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jaymm
Dec 30, 2006
how is everyone enjoying busy season? I am sacrificing sleep currently so I can have some small amount of time to myself before I need to pack up and live in a hotel for the rest of the week.

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hellboundburrito
Aug 4, 2004

jaymm posted:

how is everyone enjoying busy season? I am sacrificing sleep currently so I can have some small amount of time to myself before I need to pack up and live in a hotel for the rest of the week.

Mine was good until this week. I was averaging about 55 hours a week, but my new client is fairly complicated and our entire recurring team quit (except for the partner) so it's a brand new team now. So far it's shaping up to be a pretty horrendous job and I'm sure my hours will look more typical from here on out (I'm guessing 8am-11pm M-Th, 8:30am-7pm Friday, 9am-6pm Saturday and working from home on Sundays).

AbbiTheDog
May 21, 2007
Run my own practice, 90 hours weeks are the norm until 4/15.

Mandalay
Mar 16, 2007

WoW Forums Refugee

AbbiTheDog posted:

Run my own practice, 90 hours weeks are the norm until 4/15.

I hear there are goons in *this very thread* offering to help you for free! (I guess it's for the CPA experience requirement?)

scribe jones
Sep 17, 2008

One of the key problems in the analysis of this puzzling book is to be able to differentiate a real language from meaningless writing.

Mandalay posted:

I hear there are goons in *this very thread* offering to help you for free! (I guess it's for the CPA experience requirement?)

Just to get out of the house really. Otherwise I might get sick of Civ4 and that would be a tragedy.

Mandalay
Mar 16, 2007

WoW Forums Refugee

scribe jones posted:

Just to get out of the house really. Otherwise I might get sick of Civ4 and that would be a tragedy.

OT: this may interest you http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/sid-meiers-civilization-v-preview

mcmagic
Jul 1, 2004

If you see this avatar while scrolling the succ zone, you have been visited by the mcmagic of shitty lib takes! Good luck and prosperity will come to you, but only if you reply "shut the fuck up mcmagic" to this post!

hellboundburrito posted:

Mine was good until this week. I was averaging about 55 hours a week, but my new client is fairly complicated and our entire recurring team quit (except for the partner) so it's a brand new team now. So far it's shaping up to be a pretty horrendous job and I'm sure my hours will look more typical from here on out (I'm guessing 8am-11pm M-Th, 8:30am-7pm Friday, 9am-6pm Saturday and working from home on Sundays).

80 hours plus working from home sundays... No wonder they quit.

scribe jones
Sep 17, 2008

One of the key problems in the analysis of this puzzling book is to be able to differentiate a real language from meaningless writing.

Hexes? Oh man I am loving dead

AbbiTheDog
May 21, 2007

Mandalay posted:

I hear there are goons in *this very thread* offering to help you for free! (I guess it's for the CPA experience requirement?)

Meh, not so bad, I dork around eight months out of the year.

I've already got one junior staff, don't need to train another.

Ribsauce
Jul 29, 2006

Blacks in the back.

hellboundburrito posted:

So far it's shaping up to be a pretty horrendous job and I'm sure my hours will look more typical from here on out (I'm guessing 8am-11pm M-Th, 8:30am-7pm Friday, 9am-6pm Saturday and working from home on Sundays).
That is insane, I'd quit too. Like right now. I honestly think if someone walked in my office and said 'hey ribsauce, here is your schedule for the next 7 weeks" and laid out that bad boy I'd just walk out right then, leaving my lunch in the fridge and everything.

Mine was lovely, I was on the road almost the entire first 2 months but now I'm locked in the home office until 4/15 (I hope) and am feeling much better. I don't mind traveling a couple days or whatever, but I honestly went over 15 days out of town, in a row, not even a Sunday at home. I'm just not made for that poo poo.

hellboundburrito
Aug 4, 2004

mcmagic posted:

80 hours plus working from home sundays... No wonder they quit.

Like I said, the rest of my busy season was pretty good. I work in a small division and we work significantly less on average than bigger divisions that deal with banks and public companies, so we tend to hate our lives a bit less. I have friends who do 80 hours a week for four months straight, so I'm not really complaining about this upcoming stretch.

subversiveasset
Mar 20, 2010
What do careers in tax for public accounting/Big 4 accounting look like? I'm looking for a kind of 'year by year' or 'position by position' overview.

