And the truth is in the big four. Are the working hours of auditing and taxation really the same as those uploaded online? How to prepare for the big four? What are the future career development directions of auditing and taxation?
Today, we invited the manager of tax and business consulting department of PricewaterhouseCoopers (interviewed by superday for many times) to reveal the answer for you.
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About Puhua and Tax Audit Division
Moderator: Why did you choose Puhua at that time and persist for 8 years?
At that time, the cognition of the four major was that the career development path of the four major was relatively clear, or it was a technical job. At that time, we did not have enough information sources and jobs to choose from, which gave you more opportunities to explore your career.
At that time, it felt a bit like the atmosphere of the campus. I can learn professional knowledge and then provide valuable services through professional knowledge. Of course, the main reason is that the career development path is relatively clear. I chose taxation because my major is related to taxation. The other four majors do not require graduate students, but undergraduates have an age advantage.
Moderator: How does Puhua tax department subdivide its functions?
There are several aspects in the functional subdivision of taxation. The first is based on the content of the service, and on this basis, it is subdivided according to the industry and country where the customer is located.
The three largest groups include corporate tax, global structured services and transfer pricing (these three groups may be merged into the same option in about four major school recruitment links).
CorporateTax is the largest group, accounting for about one-third of the entire tax department. The work mainly serves foreign-funded enterprises and is subdivided into six industries and some special groups, such as the turnover tax group.
The work of Global Structural Services (GSS) mainly includes two parts. The first business is tax due diligence, and the second is serving local enterprises, that is, state-owned enterprises and private enterprises. Among them, the biggest business is tax services (including scheme design, framework construction and due diligence) in the process of overseas investment and financing of domestic enterprises, in addition to general domestic tax consulting and tax compliance services (such as tax review).
TP (Transfer Pricing) Group mainly focuses on related transactions and transfer pricing of enterprises, including preparing transfer pricing documents for enterprises in the same period, assisting enterprises to deal with the transfer pricing inspection of tax bureaus, and planning and analyzing transfer pricing for enterprises.
In addition, the tax department also has special service teams such as service tariff, personal income tax, American tax and tax science and technology.
However, students should also know that the four internal groups are a dynamic process, which is adjusted with the changes of the market and the development of business.
Moderator: I saw a paragraph on the Internet, "The audit dies every day, and the tax can basically get off work on time; Audit children die every day, and tax is reading reports all day. So what is the main difference between the tax department and the audit department in terms of work content? Can the tax department really get off work on time often?
1, work content:
The audit workflow is standardized and well-documented, especially for old customers. So for students, if you are a careful classmate who likes process work, then auditing may be more suitable for you.
However, most tax businesses need some flexibility, and there are relatively more unforeseen factors in the service process. In addition, tax is divided into many groups, because the work content between the groups is quite different, and their professional knowledge and theoretical background will also be very different; Most of the reasons for audit grouping are because their team is too big to manage, so they are grouped.
2. About working hours:
As mentioned earlier, the audit work is relatively easy to plan. For example, it is 65438+ February. I may have foreseen what kind of work will be in the next two or three months, and others have arranged it for you.
Audit has obvious off-peak season, which basically lasts for four to six months every year on average. Most employees of managers and below will work for three months, with an average of 10- 12 hours per day, and no weekends. Therefore, students who attend may need to make this psychological preparation in advance.
The time of tax collection is not so fixed, because the pace of tax collection is not as easy to predict and plan as auditing. Moreover, the superiors in the tax department will ask for the opinions of their subordinates when assigning jobs. Theoretically, subordinates can "refuse" the job; At the same time, the superior will try to arrange the project to a more capable subordinate, resulting in busy people being busy for a long time and empty people being empty for a long time. Of course, over time, the ability will vary greatly.
Moderator: So what is a typical day's work scene for you or the children below you?
In fact, each project will be different (regardless of the service content, mode and rhythm, it needs strong self-management ability and sense of responsibility). From a typical service process, there will be several stages: first, a service proposal will be written according to the communication with customers (usually the following children will draft it first, and the seniors will give him a reference case), and the specific requirements will be made clear to him. The draft version will be confirmed to the customer after being revised at all levels, and a formal contract will be signed according to this service proposal. At this point, the service will officially start.
For example, ordinary tax consultation usually ends with a written consultation report. When drafting the report, you need to communicate with customers and search for information yourself. Some information can be checked online by yourself, and some need to be confirmed by the tax authorities. Finally, after analysis and sorting, a complete report is formed.
In addition, there is a large category of tax compliance services, including tax filing services and assistance in auditing tax compliance in documents.
Ability to enter Puhua
Moderator: Do you see a major when recruiting? For some students without any accounting background who want to enter the top four, what kind of preparations are there in the early stage?
