Hi there, I am currently a Manager in the CF consulting practice of PwC in Australia and I hope I can share a bit of insight or perhaps some of my personal thoughts on getting accounting and finance jobs in Aus.

In my personal point of view, you need the following 3 ingredients to stand a good chance with securing a job in Australia:

(1) Connection/Network (If you have friends who is currently working in the company you wanna join, their endorsement will be very helpful, as Aussies are wary of hiring offshore candidates because they are not familiar with Malaysians.. without being racist or anything, just imagine a highly educated and top candidate from Bangladesh randomly send you an application for a job, will you be keen to purely assess the candidate based on his papers?)

(2) Solid and proven experience - Let's face it, the job market in Aus is competitive, mainly because everyone throughout the world wants to migrate to Aus to live in one of the World's most liveable country. That being said, the competition is actually at the lower level accounting / finance jobs, where there is just too many good candidates that an employer can choose. I liase quite closely with a number of headhunters in Australia and I gathered that actually there is a healthy demand for experience accountants, auditors or finance professionals at the managerial level, especially those with strong technical skills, esp the Big 4s, some bulge bracket IBs and consulting firms. At least that was quite true before the recent economic events.. but that being said, I can tell you the Big 4s are still looking at ppl. In short, there is a shortage of good quality candidate at the managerial lvl but a total oversupply at the junior or slightly senior role instead.

Unlike in Malaysia or Singapore however, Aussies are very choosy in selecting candidates, they would rather not employ anyone at all and leave the vacancy open than employing the less than ideal candidate (I have worked in Malaysia for 5 years and in Singapore for 1 year, I gathered that they will lower their standard and get someone in to do the job if they are desperate, I might be wrong)

(3) Ability to present yourself confidently and talk well during interview - Goes without saying, that is just Aussie/foreigner's mentality, the ability of you talking through and bullshit (to a certain extent) signifies confidence and perceived ability, which is something I personally do not like and disagree in many extent, but then again, I am not in charge.

In addition, it will be very helpful in terms of CV if you have been working in similar role in Singapore. It seems that Aussies are more familiar with Singapore and recognise Singapore experience as equivalent.

Contrary to general belief, it is actually harder to secure an accounting role in smaller commercial companies / firms compared to getting into larger professional firms like Big 4s, because employers in this space are much more parochial and they expect candidate to have more Aussie local experience, more than what bigger international firms like PwC expect. I think there is a lot of job candidate had that false impression and hence went to apply for smaller roles in smaller companies with the idea that it might be easier. It is not.

The only challenge with getting into bigger companies however is that there is a very high expectation of your CV and qualifications, which some of us may not have the luxury to have it.

Bottom line, it is possible, but difficult nonetheless. If you think I must be some foreign grad, you are wrong: I graduate locally from a private college and I have never step foot in Aus before that. Full disclosure: I worked in the CF consulting practice in Big 4s in Malaysia and a mid-tier firm in SG for 6 years, and I am an ACCA and CFA. However, I do not think my ACCA or CFA is the key determining factor, though it definitely make my overall picture look coherent and nice as a candidate. Ultimately, it is your experience that matters, as there are ppl with lesser qualification still get hired because of their solid experience.

Hope that helps.

Realistically speaking, I don't have an answer but I would like to suggest you to ask yourself the following questions and appreciate the relevances of those question:

(1) Do you graduate from a top uni with top grades (if not, getting the relevant accounting finance job is REALLY hard for graduates as competition at the graduate level is MADNESS)
(2) Do you foresee that you will be able to get PR subsequently under the relevant migration scheme? (Accountant as a nominated profession may cease to be in the list in the future, and you might just wanna try your luck now and get your foot in while it last)
(3) What is your goal to seek employment in Australia? (If you intend to earn a lot and save, Aus is not really an attractive place as tax is really high and cost of living is high as well. Singapore or HK maybe a better choice as tax rate is low and hence you can save a lot more, as long as you do not intend to buy property and car there. If you intend to buy property, then Aus is a better choice, again, it depends where you wanna buy... it is a separate topic altogether this is the general frame for consideration. If your goal is just to have a better lifestyle, the yes Aus might be better but you need to try to know that)

To put things into perspective, I also like to share with you the following observations about getting a job in Aus based on my experience:

- If you are not a PR, 90% of the time employers are not interested regardless of how good you are
- if you are offshore, employers are less likely to be interested in calling you even if you have PR
- If you do not have enough local job experience or contacts, employer are less likely to be interested even if you are onshore and you have PR.