Currently, I am interning with one of the Big 4 firms for tax, and I've noticed a few things. 1) I'm being effectively "shielded" from a lot of stuff...I know my team members have been working some 12 hours days and working on Saturdays, but I haven't had to worry about that, unless I've wanted to. 2) That will NOT be the same when I work full-time.

As per the work, I don't think it's bad. It's lots and lots of state returns for one client and all of its subsidiaries. Other team members have been working on state returns, federal returns, trusts, etc., so I feel like there's room to see other things in that vein.

But...my question really gets to...is this all there is? Just returns (where the returns may differ by entity or location)? Or does this low-level compliance work eventually lead to something different? (And if so, then when?)

I have read a few topics regarding accounting (this one and the Applying at the Big 4 topic), and there seemed to be great vitriol against audit in particular...however, most of those criticisms seemed to apply specifically to audit. So, how do the tax working conditions differ from audit, how are they similar, and so forth? Do tax professionals end up getting such a raw deal from Big 4 accounting, or is that mostly an auditor sentiment?

gmilo
Jun 27, 2006
wooo

subversiveasset posted:

What do careers in tax for public accounting/Big 4 accounting look like? I'm looking for a kind of 'year by year' or 'position by position' overview.

Currently, I am interning with one of the Big 4 firms for tax, and I've noticed a few things. 1) I'm being effectively "shielded" from a lot of stuff...I know my team members have been working some 12 hours days and working on Saturdays, but I haven't had to worry about that, unless I've wanted to. 2) That will NOT be the same when I work full-time.

As per the work, I don't think it's bad. It's lots and lots of state returns for one client and all of its subsidiaries. Other team members have been working on state returns, federal returns, trusts, etc., so I feel like there's room to see other things in that vein.

But...my question really gets to...is this all there is? Just returns (where the returns may differ by entity or location)? Or does this low-level compliance work eventually lead to something different? (And if so, then when?)

I have read a few topics regarding accounting (this one and the Applying at the Big 4 topic), and there seemed to be great vitriol against audit in particular...however, most of those criticisms seemed to apply specifically to audit. So, how do the tax working conditions differ from audit, how are they similar, and so forth? Do tax professionals end up getting such a raw deal from Big 4 accounting, or is that mostly an auditor sentiment?

I'm not a tax person but yes... that is all there is. The only difference is the higher you go the more complicated tax issues you may need to research so as to provide the correct solution for the client.

Taxes in the end... are just taxes.

Hellblazer187
Oct 12, 2003

So, it seems like I'm on my way to an A in calculus. I guess third time's the charm!

To answer a question from before, bar rules are very strict about having a partnership with a non-lawyer. If I wanted to have my own solo law/cpa practice, I'd technically have to structure it as two businesses.

Kegslayer
Jul 23, 2007

subversiveasset posted:

What do careers in tax for public accounting/Big 4 accounting look like? I'm looking for a kind of 'year by year' or 'position by position' overview.

Currently, I am interning with one of the Big 4 firms for tax, and I've noticed a few things. 1) I'm being effectively "shielded" from a lot of stuff...I know my team members have been working some 12 hours days and working on Saturdays, but I haven't had to worry about that, unless I've wanted to. 2) That will NOT be the same when I work full-time.

As per the work, I don't think it's bad. It's lots and lots of state returns for one client and all of its subsidiaries. Other team members have been working on state returns, federal returns, trusts, etc., so I feel like there's room to see other things in that vein.

But...my question really gets to...is this all there is? Just returns (where the returns may differ by entity or location)? Or does this low-level compliance work eventually lead to something different? (And if so, then when?)

I have read a few topics regarding accounting (this one and the Applying at the Big 4 topic), and there seemed to be great vitriol against audit in particular...however, most of those criticisms seemed to apply specifically to audit. So, how do the tax working conditions differ from audit, how are they similar, and so forth? Do tax professionals end up getting such a raw deal from Big 4 accounting, or is that mostly an auditor sentiment?

