Currently, I just finished my junior year of college and I have an internship with a mid market firm for next spring. I will be graduating that same spring with my bachelors in accountancy and will have my 150 credits to take the CPA exam. Assuming that I receive a full time offer after my internship, would it be worth it to decline the full time offer to try to get a job at a big 4?
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What's the reason to take an internship next summer instead of going through fall recruiting your senior year to try to land a FT position starting next summer?
I thought it would be more beneficial to have an internship with a well known firm on my resume instead of just trying to get a FT position without much accounting experience.
what's your GPA and how well known is your school?
for big 4 (if you mean audit/tax), they put heavy weight on those two things- if your school is a feeder into their programs + you have a good gpa, even mediocre internship experience will suffice
(this is true for their internship programs, which I have exp recruiting for- not sure for FT but I assume it is the same)
I have a 3.7 GPA and big 4 recruit at my school. My internship is in audit because I think I am going to like that a little bit more than tax.
Agree with Mike Ross. If your school is a feeder school and you have a decent GPA you should be able to get a full time offer if you go through recruiting in the fall with average internship experience. Depending on your GPA and school I'd get an internship this summer and then go through fall recruiting. If that doesn't work, and you really want the Big 4 name on your resume, which is a significant (perceived) step above the next tier - so don't blame you - I'd try to go through fall recruiting and get a late start date (seen some people get a September start date) if you can't ditch the summer internship next summer.
Your other option is to graduate late so you can go through fall recruiting next year. People will do a Masters of Accounting or Finance program the immediate year after they graduate so they have another year of recruiting or need to fix their GPA. Something to consider depending on your financial situation, GPA, etc.
That definitely makes sense. The only problem I have is that I don't know if places are still looking for interns for this summer.
My plan was to do the internship and gain the experience. Then apply to the grad program here and do another round of recruiting. My concern was that I would be running the risk of not getting a big 4 and spending all the money on grad school when I don't need it.
With your GPA and assuming you can get an average internship you should have no problem getting into Big 4.
It is late for hiring for internships, but I would hit the email and phones hard the next few weeks and see if you can line anything up. Reach out to your network, someone may need accounting services for the summer, if you have a career counseling office at your school, visit them now. I'd even see if your internship next summer has any openings this summer - never know, someone may have dropped out, even in a different sector - advising, tax, just get something somewhat related on your resume so you can relay that into why you want to do audit Big 4 in the fall during interviews.
There are also a lot of smaller accounting/advising firms that will hire one or two interns off-cycle. I would look into sitting down for coffee with some of these guys and asking them if they are looking for an intern. Most of these guys hire interns through this type of networking and you'll never see a job posted. So don't be afraid to ask people who may not appear like they are looking.
Although it certainly helps to have a bigger name on your resume for recruiting, it isn't a huge hurdle, especially to someone with a good GPA, like yourself. Get an internship doing something business related (even a tenuous connection to accounting will help), figure out how to relay that into a compelling story as to why you're interested in audit and you should have no problem in the fall.
Just saw you posted your GPA, I'd really try to get an internship this summer, go through fall recruiting (you're a shoe-in) and ditch the internship next summer (if you can do it without totally burning them).
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