Career, Recruiting

Fifth-Year MPA Wisdom

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You gain wisdom in your graduate year of MPA…along with a backpack.

Hello MPAs – I hope the semester is going well for all of you! I have recently started recruiting for full-time positions, which has led me to reflect on my internship recruiting and work experience. The benefit of going through the process again is that I can identify ways to make myself a stronger candidate than I was as a third-year MPA. Of course, I have more experience and coursework than I did two years ago, but there are also ways you can prepare outside of the classroom that will help you stand out among your peers. Here are a few lessons that I have learned since my first year in the program:

1. Read the newspaper – every single day. “But I don’t have any time!” – myself, as a third year. The thing is, if you have time to keep up with your news feed on Facebook, you have time to follow real news as well. As an accounting student, it is important to be aware of what is going on in the world, because events can impact our future clients, the standards and regulations in which we operate under, and the entire profession. A recent example is the Detroit bankruptcy and the city’s underfunded pension, which has led to pension accounting standards being questioned. We are not going to be able to simplify problems someday as we do in class and ignore tax effects or pretend that interest rates will remain constant – our work is going to be affected by market forces and world events, and we need to understand how these complexities interact. I highly recommend subscribing to the Wall Street Journal; student subscriptions are very affordable and will definitely help you make an impression.

2. Take finance courses. “But I want to be an auditor…why do I need to know about beta?” – myself, as a third year. I think we sometimes we accounting students feel smug when our fellow finance majors do not know how to record journal entries or build a balance sheet – however, it works both ways. We are missing a piece of the puzzle if we only focus on accounting. How can you audit a financial instrument someday if you don’t understand how the derivative was priced or what features it includes? Finance coursework will strengthen your skill set and will make you a more well-rounded accounting professional in the future.

3. Practice case interviews. “But I don’t want to go into management consulting!” – myself, as a third year. I am guessing that the majority of us do not plan on going into management consulting – however, we all plan on going into some type of client service, which involves the exact scenario a case interview simulates. Our clients or managers will ask us to identify problem areas and propose solutions, and we will likely be put on the spot. Case interviews help you practice organizing your thoughts and communicating them in a concise and coherent way. I recently did my first mock case interview, and while I correctly identified the problem and solutions, the path getting there was a little bit rough. This is a skill I will continue practicing, because it will help me sound more organized, confident, and articulate when I have to give impromptu proposals or presentations in the future.

4. Explore a variety of career options. “But I already know what I want to do!” – myself, as a third year. I was fully confident when I started the program about what position and employer I wanted to apply for. A year and a half later, I ended up declining my full-time offer for that exact position and employer and had to go back to the drawing board, because the experience was not what I had expected. The MPA program affords you so many different options, and I recommend taking some time to research all of them during the early stages of your career exploration. You may end up signing your offer with your original top choice, but you also may end up discovering a career path that is a better fit for you.

Career exploration is something I have really been concentrating on over the past few months, and I am excited about pursuing several different opportunities this fall. So far, I have decided on applying for positions in industry, financial services, and forensic accounting. I will keep you all updated on my recruiting journey – feel free to comment if there is anything you would like to know more about!

Academics, Student Life

In High Gear

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Note: Not the actual class. We’re better looking.

Days turn to weeks and weeks turn to months. It is hard to believe that it’s been almost three months since I started the MPA program. From orientation to recruiting workshops, company info sessions, and of course, the classes and group projects, one can understand how quickly time flies. I like saying that the program is in high gear. Although, looking back now, I wonder if it ever was in any other gear. All joking aside, if you are looking for a rigorous program that is bent on educating and training future accountants committed to excellence, this is it.

One thing I love about the program is the drive and motivation that my peers have. It is contagious and encouraging at the same time. In spite of the whirlwind of events happening right now, everyone is as eager and passionate about what they do.

A good example of this is a class I have on late afternoons on Mondays and Wednesdays, which is typically the sluggish time for most people. Now, I did not pick the class section because of that, it was the only one available by the time I registered. I was disappointed because I thought this class would be such a drag. But a few weeks into the semester now, my previous assumption could not be further from the truth. I look around the classroom and everyone is engaged and focused on the professor. I think I sometimes even see actual wheels spinning on their heads. There is a lively discussion of ideas and free flow of thoughtful questions. At times, we don’t even finish the slides because of the discussion.

As much as the program is in high gear, the students are as well. I could not have asked for a better set of cohorts than the MPA Class of 2014 because they encourage and remind me of why I’m here. In an intense program like what we have, it is good to be surrounded by friends who do not accept mediocrity. That is special. So even though our journey has only begun, I am convinced that these are relationships that would go beyond the weeks and months we have in our MPA experience.