I've worked in tax for a Big 4 firm for a couple of years now and it just depends on what group you're in. If you're in corporate tax, you pretty much spend your day dealing with 9 to 5 while the specialised tax groups are more project based. Hours wise you're probably being 'shielded' because you're inexperienced and nobody likes juniors billing their clients. :)

If your team members are doing constant 12 hour days they're probably looking to get promoted/improve their rating, the hours are suppose to be pretty constant and much better than audit.

Career wise it's very limited compared to audit (you either become a tax manager in commercial/go to another Big 4 (accounting or law firm)/work for the government) but I'm pretty sure we get paid more than auditors and you have more 'international' experience.

In short, tax is a good place to start out but if you ever not want to work in tax, it might be better to tough it out for a couple of years in audit.

Nipple Drainage
Feb 19, 2006

So moving into industry is best done with audit exp? even compared to advisory exp?

hellboundburrito
Aug 4, 2004

Nipple Drainage posted:

So moving into industry is best done with audit exp? even compared to advisory exp?

I think he was comparing tax and audit only. Moving from advisory to industry would be roughly similar to audit, maybe easier because you have to be on top of your game to work in advisory and you likely moved from audit to advisory at some point anyway. In my experience people in audit have better luck moving into industry for a couple of reasons; you tend to have more day to day interaction with clients in audit so you might have more contacts, and people in industry often see auditors as having a more well rounded sense of a business. I'm not saying that tax professionals don't get an in depth understanding of their clients or business in general, but overall their focus is more specialized. That being said, they could be very highly sought after in industry for other positions in which their expertise would be valuable.

subversiveasset
Mar 20, 2010

gmilo posted:

I'm not a tax person but yes... that is all there is. The only difference is the higher you go the more complicated tax issues you may need to research so as to provide the correct solution for the client.

Taxes in the end... are just taxes.

Ah, so instead of audit ("the goal of an audit is to get to an opinion," was the first thing my audit professor says on the first day of the semester...), the goal of tax is simply to get to...a return. I guess this should be obvious.

But actually, your answer helped a lot. Even research would help. I just didn't know if things would always feel like autopilot.

mcmagic
Jul 1, 2004

If you see this avatar while scrolling the succ zone, you have been visited by the mcmagic of shitty lib takes! Good luck and prosperity will come to you, but only if you reply "shut the fuck up mcmagic" to this post!

subversiveasset posted:

Ah, so instead of audit ("the goal of an audit is to get to an opinion," was the first thing my audit professor says on the first day of the semester...), the goal of tax is simply to get to...a return. I guess this should be obvious.

But actually, your answer helped a lot. Even research would help. I just didn't know if things would always feel like autopilot.

If you're going into tax you should be thinking more about tax planning than just filling out a return. Anyone making 7.50 an hour at H and R Block can fill out a return.

Kegslayer
Jul 23, 2007

subversiveasset posted:

Ah, so instead of audit ("the goal of an audit is to get to an opinion," was the first thing my audit professor says on the first day of the semester...), the goal of tax is simply to get to...a return. I guess this should be obvious.
But actually, your answer helped a lot. Even research would help. I just didn't know if things would always feel like autopilot.


At a base level the goal of tax is to do returns and 'effective tax planning'. I spend most of my time writing RAPs (reasonable arguably positions) for the tax positions that my clients want to take. Most of the people here generally hold a double degree (generally in commerce and in law) so there is a lot of technical work you need to know. The work is generally dependent on the client. One of my clients sends us documents from the US or UK and then when you open the envelope, it's actually a letter from BVI or Jersey (this is the 'effective tax planning' aspect :raise:).

I realised you were also after some kind of year by year guide before so here goes:

Start out as a junior (while studying at uni) or a grad.
Consultant in first year.
Senior consultant in two to three years (you will need to get a CA/CPA/Masters of Tax). If you've gone past the four to five year mark and haven't made senior, you generally get a tap on the shoulder asking if you want to change groups or go somewhere else.
Manager in three to five years.
Senior Manager in five to eight years.
Director in six to ten years.
Partner in ten+ years.

We also have some kind of 'semi' partner position between director and partner for people who have partnership level responsibilities but aren't actually in the partnership.

