I agree with your other points. Not this one though.

The ACA program is widely accepted as the most public accounting / auditing focused of all the professional programs. Finance people in commercial widely regard the ACA as being too narrow to be a benefit in a commercial environment where business acumen and macroeconomic awareness is much more important than memorising accounting standards.

But if you intend to pursue a career in public accounting, nothing beats the ACA.

Having said that, NONE of the accounting qualifications groom you to be a CFO, much much less a CEO. All of them are too accounting standards and protocol heavy. A finance qualification with an emphasis on financial analysis and treasury plus commercial experience working directly with the commercial managers & decision-making (eg. business analyst, credit manager, risk manager, financial analyst, corporate funding and loans) will be the way any early 'grooming' will take place.

Quite a bit of generalisation there about MNCs.

Service centers are not the only finance structure in MNCs. Like the banks, they are are mostly backroom operations only like AP, AR, invoicing, inventory costing, expense & claims, assets etc. But there are also lots of jobs which are business aligned or biz facing like biz unit finance, biz analysis, profit planning, customer financial services and corporate level finance like funding & cash, risk management, internal audit, investor relations, strategic planning etc. And depending on how the MNC wants to manage their local accounting book (according to local GAAP), some may centralise it to a service center, but most have local controllers organisations in each country as it's simply easier having locals deal with the local requirements & authorities rather than some foreigner in a far off service center somewhere.

I spent 3 years in PW (no C yet at that time) and then the last 10 years in a MNC. I've had multiple functional rotations from biz analysis, mfg & inventory costing, controller, internal audit to biz unit finance now. The scope has grown over time from one country, to ASEAN, to Asia (excluding China), to Asia (including China) + ANZ and later next year, I'll get the Indian subcontinent as well. I've moved from biz aligned (biz analysis) to service center (costing & controller) to corporate (audit) and back to biz aligned (biz unit). And the fact that bigger MNCs have many biz units of different sizes, simply moving from one biz to another can be a promotion or demotion (with no change in function or geography). So no, it's far from being "stuck in revenue" for the rest of my life.

Thinking back, if I had the chance to restart my career all over again, would I have started at PW again? No, I would go straight to a MNC. But it will have to be a big one and a global one to provide the length and breadth. Something Top 100 or maybe Top 200 in the world. Fortune 50 US or Fortune 50 Europe is okay as well. Top 5 in each major global industry is good too (global! ie. something like palm oil will not be a global industry). But you have to be mobile and willing to move wherever the company wants you to go. I reckon that after 13 years working, I would be at least 2 promotions ahead of where I am now if I started Day 1 in this MNC, rather than coming in at Year 4 from PW. I wouldn't need to waste a year or two building my network, my credibility and accumulating support amongst the bosses.

The accounting firms are different how?

Let me put it this way. If you can make it in the top 4 accounting firms in the world, you can probably make it in a top 100 MNC.

I can safely tell you that salaries in top MNCs are better than accounting firms. Most of our executives get around 6-12K and these salaries are not as uncommon as you would think. Half the 50 staff in our accounting service center are in that range. New managers start at around 14K. That's more than what senior managers get at Big 4 firms.

As for the speed of promotions, MNCs can be quite fast if you do well. Up until a few years ago, we even had automatic promotions for the first 5 levels (as long as you are rated average and above). Other than that, there's all sorts of fast track programs like future leader, high potential, subject matter expert etc.

Besides salary. there's also the quality of life and working environment. I used to hate the compulsory car/taxi pooling, sharing cheap hotel rooms, low claims, buying your own stationery etc to save cost in PW. In MNCs, you can fly business class (for flights > 3hrs), corporate hotels are 5 star (safety thing), company credit card, 100% claims when you travel etc. You just feel so much less exploited.

Some of the partners and managers were rubbish as well. Throwing files, mouthing off, being arseholes. In MNCs, there are 1800-ETHICSLINEs you can call to report any abuse or discrimination. So, everyone's generally respectful and courteous. Environment's better.

Nope. I just answered a job ad in the newspaper.

Coming from PW made the job interviews really easy. Once they confirmed that I was a S2 in PW, there were really no doubts about my accounting skills or my ability to deal with pressure.

The company had a really good fast track program. However I was hired to fill a specific job vacancy (as an experienced hire), expected to hit the ground running and had to do a specific job. It took me several years to stabilise the job & dept I was hired into (get a succession plan in place) before I could convince the bosses to fast track me into other areas. Fresh graduates with good results & interviews don't have this problem as they are fast tracked initially and rotated (the lower performers drop out of the program gradually each year). So coming in as an experienced hire set me back a couple of years compared to my peers who are at a similar performance level. Having said that, if I were to compare myself with my non-fast track peers only, coming in from PW would have put me at 1 promotion higher than those starting as fresh graduates.

So I guess if you're good, go straight into the big MNCs' development programs. If you're more like average, get into the Big4 to get a little boost.

Do you mean the PWC is not promoting people fast enough?

I made S1 in my first year. I went to S2 in my 2nd year but when I was not promoted to AM in my 3rd year, I left for more money. I have very little patience when I'm being exploited.

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Added on November 22, 2009, 9:54 amI'm in a chemical MNC. One of these: Top 10 Chemical companies

What do you mean what qualification? Graduate and get yourself a degree.

If you're talking professional qualifications, it's not really necessary. My last 4 bosses all didn't have professional accounting qualifications. A couple of them even had broad finance degrees rather than accounting degrees.

But again, having more qualifications doesn't hurt. It may not help but it doesn't hurt. CPA is the one to get for US MNCs, For European ones, anyone will do.

In my opinion, internships are a waste of time.

If you have 4 years to spend... why not spend 3 years getting a degree and 1 year in a real job? You can put 1 year of full time fully qualified work experience into your resume.

No point spending 2 years working, 1 year as an intern, and 1 year studying. If I see a resume like this, I regard it as a 4 year degree program with no work experience.

This post has been edited by seantang: Nov 22 2009, 09:54 AM

Accounting graduates from some specified local universities can get MIA membership (CA) directly without needing to obtain a professional qualification.

CPA Aust - not directly, but there is a reciprocal agreement between MIA and CPA Aust.

CFA? CPA Singapore (ICPAS you mean?) - not directly, but there is also a reciprocal agreement with MIA.

ACCA - anyone can get in as long as you didn't flunk secondary school. If I'm not mistaken, even if you happen to drop out of secondary school, you can take an accounting clerk course first (like CAT or LCCI) and then still get into ACCA. If I have a degree, ACCA will be the very last choice for me as there's no exclusivity at all.

From the employer's perspective, they are choosing someone who has 2 years of study + 1 year of internship + 1 final year vs someone who has only 3 years of study. Of course they will choose someone who has some work experience. This of course assumes that the internship was full fledged work, unlike Malaysia where interns basically waste time each day to collect their travel allowance.

From an employee's perspective however, 2+1+1 is a real disadvantage vs 3+1. You start post graduation work 1 year later, earn a year of partial wage instead of full wage, and if your freshly graduated peers joined the company without an internship, you'd be 1 year older than them.

If I have a US degree, CPA. UK degree, CA. Australian degree, CA if I want to stay long in an audit firm, CPA if I want to go elsewhere. If I only have secondary school and absolutely no possibility of going to university, then ACCA.

It's just a matter of what the professional associations think of themselves vs what the market thinks of them. To me, it depends on who's paying your salary. The professional association or the employer.

The market perception is that the reverse is true.

The one that pays the bills.