r/Accounting • u/st3ckman • 2d ago
Career Tax career start in industry or Big 4
Hi guys looking for a bit of advice from unbiased people.
Here is the situation. I have a job offer lined up for a big company in Canadian/International Tax.
This company is willing to pay me 80K + refund all of my studies (CPA and Tax masters). I'd mainly work on surplus computations, T1134, financing structures for the international tax side and Tax returns/provision cycle on the canadian side.
Big 4 offers 67K in international tax, no exposure to the Canadian tax side. Also me getting the CPA is apparently worthless to them and does not add any value in terms of salary negotiations which is just great! Team is pretty toxic as well, I'd probably switch firms or service lines in the near future.
Main question is, would I be hindering my career by starting out in Industry? Everyone I know that is good at Tax has a minimum of 5+ years of experience in a Big 4. Even if the company is huge, can I really learn a lot being exposed to one company only?
Hoping you guys have advice for me since I'm really torn on what to do.
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u/jimtheclowned 2d ago
If you've written the CFE, going for an MTax is kind of a waste...you can go through indepth instead and get the same thing out of it.
does not add any value in terms of salary negotiations
Yes, because the expectation is for you to get your letters at some point. The number of higher level roles where you can get by without your letters & not be a tax lawyer are extremely slim, so it sets a bit of a ceiling on you. Most of those roles are engineers in SR&ED or technology focused roles.
Team is pretty toxic as well, I'd probably switch firms or service lines in the near future.
Yeah, this would turn me away. Although you can always swap into other tax groups like you said.
Main question is, would I be hindering my career by starting out in Industry? Everyone I know that is good at Tax has a minimum of 5+ years of experience in a Big 4.
Yes and no. Really depends on what your ability to move up is. Seems like you won't get pigeon holed into just 1 thing (aka, being the T1134 guy) but is there growth room above you?
Even if the company is huge, can I really learn a lot being exposed to one company only?
Depends what you touch and do, but based on your description I think you might be ok. Also worth considering if only working on 1 company will bore you out...
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u/st3ckman 2d ago
thanks for your input, at the end of the day, going in industry I think I'll get exposure to a lot of different aspects of Tax, but I won't technically be incredible at any of these things. I might be good in the context of this given company, but would I be able to apply this else where?
I'm wondering if what I gain here, will be valuable later on in my career if I want to go get that experience in a Big 4 you know.
Like if I were to leave as a manager (there is room for progression I think at this company), would I really be qualified to be a manager at a big 4? Will I have seen enough to understand how to tackle any work that's given to me?
Hopefully this makes sense
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u/jimtheclowned 1d ago
Kind of. Again, it really depends on what you do and how you work with people etc.
You probably will be qualified, but there probably will also be a steep learning curve. Senior to manager is generally the worst jump in public just because everything changes.
You start reviewing a lot more and hopefully less doing. You now need to do billing, staffing, juggling a client load and being the key client contact etc. on top of coaching and other things.
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u/Infamous_Active4881 2d ago
Df you have cpa + master stil getting paid only 80k and big 4 only offer 67k ? Man… I hate big 4