Accounting
How to make career choices as a young accountant
Young accountants have never had so many options.
Historically, being an accountant often involved little personal agency — most young accountants followed the career path laid before them by their firm, and that path looked much the same from firm to firm. But now with advancing technology propelling the profession forward, new service lines multiplying almost daily, and a labor shortage putting young talent in high demand, new career pathways and opportunities are opening.
The decisions start with picking a firm size and focus area, and continue throughout the career, from committing to the partner path, to going corporate or staying in public accounting, or even starting their own practices. Experts say young accountants should navigate this evolving profession by continually reevaluating their path with an open mind.
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Picking a firm
As firms start shifting their recruiting focus to younger students, sometimes even extending
There are benefits and downsides to each. At small firms, young accountants can become jacks of all trades, have more opportunities to demonstrate entrepreneurship and the opportunity to work with clients faster. Meanwhile, big firms offer prestige, specialization, big-name clients, the opportunity to travel and connections. Many students choose the latter route and aim for one of the Big Four: Deloitte, PricewaterhouseCoopers, Ernst & Young or KPMG.
Jeff Phillips, CEO at Padgett Business Services and cofounder of recruiting firm Accountingfly, thinks the narrative that students receive in school too often skims over the benefits of working in small and midsized firms.
“Don’t buy into the myth that you must start your career at the Big Four,” he said. “They are excellent companies, but there are awesome firms in the Top 200. There are awesome local firms.”
The stereotype is a young accountant starts working in a big firm, grows tired of the grueling hours, and eventually leaves for the
But some experts warn that starting in a small firm may limit career mobility down the line.
“It’s always easier to go from big to small. It’s harder to go from smaller to big,” said Stan Veliotis, associate professor at Fordham University. “Both are possible, but it’s easier in one direction versus the other.”
He said that students risk giving the impression to future employers that they couldn’t get an offer from the big firms — not that they didn’t want to work there.
But Douglas Slaybaugh, a CPA career coach, disagreed: “I’ve seen it go both ways. I’ve got a client right now that’s moving from a smaller firm to a big firm. And there is such a need for resources in the industry right now that if that was ever a thing, it’s less of a thing now.”
Choosing a focus area
It’s difficult choosing a focus area—between tax, audit and accounting, or one of the new possibilities that are cropping—before having actually worked in a firm. Many students may feel they’re sealing their fates with the choice, but the reality is that they can always switch down the line. The best course of action is to just jump.
“Don’t worry too much about a focus area,” Veliotis said. “As long as you have some interest in it, take it, and then you will see over time what you gravitate towards.”
Slaybaugh encourages students to use internships and firm college programs to get a taste of the profession. “Start early and try lots of things,” he said. “You have to start, but you’re never stuck.”
How long to stay
The next question is how long to stay at your first firm. Traditionally, an accountant’s entire career would play out within a single firm — joining as an intern and climbing the ranks until they make partner.
Today, Veliotis says it’s easier for young accountants to leave their firm now that applying for a job can be as easy as clicking a button online. In the past, joining a new firm meant being headhunted or actually running from office to office looking. He recommends staying at least one year in a firm — ideally several years, but never less than one.
“One year is a magical number,” Veliotis said. “In accounting, almost all the disciplines in the accounting firms, all the client engagements, are cyclical, meaning every year, the year finishes and now you have to prepare the tax return, or now you have to prepare the audit or the financial statements. So if a person leaves within a year, it almost looks like something blew up or they couldn’t handle the second cycle.”
Remember, Veliotis said, firms are always taking a risk on young talent — they don’t know how much you know out of college. That’s why it’s important to at least get the first promotion.
From there on, Phillips suggests that accountants reassess their career every three to four years.
“As long as they’re pretty happy with the firm, stay until they’re around a manager level. Your options expand exponentially the longer you stay at that first employer,” he said. “As someone with a recruiting background, we don’t like to see candidates who have changed jobs every 18 months — we just feel like you’re going to change jobs in 18 months on us. So I think there’s a lot of wisdom in sticking something out for a chunk of time to learn how to exist in a firm.”
