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Ellipsis123
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Posted: 05 Mar 2010 at 09:04 \| IP Logged

I would put networking in there as well. The Big Four holds a lot of information sessions and corporate presentations on campus. If the head recruiter remembers you and all the events you've attended, that can really help you score a first round interview. I would recommend going to as many Big 4 on campus events as you can.

allegro-cpa
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Posted: 05 Mar 2010 at 19:09 \| IP Logged

Legend wrote:

Pre-interview
1. GPA
2. School
3. Work experience
4. Good looks + Networking abilities

Post-interview
1. Interview skills (How good you looked that day)
2. School
3. GPA

Just a rough breakdown.

What if you have a few years experience already, experience might outweigh gpa and school after time has passed.

Nan - Louisiana
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Posted: 05 Mar 2010 at 19:43 \| IP Logged

allegro-cpa wrote:

What if you have a few years experience already, experience might outweigh gpa and school after time has passed.

I'm wondering that myself. Military was my 1st career. CPA is my 2nd career. You can describe me as a non-traditional job applicant.

When I got out of the military the local accounting firms wouldn't touch me. Old degree and no recent experience gets you nowhere. So my in-between years have been working at a non-CPA accounting job.

But now, the comment I got from a former Big-4 partner was, "You just passed the entire CPA exam on the first sitting and you got your degree HOW MANY years ago????" Then he offered to make some calls for me when I am ready to go for interviews.

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ebitda
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Posted: 07 Mar 2010 at 02:14 \| IP Logged

Can anyone elaborate on why passing the exams don't help for recruiting (referring to stochastic's 2nd point)? Isn't that essentially what the career pretty much comes down to--becoming a CPA? I just thought it might be a sign of dedication to the career, and a stamp of approval because they don't have to worry about you passing (or even invest in you to pass them).

The main reason I ask is, I will be taking accounting courses through an extension program to become CPA eligible (graduated in May 2009 with a finance degree but no offers, not surprisingly in this market). There is no campus recruiting there, which means I am at a disadvantage compared to current degree-seeking students that have on-campus opportunities. I thought the only way I would stand out from newly minted accounting graduates (especially MAcc students) was to have all 4 parts done beforehand. Am I not going about this correctly? Should I just network and try to get my foot into the door before taking the exams (not only Big 4 of course)?

I went to a top 3 undergrad business program, but I don't think I can even leverage the school factor that much anymore because I studied finance, not accounting. Thanks for any advice.

fla_examer85
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Posted: 07 Mar 2010 at 14:37 \| IP Logged

ebitda wrote:

Because at the Big 4 they EXPECT you to be able to pass the CPA Exam. If you can't, they were going to fire you anyway. I've heard from some people if you are staff level and don't pass the exam in 4-5 years you automatically get the boot in a lot of Big4 offices. Don't know if true or not.

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