Unless you're looking to make partner (which most interns end up doing), it's best to leave after three to four years.

Nipple Drainage posted:

So moving into industry is best done with audit exp? even compared to advisory exp?

I think so. Most of my friends in audit who left for commercial got the job either through a referral from one of their clients or via their contacts. Tax-wise, most people I know had to go through a recruiter to find their next job.

Hope this helps!

subversiveasset
Mar 20, 2010

mcmagic posted:

If you're going into tax you should be thinking more about tax planning than just filling out a return. Anyone making 7.50 an hour at H and R Block can fill out a return.

This sounds even better. But when should I be thinking more about tax planning? Should I be upset now that all I'm doing is returns? Or is that something two years down the line? 5 years? 10 years? Different firm?

Kegslayer posted:

I realised you were also after some kind of year by year guide before so here goes:

Thanks for the year-by-year guide. I guess, though, what I was more looking for were the kinds of responsibilities (broadly) by each year/position.

There's one person saying that "taxes are just taxes," the return is the only thing, and that the only thing to possibly look forward to is tax research on complicated positions. Then there's another person say that returns are low-level stuff, and that it's all about the planning. You elaborated on this a bit, but I didn't get a sense of the time frame for that. As an intern, I'm doing 0 planning, so am I in the wrong firm/wrong department/on the wrong client?

Also, I think I lost something in translation from your year-by-year guide.

I'm used to seeing something like

staff (or associate) (from start to 2nd year)
senior (from 2nd year to 5th year)
manager (from 5th year to...??? year)
senior manager (from ??? year to ??? year)
Director
Partner

So the final position titles seem familiar to me. I just don't know what the difference for "junior," "consultant," and "senior consultant" are (especially since those sound a lot nicer than "staff" and "senior"). Are those equivalent position names from a different firm (every firm has to have its own lingo, these days...), or are they position names for a different kind of department or different kind of firm entirely? (in which case, my follow-up question: is a Big 4 firm not the right place for tax planning? I...find that possibility a bit difficult to believe, but perhaps I'm a victim of all that "we're the best" brainwashing propaganda...)

Kegslayer
Jul 23, 2007

subversiveasset posted:

Thanks for the year-by-year guide. I guess, though, what I was more looking for were the kinds of responsibilities (broadly) by each year/position.

There's one person saying that "taxes are just taxes," the return is the only thing, and that the only thing to possibly look forward to is tax research on complicated positions. Then there's another person say that returns are low-level stuff, and that it's all about the planning. You elaborated on this a bit, but I didn't get a sense of the time frame for that. As an intern, I'm doing 0 planning, so am I in the wrong firm/wrong department/on the wrong client?

Also, I think I lost something in translation from your year-by-year guide.

I'm used to seeing something like

staff (or associate) (from start to 2nd year)
senior (from 2nd year to 5th year)
manager (from 5th year to...??? year)
senior manager (from ??? year to ??? year)
Director
Partner

So the final position titles seem familiar to me. I just don't know what the difference for "junior," "consultant," and "senior consultant" are (especially since those sound a lot nicer than "staff" and "senior"). Are those equivalent position names from a different firm (every firm has to have its own lingo, these days...), or are they position names for a different kind of department or different kind of firm entirely? (in which case, my follow-up question: is a Big 4 firm not the right place for tax planning? I...find that possibility a bit difficult to believe, but perhaps I'm a victim of all that "we're the best" brainwashing propaganda...)

Does your group do a lot of tax planning? If they don't then it's probably not the right group for you if you're looking to head into the tax planning direction. Alternatively, doing the more day to day stuff allows an easier move into a commercial tax group since most of it is just the day to day stuff and they outsource a lot of their tax issues. In terms of 100% tax planning, most of the high end international stuff is done by the magic circle while the national stuff is done by the top 4 local law firms so if you want a career in tax planning, thats the way to go. Although on that note, Boston, Deutsche, Goldman Sachs and some others also provide tax advice.

Not sure if the terms I use are specific to tax but all the Big 4 here have the same named positions. Deloitte might use consultant and associate interchangably though.

