Peter Driscoll
PricewaterhouseCoopers
By : Jeffrey Sparshott
Peter Driscoll, president of PricewaterhouseCoopers in Poland, found his way to the country through a series of chances.
"In 1986 the International Monetary Fund was looking for a German-speaking British tax expert to help design and introduce tax reform in Hungary," he said. "My name came up on a computer search and I found myself in Budapest where none of our counterparts in the Hungarian government spoke German. My schoolboy French was more useful. Then, a few years later after I joined Price Waterhouse, a colleague offered me the chance to come to Warsaw to start a tax advisory practice. I accepted at once."
Now PricewaterhouseCoopers is Poland's biggest international accounting firm. And the company will continue to grow during 2001, Driscoll said, adding that companies in the accounting and consulting business will stay successful by offering quality services.
"I expect the market to become more polarized between the very large players who can bring together world-class teams of specialists to work with companies' boards, and niche experts who are brought in to solve one-off problems," he said. "The losers will be those in the middle who try to be all things to all men and are really not able to add much value."
Born in Croydon, England, 10 miles from London, Driscoll studied modern and medieval languages at Cambridge University, and management at Henley Management College. He started his career as a tax inspector in the U.K. and found himself in his current position in 1989.
Past Notes:
1963-1966: Studied at Cambridge University
1977: Graduated from Henley Management College
1989: Hired by Price Waterhouse as a tax partner responsible for Central and Eastern Europe in Frankfurt am Main
Business Acumen:
"As a consultant, I believe there is no substitute for honesty. Clients pay to hear the truth and not what the consultant believes they would like to hear. This can be uncomfortable at times and especially when the client is a government minister with his own agenda. I remember some quite emotional meetings with ministers in the United Kingdom. However, it never pays to avoid important issues or to allow your client to do so."