Slaybaugh thinks accountants should be reassessing more frequently: “Every year, once a year, you should decide whether you’re going to stay in the job you’re in or not. What that does is it removes planned continuation bias, in that we decide we’re going to be accountants based on the circumstances in which we made the decision. Well, times change. Circumstances change.”
Getting your CPA
Most experts agree that getting licensed as a CPA is still important. It provides more career mobility and is a symbol of trust and reliability. But do you really need your CPA?
Slaybaugh says it “depends on the day.” Some non-audit managers and partners don’t have their CPA, so it’s certainly possible to get promoted without it.
“The importance of it still exists. It’s still an important aspect of our society to be able to have that trust in the profession,” Slaybaugh said. He added that getting an MBA plus a CPA can help you become a CFO.
Committing to the partner path
The path to partner, which takes 10 to 20 years on average, is daunting. Luckily, even if an accountant jumps ship before they make partner, at least they’ve gained highly-sought-after experience.
“If you work until you’re about to become a partner and you decide that’s not for you, you have many options available to you, because every company in the world wants to hire somebody with that skillset,” Phillips said.
Experts also recommend interviewing your partners to investigate if the career is right for you. What would they do differently? What do they like and dislike about being a partner? What is the lifestyle like? What are the hours like?
Slaybaugh says if the partner path is for you, you should be yourself from the beginning. For example, don’t pretend you enjoy a niche more than you do, or commit to more hours than you’re actually willing to.
“It’s best to have consistency. Be yourself,” Slaybaugh said. “This has nothing to do with developing as a professional or becoming a better leader; this is about doing things that are against your core values or not resonating with your core values.”
Going corporate
It’s common for accountants to make the move from public accounting to corporate or industry accounting. Often they enter the industry their clients were in, Veliotis said.
“When you make the jump from an accounting firm—where you have a lot of diversified experiences, you’re learning about best practices, you have the stress of client delivery—and you go in-house, you’re very, very powerful on a resume because you know the area,” Veliotis said. “You proved yourself in the most stressful environment there is, which is serving many clients. And then you go to one company, in essence, you just have the one client.”
For those aiming to be a CFO, Slaybaugh recommends staying longer in public accounting to gain more experience. He also noted that you’ll likely experience an immediate pay bump going corporate, but said the salary will eventually be outpaced by what you could’ve made as a partner.
Joining up
Joining professional associations, like the American Institute of CPAs, the National Conference of CPA Practitioners or the National Association of Black Accountants, or state CPA societies, can be an excellent way to practice networking and communication skills. (Communication is an
But while many of these organizations offer virtual meetings, Veliotis encourages young people to go in person for the full benefits and resources.
Owning your own firm
For some accountants, starting your own practice may be the dream, but no one actually teaches how to start a firm.
“If you’re entrepreneurial, the skillsets you’re going to need are that technical knowledge that you probably will not learn in college — you will probably learn working inside of a company,” Phillips said.
The most important soft skills for running a successful firm are a high degree of responsibility and ownership. “It starts and ends with you,” Phillips said.
It’s a great time to start an accounting firm, he added. Demand for services is growing, the economy is growing, there are more niches than ever, and firms that are scaling and shaking loose clients can be grabbed by an entrepreneur.
If you learned nothing else
What remains true for all young accountants — no matter what path they find themselves on, whether they become partners or quit their firms to start their own practices — the most important thing is remaining proactive about making their own choices because the profession will no longer do it for them.
The Financial Accounting Standards Board met this week to discuss its projects on accounting for transfers of cryptocurrency assets and enhancing the disclosures around certain digital assets, such as stablecoins.
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During Wednesday’s meeting, FASB’s board made certain tentative decisions, according to a
At a future meeting, the board plans to consider clarifying the derecognition guidance for crypto transfer arrangements to assess whether the control of a crypto asset has been transferred.
FASB also began deliberations on the
The board decided to provide illustrative examples in Topic 230, Statement of Cash Flows, to clarify whether certain digital assets such as stablecoins can meet the definition of cash equivalents. It also decided to include the following concepts in the illustrative examples:
- Interpretive explanations that link to the current cash equivalents definition;
- The amount and composition of reserve assets; and,
- The nature of qualifying on-demand, contractual cash redemption rights directly with the issuer.
