A Counting School - Hardcore Chartered Accountancy

What's my firm's ICAO number?

One of the rites of passage for CA students is filling out their professional experience declaration. Every province in Canada has its own twist, but in Ontario you fill out the CA Student Experience Certification Report. One of the trickiest questions you'll be challenged with - aside from pulling the math from your timesheet reports for the 30 months you spent getting your 2500 hours - will be a simple bit of trivia. What's my firm's ICAO #? Sure, you could call them to ask. And if you're lazy you will. Or maybe you know someone in your company who recently figured it out the hard way. But since you're already here, read on to learn the quick and easy way.

How to get an accounting job in the 'off season'

If you're not familiar with CA firms, you may be a little surprised to know that there's such a thing as "recruiting season." Employers will come around university and college campuses during set times of the year - both in Canada and the US - to interview potential employees en masse . The phenomenon of ‘campus visits’ is especially pronounced in the US where there’s a plethora of colleges to visit - smaller campuses often miss out on visits from the Big Four and students who want to get noticed with an in-person interview end up having to travel to a campus visit taking place at another larger school. A reader asks what to do if you had the misfortune to miss out on recruiting season - or were simply unsuccessful in the hunt for a position . Above: Non-big-four recruiting poster in Buffalo's airport. Photo credit: Krupo (as usual) I'm grouping both scenarios together because the methods of dealing with either scenario are ultimately the same. Figure out what...

Pervasive Qualities chuckle at Consulting Firms

This is what I think of when you say consulting . The link pops up straight to a chart outlining a ten point scale showing how close someone is to quitting. Despite what you're about to read below, this is one scenario where you can actually replace many of the instances of the word "consultant" with "auditor" in the above linked article. Some will argue it's a matter of semantics between to distinguish between "advisory" and "consulting" work, as the Big 4 - aside from Deloitte - have largely shed their consulting practices. Yes, "just legalistic semantics." Until you identify the mindset present somewhat satirically presented by Getting Drunk in First Class . Above: And they also often stay in posh downtown hotels. Aside from being a way of doing business where you're actually setting up and running things versus just testing and suggesting, consulting has also acquired a kind of a bad rep from what I've seen . Just pick...