My career in accounting has not been a total failure, but it has been full of disappointments. I blame my career choice on what I consider a somewhat unfulfilling life as an adult. While I have had some successes, it is a career that does not pay all that well given the demands and degree of difficulty. As a result, enrollment for accounting majors in on the decline and the number of young students attempting to be a CPA are on the decline. I can't say I blame them. If I were to go back, I would choose to go into computer programming or some sort of analytics field or possibly actuarial work.
I spent 5 years in college to meet the 150 credit our requirement to sit for the CPA exam. I graduated at the top of my class in what was considered in the top two or three most difficult majors at the college and was considered as quality of a degree as the accounting degree from the largest University in the State. I enjoyed the classes for the most part and while I did study, school and tests game naturally for me. I enjoy learning new things and being forced to think critically in school (something that seems to be absent in society today).
After graduating I passed all 4 parts of the CPA exam on my first try. One of the most difficult certifications to obtain, yet with some of the least benefits. I started my career in public accounting at a accounting firm that was about 2.5 hour drive from home. Public accounting as a start to your career is pushed hard by the universities because it is where you are exposed to a lot and is a good way to advance quickly. In public accounting, you either work in audit or tax and work on many different clients, typically business clients.
Working was a wake up call and much harder for me than school. I hated it if I am being honest with myself. In the moment, I was lying to myself and just told myself that it was not so bad and that things would improve. It did not take long for me to experience high levels of anxiety. Working in a cubicle in an office environment can be hell for someone on the spectrum. Being highly sensitive to noise (was not aware of this at the time), it was hard for me to focus with the background noise. People walking by, talking on the phone, laughing, talking with each other. All things that drove me bananas. Talking with coworkers often gave me anxiety. Speaking with clients would cause horribly high levels of anxiety. I was doing well with the actual work, but social interactions were failures for me. I hated meetings.
During the tax season, we would have Saturday lunches (so generous of them, they fed us when we were working 58 - 70 hours per week from mid January to mid April). These lunches gave me so much anxiety. Sometimes, I barely could get myself upstairs to grab the food. At the time I also was having issues with eating swallowing my food due to food getting stuck in my esophagus due to a medical issue at the time. I stopped eating as a group and instead brought the food down to my desk.
Tax season was brutal. Working very long hours in a terrible environment for an aspie which led to depression and debilitating anxiety. My housing environment was not great either. I had some roommates who I knew to some degree, but they sometimes did not treat me very well. They would at times make fun of me. I considered them friends. Roommates prevented me from just being able to escape into my own world to decompress and recover. To say the least, I was miserable. It took a heavy toll on my physically, mentally, and emotionally. I spent about 3 years there, which I consider to be the worst years of my life.
I finally moved on and found another job in public accounting that was closer to where I had grown up. In hindsight, maybe it was a mistake to continue in the same industry that I was not really enjoying much. But I was feeling lonely and homesick. I had some friends in the area of my first job, but not much a support system. In hindsight, some of those friends did not treat me that well and I was not that close to them. It was also difficult to find jobs outside of public accounting in my area of focus (tax) so I didn't have many choices. This new company turned out to be a little better fit for me but it still was public accounting and the workload was intense. Tax seasons were very difficult with long hours. I enjoyed working with some of the people there. Someone who eventually became my manager told me at the end of a tax season, he had no idea how I completed so many complex tax returns during tax season. I tended to get the most complicated returns since I was so good technically. After 4 years I decided to move on due to how difficult tax seasons were.
Dummy me moved on to another job in public accounting, although with a smaller company. The hours were less demanding but still had to deal with tax season. The work itself was not as good of a fit for me because I was working on smaller clients with less technical issues to work through which is what I had been good at. I had to deal with clients directly and I generally hated clients. They were generally ungrateful for our services and did not value the work we did. When you work in accounting you are generally seen as a necessary evil. Those who are most successful are those who are smart enough to have some technical ability, but are also very good communicators or smooth talkers. That combination is a powerful force and those individuals tend to be pretty successful. Although even some of those individuals tend to work long hours because and accounting career is terrible in terms of work/life balance. I tended to just go through the motions at this latest job. I was bored but stressed at times too. I was there during the COVID years and and there were a ton of BS coming out from the government to deal with during that time.
After about 3 years, I decided to move on because I did not really enjoy the work. I finally found a took a job outside of public accounting. It was a job in industry where I only had to worry about dealing with tax related issues for the company I worked for. Fairly high level position with a much better pay rate as well. This job has not been absent of challenges but overall I think it is the best fit for me of the the jobs I have had so far. Tax is still looked at as a necessary evil and is not valued a whole lot. In my time there we have been short staffed in my department. The employee that had reported to me resigned a few weeks ago so now I have to pick up their work on top of everything else until we hire someone. Unfortunately due to the chronic shortage of accountants, there are not many applicants to choose from. It is a bad time to be a director and manage employees because the shortage of qualified employees put more pressure on all employees.