FASB plans to clarify that an entity should consider compliance with relevant laws and regulations when it’s creating a policy concerning which assets that satisfy the Master Glossary definition of the term “cash equivalents“ will be treated as cash equivalents.
“I agree with the staff suggestion to look at examples,” said FASB vice chair Hillary Salo. “From my perspective, I think that is going to help level the playing field. People have been making reasonable judgments. I agree with that. And I think that this is really going to help show those goalposts or guardrails of what types of stablecoins would be in the scope of cash equivalents, and which ones would not be in the scope of cash equivalents. I certainly appreciate that approach, and I think it has the least potential impact of unintended consequences, because I do agree with my fellow board members that we shouldn’t be changing the definition of cash equivalents, and it’s a high bar to get into the cash equivalent definition.”
“I’m definitely supportive of not changing the definition of cash equivalents,” said FASB chair Richard Jones. “I believe that’s settled GAAP in a way, and we’re not really seeing a call to change it for broader issues. I am supportive of the example-based approach. The challenge with examples, though, is everybody’s going to want their exact pattern, but that’s not what we’re doing.”
The examples will explain the rationale for how digital assets such as stablecoins do or do not qualify as cash equivalents and give a roadmap for other types of digital assets with varying fact patterns to be able to apply.
“We really don’t want to be as a board facing a situation where something was a cash equivalent and then no longer is at a later date,” said Jones. “That’s not good for anyone, so keeping it as a high bar with certain rigid criteria, I think, is fine.”
Stablecoins are supposed to be pegged to fiat currencies such as U.S. dollars and thus provide more stability to investors. “In my view, while a stablecoin may meet the accounting definition established for cash equivalents, not every one of those stablecoins in the cash equivalent classification represents the same level of risk,” said FASB member Joyce Joseph.
She noted that the capital markets recognize the distinctions and have established a Stablecoin Stability Assessment Framework to evaluate a stablecoin’s ability to maintain its peg to a fiat currency. Such assessments look at the legal and regulatory framework associated with the stablecoin, and provide investors with information that could enable them to do forward-looking assessments about the stability of the stablecoin.
“However, for an investor to consider and utilize such information for a company analysis the financial statement disclosures would need to include information about the stablecoin itself,” Joseph added. “In outreach, the staff learned that investors supported classifying certain stablecoins as cash equivalents when transparent information is available about the entities at which the reserve assets are held. Therefore, in my view, taking all of this into consideration a relevant and informative company disclosure would include providing investors with the name of the stablecoin and the amount of the stablecoin that is classified as a cash equivalent, so investors can independently assess the liquidity risks more meaningfully and more comprehensively by utilizing broader information that is available in the capital markets and its emerging information.”
Such information could include the issuer, reserves, governance and management, she noted, so investors would get a more holistic look at the risks that holding the stablecoin would entail for a given company.
The board decided to require all entities to disclose the significant classes and related amounts of cash equivalents on an annual basis for each period that a statement of financial position is presented.
Entities should apply the amendments related to the classification of certain digital assets as cash equivalents on a modified prospective basis as of the beginning of the annual reporting period in the year of adoption.
FASB decided that entities should apply the amendments related to the disclosure of the significant classes and amounts of cash equivalents on a prospective basis as of the date of the most recent statement of financial position presented in the period of adoption.
The board will allow early adoption in both interim and annual reporting periods in which financial statements have not been issued or made available for issuance.
FASB also decided to permit entities to adopt the amendments to be illustrated in the examples related to the classification of certain digital assets as cash equivalents without the need to perform a preferability assessment as described in Topic 250, Accounting Changes and Error Corrections.
The board directed the staff to draft a proposed accounting standards update to be voted on by written ballot. The proposed update will have a 90-day comment period.
Senators introduced several pieces of tax-related legislation this week, including measures aimed at improving customer service at the Internal Revenue Service, cracking down on tax evasion and curbing the carried interest tax break, in addition to efforts in the House to repeal the Corporate Transparency Act.
