a consultant, she says, is not just about your technical abilities, it requires patience, empathy, a sense of humor and an ability to motivate individuals to embrace and implement change.
"I would encourage a woman starting her career in consulting today to focus on building relationships rather than trying to sell projects," Etzold says. "When I started in consulting, the challenge for me was to navigate building relationships with a predominately male buying group.
Networking options, she says, were limited in that she didn't play golf, smoke cigars, or have the patience to sit through an entire baseball game. She had to rely on building relationships through work.
"I focused on being responsive, getting done what I said I would, and consistently delivering quality work and an effective solution," she says. "In the end, the relationships I built have proven to be long-lasting and have delivered recurring dividends."
What's also returned recurring dividends, she says, is advice her father gave to her. "My father was a successful salesman and he attributed success to knowing your product inside and out, knowing your customer and not just their likes and dislikes related to what you are selling, knowing your competition; and most importantly always tell your customer the truth even if it means losing a sale."
But it doesn't seem that Etzold has lost too many in her day.As for the award itself, Etzold says that it's an honor to be part of a select group of exceptional women leaders. "I am committed to building trusted relationships with my clients and my PwC team," she says. "Trust and respect is foundational to our success and is implicit in the quality work my team delivers."
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