n***y
发帖数: 1675 | 1 What to Know About the Big Four Before Accepting an Offer
by Barrett Brooks• Posted inBlog, Business & Careers
原文链接如下：
http://livingformonday.com/business-and-careers/big-four-basics
It’s finally time to apply for a job (or maybe even to accept/decline an
offer) or make a career change – something you’ve been looking forward to
for a long time. Your background or major in accounting, finance, or
economics has prepared you with a desirable skillset and a valuable degree.
It’s decision time and you just can’t put your finger on what you want to
do. You have this nagging feeling you don’t know everything you should
about the opportunities available to you, especially when it comes to the
Big Four accounting and advisory firms.
Despite the fact that so many people work for the Big Four, it is surprising
how little upcoming graduates and young professionals actually know about
the work environment and culture.
I trace the lack of knowledge back to one primary thing: the recruiting
function of the major firms. The Big Four have major campus recruiting and
job advertisement budgets, so their brands are in our faces all the time.
Many job applicants don’t even consider whether they are a good fit, what
kind of lifestyle they want to live, or how their work will affect their
career trajectory. Job seekers sometimes make uninformed career decisions
simply because the firms are constantly on top of mind.
The solution to all of this hullaballoo is to know your stuff before getting
sucked into the recruiting events where the firms will compete to give you
the best wine and dine experience while handing out tons of company swag.
The Big Four are great places to work, for the right type of person. Each
firm has its own distinct personality, but they also share much in common.
By taking an objective look at what goes on behind the recruiting curtain,
you can make a great decision about whether a Big Four career is right for
you. Let’s get after it.
First things first, you’ve got to get in the right mindset before we can
talk through what you need to know. Forget the burden of your major or
background, as well as the desires of your parents and extended family.
Forget about what your friends want to do when they grow up. This is about
you finding the right career that will align with your values and help you
have a massive impact through your work.
First things first: Who are the Big Four?
1.Ernst & Young
2.Deloitte
3.KPMG
4.PwC
The ways to go to work
There are three or four primary ways to go to work for the Big Four,
depending on how you look at it:
■Audit – Audit is the major revenue driver for most of the firms and the
profession grew in scope after the Sarbanes Oxley Act of 2001. You’ll be an
external auditor, mostly for public companies or large private companies.
You will be assigned to a team at a time to work on specific clients. You’
ll also be subject to a “busy season”, which is the time of year when
audits are due and the workload, hours, and stress increase for a couple of
months. Auditors largely work from the client site or office as opposed to
the firm’s home office. There can be large amounts of travel depending on
the project and your specific assignment.
■Tax – Tax is the second traditional service offering of accounting firms
. The Big Four largely provide tax services to non-audit clients, both
public and private. All companies have to pay taxes, so this is a service
that is not going away any time soon. The Big Four primarily concentrate on
large clients because of their size, name recognition, and the scope of the
work. Tax accountants are often staffed in the accounting firm’s office as
opposed to the client site.
■Advisory – Advisory means different things for different firms, but you
can count on there being a couple of different divisions within advisory.
First, there is almost always a “Risk” group. Professionals in the risk
group are often CPA’s and most often work as internal auditors for non-
audit clients of the firm. Second, there is often an “IT Risk and
Outsourcing” group. Professionals in the IT services group often provide
technology audits, IT process outsourcing, and support to other teams in
need of IT expertise. Finally, many groups have consulting services within
their advisory practice. Consulting can mean many things, which we cover in
more detail elsewhere, but the majority of their efforts lie within the “
business process improvement” space.
■Other – There are also many other services offered under the umbrella of
each firm, and you will have to dig in to each of their websites to learn
more. Common practices include transaction services, real estate advisory,
and more. There are often relatively few jobs available within the human
resources and administration functions at the Big Four as well, but we will
not dig into those as much here.
The organizational structure
In order to understand where you fit into the picture and how you might
progress up the ladder, you first need to understand how the firms are
structured. The first thing you need to understand is that the firms are
structured as partnerships.
The levels within the firms are as follows:
1.Associate/Staff (1-3 years)
2.Senior Associate/Staff (2-3 years)
3.Manager (3-5 years)
4.Senior Manager (5-7 years)
5.Partner (To retirement or firm leadership)
This is a very simplified version of the actual organization and you will
see titles outside of these, but it serves the purpose of helping you
understand where you might fit within the general structure.
I’ve outlined the structure like a ladder. At the entry level, you would
start your career as a staff or associate and stay at that level for 1-3
years depending on your performance and whether you can navigate the
political environment and hierarchy sufficiently well for your ambitions.
You will continue up the ladder in a similar manner until reaching partner,
at which point you will either maintain your role for some time or seek
further leadership responsibility within the firm.
