[Anonymous]

Hey guys,

I know that obviously it’ll all come down to me and personal preferences, but I was wondering if some people could chime in about which firm they find better than the other. I know this all comes down to personal opinion, so to some degree I should take it with a grain of salt but…

-Both of them offer nearly the same compensation package (as I’m sure most people are aware of)

-My experience with the culture at both (from an initial perspective) has been great. Liked the people at both firms, so it’s hard to decide purely based on my initial impression of the culture of the two firms (which is the biggest problem; I would have thought this would be the big differentiating factor that would allow me to make an easier decision).

I’m really open to working in all industries although my preference would be financial services, hedge funds, private equity, etc…

Are there factors other people could fill me in on? Training and education at either firm? Progression in both firms? Clients?

Again, any information or thoughtful opinion would be helpful. Thanks again all!

[Anonymous]

I will be biased and say go with PwC, since I'm an auditor there and we are simply number one XD

Now joking aside, it doesn't matter both of them will give you great opportunity and great exposure. Both will help you to get the CPA, it comes down to personal preference.

Personally, I received offers from all of the big 4 but I chose PwC because simply my accounting teacher is a senior manager there.

[PublicGuy]

You might as well have asked the board who their favorite football team was and you would get the same level of biased and meaningless responses.

Are there any differences in the work performed at each office? For example my Big 4 office does not serve financial clients at all, so someone wanting to do that would be better served if another firm offered that (though i dont know they actually do in my market).

It's basically a coin toss. You could try and argue for pwc because its bigger but that doesn't really have any tangible benefit on that scale. Both firms have a great reputation and great career benefits.

Quick fix would be to pick the color scheme you prefer i guess.

[the LAST Coffee]

Pick the one with the hottest girls then if you're unable to pick one over the other.

FAR 84 (AUG '15)
BEC 83 (AUG '15)
AUD 79 (OCT '15)
REG 71, 78! (NOV '15, FEB '16)

[acamp]

First off, my condolences for you not having an offer from the Best Big4 firm, so if you must settle between these two…

😉 hahaha

Once upon a time I was deciding between two Big4 firms and I weighed all the pros and cons and was having a tough time making a decision. A friend of mine put it this way, “they're both great firms, what does your gut say?” Well there you go. If you can't decide on tangible facts, sometimes you just gotta go with your gut

Ninja + Wiley Test Bank: [FAR - 81] [REG - 76] [BEC - 88] [AUD - 73](doh!)

Becker Videos: [AUD - 82]

California CPA

[taxsage]

I would reach out to some of the people you met and learn about the current need of the firm(aka what type of clients you will be working with). Geographically not all Big 4 firms are the same. In a specific industry within a geographic region one Big 4 firm may be considered a leader. For example in my area one Big 4 is considered to have better(or dynamic) technology clients, one Big 4 has a bigger hedge fund practice, and the other has a large private equity focus. When you are leaving your firm you may want to name drop some past clients and some firms have more recognized clients. The Industry you work on at a Big 4 WILL LIKELY BE THE INDUSTRY YOU GET RECRUITED INTO AND MAY VERY WELL DETERMINE YOUR WHOLE CAREER. While you can always change industries down the line as an accountant you may end up taking a pay cut or temporary pay raise slowdown during the process. For example if you are working oil and gas at Big 4 for a few years you can likely leave to an oil and gas job for 90k a year or a general accounting job at 70k. You might also lose some of the prestige on your resume if your Big 4 experience was very specialized in an industry you no longer practice in.

I would also consider how long you will likely stay at the firm. PWC is the only firm that promotes to senior at year 3. Ideally at a minimum you want to stay at a Big 4 firm until senior and one additional year to say that you managed people and performed senior level responsibilities. At KPMG that will likely be 3 years total, At PWC that will be 4 years. On the other hand some people joke about KPMG being inferior in some way. These jokes are unjustified, but may make the firm subliminally less prestigious to a hiring manager from another Big 4 in the future.

[Fat Bunny]

I would say go with PwC

REG - 77, 10/18/2014
BEC- 84, 2/26/2015
FAR - 78, 7/16/2015
AUD - 86, 8/27/2015 (Yes!!! I am officially done )

[Anonymous]

Go to PwC. KPMG is only part of the Big 4 because it has Phil Mickelson as an endorser.

[Author]

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