Getting into a regional public accounting firm from out-of-state?

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  • #190209
    what_now
    Member

    I had posted about my situation in the Big 4 accounting section, but basically, I’m a student in a highly-accredited school in the midwest, who will be graduating in next spring with a Masters and having hopefully completed all four sections of the CPA exam, but with no full-time job offer. I am planning to move to Southern California once I graduate school, and therefore had only applied to the Big 4 (well, three of them), since they are the only firms that recruit directly to the city that I want to start my career in (the rest of the firms recruit only for their regional offices). I wasn’t able to land a full-time offer from the firms I recruited with, so I’m currently without a job upon graduation, but I’ve decided that I still am going to stick with my plan of moving out West and trying my luck.

    I’m honestly very worried that I’ll be stuck working at H&R block or something, because I feel it isn’t very stimulating work, and frankly, it would be a complete waste of my Masters/CPA. Ideally, I would still like to be working in public accounting. I don’t need to work for the Big 4, but I would still like to work at a smaller regional public accounting firm. (Also, I have previously completed an internship at a Big 6 accounting firm, which I honestly really enjoyed, but I wasn’t able to transfer to the office that I wanted, so I had to turn my full-time job offer down.)

    Does anyone have any advice on how a recent graduate from out-of-state might be able to break into another location’s regional accounting firms? I had received advice from a previous thread that I should look into joining some of the local accounting/CPA associations for networking opportunities, so I was wondering if that has really worked for people, or is there more that I could do?

    Also, if all else fails, would taking up an temporary position at something like a sole proprietorship CPA firm or H&R block “hurt” my chances of getting back into public accounting? I don’t want to give the impression to potential employers that those are the only jobs I could do, but at the same time, I feel like some more work experience (and income) in the new location may help.

    Thanks!

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