The pay
When I started my first job as a staff level consultant, I was making $49,
000 a year with a $3,000 first year signing bonus or something like that. I
tell you this to give you a frame of reference. I did exactly zero
negotiating and took the offer as it came.
As a consultant, you might be able to finagle your way into a higher
starting salary and a similar signing bonus, but anything above $55,000 at
the entry level is highly unlikely. As an audit, tax, or other advisory
associate you can expect to make slightly less than your consulting
counterparts. Why? It’s simply the nature of things in the professional
services world.
Compared to other entry-level jobs, the Big Four pay better than many, but
they are certainly not the highest pay check you will find. They primarily
compete with each other and they make sure to benchmark their salaries
against comparable jobs around the marketplace. Some firms will claim to
make up a slightly lower salary with other fringe benefits, one of which is
often “our culture.” Your fit (values, strengths, purpose, vision,
personality) with one firm over another will determine how much you like the
culture, and therefore one culture is not inherently better than another.
In my opinion culture is not something to be substituted for salary if
choosing between two Big Four firms. Keep that in mind when considering
competing offers.
The competitiveness
Receiving an offer at a Big Four firm is a competitive process. The firms
design it to be that way because it results in more applications, more
qualified applicants, and a higher likelihood that each offer is accepted.
Do not let the competitiveness of the process make your decision for you.
Values, passion, purpose, strengths, and vision should be your guiding
lights when deciding whether to take an offer.
Once you’re in the job, the nature of the organization makes the work
environment somewhat competitive. Only a certain number of staffers can be
promoted to senior staff each year. Those that are not promoted can either
wait in line or they will be asked to leave if they are not performing. The
competition gets heavier with each progressive promotion.
The hours
I’m not going to sugar coat this one. The hours will be long more often
than not if you go to work for a Big Four firm. The nature of the work
simply makes this a reality. Whether you are in tax, audit, advisory or
consulting, you can expect to work long hours. Period.
The hours may flex over time. Inevitably when a team is on a deadline or in
busy season, they stay in the office as long as possible. You can expect to
eat dinner with your team at a conference table, go home for a couple hours
of sleep, and then head back to the office for more during the busiest times
of year. When those times role around, the work-life balance ideal is not
well-practiced. I’m sorry if I’m telling you something you hoped not to
hear, but I want you to be fully prepared.
With that being said, the hours will not always be ridiculous. There will be
times of the year and specific projects that may only require a typical 9-5
or 8-6 commitment. Cherish those times and take advantage of building
balance and fulfilling activities into your life when you get the chance.
The travel
Consultants should expect to travel 80% of the time. Occasionally you may be
able to get yourself staffed on a hometown project and travel much less,
but that is not the norm. Don’t let them tell you otherwise. At the entry
level, you can expect to go where the firm needs you. Whether you are
interested in the client, want to travel, or have specific ambitions, your
job is to vocalize those things while accepting your role at the bottom of
the staffing totem pole.
Auditors are often staffed in client offices within their home city. Travel
can occur from time to time when a team in another city requires a resource
that is not locally available and you fit the bill. You may also travel
regionally to conduct inventory assessments and other random assignments as
required by the client.
Tax accountants travel the least of the slew. They are most often staffed
right at home in the firm office, with intermittent client visits and
occasional travel. If travel is not your thing, becoming a tax accountant is
probably your best bet within the big four.
Anyone else in the advisory practice can expect a wide range of travel
possibilities. Depending on the project, client, and service line you may
travel 100% of the time for years on end, or you may end up on local clients
that require zero travel. The world of advisory is generally blurry and
hard to define, so be sure to do extra research if the advisory practices
have allure for you.
The flexibility
Now, I bashed on the firms for the whole hours thing, but I will give them
credit where credit is due. If you work hard, take initiative, and speak up
when you have a reason to get out of the office, you can make flexibility a
part of your life.
More often than not the people are inherently good. During the times of year
when it is not so busy, you can often get permission to take care of
personal errands, go to the doctor, make it to a family event, etc without
taking vacation time. You’ll have to feel out your leadership to understand
what flies and what doesn’t, but you will certainly want to take advantage
of the weeks that are slow.
With that being said, you can count on having very little flexibility during
busy season or tight deadlines. That’s the way it is.
The people
Each firm varies with the type of people it attracts, but by and large you
can expect several consistent traits from the people at Big Four firms:
■They’re generally pretty smart
■They work hard
■They are ambitious
■They understand numbers
■They like to have some fun outside of work
■They have good hearts
The good thing about the people at the Big Four firms is that they’re all
in the same boat. If you’re working long hours, they are working long hours
next to you. If they don’t get the job done, they’ll likely be asked to
leave, so you don’t have to deal with slackers for too long. Leaders
generally want their people to do well and have been in your shoes so
understand what it takes to succeed.