In terms of responsibilities, I'm used to seeing:

Staff/associate: mostly data entry, tax returns, filing and general research etc.
While not every manager I know does so, I generally involve all my juniors in someway or other either but not everyone does. It's about 90%-95 compliance work.

Senior: Most of the work in the firm is done at a senior level, they review the work of the juniors and are more involved with the clients themselves. They also do the longest hours and start delegating work around.

As a senior you'll need to juggle your workload looking at maybe 50%-70% compliance (with the majority of it being reviewing a consultant's work). If the partners themselves have consulting work, they generally work directly with one or two seniors and use managers/directors to confirm if the advice is correct. You also do a lot of research presentations and start doing some cross-firm stuff with tax partners in other groups.

Managers: Most managers don't touch tax return preparation but do spend a lot of time reviewing it. You probably need to take more client meetings to consolidate work (ie, build yourself as the go to tax guy from your clients perspective).

Technically you don't need to bring work in but there was a manager here awhile back that brought in a major client and made the jump directly to partner. The other major responsiblity is billing (you need to bill the client a certain $ amount) and 'firm' stuff (from recruitment to appraisals to preparing firm seminars etc). About half my time is taken up with client stuff and the other half with 'firm'. This is also the level where you're expected to be the most technically proficient.

Director/Partner: Most of their day to day work is reviewing and signing off on other people's work. The other big responsibility is bringing in new clients. Most partners have a certain quota of new clients (of a certain turnover) they must bring in. If you're sitting on a big client account, you're generally also tasked with other firm or international projects.

Last bit, I really hate the 'we are the best' culture and attitude but it's something all Big 4 have and probably need to have.

subversiveasset
Mar 20, 2010

Kegslayer posted:

Does your group do a lot of tax planning? If they don't then it's probably not the right group for you if you're looking to head into the tax planning direction. Alternatively, doing the more day to day stuff allows an easier move into a commercial tax group since most of it is just the day to day stuff and they outsource a lot of their tax issues. In terms of 100% tax planning, most of the high end international stuff is done by the magic circle while the national stuff is done by the top 4 local law firms so if you want a career in tax planning, thats the way to go. Although on that note, Boston, Deutsche, Goldman Sachs and some others also provide tax advice.

(In-depth look at responsibilities by position)

From what I've seen, my group doesn't have a lot of tax planning stuff. But then again, what I've seen so far is a month's worth of *intern* stuff -- I haven't talked a whole lot with the director and partner on the engagement.

Your elaboration on responsibilities throughout career was exactly what I was looking for, though.

Ultimately, I realize that I'm a bit early in the process. I have quite a bit of time to just get situated first, so I guess that's what the compliance-heavy workload at the bottom of the career ladder is all about.

2 penny bottle imp
Jun 11, 2008

I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SCUMMER

subversiveasset posted:

From what I've seen, my group doesn't have a lot of tax planning stuff. But then again, what I've seen so far is a month's worth of *intern* stuff -- I haven't talked a whole lot with the director and partner on the engagement.

Your elaboration on responsibilities throughout career was exactly what I was looking for, though.

Ultimately, I realize that I'm a bit early in the process. I have quite a bit of time to just get situated first, so I guess that's what the compliance-heavy workload at the bottom of the career ladder is all about.

You realize it's tax season right? Like, the time of the year that taxes need to get filed? There's a seasonality issue involved here.

gmilo
Jun 27, 2006
wooo

subversiveasset posted:

From what I've seen, my group doesn't have a lot of tax planning stuff. But then again, what I've seen so far is a month's worth of *intern* stuff -- I haven't talked a whole lot with the director and partner on the engagement.

Your elaboration on responsibilities throughout career was exactly what I was looking for, though.

Ultimately, I realize that I'm a bit early in the process. I have quite a bit of time to just get situated first, so I guess that's what the compliance-heavy workload at the bottom of the career ladder is all about.

Think about it this way - you need to learn to crawl before you can walk. You can't help at all with tax planning issues if you aren't comfortable with various types of returns or issues dealing with the client's specific industry.

