[Anonymous]

Hi everyone,

First a little background about myself. I recently received my bachelor’s degree with a double major in Accounting and Financial Economics (225 credits eligible for the exam, 3.01 cumulative, 3.2 accounting GPA) and am looking for some career advice. I am currently studying for the CPA Exam and am scheduled to take FAR on 8/9 as my first test.

Anyways, I had a phone interview with a small local CPA firm and I did well enough to warrant an in-office interview next week for a Staff Auditor position. As most of you are probably aware, fall recruiting is coming up and I specifically asked the firm that interviewed me that if I was offered a job, would I be able to partake in fall recruiting, and they obviously said NO. The only reason why I am even considering taking the job (if I get an offer) is because I have a bunch of student loans that I will have to start paying off beginning January 2014, and I know that if I were to receive an offer from one of the bigger firms that I wouldn’t start till maybe in the summer or next fall at the earliest.

so….2 question:

1: If I receive an offer at the small local firm next week, should I take it? (would ask for a starting salary ~$55k/year which is about the median rate for a staff auditor)?

2: How difficult is it to switch firms in maybe 2-3 years down the road? I do not want to cut myself short and stay at a smaller firm when I believe I have the potential to achieve more, but again, I need the money asap.

and fwiw, I have been trying to do some networking but it has proven to be quite difficult. I’ve talked to a couple recruiters at Moss Adams, but that is about it, meaning that getting an offer at another firm might prove to be difficult for someone in my position. My only real professional experience is that I was an intern at Scottrade (investment brokerage firm) for a little over a year.

Thanks in advance for any help, it is much appreciated!

[2012passtheCPA]

Hi Jason!!

I'm somewhat in your position right now. I've passed the CPA exam, have my 150 hours, but only have my undergraduate degree in Accounting and absolutely zero big firms recruited at the school I graduated from. All I need is the experience part for my CPA license and voila!!

I'm currently looking for a job in public accounting and it is extremely difficult. Everyone seems to be searching for Senior Associates not Associates. I assume that's because here in about 2-3 months they'll have a whole new batch of Associates coming from wherever.

With that being said you should do your best to nail the interview! Also, do some research on the firm regarding salary. 55k for not Big 4 sounds incredibly high to me. However, I don't know what area you are talking about nor do I know the firm you are referencing. If you can't find the specific firm, try researching firms roughly the same size as the one you are interviewing with. There are tons of places that should give you a rough idea of what the salary is. I'd also give a range of salary “desire” when they ask, instead of a hard number.

As far as switching firms, I'd worry about that 2-3 years down the road when you have some experience and in those 2-3 years you've worked up a network that hopefully would slide you into a new bigger firm when the time comes.

Good luck!!

[Anonymous]

Pending where you are located, I highly doubt you can get 55k starting from a small firm. I'm pretty sure that's what the Big 4 starts at for auditors.

[Anonymous]

If you get a chance to get into an accounting firm, it shouldn't matter the size. Get some experience, then down the road once you are a CPA and have experience, look at transferring to a bigger firm. You never know, working at smaller firm could be much more beneficial to your career than you are thinking. You usually have the opportunity to learn more in a smaller firm because there is less staff to spread the work out over and your workload ends up being quite diverse.

And I agree that $55K does seem high for a small firm.

[Anonymous]

What is a more realistic salary? I am basing this off of the Robert Half salary calculator where it said the range is from about $53-61k for a staff auditor in my zip code with up to 1 year of experience.

[2012passtheCPA]

I could be mistaken, but I believe that 1 year of experience is public accounting experience. So sure you have an internship for a year, but I don't believe this counts because you weren't in public accounting.

From what I've seen, at least for Big 4 as an overall average (meaning if you live in DC or NYC it could be different) is around 50-52k as an associate.

That's Big 4. Local firm, depending on how much revenue they do each year, my guess would be that's more in the 40-45k range. That's just a guess based on very vague details given.

[Anonymous]

I graduated in the summer of 2010 and got a job Sept 2010 in a small to mid size firm in the Midwest. There are a total of 12 people in the office, 5 of which are CPAs. I was eligible to sit for the CPA exam upon graduation.

I started at 42.5k and 3 years later including bonuses with our OT policy (you can pay straight overtime out) I make about 50k a year. I have yet to pass the CPA exam but should soon.

Although I don't have anything to base it on, I think smaller firms are the way to go. You get the chance to learn everything… personally I deal with bookkeeping, income taxes, sales taxes, payroll taxes, auditing, reviews, compilations, gift taxes, research into topics…

I would say the downside to smaller firms are less pay and less people. There is less opportunity for friends or networking and a greater risk you won't have a buddy at work. I have one good friend I made here but the rest are older… I'm 25, coworker friend is 23, but the rest are 35+

[Anonymous]

How does having some parts of the CPA Exam completed affect how firms view your resume? I've spent my whole summer so far studying for the CPA because I wanted to have some parts completed for fall recruiting. I've read a bunch of posts on A71 and it seems like there are people with all 4 parts passed that are still having difficulties getting a staff auditor position which is really starting to worry me.

[Anonymous]

My experience with a small firm is that it is the worst thing ever. Maybe if the firm exposes you to all the various aspects its ok but this firm only wanted me to do Audit and their clients were terrible and the partners were willing to do anything to make terrible clients happy, which includes violating probably every auditing standard. Mid size and big firms follow auditing standards if only for the purpose that they are terrified of lawsuits. BEWARE.

[Author]

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