Related Posts
Anonymous User
More Posts
When are mid-year reviews set to happen?
Enthusiast
What is the midpoint salary of Band 8?
Anonymous User
Do you always need an MBA to get into MBB?
Additional Posts in Accounting
FSO Advisory Academy- who is coming?
Cinco de mayo!!! Let's get wasted
New to Fishbowl?
Download the Fishbowl app to
unlock all discussions on Fishbowl.
unlock all discussions on Fishbowl.
Big4 people just have their bellies filled with the kool aid. Reality is mid tier is better since you get paid more for the hours you work, get faster exposure since it’s smaller clients and teams, and enjoy a better wlb while still getting great experience and firm recognition on your resume.
At my mid-tier, I:
Was paid less.
Worked more hours than B4 because there's literally no one else to cover as the teams are small.
Never had even a single staff to help me.
Got pulled into helping other offices/sectors just because my busy season ended.
Had subpar technology and hence was stuck doing manual work for a huge chunk of the day instead of value added work.
Was not allowed to take on clients I wanted exposure to because they could not hire anyone to replace me on my current clients.
It's quite hard to generalize. Personally, my life and career got so much better when I moved to a B4 and I refuse to ever go back to a mid-tier. Some will say the opposite.
OP, what level are you? You've been at GT, BDO, RSM and KPMG? That's quite a list for someone at a level low enough to not understand why Big 4 stands out. Job searches always want big 4 experiences. As a former GT employee, I completely understand why. (Resources, tools, clients, employees, revenue, global)
lol I mean one of the GT, BDO, and RSM ( not all). I was with GT, compared to KPMG, GT is so awful and primitive.
Bigger/better clients which equates to more opportunity, better exit ops, better pay, harder to get into are all factors that play into the perception of B4 being elite.
Chief
This isn’t accurate. Bigger clients could also means larger engagements and at low levels you see less of the full picture of an audit. If you want to learn how to be more of a “swiss army knife” at a early stage of your career it is significantly more likely at a smaller firm because there’s less resources and you will need to be more of a generalist by necessity.
The trade off is Big 4 often has far superior technically training/resources, but there’s no way you can demonstrate there’s more “opportunity” because there’s an exception for every argument one could make on that topic.
Not for nothing I also worked at a big 4 for 3 years and learned far less in my first year at a middle market. I thought like you before I left too.
Yeah I'm pretty sure the middle market firms beats big 4 in pay until maybe PPMD. Only reason I can think of is bigger clients.
EY, PwC and KPMG had no problem matching my salary expectations. GT gave me an offer way off(under 30% my range).
Because we get paid the most 😌
ASM1 how long have you been at mid tier?
Bigger clients, bigger deals, oftentimes more complexity is what generally does it
It’s not elite in the sense like Medicine, MBB, FAANG, Big Law etc. The barriers to get into Big 4 are very low comparatively.
You don’t need to go to a elite school to get recruited, most people are decent accounting students from state flagship colleges.
It’s elite in the accounting world as in most F500 companies prefer recruiting Big 4 accountants for the reasons PwC1 said.
Chief
PwC 4 you’re delusional if you think the big 4 are exclusive. In college I got an offer from ALL FOUR big 4. Worked at PwC for 3 years and left the week after I made senior because of how horrible the work environment and left for a midsize firm into a better discipline and way more money. I don’t know what office you’re in, but PwC nyc office, the biggest office by a LONG SHOT I might add, hires literally anyone who finishes college. The vast majority of the people I worked with at PwC were not smart. They need bodies for roles and they filled them. Simple as that.
I would say the training/resources that one of the other comments mentioned. With more money, firms are able to heavily invest in training material and new technology.
Yes, nobody gives a sht outside of the accounting industry. But when you’re apart of the accounting industry, it matters. It’s the most prestigious spot you can land within the Audit bubble. I’ll admit, it’s not a prestigious or sexy bubble as a whole compared to other industries.
I had a family party recently and my mom was telling my aunts that I got promoted to manager recently. They were absolutely shook I was making 150k at 26. They thought accountants were just bookkeepers making 20 bucks an hour. Fk my aunts and their med school kids. Have fun working with smelly sick people for the rest of your lives. My excel spreadsheet smells amazing!
@kpmg Who the fk is looking down at doctors?
I’m saying its a tough job and I don’t want to do it. It’s a mentally draining and overall gross job. Who goes to the Hospital? Sick people. It ain’t rainbows and sunshines and non smelly actors like in the movies. On top of that you have the mental toll of witnessing people die and their members breaking down. Fk that
You don’t think providing assurance over financials is contributing to society? Idk if you heard of Enron and the $74 billion it stole from society, maybe look it up. I think you need a better understanding of your job, maybe when they promote you from prepaids testing duty
And yes, $150k is a start for tech, but I wasn’t that smart in college to start in tech. No arrogance here, as I’ve stated previously, it’s not as prestigious or sexy to other industries. It’s just the fact that I’m in the best position possible in my current lane.
People like me are proud of where we are and how hard we worked to get there. It’s legit so naive that you’re talking about prestige with being a lawyer and or doctors like it’s high school. No wonder you ended up in a mid tier firm out of college.
If you look at the size of 4-10 compared to big 4 it is quite a difference. I’ve never looked down at anyone at smaller firms but at the end of the day the big 4 have the larger clients that can support their work and also no matter where you go you will have the name recognition which might not be the case for smaller firms.
Not to say you can’t have a successful career in accounting outside of big4 you absolutely can but I would equate it to attending a top school or MBA program vs a state college. Ultimately the education you get is similar but having that name recognition can give you an upper hand when you compare the resumes side by side.
I mean this question also depends on practice. Places like EY-P and PwC-Strategy& are top consulting practices and hire from Ivy league and M7.
At a national firm now, and used to be big4. It depends on your experience, but my experience in big4 was more positive
My Regional Firm had better culture.
Chief
It’s really depends on the practice and firm. I work in rewards & compensation consulting group at my firm, and when doing the same thing at a Big 4 it was wayyyy worse because the practice wasn’t prioritized by leadership there because it’s not a major revenue driver and caused a lot of issues operationally.
Much better set up here, but I’m sure there are plenty of examples of how people left MM to go big 4 because of issues in their service.
Everything has a layer of “it depends”, but if you’re wondering why some people are super stuck up about being at the big 4 that’s just how people can be when they are overly prideful.