ACCA qualification and my future in this job...

Hi people,

I will try to make this as brief as possible since I tend to be a bit emotional in writing.

Basically, I am a nearly qualified accountant (awaiting the last exams results taken in this June) and currently working in a small private bank. I moved across from practice last July because I wanted to be in banking industry.

Good things about working here is - good pay, quiet environment, mature people, probably the opposite of everything I didn't like in practice.

However I am beginning to doubt if I will ever progress here.

I've got two dominant and experienced bosses (CFO & COO). They are obviously qualified accountants and have been in practice & industry for many years. Therefore there is no way I will ever jump over them, which is fine as long as I progress in my own way by learning new things, getting a payrise etc etc.

My boss...she is always on my back. She tells me to do this to do that..and check my work and ask why this is that way why that is this way...They discuss the real finance stuff but always keep things to themselves. If she finds out in rare occasions I have direct communication with her boss (COO) without her prior knowledge, she asks every single detail and questions why I had to do it. Therefore I tend to talk through her to the big boss and vice versa. I feel I am no more than an accounting clerk and I hardly use my accounting knowledge.

At least I was able to work under a minimum supervision and make my own decision in my previous job..I was close to my seniors and partners and had no problem discussing any issues...They were not autoritarioans.

I know industry is different from practice and responsibiliy/progress are not necessarily correspondent in my situation but I can't help feeling disheartened. I did not dislike working in practice but I wanted to learn more about how a bank worked.

It's been an year since I left my previous job (however due to my personal circumstances, I started working at this bank from last November) so I fear I am being impatient again. I have a tendancy of being ambitios over patient I must admit.

Should I just keep my head down till the resutls come out and see what happens?

Should I just believe my own judgement - from what I've experienced here I won't be treated any differently even after qualification - and start looking around?

In industry you are not expected to be treated any differently because you've achieved the qualification?

Sorry for the long post but I would be really gratful if I could borrow your brain on this...

Thanks!

You've only been there a short while. Stick it out for now. Gain a bit more experience there. Also if you move too quickly it won't look good on your cv. You may be nearly qualified but to the CFO you are just starting in the bank. Maybe when your there a little longer than 7-8 months she'll trust your work a bit more. If I were you I'd stick it out until you're there about 18 months then start looking around again

If I was you I would satrt looking around now but keep it in the back of your mind that you will only move for something special.

If you are very unhappy then not good to stay but previous poster was right about the bad appearance of a cv that has a lot of short appointments on it. Not many employers want to invest time, money and energy into an employee who has several very short stays on their cv

Thanks FredBloggs and badge55.

Yep I am aware of the consequences on my CV..I was in practice (big4) for 2.5 yrs before and this move was strongly disapproved by the partners over there. Then again I believe it was normal for them not to want to let go of their employees due to the strong demand of auditors..

However if you wanted to move back to practice, wouldn't it be better to make an out-of-practice as short as possible?

I am not very unhappy in this job. I am annoyed every now and then. I want to be treated as a proper accountant (At least I believed I would be when I got my qual.).

To be fair, this job brings me almost everything I didn't like for in my previous job. Amazing that I've already forgotten that I did have some awkard times and bad memories as well while I was working in practice. I sometimes wonder if I was somehow brainwashed(!) by the image of big4.

Every reply you posts will make my day!
Thanks a lot in advance.

Get as much as you can out of the job then move on. This is what ambitious finance professionals do. If you get an interview for another finance job it is a reasonable explanation for leaving that you are not being challenged in your current role. It makes sense to wait until you have passed your exams then you are in a position to talk to your current employers about your future role. If it is not going to grow into something more demanding than start looking.

Hi Puretone,

I'm an accountant with 12 years post qual experience. I trained in practice so I hope I might be in a position to give you some advice.

Re the job, one of the most stressful things in life is to be in a position where you're constantly questioning yourself. Sounds like you're there now; should I stay / go, if I go what will I do, what will future employers think of my move.

I think you should take a day out to think through your options, write them down and then stick to it. If you decide to stay, write down the reasons why you've made that decision and then look at them whenever the doubts start to creep in. If you decide to go; write down the possible outcomes and how you'll handle them. In any event, try to see past the current set of circumstances and look at where you want to get to.

Also, if it helps, I have a part qualified accountant in my team and he tends to be more concerned about "getting more responsibility" than just doing the role he's currently assigned, sometimes to the extent that he doesn't carry out his tasks well. He doesn't seem to have made the connection that shining at your current position is what leads to getting more responsibility. I'm not saying this applies to you, but one to give some thought to perhaps.

I really appreciate your advice Streamer.

I will take a day out to think through my options as you've advised..Are you still in practice by any chance?

One thing that bothers me at this moment is what my boss tells me. Maybe she's trying to be honest with me but it doesn't really help - she said she would understand me if I left after I become qualified. Her boss would be annoyed but she would understand why I did that. She casually teases me that she doesn't understand why I moved across from practice (as if it were a mistake). The other day she even said there was a new big 4 office just opened, it could be a great opportunity for me. (FYI she was qualified in a big 4 in Scotland.)

Sometimes I think she honestly thinks for my future. But sometimes I am incredibly confused what's behind all this. Since she's my boss who knows about the company, she believes that I am wasting my time in this company or she's trying to get rid of me?

When would you say like this to your subordinate..?

I'm not in practice anymore. It didn't work for me and I notice I'm a much more productive person working in an environment that makes me happy.

Your boss's conversations do seem a little random but I wouldn't let it concern me. Its easy to spend a lot of time worrying about what other people do or say. Again, work out what you want, once you've done so you may be in a position to speak to her about the comments or take her up on her advice!

Put another way, you don't want to have a conversation along the lines of "X, I really want to build my career working here and your comments about opportunities in the Big 4 confuse me", when you're going to hand in your notice shortly after.

Best of luck with it.

Thanks for your advise streamer.
I'll bear in mind what you said.

Are you giving a bit too much info about your boss and thereby identifying yourself? Accountant, Non irish, female, where she qualified. I would be surprised if that fitted more than a few people.


Murt