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Senators Bill Cassidy, R-Louisiana, and Mark Warner, D-Virginia, teamed up on introducing a bipartisan bill, the
The bill would establish a dashboard to inform taxpayers of backlogs and wait times; expand electronic access to information and refunds; expand callback technology and online accounts; and inform individuals facing economic hardship about collection alternatives.
“Taxpayers deserve a simple, stress-free experience when dealing with the IRS,” Cassidy said in a statement Wednesday. “This bill makes the process quicker and easier for taxpayers to get the information they need.”
He also mentioned the bill during a
“I’m happy to meet with the team … and do all I can to make it as good as you want it to be,” said Bisignano.
“My bill would equip the IRS with the legislative mandate to create an online dashboard so that taxpayers can monitor average call wait time and budget time accordingly,” said Cassidy. He noted that the bill would allow a callback for taxpayers that might need to wait longer than five minutes to speak to a representative, and establish a program to identify and support taxpayers struggling to make ends meet by providing information about alternative payment methods, such as installments, partial payments and offers in compromise.
“I know people are kind of desperate and don’t know where to turn for cash, so I think this could really ease anxiety,” he added. “This legislation is bipartisan and is likely to pass this Congress.”
Cassidy and Warner
“Taxpayers shouldn’t have to jump through hoops to get basic answers from the IRS — and in the last year, those challenges have only gotten worse,” Warner said in a statement. “I am glad to reintroduce this bipartisan legislation on Tax Day to ease some of this frustration by increasing clear communication and making IRS resources more readily available.”
Stop CHEATERS Act
Also on Tax Day, a group of Senate Democrats and an independent who usually caucuses with Democrats teamed up to introduce the Stop Corporations and High Earners from Avoiding Taxes and Enforce the Rules Strictly (Stop CHEATERS) Act.
Senate Finance Committee ranking member Ron Wyden, D-Oregon, joined with Senators Angus King, I-Maine, Elizabeth Warren, D-Massachusetts, Tim Kaine, D-Virginia, and Sheldon Whitehouse, D-Rhode Island. The bill would provide additional funding for the IRS to strengthen and expand tax collection services and systems and crack down on tax cheating by the wealthy.
“Wealthy tax cheats and scofflaw corporations are stealing billions and billions from the American people by refusing to pay what they legally owe, and far too many of them are getting a free pass because Republicans gutted the enforcement capacity of the IRS,” Wyden said in a statement. “A rich tax cheat who shelters mountains of cash among a web of shell companies and passthroughs is likelier to be struck by lightning than face an IRS audit, and Republicans want to keep it that way. This bill is about making sure the IRS has the resources it needs to go after wealthy tax cheats while improving customer service for the vast majority of American taxpayers who follow the law every year.”
Earlier this week. Wyden also
The Stop CHEATERS Act would provide the IRS with additional funding for tax enforcement focused upon high-income tax evasion, technology operations support, systems modernization, and taxpayer services like free tax-payer assistance.
“As Congress seeks ways to fund much-needed policy priorities and address our growing national debt, there is one common sense solution that should have unanimous bipartisan support: let’s enforce the tax laws already on the books,” said King in a statement. “Our legislation will make sure the IRS has the resources it needs to confront the gap between taxes owed and taxes paid – while ensuring that our tax enforcement professionals are focused on the high-income earners who account for the most tax evasion. This is a serious problem with an easy solution; let’s pass this legislation and make sure every American pays what they owe in taxes.”
Carried interest
Wyden, King and Whitehouse also teamed up on another bill Thursday to close the carried interest tax break for hedge fund managers that
Carried interest is a form of compensation received by a fund manager in exchange for investment management services, according to a
Under the bill, the
“Our tax code is rigged to favor ultra-wealthy investors who know how to game the system to dodge paying a fair share, and there is no better example of how it works in practice than the carried interest loophole,” Wyden said in a statement. “For several decades now we’ve had a tax system that rewards the accumulation of wealth by the rich while punishing middle-class wage earners, and the effect of that system has been the strangulation of prosperity and opportunity for everybody but the ultra-wealthy. There are a lot of problems to fix to restore fairness and common sense to our tax code, and closing the carried interest loophole is a great place to start.”
