How to get a job in a small medium firm

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Good evening,

i was looking for advice on how to get my first accounting job in a small or medium sized practice and how if you are a partner you look for candidates to separate themselves from the rest?

i am really looking for any advice as I am really keen to get hands on experience and build my career.

 

thank you all.

Jon

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By cheekychappy
24th Sep 2016 22:25

I luk 4 gud gramma puncsuashon and spellin

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FT
By FirstTab
25th Sep 2016 08:58

Hello Jon

I know what the London market is like at your level. I am not sure if it is the same nationally. In London, to get a foothold in the accountancy work is not easy. All I can say is please do not give up. Keep trying.

Here are the key traits I look from an employee:

1. Demonstrates a positive personality. I do not want to work with people who brings their personal problems at work.

2. I get more than my money's worth out of them. The person needs to DO the work and do it efficiently. One of the big no-no is spending time on social media in my time. It happens a lot now a days.

3. Comes out with ideas, no matter how silly they are, to improve the practice.

4. Turns up and turns up on time.

5. Gets on with people in the office and the people in our office block. Easy going type.

6. Willing to learn on his/her own. I cannot teach them every little thing.

Overall, just think if you were paying someone a salary, what results would you want from your most valuable resource. How would you feel, if the time you pay him/her for was not used in work but doing on other nonwork-related activities.

Good luck.

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FT
By FirstTab
25th Sep 2016 11:00

Duplicate. Delete

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Red Kite
By Red Kite
26th Sep 2016 08:21

I'd like to think that employers look for a spark of wit and humour, in addition to skills for the work involved.
Without personality, the days will be very long.

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Worm
By TheLambtonWorm
26th Sep 2016 10:00

It really depends on what the firm wants.

I personally wouldn't consciously look for someone to 'separate themselves from the rest' though.

Speaking from a smaller practice perspective - As long as the person seemed reliable and competent to do the job required, then I would just pick the one I liked the most.

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paddle steamer
By DJKL
26th Sep 2016 11:31

The catch here is whilst people are giving you the attributes they seek they are not addressing how you, with a bit of paper and maybe a thirty minute interview, can convince the prospective employer you have these skills.

I do not do recruitment these days but at one time I did a fair bit of interviewing, accordingly my comments may be a bit out of date:

1. If not already done get/research professional input re CV.

2. If just out of university you may have limited work experience so you have to pore through what you have done to take out the positives; even that 6.30 a.m. temp summer job cleaning Student Union toilets may have relevance if you look at the detail (timekeeping/perseverance through adversity (clogged toilets are not pleasant!!))

3. Often talking through with a friend/family member can help you see skills that you were not aware the work experience/job helped display/demonstrate- lateral thinking is useful.

3. Gone are the days when one just puts down interests like "reading "on a CV (I cringe at the thought of some I prepared in the 1970s and 1980s), in an ideal world your university involvement ( if appropriate) in clubs/societies/student politics makes interesting reading, if you have little of this what were you doing!!!!!!!

4. Proof read everything you write three times, accountancy involves attention to detail so spelling/ grammar errors etc really do not sell this point to a prospective employer, if you produce a CV littered with mistakes would you let accounts be printed with such errors. (I once had to help unpick 100 sets of accounts for a charity because a partner found a typo on one page that everyone had missed and insisted substitute pages were inserted into 100 sets of accounts)

5. Do review your online profile-prospective employers will.

Probably will not apply if you are just out of college/university, but three things that would often lead me to discard a CV to the no interview pile:

1. Moves employment often with short stays with each employer.

2. Big unexplained employment history voids, whilst CV is possibly not the place to explain the covering letter can be useful.

3. Vastly overqualified for role- experience taught me, when I worked in retail industry, that if I gave say a shop role to someone who say had one or two degrees I was not going to keep them, so if you are applying for very junior positions with no discernible career ladder within the organisation work out why as you may well be asked.

If these apply work out how you will explain them.

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