[Anonymous]

I interned at a Big 4 and am now working for a mid-size firm and currently studying for the CPA (AUD passed) with one busy season of experience at each firm. I don’t think I want to be in public acct for more than a few years and I don’t know what I want to do after. I am a social person and like working in groups. It makes the day go by so fast. Many days I work in my cube and don’t interact with a lot of people, which I am not a huge fan of. Auditing also seems very compliance oriented, and I think I want work that is more strategic in nature and more meaningful to me.

My question is: will I be any happier in corporate accounting? Would a financial analyst role suit me better? Or do I need to venture out and try out recruiting, operations, supply chain management? I also feel like working at a smaller company would give me more experience wearing multiple hats. I don’t particularly like the idea of being pigeon-holed into becoming an expert at one thing. In public acct, it seems like I am specializing in becoming an accountant, whereas I want to become a businessman. However, it seems the larger companies do a better job at training entry level employees who just graduated from college.

Thanks for your advice!

[Kimboroni]

My audit professor's view was that auditing is a great way to learn about business from a very broad perspective and makes you a valuable asset for a company looking for a controller/CFO type person. The work you're doing now may not seem like it, but as you move up and take on more responsibility in the audit (and supervise the people who do what you are doing now), you learn more and more. He basically said to put in your 8 years or so to get to audit manager, and then the business world is your oyster.

AUD 84 (1/9/14-Wiley books/TB + free materials)
FAR 83 (5/21/14-the above + NINJA 10 Pt Combo Lite)
REG 84 (7/9/14-Wiley books/TB + NINJA Audio/FC/Notes)
BEC 76 (10/5/14-Wiley books/TB + NINJA Audio/FC)

Disclaimer: My ninja avatar is not meant to imply that I have any affiliation with this site other than being a forum member. That's a pic of a T-shirt that my daughter gave me for my birthday. 🙂

[fuzyfro89]

Bucky:

I will somewhat agree with Kimborini, but wholeheartedly disagree on the amount of time to spend in (external) audit.

We all got the speeches from college professors (4 at my university were sponsored by each of the Big 4, and Deloitte alone had started an accounting foundation of $1 million over several years). Coincidence? You be the judge…

I spent 1.5 years in Big 4 (2 busy seasons), and I think the timing was perfect for me. I got what I needed, had enough experience to speak intelligently about audit, thoroughly understand the process, got the name on my resume, and moved on to try something else.

**if you goal is to work in accounting, then staying will be helpful, but if that's not your goal, you aren't helping yourself by staying > 4 years. At that point, you start becoming a bit too experienced and may find it increasingly difficult to move out into a different role and take a step up.

If you spend 8 years in audit, you will be stuck in an accounting role and far too highly compensated for any other function to be appealing and would be lucky to find a company willing to put in the resources to retrain you.

My opinion, anyway…

[Anonymous]

Yea I went to a large big 10 university where big 4 is shoved down your throat. The work at the midsize firm I work at is a little more bearable, however accounting work just seems too compliance oriented for me. To be honest I majored in accounting to get an understanding of the fundamentals of business and become well rounded. I figured future employers would give me more respect for majoring in accounting an getting a CPA than marketing. I also have family who are CPA's and kind of gently pushed me into accounting. I don't think I would have majored in it if my mom wasn't an accountant. I don't mind working over 40 hours a week if I find the work interesting. Part if me thinks this is the grunt work all entry level employees in the business world have and part of me thinks accounting isn't for me, I'm not sure. I enjoy working in groups and being very collaborative. I like making an impact, being like “hey I did something to save people money or earn the firm more money”. Public accounting auditing is required by banks for loans or by the government for publicly traded companies. The clients want you to get in and out without causing a stir as much as you can.

[Anonymous]

But you do make an impact as an auditor… your reports give stakeholders the necessary confidence in the company. Aren't you still helping the client “save money” indirectly? Or potentially gain more money?

[Anonymous]

I suppose the seniors have a better understanding of the impact of their work. For a first year like myself it's like hey audit cash,ap,ar, fixed assets in 3 days for review and use PY as a reference. I don't really have a lot of time to soak in the entire process I am completing because it's like ok you have 3 hours to audit cash, ready go! I'm on an audit this summer that won't be as stressful because I won't have to go to a new client the next week (audit fieldwork is about one week per client during busy season) so maybe I will get more time to understand the business and more mentoring from the senior as well.

As a first year I'm not really involved in the higher level strategic thinking on audits. I basically complete workpapers my senior tells me to as fast as I can to stay within the budget.

[Anonymous]

Auditing is one of the most ‘social' and team-oriented accounting positions you can get. If you don't think you get enough in auditing (you really work in a cube as an auditor?!), then I guarantee that you won't be any happier with that aspect of corporate accounting – where you will literally be in a cube 99.9999% of the time.

‘ I like making an impact, being like “hey I did something to save people money or earn the firm more money”. Public accounting auditing is required by banks for loans or by the government for publicly traded companies. The clients want you to get in and out without causing a stir as much as you can.'

I absolutely agree. Auditing is a compliance activity (which does have value), but it is not the most emotionally satisfying career you can have day-in day-out. Most people are not super passionate about auditing and for good reason.

[NicoleL]

If you like working with people in groups, making a difference in the company and like working with numbers…you might want to consider something in corporate fp&a (financial planning & analysis).

FAR - 93 (YAY!!!!)
REG - 93 (Double YAY!)
BEC - 87 (Whew!)
AUD - 96 (DONE!!!!!)

[Anonymous]

Even though we are in an audit room together we spend most of the time quietly working on our own computers unless there are questions or we go to talk to the client. Now that it's not busy season I have a lot of office time working at my desk. I gotta get up and go make small talk with my co workers every few hours to keep myself from going insane!

My girlfriends parents work in corporate finance and have suggested FP&A as a possible career choice. But when I think abut finance I think about hardcore math people grinding away all day on excel spreadsheets. I am not very confident in all those excel formulas quite yet haha. School pretty much teaches theory and only have had brief experience with excel formulas so far (pivot, if statements, etc).

[Anonymous]

Always liked teaching. I was a swim instructor during my high school and college years. Don't think I am passionate enough about accounting to go get a PhD and teach it though. And most “senior lecturers” have year and years of industry experience. It would be pretty cool to be a high school business teacher and coach ultimate frisbee on the side…

[Anonymous]

or you can start the accounting club for prospective CPA students and teach them how to do taxes and make extra money while you have your students do the taxes, throw them an occasional pizza party and field trip to an accounting event to make them happy.

[Anonymous]

eliasm6, the jist of what you're saying is a good idea. Unfortunately, I don't really have any experience in taxes other than the 4 week individual tax course I took in college 2 summers aga haha.

[Author]

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