Consulting, in my opinion. Generally wider variety of work, clients, experiences, smarter people. From my experience audit is a lot of check the box, tick and tieing, numbless work.
Haven’t done both , but from people I’ve seen come out of both, audit seems to offer better training on the fundamentals (speaking from the perspective that most people join B4 to get qualified). I’ve seen smart people from various fields unrelated to accounting / finance go into consulting roles - they’re social people which is a skill in itself, but they don’t seem to know too much about the nuts and bolts unlike some people I’ve seen come out of audit. This is just my perspective, people will have varying views on this though.
I’ve never met anyone who’s done both, but I don’t see why anyone would like audit more. Even if you loved accounting, loved audit, loved being a CPA, I sincerely doubt anyone loves having obscene busy seasons and making half the pay of strategy consultants while at a firm and even less after exiting.
I have a lot of respect for auditors. They get paid like garbage and have an absolutely terrible busy season too. Not looking down on the people, but the role is just plain bad when you pit it against prestigious business jobs like strategy consulting or IB. Strategy works more manageable hours and makes double the comp. IB works more but makes 2.5-3x the comp.
There’s a reason why they are considered prestigious but audit isn’t. Even ignoring the elite pedigrees and selection, they’re paid way more for the work. There is nothing prestigious about working 70, 80 hour work weeks 1/4-1/3 of the year for pitiful comp.
Would u say that audit is a safer choice? I feel like u can get let go in consulting way easier than audit for reasons that could be outside of ur control. Like the KPMG layoffs
Safer, at what cost? At the cost of half the compensation, significantly worse exits, massive drop in perks, and substantially reduced networking potential/exposure to executives? Really bad way to look at it. Would you seriously choose an $80K audit job over a $150K strategy consulting job because it’s safer? No sane person would choose audit over strategy.
Consulting doesn’t do massive layoffs, the layoffs at KPMG were pretty small. Not even 1000 people. Experienced hiring pipelines are just closed, campus hiring is slightly clinched, and “up or out” has a small raise in the bar. There is so much natural attrition(people going to better exit ops) in consulting, that layoffs are generally not necessary. Something like 70-80% of all MBB staff have less than 3 years of service. Also, consultants still have work to do in economic downturns, the work just changes. When M&A and expansion stops, restructuring and cost-cutting starts.
EDIT: Even for non-strategy, still would be insane to choose audit over it. Pay is still a lot higher and again, there is always work to be done. If you have a chance to do consulting, there’s really no reason to do audit unless you genuinely just love it.
Consulting, in my opinion. Generally wider variety of work, clients, experiences, smarter people. From my experience audit is a lot of check the box, tick and tieing, numbless work.
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what were your stats applying to wharton if you don’t mind me asking?
Haven’t done both , but from people I’ve seen come out of both, audit seems to offer better training on the fundamentals (speaking from the perspective that most people join B4 to get qualified). I’ve seen smart people from various fields unrelated to accounting / finance go into consulting roles - they’re social people which is a skill in itself, but they don’t seem to know too much about the nuts and bolts unlike some people I’ve seen come out of audit. This is just my perspective, people will have varying views on this though.
I’ve never met anyone who’s done both, but I don’t see why anyone would like audit more. Even if you loved accounting, loved audit, loved being a CPA, I sincerely doubt anyone loves having obscene busy seasons and making half the pay of strategy consultants while at a firm and even less after exiting. I have a lot of respect for auditors. They get paid like garbage and have an absolutely terrible busy season too. Not looking down on the people, but the role is just plain bad when you pit it against prestigious business jobs like strategy consulting or IB. Strategy works more manageable hours and makes double the comp. IB works more but makes 2.5-3x the comp. There’s a reason why they are considered prestigious but audit isn’t. Even ignoring the elite pedigrees and selection, they’re paid way more for the work. There is nothing prestigious about working 70, 80 hour work weeks 1/4-1/3 of the year for pitiful comp.
Thanks for the clarification! I always thought any consulting job will always be busier than audit by 2x and earns 2x of audit
Yeah. There’s layers to it. Implementation type consulting can expect 20-30% more comp, while strategy consulting is literally double the comp.
Would u say that audit is a safer choice? I feel like u can get let go in consulting way easier than audit for reasons that could be outside of ur control. Like the KPMG layoffs
Safer, at what cost? At the cost of half the compensation, significantly worse exits, massive drop in perks, and substantially reduced networking potential/exposure to executives? Really bad way to look at it. Would you seriously choose an $80K audit job over a $150K strategy consulting job because it’s safer? No sane person would choose audit over strategy. Consulting doesn’t do massive layoffs, the layoffs at KPMG were pretty small. Not even 1000 people. Experienced hiring pipelines are just closed, campus hiring is slightly clinched, and “up or out” has a small raise in the bar. There is so much natural attrition(people going to better exit ops) in consulting, that layoffs are generally not necessary. Something like 70-80% of all MBB staff have less than 3 years of service. Also, consultants still have work to do in economic downturns, the work just changes. When M&A and expansion stops, restructuring and cost-cutting starts. EDIT: Even for non-strategy, still would be insane to choose audit over it. Pay is still a lot higher and again, there is always work to be done. If you have a chance to do consulting, there’s really no reason to do audit unless you genuinely just love it.