The above points posts a very interesting challenge because even if you are good with solid working experience, you might not get a job because of the above-mentioned.

If you can afford, I will suggest you to obtain your PR first because regulation changes is beyond your control and you should secure it while you can, while getting job experience is within you control. There are more options available with PR in hand.

Taking a gamble is a prerequisite in securing jobs in Australia and you must be ready to persevere for a year or two. Given that prerequisite, the real decision point is whether to get your PR now and head back to Asia to obtain the relevant job experience before moving back, or to get your PR now and try your luck with the job market immediately. FYI, As soon as I got my PR, I also spent almost a year before I secure a job, but fortunately, I was working in SG then. My intention then was to save enough so that I can move to Australia and sustain myself for year while I look for jobs. Most ppl I know need to hang around for at least a year or two before they get a job, although some are luckier because they have right contacts.

Btw, there is still healthy demand for accountants, just that it is not evenly distributed - there is shortage at the senior, experience level and in places other than Melbourne/Sydney. You may stand a higher chance if you are willing to work in say.. Gold coast or Adelaide or somewhere but then I suppose that defeats the purpose as most ppl wants to stay in Sydney and Melb.

Not sure if that helps but I hope it give you some points to think about and make a more informed decision.

I dunno about GPA requirement my friend, but I can tell you pretty confidently that if you do not accumulate enough internship experience and if you are not a top scorer, it is very unlikely any Big-4s or even mid-tiers will consider you at all. I said that because my Partner here said that in my face when we were having Manager's meeting and we were talking about recruitment. It is kinda brutal but that is only because everyone who look for a graduate job are with relevant experience before they graduate. They just raised the bar.

So to answer you question, yes possible but I personally think you need more than that.

About your PR question and the SOL, I have few answers to that: There is always Canada and NZ, consider that, though at the moment, Aus is more sophisticated market in terms accounting and finance. However, that might change in the future.

Considering your financial limitations and the fact that you are unlikely to get your PR as soon as possible, I will say it is alright and you should focus on building your career locally and move to SG or HK later (if you wish). As long as you have solid experience, the world is your oyster and you will be able to secure 457 visa and work in Aus. I have seen it happened before and it is possible. You just need relevant experience.

How did I get my job? I guess it is a combination of everything - I have a friend who worked there and he gave me an informal endorsement, I have the right skill set they needed in that market, I have a strong referral letter from my ex-employer, and I am a PR. Most of all, it is the right timing when they needed ppl and I impressed them during interview (just being lucky that they asked about things that I know). It is hard to pinpoint. Sometimes, you just need to wait for the right moment, there is no secret recipe for this, just luck and preparation.

As for your question about 485 - I have seen ppl being employed under 485 but very very limited. The one I saw is a Dean's list student from Melb Uni and he built strong network even before he started work. I might be wrong but if you do not have those qualities i mentioned, forget about it.

I hope I have not been discouraging but I think it is better to tell you the reality. Again, there is always other countries other than Aus, and there is always 457.

Cheers

If it is the Aussie laid-back lifestyle you are looking for, then my advice is not to work in Big-4, consulting firms or IBs, and do not work in Sydney and Melb, because contrary to the common belief, people work late here as well, esp in Syd and Melb. That is because situations are getting more competitive now and there are more.. Asians coming in which bring along their "strong" work ethics as well.