Repealing Corporate Transparency Act
The House Financial Services Committee is also planning to markup a bill next Tuesday that would fully repeal the Corporate Transparency Act, which has already been significantly
If enacted, the repeal would eliminate beneficial ownership reporting requirements, removing a transparency measure designed to help law enforcement and national security officials identify who is behind U.S. companies.
“This repeal would turn the United States back into one of the easiest places in the world to set up anonymous shell companies, something Congress worked for years to fix,” said Erica Hanichak, deputy director of the FACT Coalition, in a statement. “These entities are routinely used to facilitate corruption, financial crime, and abuse. Rolling back the CTA doesn’t just weaken transparency, it signals to bad actors around the world that the U.S. is once again open for illicit business.”
The Internal Revenue Service rarely penalizes taxpayers who have high balances in foreign bank accounts and fail to file the proper forms, according to a new report.
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The
Taxpayers with specified foreign financial assets that meet a certain dollar threshold are also required to report the information to the IRS by filing Form 8938. Failure to file the form can result in penalties of up to $60,000. However, TIGTA’s previous reports have demonstrated that the IRS rarely enforces these penalties.
The IRS created an Offshore Private Banking Campaign initiative to address tax noncompliance related to taxpayers’ failure to file Form 8938 and information reporting associated with offshore banking accounts, but it’s had limited success.
Even though the initiative identified hundreds of individual taxpayers with significant foreign bank account deposits who failed to file Forms 8938, the campaign only resulted in relatively few taxpayer examinations and a small number of nonfiling penalties. The campaign identified 405 taxpayers with significant foreign account balances who appeared to be noncompliant with their FATCA reporting requirements.
The IRS used two ways to address the 405 noncompliant taxpayers: referral for examinations and the issuance of letters to them.
- 164 taxpayers (who had an average unreported foreign account balance of $1.3 billion) were referred for possible examination, but only 12 of the 164 were examined, with five having $39.7 million in additional tax and $80,000 in penalties assessed.
- 241 noncompliant taxpayers (who had an average unreported account balance of $377 million) received a combination of 225 educational letters (requiring no response from the taxpayers) and 16 soft letters (requiring taxpayers to respond). None of the 241 taxpayers were assessed the initial $10,000 FATCA nonfiling penalty.
“While taxpayers can hold offshore banking accounts for a number of legitimate reasons, some taxpayers have also used them to hide income and evade taxes,” said the report.
Significant assets and income are factors considered by the IRS when assessing whether taxpayers intentionally evaded their tax responsibilities, the report noted. Given the large size of the average unreported foreign account balances, these taxpayers probably have higher levels of sophistication and an awareness of their obligation to comply with the law.
TIGTA believes the IRS needs to establish specific performance measures to determine the effectiveness of the FATCA program. “If the IRS does not plan to enforce the FATCA provisions even where obvious noncompliance is identified, it should at least quantify the enforcement impact of its efforts,” said the report. “This will ensure that IRS decision makers have the information they need to determine if the FATCA program is worth the investment and improves taxpayer compliance.
TIGTA made three recommendations in the report, including revising Campaign 896 processes to include assessing FATCA failure to file penalties; assessing the viability of using Form 1099 data to identify Form 8938 nonfilers; and implementing additional performance measures to give decision makers comprehensive information about the effectiveness of the FATCA program. The IRS disagreed with two of TIGTA’s recommendations and partially agreed with the remaining recommendation. IRS officials didn’t agree to assess penalties in Campaign 896 or with implementing performance measures to assess the effectiveness of the FATCA program.
“From our perspective, TIGTA’s conclusions regarding IRS Campaign 896 are based, in part, on a misguided premise and overgeneralizations, including the treatment of ‘potential noncompliance’ as tantamount to ‘egregious noncompliance’ that warrants a monetary penalty without contemplating the variety of justifications that may exempt a taxpayer from having to file Form 8938,” wrote Mabeline Baldwin, acting commissioner of the IRS’s Large Business and International Division, in response to the report.
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