Career Change - Into Big 4 Advisory

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rhyme

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Hi All
Here is my story, advice appreciated!
Background: Earned Finance degree 3 years ago - major canadian university. Currently a level 3 candidate, writing exam in June.
I am currently working in a BO role, and becoming more and more annoying/depressed. My job is boring and I do not want to stay here. That said, I have met with the firms head of research and the more I learn about ER, the less I am interested in it as a career. Nothing against it, it just isn’t where my interests are.
I have always been more interested in financial consulting / advisory. I am seriously considering going back to school to take the necessary accounting courses (my university offers a program where you can do it in a year). I’d like to get in with a Big 4 firm, earn my CA (Chartered Accountant in Canada), and then transition over to advisory where the work experience would count toward the CFA. So realistically in a few years I have both designations.
I spoke with a partner at Big 4 in this role in my city and he viewed this as a solid idea.
My question is what do you guys think? Please no flame about not making 300k a year in that career. I’m cool with that. I want to earn good money obviously, but am realistic. Basically just not sure that Financial markets are for me, and consider this an interesting alternative?
Thanks!!
 
I think this is a solid strategy but would be curious to learn more about why you have become more interested in financial consulting and advisory. Frequently I see a lot of people contemplating different career paths, and they ask me what I think of their analysis and whether I think it’s a right transition for them…and the first thing I always ask them is how they learned about the industry and role, and who they talked to.
Specifically, the perspective you might get from a director-level person may be quite different from that of a junior-level person, where the opportunities may differ greatly in terms of responsibilities, duties, and salary. It’s important to understand the complete hierarchy of roles and opportunities in any industry you’re evaluating.
In general I think accounting is a fine career option, but again I am curious to hear more about why it is you’re interested in it as well as what you don’t find appealing about finance.
 
If this is what you want to do, then it’s a solid career. The senior manager in Transaction Tax at my firm probably pulls in around 150K-175K. Partners start off at 350K. I’m in a major market, so the pay is higher in comparison to smaller markets.
I say go for it! In the end, there are less people in your role, and your experience is probably going to be sought after.
 
this is not an accounting role as numi suggests, and you seem to be aware of this so overall it’s a solid plan to transition in that role. but be aware that accounting/audit dominates the corporate culture within a big 4 even if you are in a strictly advisory/consulting role. your office managing partner will be an auditor. your region managing partner will be an auditor. audit will play first fiddle in every decision around you or in corporate politics. depending on your specific role within advisory, you may avoid dealing with accounting but you will never avoid dealing with accountants :)
 
Sorry, I occasionally use “accounting” interchangeably with “advisory” because they are housed within the same type of company, but Mobius Striptease is correct that the roles are different here
 
@ Numi:
I’ve done a lot of research online, and have spoken to friends who currently work at big 4 (although not in Advisory). The partner I know has said that he will hook me up with some jr people in his dept to give my a better idea of what the day to day job is like.
I also plan on talking to some hr recruiting reps to get a solid idea of what they are looking for as recruiting happens in the fall and If I decide to do this I want to make sure that I have a really good chance at a job. I am trying to get as much info as I can as this is a big decision.
As for Finance, I just feel that to be really successful in this industry you really have to love it, and be into the markets. I find it interesting, but it’s not somthing I can see myself doing long term. So I figure it’s better
@Mobius
I will probably have to do some accounting for the first 2 years or so in order to get the experience necessary for the CA. The plan would be to then transition into advisory asap!
 
absolutely nothing is wrong with accountants in particular but i wanted to stress that an advisory/consulting role within big 4 is a minority position. regardless of how big your market is, you will generate a fraction of the revenue that audit brings. then you’ll naturally play second fiddle cause everything revolves around how much revenue your group brings. career path within big 4 is best suited for an accountant, that’s all!
 
Mobius Striptease Wrote:
——————————————————-
> absolutely nothing is wrong with accountants in
> particular but i wanted to stress that an
> advisory/consulting role within big 4 is a
> minority position. regardless of how big your
> market is, you will generate a fraction of the
> revenue that audit brings. then you’ll naturally
> play second fiddle cause everything revolves
> around how much revenue your group brings. career
> path within big 4 is best suited for an
> accountant, that’s all!
Yeah, I agree.
 
I work in big 4.
The transaction services guys earn a bit more than the audit guys form my understanding. And if its a good team closing deals are certainly producing a lot more revenue perhead than audit guys.
When you say advisory and consulting maybe you mean something else. A lot of the big 4s have consulting teams that offer all kinds of stuff from strategic to change and organisation etc etc.
 
I believe Mobius is talking about the transaction advisory / valuation type of consulting. and he described perfectly the dynamic b/w the accountants and the consultants. If you end up doing a lot of audit assist type (i.e. reviewing valuations done by other firms) of work, it can really be annoying. Your performance is judged by auditors who generally don’t have the analytical tools to understand what you do. Than, if you bring up issues with the valuations, even if they’re complete crap, the auditors get unhappy. So you’ll be under enormous pressure to not bring up issues and just say that valuations are reasonable.
 
Mobius Striptease Wrote:
——————————————————-
> this is not an accounting role as numi suggests,
> and you seem to be aware of this so overall it’s a
> solid plan to transition in that role. but be
> aware that accounting/audit dominates the
> corporate culture within a big 4 even if you are
> in a strictly advisory/consulting role. your
> office managing partner will be an auditor. your
> region managing partner will be an auditor. audit
> will play first fiddle in every decision around
> you or in corporate politics. depending on your
> specific role within advisory, you may avoid
> dealing with accounting but you will never avoid
> dealing with accountants :)
+1
 
nh1977 Wrote:
——————————————————-
> I believe Mobius is talking about the transaction
> advisory / valuation type of consulting. and he
> described perfectly the dynamic b/w the
> accountants and the consultants. If you end up
> doing a lot of audit assist type (i.e. reviewing
> valuations done by other firms) of work, it can
> really be annoying. Your performance is judged by
> auditors who generally don’t have the analytical
> tools to understand what you do. Than, if you
> bring up issues with the valuations, even if
> they’re complete crap, the auditors get unhappy.
> So you’ll be under enormous pressure to not bring
> up issues and just say that valuations are
> reasonable.
Enormous pressure is a little big exagerated. Everything gets reviewed first by manager/senior manager and then partner.
They’ll just tell you to change that and that. It’s not pressure because you won t decide of the outcome of the report anyways.
 
Thanks for the advice everyone, much appreciated!
 
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