You’ll have to get used to seeing your friends leave their jobs if you go
to work for the Big Four. Turnover is a major problem for the firms, and you
should recognize that you’re far more likely to leave or be asked to leave
than to ever make partner. That’s just the raw numbers of the game. People
have many reasons for leaving, from joining client teams, to getting a
raise from another Big Four firm, to simply chasing a passion. People
leaving is a fact of life, so go in expecting to receive plenty of going
away emails.
Finally, a note about assholes and douchebags. Somewhere along the way you’
re bound to run into a jerk, no matter where you decide to go to work. Don’
t let these bozos ruin your career. Do your best to do what they say and get
off their teams as soon as possible. Speak up when you’re being
emotionally abused or given a ridiculous workload – most firms have
mentoring structures that will allow you to express your concerns and get
things taken care of.
So there’s your Big Four 101, no B.S. edition. As I said at the beginning
of this post, the Big Four are great places to work for the right people. As
long as you go in with the right idea and use the right criteria to make
the decision to accept your offer, you can have a very successful and
fulfilling career.
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此人还有另外2篇文章，我一并发出来，有兴趣的可以继续阅读。
10 Reasons to Go to Work for the Big Four
You’re on the cusp of accepting a great job with a Big Four accounting firm.
You have an offer in hand, and your whole family is proud. But you can’t
quite put your finger on why you should accept the offer. What are the
benefits of making the decision to say yes, you ask yourself. What does this
mean for my future? You’re not sure what kind of lifestyle you’ll end up
living. As you consider what to do, more questions come up than answers.
The challenge is that you’re making one of the biggest decisions of your
life and you can’t figure out why you want to say yes. You know that if you
just had a list of the benefits in front of you, you could make a great
decision. But the real problem lies in the fact that you don’t know if you
should say yes. It feels good to get an offer, but you’re not sure if it’s
right for you.
I’ve got the solution for you, and by the time you get done reading you’ll
know ten great benefits of going to work for the Big Four.
1.The name. If you ever decide to leave the firm (and statistics tell us
you will), you will have a prestigious name on your resume. It will vouch
for your credibility and ability in a way that is difficult to measure.
2.The pay. Of jobs available to college grads and young professionals, the
Big Four pay exceptionally well. There are always higher paying jobs to be
found, but you can rest assured that you will be paid well and live a
comfortable financial lifestyle as a result. (Always subject to your
spending habits.)
3.The mentors. If there is one thing I found at each of the Big Four firms
I interacted with, it was great mentors. In just nine months at the firm I
worked for I developed direct mentoring relationships with three partners,
several senior managers, and managers galore. If you’re looking for people
with great business experience, you can find them everywhere in the Big Four.
4.The experience. Yup, the hours are long, but they add up to an incredible
set of experiences that vouch for your ability to perform and tackle big
projects. You will develop immense business acumen if you put your mind to
it, and little can substitutes for the raw experience offered by the firms.
5.Certification. If you’re in the running for any kind of professional
certification and need real-world experience to make the cert official, this
is a great place to bide your time. You might even end up with a career out
of the deal.
6.The training. The Big Four still invest heavily in their employees from a
training perspective. They also offer countless hours of online training on
everything from negotiating to audit principles. If there’s one thing I
miss, it’s access to great training materials (even if they didn’t always
apply to my job . Take advantage!
7.The other young people. The nature of the beast means there is a constant
crop of young people entering the Big Four firms. You will constantly be
surrounded by a group of peers that you can relate to and build a career
with. Be sure to surround yourself with the movers and shakers for an extra
boost in morale.
8.Build up savings. If you want to quickly build up your savings and get on
the path to a healthy 401k account, the Big Four are great places to make
it happen. Live off of half your salary (not difficult) and sock the rest
away. When you’re ready to make a passionate career move or start your own
business, you’ll be glad you got a head start.
9.Make your parents happy. Let’s be honest. If you want to impress your
relatives and make them proud, just tell them you got a job at a Big Four
firm. Like it or not, the name carries weight, even during the holidays.
10.Upward mobility. If you’re dedicated to building a career in public
accounting or business advisory services, it can certainly be done at the
Big Four. For high performers and ambitious professionals, there is always a
chance to move up or take on more responsibility.
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10 Reasons Not to Go to Work for the Big Four
You have a job offer in hand from a Big Four accounting firm…
…You can’t quite put your finger on why you have a sinking feeling as you
open the official job offer you just received in the mail. You know you
should be excited, but your gut tells you something different. How do you
make the right decision?
Here’s the deal: you’re scared about what your future will look like if
you don’t take the offer. I know, I’ve been there. You know other people
would have killed for the position, but it still feels wrong.