I have more to add, but wanted to lay out my experience in my professional career. Overall I feel like my career in accounting has taken more from me than what it has given back. I anticipate there are going to a be a lot major problems in the field do to serious shortages of employees as the boomer generation retires. The leadership in the accounting profession has done a very poor job in the last 20 years to make the industry attractive. Greed of those in power has caused a lot of damage to the long term viability of the profession.
I spent 5 years in college to meet the 150 credit our requirement to sit for the CPA exam. I graduated at the top of my class in what was considered in the top two or three most difficult majors at the college and was considered as quality of a degree as the accounting degree from the largest University in the State. I enjoyed the classes for the most part and while I did study, school and tests game naturally for me. I enjoy learning new things and being forced to think critically in school (something that seems to be absent in society today).
After graduating I passed all 4 parts of the CPA exam on my first try. One of the most difficult certifications to obtain, yet with some of the least benefits. I started my career in public accounting at a accounting firm that was about 2.5 hour drive from home. Public accounting as a start to your career is pushed hard by the universities because it is where you are exposed to a lot and is a good way to advance quickly. In public accounting, you either work in audit or tax and work on many different clients, typically business clients.
Working was a wake up call and much harder for me than school. I hated it if I am being honest with myself. In the moment, I was lying to myself and just told myself that it was not so bad and that things would improve. It did not take long for me to experience high levels of anxiety. Working in a cubicle in an office environment can be hell for someone on the spectrum. Being highly sensitive to noise (was not aware of this at the time), it was hard for me to focus with the background noise. People walking by, talking on the phone, laughing, talking with each other. All things that drove me bananas. Talking with coworkers often gave me anxiety. Speaking with clients would cause horribly high levels of anxiety. I was doing well with the actual work, but social interactions were failures for me. I hated meetings.
During the tax season, we would have Saturday lunches (so generous of them, they fed us when we were working 58 - 70 hours per week from mid January to mid April). These lunches gave me so much anxiety. Sometimes, I barely could get myself upstairs to grab the food. At the time I also was having issues with eating swallowing my food due to food getting stuck in my esophagus due to a medical issue at the time. I stopped eating as a group and instead brought the food down to my desk.
Tax season was brutal. Working very long hours in a terrible environment for an aspie which led to depression and debilitating anxiety. My housing environment was not great either. I had some roommates who I knew to some degree, but they sometimes did not treat me very well. They would at times make fun of me. I considered them friends. Roommates prevented me from just being able to escape into my own world to decompress and recover. To say the least, I was miserable. It took a heavy toll on my physically, mentally, and emotionally. I spent about 3 years there, which I consider to be the worst years of my life.
I finally moved on and found another job in public accounting that was closer to where I had grown up. In hindsight, maybe it was a mistake to continue in the same industry that I was not really enjoying much. But I was feeling lonely and homesick. I had some friends in the area of my first job, but not much a support system. In hindsight, some of those friends did not treat me that well and I was not that close to them. It was also difficult to find jobs outside of public accounting in my area of focus (tax) so I didn't have many choices. This new company turned out to be a little better fit for me but it still was public accounting and the workload was intense. Tax seasons were very difficult with long hours. I enjoyed working with some of the people there. Someone who eventually became my manager told me at the end of a tax season, he had no idea how I completed so many complex tax returns during tax season. I tended to get the most complicated returns since I was so good technically. After 4 years I decided to move on due to how difficult tax seasons were.
Dummy me moved on to another job in public accounting, although with a smaller company. The hours were less demanding but still had to deal with tax season. The work itself was not as good of a fit for me because I was working on smaller clients with less technical issues to work through which is what I had been good at. I had to deal with clients directly and I generally hated clients. They were generally ungrateful for our services and did not value the work we did. When you work in accounting you are generally seen as a necessary evil. Those who are most successful are those who are smart enough to have some technical ability, but are also very good communicators or smooth talkers. That combination is a powerful force and those individuals tend to be pretty successful. Although even some of those individuals tend to work long hours because and accounting career is terrible in terms of work/life balance. I tended to just go through the motions at this latest job. I was bored but stressed at times too. I was there during the COVID years and and there were a ton of BS coming out from the government to deal with during that time.
After about 3 years, I decided to move on because I did not really enjoy the work. I finally found a took a job outside of public accounting. It was a job in industry where I only had to worry about dealing with tax related issues for the company I worked for. Fairly high level position with a much better pay rate as well. This job has not been absent of challenges but overall I think it is the best fit for me of the the jobs I have had so far. Tax is still looked at as a necessary evil and is not valued a whole lot. In my time there we have been short staffed in my department. The employee that had reported to me resigned a few weeks ago so now I have to pick up their work on top of everything else until we hire someone. Unfortunately due to the chronic shortage of accountants, there are not many applicants to choose from. It is a bad time to be a director and manage employees because the shortage of qualified employees put more pressure on all employees.
I have more to add, but wanted to lay out my experience in my professional career. Overall I feel like my career in accounting has taken more from me than what it has given back. I anticipate there are going to a be a lot major problems in the field do to serious shortages of employees as the boomer generation retires. The leadership in the accounting profession has done a very poor job in the last 20 years to make the industry attractive. Greed of those in power has caused a lot of damage to the long term viability of the profession.
