[Anonymous]

Hi All,

I’ve been following these threads (addicting) since I started my studies but am new to posting. I have my last exam in a few weeks, can’t wait! My question is if anyone has worked for a large, public corporation in Financial Reporting/Consolidations? Are those positions more highly regarded than say the General Accounting side? I’m currently a Senior Accountant in NYC with an ok salary. And there’s an opportunity out of state with a much cheaper cost of living. I’m considering it since they will match my current NYC salary and offer full relo. But how bad is it to go from Senior Accountant (General Accounting) to Analyst-Financial Reporting/Consolidations? I don’t want my resume to look silly.

Any advice is appreciated!

[NYC_CPA]

cpawannabe : I am currently in a decent size public corporation, working in Financial Reporting. In general, I would say this position is regarded more highly than a position in general accounting side. The two jobs are different and to have a combination of experience in both general accounting and financial reporting/consolidations will actually look better on your resume and will actually open up doors to controller positions in the future. These positions are looked at differently depending on the companies. As an example, our Director of Financial Reporting is in second in charge after the CFO of the finance/accounting department (controller report to him), whereas in other companies, accounting (controller) and financial (financial reporting/consolidations and FP&A) report to VP's of Finance. I hope this helps.

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[Anonymous]

Yes NYC_CPA that definitely helped a lot! I was more concerned about the title, going from ‘Senior' to Analyst, but gaining the Financial Reporting experience at a large headquarters for a gigantic company will be awesome experience. Thanks again!!!

[Anonymous]

My boss (who has 3-4x the years in the business that I do) has tried to stress to me that the titles aren't nearly as important as the work being done. So, if you go to the Analyst job and bust butt to be the best analyst there and be doing things beyond analyst level, then at a next job they're going to say “You went from being important in general accounting to being important in financial reporting”, and that's all they're going to see/care.

However, myself, I'm more concerned that a way out-of-whack title could be a problem, so my goal in your spot would be to ensure that the new company either has room to move up or that there's other options in the area. Being a lower COL area makes me wonder/worry that the options might not be as great. I've never personally seen a lower COL area than where I am (3 BR 2 BA house would rent for about $400/mo here), but the trade-off is that there's not a lot of options, so it's a consideration to keep in mind. In NYC, prices are crazy and I'm sure that the competition for jobs is ridiculous, but there's jobs to compete for – in a smaller area, you might be one of 3 applicants to a job, but the job might be one of 3 finance/accounting jobs posted all year. So, there's trade-offs.

The fact that with the current title of “Clerk” I was able to get an interview to be a Controller I think illustrates both my point and my boss' point: I've done way more than Clerk work, and they recognized that despite my low-level title…but at the same time, there's few job openings and few candidates around here, so I was considered in part because they probably only had a handful of applicants anyway. (Will have to update later whether or not I got the Controller job. 🙂 )

[Author]

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