[Omni]

Hi everyone,

I will be starting off at big 4 this upcoming summer, however, after great consideration and speaking with my mentors and family, I know the accounting life won’t be for me.

I have decided that I’d like to change my career path and pursue management consulting. However, I was hoping to get some input from the awesome community here as to how I should go about my stay at big 4.

I will be working in advisory, and I hope to stay at least until I make senior. I have decided not to go the CPA route and was wondering how much this will affect my ability to make senior. I understand that certifications are only required to pass the senior level, however, do management/counselors check your progress for certifications? I don’t want them to realize I’m not pursuing one as it would give them a bad image on my dedication to the practice. Just wondering if anyone has experience in being examined on their progression towards a certification.

[fuzyfro89]

If you are planning to stick around for 1-3 years, I recommend you take and pass the exams. It's worthwhile to have that.

Counselors will probably ask, and you can likely hold them off for a while (“I'm working through them”). A decent counselor/mentor will ask you how it's going, what your study plans are, what advice they can offer, which sections you're working on, how you are getting through the material, etc. Unless you plan on straight lying to them, I don't know how to have the conversation that “I'm not studying for the exams”.

I left big 4 for internal audit, and then moved into corporate finance and having a CPA has been useful… right or wrong, it's viewed positively, especially if you move into a different field such as consulting or finance. Granted, you'll have to move into a new area to move past the “typical accountant” stigma, but that's easy once you get different experience. Either way, this part is up to you.

Separately, how do you plan to get into management consulting? I'm assuming you mean actual strategy consulting, since you are already going into “consulting” (big 4 advisory)… a lateral move will be difficult. Not because it's impossible, but those firms just have pipelines established at undergrad and MBA level… so in between you'll have to rely on networking to get a foot in the door even at your current firm.

If you're gonna work in Big 4 unless you're in IT you're pretty mucheap expected to have a CPA license or actively working towards it. Even if you plan to leave at senior level those few years before you make senior the awkward conversation will always come up about your CPA status. People who work in public accounting without a CPA are in usually one of two categories.. either that they tried failed and gave up, or they never had the ambition or interests to get certified which will affect how you are perceived by mentors other staff and sometimes even clients. In my experience when you need to communicate with clients some.of them assess your knowledge by your experience and certification if they feel you aren't competent enough to communicate with then they're gonna ask to speak to someone else or mention it to senior mgmt. Which won't be a good look for you. The point is if you're gonna go Big 4 route in audit, advisor or tax get certified!

[Tim]

Don't pass up your opportunity to get CPA licensure. It will only get harder as time goes on and you forget more of the material. Even if you were going to go coach basketball for the rest of your life I would say you should go ahead and get your CPA. It's a very respected certification.

[Reverie]

Cpa chits on every business degree and licensure as of today. It also chits on lawyers and CFAs. Get it.

[Author]

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