I'm not very professional. I think you can convince the interviewer during the interview that you want to come to the Big Four not because of a whim, but because you have really thought about it for a long time. If you have taken some practical actions before, it will help convince the interviewer, for example, you have some relevant internship experience, or you have taken some professional qualification examinations such as certified public accountants.
Moderator: Which internships are related internships?
If you have the opportunity to come to the Big Four, you'd better practice directly in the Big Four. In addition, I think it will be helpful to practice in some relatively first-line accounting firms or in some large enterprises. However, if you do well in the interview, your lack of relevant experience will not affect your admission.
Moderator: I had a college classmate before, who was not a related major and had no relevant internship experience, but finally entered Puhua.
That's right. That's why I said it would help. PricewaterhouseCoopers is interviewing all day. Before one-on-one, the boss in charge of one-on-one with you has seen your previous performance, that is, your ability, which has nothing to do with your major.
You can explain your wishes clearly in the one-on-one interview later. For example, why do you want to come to the Big Four when your major is not right? It is a very important decision for everyone to give up the original professional background and join a new major. If this decision doesn't make the interviewer feel that you are thoughtful, others will think that your choice may not be very stable.
Moderator: What kind of ability do you need to do a good job in the tax department? How to train college students?
No matter what segment you are in, communication skills are very important. Can you understand what others mean and the considerations behind it? Can you convey your meaning to others accurately and effectively? These abilities are very basic for many industries.
You may need some flexibility and determination in tax work. For example, this is a simple errand. I asked him to go to the tax bureau to do something for me. If there is a problem, students with high flexibility and determination will know what happened and need me to ask, and he can make his own decisions to deal with it.
More harshly, if he can consider the problem from the perspective of his superiors, he can better consider the background and purpose of the whole project. That is, you have to think about why your superior wants you to do this, and what is the intention behind his instructions?
How to cultivate it, I think it still varies from person to person. But first of all, don't resist socializing and communicating with people, and usually find more opportunities to exercise; Besides, we should broaden our horizons and try and learn things beyond our knowledge. Broaden your horizons by participating in relevant internships or paying attention to some financial knowledge and topics, which is of great benefit to your long-term career development.
Moderator: Which websites or magazines do you often pay attention to?
Usually pay attention to some foreign media and financial professional media, such as FT and Wall Street. Of course, everyone's situation is different, and everyone can look at it according to their own situation and interests.
Moderator: Many students think that tax revenue will be less than that of audit, and that the threshold of tax revenue will be slightly higher than that of audit. Is that so?
I don't think it will be too difficult to get an offer from the application intensity, but the overall competition should be similar.
Company training and career development
Moderator: Puhua's customers are all over the world. Will the work involve tax treatment in different countries? If so, most recent graduates do not have such knowledge reserves. How does PricewaterhouseCoopers handle it or does it train with employees?
If overseas taxes are involved, this requirement will be very high. Generally speaking, except for the United States, there is a special team, and the service teams on other continents generally do not formally issue tax opinions to overseas countries and regions.
If the needs of customers in China involve tax issues in other countries, we will contact the local Puhua team to provide assistance. For example, a China company went to Brazil to collect minerals. In this case, if customers need to make suggestions on their investment plans from a tax perspective, the PricewaterhouseCoopers Brazil team will make suggestions from a Brazilian tax perspective, and the China team will be responsible for communication and coordination to give customers a complete solution.
Therefore, what you need is strong communication skills and project management skills.
Moderator: in what form will the four congresses cultivate this ability?
In fact, the most important of the four trainings is project training, which is what we call job training. Although there is continuous classroom-style lecture training, people may not listen carefully, so the effect may not be particularly good.
The real improvement is through your own personal practice, and your superiors give you a lot of guidance through the project. The four mechanisms determine that the working ability of subordinates can improve the working efficiency of superiors, so superiors are willing to guide subordinates.
Moderator: Some students said that they felt that the development of the tax department was relatively narrow. Do you agree?
If you reach a certain level, and your comprehensive ability is good, whether it is auditing or taxation, the road to development will be broader, because when you reach that level, you are more interested in your comprehensive ability, and you are only your professional knowledge and ability.
Generally speaking, audit can develop in the direction of financial analysis, enterprise investment and financing, internal audit and so on. And taxation can develop in the direction of enterprise tax manager or tax director. But this is not absolute. For example, some time ago, a senior tax manager around us jumped out and became the CFO of Wukong looking for a house.
For college students, the "Big Four" is a good place to cultivate your ability, but not only your professional ability, but also your workplace core abilities such as communication ability and project management ability. The direction you can choose in the future is not necessarily just the financial direction.