First female boss of major City accountancy firm steps down after 'socialist agenda' criticism

Grant Thornton chief executive Sacha Romanovitch capped her pay at 20 times the company’s average and brought in a profit-sharing scheme for all staff

Grant Thornton said Ms Romanovitch would not stand for re-election to the firm’s top job and would be replaced before the end of 2018 (Getty)

The first female boss of a major UK accountancy firm will step down after facing criticism from colleagues for her “socialist agenda”.

Sacha Romanovitch will leave her role as chief executive of Grant Thornton – the county’s fifth largest accountancy firm – as soon as the company has found a successor.

Grant Thornton said Ms Romanovitch would not stand for re-election to the firm’s top job and would be replaced before the end of 2018.

Colleagues attacked Ms Romanovitch in an anonymous letter sent to several media outlets last month, saying she had created a “culture of fear”.

The letter, which claimed to represent the views of 15 partners or directors, alleged that Grant Thornton was “out of control” and had “no focus on profitability”.

Ms Romanovitch has worked at Grant Thornton for 28 years, becoming a partner in 2001, but she has provoked the ire of colleagues in her time as chief executive with policies some have labelled “socialist”, including capping her own pay at 20 times the firm’s average and introducing a profit-sharing scheme for all staff. Standard practice in the industry is to share profits only among equity partners who can earn several million pounds a year at the biggest firms.

Responding to the letter, Ms Romanovich said: “A small cadre of partners will find it hard we are making decisions that will depress profits in the short term but will help profits in the long term … If profits get unhinged from purpose it might not hurt you now, but it will come back and bite you on the bum.”

Ed Warner, independent chair of Grant Thornton UK’s partnership oversight board, said on Monday that: “Following discussions with Sacha, the board has agreed that a new CEO is the logical next step to create long term sustainable profits for the firm.”

The departing chief executive said the “time is right” for a new figure to take the firm forward.

“I will be working to support a smooth transition to our next chief executive, focusing on continuing to deliver sustainable value for our clients through our diverse and talented team,” she said.

The announcement comes as regulators and politicians ramp up the scrutiny of the accountancy profession and the big firms; in particular for failing to recruit women into top jobs, and signing off the books of a number of firms that later collapsed.

None of the Big Four of KPMG, Deloitte, EY and PwC have ever appointed a female chief executive and all revealed gender pay gaps significantly larger than the national average, a fact they acknowledged was partly due to the relative scarcity of women in senior roles.

The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) this month launched a detailed investigation into the audit sector to examine concerns that it is not working well for the economy or investors.

The CMA pointed to the collapse of construction giant Carillion in January just months after its accounts had been signed off by KPMG.

In February, Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Committee chair Rachel Reeves described Carillion’s annual reports as “worthless”.