If you want a laid-back lifestyle, you should go to commercial and be an accountant. However, tendency of you being fired is likely because that is just the way business work here. One of the big advantage of working in Big-4s are slightly better job security. The job will most job security is the Big-4 banks, or so I heard.

It is not all that rosy here anyways. The engine of growth and the future lies with Asia, my friend. A lot of capable Aussies actually moved to HK and SG to work mainly because.. tax rate are lower and the quality of life is higher there (depending on how you interpret that, for some of them I know, that is what they say)

It is a funny world where we want to move there and the locals want to move away.

Cheers

Hi there Caspersky,

Looks like you found my thread here

Each Big 4 has its own unique culture I think. For example, in terms of ppl culture, EY stands out (based on my exp in EY Msia, EY Aus and maybe EY SG, due to many of my friends working there), and PwC is very elitism (It is the same in Msia, SG and Aus too). I obviously dunno know Deloitte and KPMG because I never work with them before. Generally Msia and SG is pretty much similar.

Notwithstanding the individual firm's unique cultures, I think in Asia, there is a lot of expectation to self-learn. In Aus, ppl have been willing to spend time to train you and get you to speed, and they do things BY THE BOOK. So in that way, you learn the methodologies and the way to do things exactly according the best practice. Downside is that they really do not know how to be flexible when situation changes, they are book smart but not as street smart as.. well Asians.

Overall, in terms of friendliness, Malaysians are the most friendly of all. Followed by Australians and Singaporean in my own experience. Australian are nice to strangers but sometimes, they are nice as a matter of courtesy, unlike Malaysians who are generally genuinely nice to ppl. Singaporeans.. well, you know.

Working culture wise, I think bosses in Msia and SG are willing to give junior higher responsibilities (Meeting clients, lead a job) as compared to Aussies, where higher responsibilities tend to be allocated to higher lvl ppl such as Senior Mgr and Directors. As a result, you will see that in Asia, juniors work really hard and clocks overtime, whereas in Aus, Directors and Senior Managers did all the overtime and Junior get to go home slightly earlier. Aussies are more open in terms the company's strategy and they will involve all lvl of ppl periodically to talk about which client to target and how should we compete, which in Asia is only reserved to Mgrs and above.

In general, Aussies are willing to accept the fact that juniors can be technically stronger than Managers but in Asia, such scenario is perceived to be despicable. Aussies accept the fact that no one knows everything and it is perfectly okay if the junior knew certain things that Mgrs do not know. They are also obviously very aggressive in terms of claiming about things they know when in fact they only know the basic by Asian standard.

Oh yeah, although hard work and overtime permeates across different cultures, lunch hour and weekends are holy in Australian context. Unlike Malaysia and SG where bosses will just call you back to work during weekends. Comparatively speaking still, overtime is Aus is still milder compared to SG and Msia as ppl will strive to finish their work by 5. As result, when they work, they REALLY work. No tea breaks, no chit chats etc. In Msia and SG, we spend too much time talking and procrastinating in btw, that results in the need to work beyond 5.30. If you work in M&A or IB however, it is probably the same throughout the globe. But for the rest, there is slight difference.

I don't even know where to end but this potpourri of observations is what I can provide so far.

I think you made a good point which I think it is worthy of highlighting: Cover letters.

I am not sure if things have changed, but cover letters seems to be secondary in Asia whereas in Aus, it makes all the difference. And mundane, robotic cut and paste cover letter won't do you good, you need to show that you are an interesting person with a point of view in the cover letter in order to stand out. Most of all, you need to sell a BUSINESS CASE and a STORY to your existing CV in the cover letter. That is what it is all about.

Long story short, in addition to your technical skills, Aussies in general are also looking for interesting person to work with. If you manage to sell that interesting persona, you will be getting something.

I don't profess I know much about their mentality but in job hunting, that is the gist of it based on my job search experience. Even until today, I sincerely find that Australian think very differently in many ways which I can never understand. I know what they will do but I just dunno why on earth they do certain things sometimes. Having a go (aka try out new things) and being random seems to be in their culture.

Cheers