how much work experience is needed for Big Four ?

I've recently thought about accountancy as a career. As I did not want to go into accountancy whilst doing my degree I have no work experience / internship.

How much work experience would I need before completing my application to stand a realistic chance ? And is work experience in a high street accounting firm helpful or do I need to look at city firms ? thanks

Reply 1

Elasticity

2

Original post by dbdb

I've recently thought about accountancy as a career. As I did not want to go into accountancy whilst doing my degree I have no work experience / internship.

How much work experience would I need before completing my application to stand a realistic chance ? And is work experience in a high street accounting firm helpful or do I need to look at city firms ? thanks

I had zero relevant work experience (only part time shop jobs and a summer spent slaving away in a factory) and got an offer from PwC. The application process is much more about competencies (where you can use examples from university societies, sports clubs, academic group projects, part time jobs etc), proving a baseline set of skills (the tests and assessment centre) and career motivations/understanding of what you'll actually be doing.

Reply 2

username1177050

20

Original post by Elasticity

I had zero relevant work experience (only part time shop jobs and a summer spent slaving away in a factory) and got an offer from PwC. The application process is much more about competencies (where you can use examples from university societies, sports clubs, academic group projects, part time jobs etc), proving a baseline set of skills (the tests and assessment centre) and career motivations/understanding of what you'll actually be doing.

So does it matter as much as law which university you go to? Or is accounting more flexible?

Reply 3

Elasticity

2

Original post by neal95

So does it matter as much as law which university you go to? Or is accounting more flexible?

No idea how it compares because I did not study law and have not been interested in working in law. I imagine top 10 or 20 universities might be at a slight advantage.

Reply 4

MancStudent098

13

Original post by dbdb

I've recently thought about accountancy as a career. As I did not want to go into accountancy whilst doing my degree I have no work experience / internship.

How much work experience would I need before completing my application to stand a realistic chance ? And is work experience in a high street accounting firm helpful or do I need to look at city firms ? thanks

A level standard matters - obviously this tends to correlate with university. But in itself university doesn't mean much.

Reply 5

AW1983

10

Answer to the OP is none. However, you do need to provide examples of competencies on their application forms and work experience is a good way of doing that.

Assuming you still have time before making an application (ideally a year) I would suggest you take a look at the application forms for each of the big 4 firms and think about how you can answer the questions today. Then think about the experiences and activities you could undertake to make better answers.

Reply 6

Tokyoround

16

Pretty much none. They will take anybody with a 2.1 from a reputable institution that can jump through the ridiculous hoops in the recruitment process.

Reply 7

ThatAuditGuy

Original post by dbdb

I've recently thought about accountancy as a career. As I did not want to go into accountancy whilst doing my degree I have no work experience / internship.

How much work experience would I need before completing my application to stand a realistic chance ? And is work experience in a high street accounting firm helpful or do I need to look at city firms ? thanks

The simple answer is none, you need to be able to show that you are passionate about the subject and that you have some basic understanding of how your service line works. The biggest asset a graduate can have is commercial awareness, the pure ability to discuss anything related to finance to some degree will make you stand out at interviews.

Reply 8

M1011

19

Original post by Tokyoround

Pretty much none. They will take anybody with a 2.1 from a reputable institution that can jump through the ridiculous hoops in the recruitment process.

Ridiculous hoops? Exact same as every other grad scheme lol.

Reply 9

Tokyoround

16

Original post by M1011

Ridiculous hoops? Exact same as every other grad scheme lol.

Yeah, they're all ridiculous!

Reply 10

M1011

19

Original post by Tokyoround

Yeah, they're all ridiculous!

Interesting - which parts out of interest? I tend to find the competency questions are a bit stupid, but the rest (tests, interviews, group exercises, case studies) all seem reasonable to me.

Reply 11

ThatAuditGuy

Original post by M1011

Interesting - which parts out of interest? I tend to find the competency questions are a bit stupid, but the rest (tests, interviews, group exercises, case studies) all seem reasonable to me.

I agree. I notice a lot of people feel like the recruitment process isn't fair but how else would they go about filtering 1000's of applications ?

Reply 12

Tokyoround

16

Things I hate the most are brain teasers and competency questions because they don't really mean anything. You can easily lie in competency questions and completely fabricate a scenario to answer the question. Tests and group exercises are good though I agree there. When I've had the opportunity to interview people I've never bothered with competency questions and just try to find out about their personality and work ethic.

how much work experience is needed for Big Four ?

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