Finance related Jobs

[Liub]

Anyone here have a job in Finance or studying Finance at Uni?

I'm currently studying Finance at Uni in Perth and most my friends are doing Accounting. I've been worried lately at the lack of Finance jobs on offer as opposed to Accounting opportunities.

Things I notice include at Uni career fairs there are plenty of job offers for Accounting but I'm lucky to find one or two in Finance. Even when I google Finance jobs they still come up as Accounting.

Can anyone with a Finance related Job or experienced in the business world let me know what they think?

Cheers

 

[kevan]

I'm currently studying finance too but doing a double major along with marketing so i'm still hopeful that theres a job when i graduate.

Along with you most of my friends are doing accounting but some are doing finance but i do find that its much easier to get an accounting job these days. I guess i'll find out when i graduate.

 

[Liub]

You go to Curtin mate?

 

[kevan]

indeed i do. i presume u do too?

 

[patsmith]

At least you aren't an accountant.

 

[bresker]

Interested in a job in credit control?

I quite enjoyed it. Start at the bottom and work your way up to credit management. With a finance degree you may go far.

 

[daddy_4_eyes]

There's a lot of accounting jobs going, but there's also a lot of accountants out there.

Thing with finance is that a lot of skills are learned on the job, its not that easy to apply what you've learned at Uni directly to work. Most people work their way up. E.g. Bank teller --> para-planner --> Financial planner. Not many graduates move straight into para-planning, and unless daddy owns a practice, no graduates ever move straight into financial planning.
Same principle applies with other finance fields such as fund management, broking, inv. banking, etc.

In Melbourne, a lot of the better grad jobs want an ENTER 90+ & Melb Uni graduates. So its very competitive and for a lot of students impossible to get grad jobs unless they're willing to settle for a rubbish role that is falsely sold as a graduate job.


The financial rewards in the finance sector are much greater than the accounting profession IMO, particularly as most accountants never earn more than the $80k an experienced CA/CPA would ask for (of the 37 million accountants in Australia, how many actually earn 6-figure salaries?).

 

[AG]

If you work for yourself as an accountant you would be in the 6 figure sums.

I finished my Commerce degree in June and my best marks were in Finance but a lot of people I talk to recommend accounting as an easy entrant job. I'll probably do the CPA course for three years and then jump into Finance. I don't have any plans to be a career accountant but I think it's a good skill to have.

 

[Eagle87]

There's a lot of accounting jobs going, but there's also a lot of accountants out there.

Thing with finance is that a lot of skills are learned on the job, its not that easy to apply what you've learned at Uni directly to work. Most people work their way up. E.g. Bank teller --> para-planner --> Financial planner. Not many graduates move straight into para-planning, and unless daddy owns a practice, no graduates ever move straight into financial planning.
Same principle applies with other finance fields such as fund management, broking, inv. banking, etc.

In Melbourne, a lot of the better grad jobs want an ENTER 90+ & Melb Uni graduates. So its very competitive and for a lot of students impossible to get grad jobs unless they're willing to settle for a rubbish role that is falsely sold as a graduate job.


The financial rewards in the finance sector are much greater than the accounting profession IMO, particularly as most accountants never earn more than the $80k an experienced CA/CPA would ask for (of the 37 million accountants in Australia, how many actually earn 6-figure salaries?).

Most of this is reasonably accurate until the last paragraph.

In public practice in Perth ANY accountant with 6+ years experience who isnt a spud would be making more than $80k.

In any sort of reasonable size firm, a manager would be on at least $100k, a senior manager $130k and anyone above that even more.

Most salaried partners/directors would be on a minimum $200k and equity partners, well I have associates in small/medium practices (partners) earning $450k+.... sure many sole practice guys are making mid-100's but then some of these guys are on 300k+..... and the really big practices have guys on exec money $500K+ year in, year out....

Certainly there are plenty of Accountants in Perth earning well north of $200k.

Will be interesting to see what happens to FP incomes over the next 5 years or so given the move towards "pay for service" ... will be interesting to see if FP's can charge the $400+ per hour that some accountants are charging.

 

[daddy_4_eyes]

Most of this is reasonably accurate until the last paragraph.

In public practice in Perth ANY accountant with 6+ years experience who isnt a spud would be making more than $80k.

In any sort of reasonable size firm, a manager would be on at least $100k, a senior manager $130k and anyone above that even more.

Yeah, you're right. Your last paragraph is what I was referring to.
With today's flat corporate structures, most accountants never move up the corporate ladder. You'll have a manager on $120k, and 8 accountants underneath him/her on $50-80k.

In Finance the base salaries tend to be higher for bottom-rung positions, but that's because if you're a spud you don't ever even get to that level.

Will be interesting to see what happens to FP incomes over the next 5 years or so given the move towards "pay for service" ... will be interesting to see if FP's can charge the $400+ per hour that some accountants are charging.

Personally I'm glad this is being implemented. 1) Too many FP's do f*ck all and get ridiculous trail, 2) will make fees more transparent.

My previous employer was an insurance salesman posing as a FP. Had a huge register of clients earning around $600k p.a trail but the quality of advice he provided wasn't anything better than you could get from google.

 

[Eagle87]

Personally I'm glad this is being implemented. 1) Too many FP's do f*ck all and get ridiculous trail, 2) will make fees more transparent.

My previous employer was an insurance salesman posing as a FP. Had a huge register of clients earning around $600k p.a trail but the quality of advice he provided wasn't anything better than you could get from google.

He is no orphan.

Of course fee based income may tempt FP's to move even more into relatively unregulated areas of advice (tax in particular) that are typically the preserve of Accountants or Lawyers......

Given the shit fight in the past about what constituted FP advice and the move to exclude accountants from giving advice in those areas, it could be a fun time ahead.

I think fee based advice will change things substantially and no doubt lead many of the imposters you described earlier in early retirement.

 

[TheSaviour]

Most of this is reasonably accurate until the last paragraph.

In public practice in Perth ANY accountant with 6+ years experience who isnt a spud would be making more than $80k.

In any sort of reasonable size firm, a manager would be on at least $100k, a senior manager $130k and anyone above that even more.

Most salaried partners/directors would be on a minimum $200k and equity partners, well I have associates in small/medium practices (partners) earning $450k+.... sure many sole practice guys are making mid-100's but then some of these guys are on 300k+..... and the really big practices have guys on exec money $500K+ year in, year out....

Certainly there are plenty of Accountants in Perth earning well north of $200k.

Will be interesting to see what happens to FP incomes over the next 5 years or so given the move towards "pay for service" ... will be interesting to see if FP's can charge the $400+ per hour that some accountants are charging.

Plenty of dumbsh!t tradesman earning more than that in Perth.

Earning 100k in Perth is the equivalent to eraqrning 55-60k in Melbourne or Sydney.

 

[Eagle87]

Plenty of dumbsh!t tradesman earning more than that in Perth.

Earning 100k in Perth is the equivalent to eraqrning 55-60k in Melbourne or Sydney.

Not overly relevant to anything... but thanks.

Of course a review of average household income would suggest that your talking bollocks.

Certainly there are plenty of tradies making shitloads in Mining and Oil&Gas - hardly in Perth though. Plus, which number were you referring to? The $500k per annum?

 

[Brad Goodman]

Interested in people's thoughts on moving into FP from another industry with the mooted changes seemingly not far away. Bad time to do it?

 

[Chief]

You know what you need?

Yes!

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