I have an opportunity to go back into Big 4 accounting (I worked for two Big 5 early in my career and another Big 4 about 8 yrs ago).

I've worked in the software business for ~20 years for a couple of companies that provide solutions for tax. I had someone at a Big 4 firm reach out to me given my experience in the niche market I've been in for 20+ years where they need some help. Since the market is so small, there is a lot of "incest" across accounting, software, and industry so a lot of the faces are familiar. For the most part, I like or get along with the majority of the people.

I'm curious about the culture these days and pay scale/range for someone with 20+ yrs experience.

LitreBoy said:

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I have an opportunity to go back into Big 4 accounting.

I'm curious about the culture these days and pay scale/range for someone with 20+ yrs experience.

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If opportunity is Partner/Managing Director = Consider it.



If they bring you in a step below PPMD (Director @ PwC, Senior Manager @ EY), you'll hate life, but maybe that's your jam. You'll still make decent money ($250-$350 for our Directors in my consulting group), but they are constantly in the pressure cooker and playing the politics game to push a PPMD case.

It's not for PPMD level. I'm not a CPA.

If there are any Big 4 recruiters (internal or external) on the board, I'd love to chat. They asked my salary expectations and I countered with asking the range for level/role. There's a gap of $185K between high and low.

Don't want to sell myself short and don't want to come in too high initially. I do have a little advantage that they reached out to me....

Respond here and I can post my email if willing to chat.

If the position is in a niche advisory group, unless the group is contributing really solid margins and distributable income, it will be the first on the cutting blocks when it comes times to manage growth and earnings per unit…..which happens at all large firms. That is a lot of pressure/stress to win more work in a practice that probably has few evergreen accounts.

LitreBoy said:

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It's not for PPMD level. I'm not a CPA.

If there are any Big 4 recruiters (internal or external) on the board, I'd love to chat. They asked my salary expectations and I countered with asking the range for level/role. There's a gap of $185K between high and low.

Don't want to sell myself short and don't want to come in too high initially. I do have a little advantage that they reached out to me....

Respond here and I can post my email if willing to chat.

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If you are happy with your job…give them a crazy number. What's the worst that could happen?

LitreBoy said:

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It's not for PPMD level. I'm not a CPA.

If there are any Big 4 recruiters (internal or external) on the board, I'd love to chat. They asked my salary expectations and I countered with asking the range for level/role. There's a gap of $185K between high and low.

Don't want to sell myself short and don't want to come in too high initially. I do have a little advantage that they reached out to me....

Respond here and I can post my email if willing to chat.

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PPMD has nothing to do with CPA.

It's just a rank. If you enter as a Director from industry w/ 20 years of exp., you're in for pain, imo.

Push for Principal/Managing Director or move on.