One thing I've found in public accounting is that the amount of things you need to learn can seem daunting. It isn't like many other jobs or internships where you learn something specific and get good and comfortable at it (unless you want to file 1040EZs @ H&R Block).
When I move from client to client in my audits there is almost always something special I need to learn to adapt to with that client because of either
a) the switch from public/private/govt run
b) size and industry of the entity
and c) if the client's people are skilled (people screw up a lot)

If you're a month into your internship, focus on showing up on time, doing work assigned to you, asking good questions, and generally being a nice person to work with. That is ALL you need to worry about right now. I know you want to plan 10 years into the future on where you'll be partner and blah blah blah but your insights and experiences will change your outlooks so much its not worth worrying about right now.

Set yourself up for future success by doing what I just said. It also doesn't hurt to chat up older, established professionals to see how they achieved their current positions. My FAVORITE thing about being an auditor is the ability to sit down with someone like a CFO and just talk about career advice. I've gotten amazing insight from clients on what they did right and wrong in their careers and their advice on what moves I should make in mine.

Chow-King
May 24, 2003

"I could kiss you on the nuts."
What's the consensus on best CPA review course? Top 3 results on Google are Becker, Roger and Yaeger. Anyone hear anything good about Roger? I'm leaning towards that since it's over a thousand bucks cheaper than Becker. But I would be willing to pay more depending on the result.

N.N. Ashe
Dec 29, 2009
Hi I'm a undergrad student in accounting and I am really interested in helping small businesses thrive. I'm not exactly sure how to approach this though. Whenever I hear someone give advice on starting a business the person inevitably says "Always talk to good accountant." I want to be that accountant. Is anyone that guy? Can anyone give me advice on reaching that goal?

RTB
Sep 19, 2004

N.N. Ashe posted:

Hi I'm a undergrad student in accounting and I am really interested in helping small businesses thrive. I'm not exactly sure how to approach this though. Whenever I hear someone give advice on starting a business the person inevitably says "Always talk to good accountant." I want to be that accountant. Is anyone that guy? Can anyone give me advice on reaching that goal?

First I'll sat that this is mostly a stereotype people get from movies. "I have a good accountant" is an easy way for them to explain away a complex situation in a way people will (kind of) understand. That being said, there are lots of ways for accountants to make an impact on their organization. Just don't expect to be the go-to guy who can solve every financial problem as most organizational problem solving is a group effort.

A) Go into corporate tax. You can help businesses structure themselves in a way which minimizes the tax impact of their actions

B) Internal audit - Not very glamorous, but creating and enforcing internal control policies helps an organization prevent fraud and operate more efficiently. Also a great way to learn about each of the different parts of a large organization.

C) Consulting - Not what you think of when they say "Accountant" in the movies, but there are a bunch of different lines of consulting which range from IT to human resources to "The Bobs" from Office Space. Most of which are intended to help businesses meet their goals

Hope this helps. Good luck in your studies/career decision.

Mandalay
Mar 16, 2007

WoW Forums Refugee
I'm not an accountant, but if you're talking about startup small businesses, the above sounds profoundly unhelpful.

2 penny bottle imp
Jun 11, 2008

I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SCUMMER

Mandalay posted:

I'm not an accountant, but if you're talking about startup small businesses, the above sounds profoundly unhelpful.

How is consulting/tax planning unhelpful to a small business? :confused:

Mandalay
Mar 16, 2007

WoW Forums Refugee

rockin peanut posted:

How is consulting/tax planning unhelpful to a small business? :confused:

Now that I re-read his post, you're right. For some reason, I smelled some big-established-business language. :confused:

gmilo
Jun 27, 2006
wooo

Chow-King posted:

What's the consensus on best CPA review course? Top 3 results on Google are Becker, Roger and Yaeger. Anyone hear anything good about Roger? I'm leaning towards that since it's over a thousand bucks cheaper than Becker. But I would be willing to pay more depending on the result.

From what I've heard Becker is the best. I use it and would recommend it to others. I wouldn't waste any money on the things like flash cards though- make them yourself. If you're a flash card person, you'll learn more this way anyway. I bought their Final Review as well and I think it is really helpful.

If I were you I would pick the self-study course option unless you have absolutely no self motivation. The online courses are spaced out too far and the "live classes" involve going in and watching the same DVD that you could be watching/pausing/rewinding by yourself in your own home.