The real issue here is that you know the job and company aren’t right for
you, but you feel pressured to accept the offer anyways. You need a way to
articulate the reasons why you don’t dig the place and you haven’t been
able to come up with the solution.
To get to the right answers, you need to understand why you don’t like the
job beyond “it doesn’t feel right” so that you can explain yourself to
others in a positive manner.
Here are ten reasons not to go to work for the Big Four:
1.The hours. If you know anyone who has worked for the Big Four, then you
know someone who has gone through periods of living in the office. The hours
can be grueling at times, and as you move up the org chart it tends to get
worse. If you don’t dig long hours, don’t put yourself in the position.
2.The work itself. The work at Big Four firms is highly analytical and
occasionally monotonous. Checking boxes and retrieving documentation can
only be interesting for so long. Make sure you understand what kind of work
you will be performing before you take your offer. If it’s not what you’re
looking for and it doesn’t build a skillset that allows you to make the
impact in the world you envision, say no!
3.The travel. Depending on your role, it is quite possible that you’ll
spend more nights in hotels than in your own bed. It’s not true for every
role, but the travel can get old after a while – especially when you’re
seeing the inside of office buildings instead of the local attractions.
4.Excel. Almost any job at the Big Four is going to require some serious
Excel skillz. If you dread work in excel or you don’t want to be the
resident whiz kid, this might not be the field for you.
5.The structure and defined upward mobility. While there are plenty of
opportunities to move up within the firms, there is a well-defined structure
for getting up the ladder. Some people are able to buck the system and move
up faster than normal, but you can expect a pretty consistent experience: 1
-3 years as a staffer, 2-3 years as a senior; 3-5 years as a manager; 5-7
years as a senior manager. And that’s to get to partner. Something about
the defined time periods drives me nuts, but it might work better for you.
6.Your responsibilities. For many entry level roles, your work will be very
defined. You will not be asked to use much creativity or get outside of
your box very often. If you’re not cool with defined work flows, this might
be a tough place to thrive. (Exception: some advisory services, including
consulting.)
7.Your (lack of) desire to develop expertise in the field. Read: lack of
passion, interest, or purpose. If you don’t have a passion for accounting
or an interest in becoming an expert in the field, why would you waste
valuable years of your life investing in that field? If you can’t connect
the impact you’ll have through your work to your personal purpose, you can
count on running into a lack of fulfillment.
8.Getting pigeon holed. One of the favorite lines of Big Four recruiters is
that you can create any kind of career you want by moving between service
lines, exploring different industries, etc. The reality is that this is much
more difficult to do than they say at recruiting events. You run a real
risk of getting pigeon holed into a specialty that doesn’t get you excited.
Bummer.
9.Your values and strengths don’t align. Take a close look at your
personal values and your natural strengths. Do your values align with those
of the company and the people that work there? Will you get to use your
natural strengths in your work everyday? If the answers are no, then you won
’t be fulfilled. That’s true at the Big Four or anywhere else.
10.The lack of time to do what you want. The corollary to the long hours is
the fact that you won’t have the time to do what you want or develop new
hobbies. You’ll sacrifice time with friends, family, and doing what you
love in favor or working long hours during busy season. The trade off is
good pay, good experience, a prestigious name on your resume, and several
other benefits. You’ll have to decide what is most important to you. | l*******w
发帖数: 61 | 2 不错。有意思。
不过，这是接近事实吗？很好奇。四大做过的不妨点评一下？ | t*****g
发帖数: 2941 | 3 ■They’re generally pretty smart
■They work hard
■They are ambitious
■They understand numbers
■They like to have some fun outside of work
■They have good hearts
真有已上quality的人,可能去到哪个公司都比较容易成功吧,不一定非得四大 | p**z
发帖数: 1311 | 4 pretty much true I would say
and it all depends on your luck too who you get to work with client/managers
/seniors etc. | l*******w
发帖数: 61 | 5 是这样吗？我读后感觉像是描写季节工人的生活。每个季节都这么忙，难道每季都是不
同的事吗？一直换项目换客户倒是有可能不停地干新的事。会计准则和税法像是大家都
要遵循的吧，如有不断重复的事物，这么多码工为什么不写点东西减轻大家的重复劳动
呢？这可是造福四大及其他财会人员的大恩大德的大好事。而不是动不动就会弄一网站
吸引眼球赚广告费，真是不懂哪来这么多人有时间网上互动眉来眼去的，不是说每天都
在长时间工作？
managers
【在 p**z 的大作中提到】
: pretty much true I would say
: and it all depends on your luck too who you get to work with client/managers
: /seniors etc.
| p*******7
发帖数: 206 | |
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