Especially in a field like public accounting you can go from no work to ohmygoddeadlines its nice to not worry about missing class or some bullshit homework due date.

edit - Don't put off studying. I passed my first two sections with ease and blew off the third because I rescheduled it to a later date. Big mistake. I ended up forgetting enough details from the early studying to miss a passing grade by a few points. I didn't have enough time in my final cramming to go back over and thoroughly learn the material.

gmilo fucked around with this message at 08:01 on Apr 14, 2010

Tiax Rules All
Jul 22, 2007
You are but the grease for the wheels of his rule.
So, as someone who is getting a BA next year in something totally unrelated to accounting, with no experience in the field, should my next step be to apply for an accounting masters program?

RTB
Sep 19, 2004

Tiax Rules All posted:

So, as someone who is getting a BA next year in something totally unrelated to accounting, with no experience in the field, should my next step be to apply for an accounting masters program?


This should be helpful -
http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3301097

edit: reread that post and maybe not so helpful if you aren't considering the CPA...

RTB fucked around with this message at 21:55 on Jul 9, 2010

garythetard
Jan 31, 2005

Tiax Rules All posted:

So, as someone who is getting a BA next year in something totally unrelated to accounting, with no experience in the field, should my next step be to apply for an accounting masters program?

Really depends on what you want to do. Master's would help if you want to be a CPA. Otherwise you might just be able to take a few accounting classes and get an entry level job doing some accounting stuff then move up from there. Surprisingly it seems like you can get a lot of jobs with even just an associates degree. Some IRS positions only require as little as six hours of accounting.

edit: I'm actually kind of in a same position. I have a previous degree and a business minor so for me I had only like 30 hours left for a BBA in accounting. Also because CPA elgibility here only requires 150 hours of school and 30 hours of upper division accounting it's easier for me to just get the BBA and take 3 or 4 extra accounting courses.

garythetard fucked around with this message at 22:04 on Jul 9, 2010

hellboundburrito
Aug 4, 2004

Tiax Rules All posted:

So, as someone who is getting a BA next year in something totally unrelated to accounting, with no experience in the field, should my next step be to apply for an accounting masters program?

Like garythetard said, it depends on what you do. Personally, I think the best way to get a good and fairly lucrative job in accounting is to become a CPA and then go into public accounting. While public accounting is in most cases a LOT of work and doesn't pay as well as most people would like considering the hours for part of the year, it is a great stepping stone to another job in finance or accounting. Having public accounting experience, particularly with the Big 4, will give you a lot more opportunity in the field following your exit than if you try to move up from a typical staff accountant or clerk position.

This situation is one of the only times I will recommend getting an MSA. It will qualify you for public accounting positions and give you the base technical knowledge you need, and the rest you'll pick up along the way once you start working. And the bonus is that you can eventually get your CPA and you'll be well off from there.

scribe jones
Sep 17, 2008

One of the key problems in the analysis of this puzzling book is to be able to differentiate a real language from meaningless writing.
interviewing for internal revenue agent on tuesday, wish me luck :)

Tiax Rules All
Jul 22, 2007
You are but the grease for the wheels of his rule.
Is there a distinct hierarchy among masters accounting programs? Will employers still be willing to hire me if I get a degree from some random sketchy (but accredited) program?

Azrial
Apr 26, 2002

Coach, how did we beat Tennessee this year? The same way Vanderbilt did.

Tiax Rules All posted:

Is there a distinct hierarchy among masters accounting programs? Will employers still be willing to hire me if I get a degree from some random sketchy (but accredited) program?

I would just go to a state school program, it will only be a year possibly two years if you do not have an undergraduate degree in accounting. My masters was 12k for the one year program at a large state school.

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Unlucky Sven
Oct 26, 2004

Tiax Rules All posted:

Is there a distinct hierarchy among masters accounting programs? Will employers still be willing to hire me if I get a degree from some random sketchy (but accredited) program?

As you look at Accounting Programs try to figure out who recruits at the school. For instance if you really want to work for a public accounting firm make sure that the firms have events scheduled/attend career fairs/recruit from that school. It will be harder to get into that firm(especially the bigger firms) if they have no relationship with the school.

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