Academics, Alexandria, Student Life, Study Abroad

Czech it Out – UT Classes Abroad

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Visiting the Skoda manufacturing floor in our Safety Gear

As I said in my earlier blog, the MPA summer programs allow you to take two accounting elective courses in a foreign country: one led by UT faculty, and one led by faculty at the host university.

I’ve already discussed the Czech faculty I had the privilege of taking classes with, so now it’s time to talk about my UT faculty led course.

The course was split up between UT Professors Kamas and Koonce. Before I dive into the subject matter they taught, I would like to point out that these courses aren’t like any MPA courses you can take in Austin. Not only are they in a foreign country, but the faculty get to set their own curricula. This means that they get to lecture on whatever they are passionate about, and their passion definitely comes across in their teaching.

Professor Kamas led the first half of the course, and focused on managerial accounting and financial statement analysis. We discussed what considerations international firms take into account in order to manage their profits and strategy effectively. The course material really hit home because Professor Kamas used cases of international firms and brought in his own copious experience of running a business. Professor Kamas had a Big 4 partner come to the classroom and discuss the challenges of moving from the US to a foreign country with our class. We also enjoyed the luxury of seeing what we were learning in the classroom applied to an actual multinational company. We went on a company visit of Skoda (the largest car manufacturer in the Czech Republic), and learned about accounting and the strategy challenges of trying to expand internationally.

The second half of the course was led by Professor Koonce. To give you some background on her course material, Professor Koonce is the top experimental researcher in financial reporting according to the most recent BYU rankings of accounting research (go Professor Koonce!). She introduced us to experimental research in accounting by lecturing on the basics of judgment and decision making and how the concepts overlapped with accounting. This was probably the most fascinating class I have taken in my time in the MPA Program. We are lucky to have such wonderful faculty teaching us, but teaching is such a small part of some of their jobs. So much of their time is dedicated to research, and we really have no idea what is involved in this. Hearing about the basics of what our faculty are up to when they are not in the classroom was an unbelievable experience.

Click here to continue to Part 3 of Ally’s Czech It Out Adventures!

Academics, Student Life, Study Abroad

Czech It Out- Classes in a Different Country

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A group of Texas MPAs overlooking scenic Prague

This past summer, I had the wonderful opportunity to participate in the MPA Summer Program in Prague. This is the first of my many installments called “Czech It Out” where I document my experience abroad.

For those of you unfamiliar with the MPA summer programs, students go abroad for 5 weeks and take 2 accounting elective courses. 1 course is taught by UT professors, and the other by professors at the host university.

Students that venture to Prague attend VSE, the economics school, and take a class on European Accounting in Europe taught by a combination of 3 professors from Prague.

As to be expected there were several cultural differences that students noticed in the classroom. The first of which is that the Czech style of teaching is much more lecture based than the classes of their UT counterparts. They did not really ask for student participation and seemed thrown off when students raised their hands in the middle of lectures.

They also did not “hold our hands” at all. For example, when we asked Professor Zarova what she wanted to see in the group presentation and paper she assigned, she replied “Oh, whatever you feel is important.” Most of us MPAs didn’t know what to do after being provided very descriptive rubrics for each of our projects in Austin.

From the perspective of enhancing your accounting education, I could not recommend a better thing to do. First of all, Czech classes were fascinating in that the country is still recovering from 40 years of communism. I had no idea what an influence communism still played on the Prague culture and economy today. It really hit home when our professors told us that in 1991, when the Soviet Block fell, all their degrees lost all of their value because the only masters and doctorate degrees they could receive were in Leninism and Stalinism. Once communism fell, they had to go to the US and UK to reacquire their credentials in capitalism and learn how the capitalist system worked.

It was also fascinating hearing about US GAAP and IFRS convergence efforts from a European perspective. I never understood why it would be so hard to find a compromise, but after learning the stark cultural and business differences amongst European countries, I have a much better understanding of the complexities that arise with convergence efforts.

Click here to continue to Part 2 of Ally’s Czech It Out Adventures!

Jonathan, MPA Council, MPAC

Getting Involved: MPA Council

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I worked for a few years prior to returning to school in the MPA program.  I was a bit of a wallflower as an undergraduate, and I wanted to do the complete opposite here.  I’m doing everything I can to be as active as possible, and one of the great things about UT and the MPA program is that you can be as deeply involved as you desire.  As a traditional MPA, I’m only going to be here for just over a year, so I have to jump in feet first.

To that end, I was very interested in the MPA Council.  A couple weeks ago, they hosted an information session to kick off the fall semester.  I loved that one of their goals is to build the community of the MPA program, and that includes not only students, but alumni, faculty, staff, and employers.  I was elected to an officer position as Vice President and I’m massively excited to help roll the year out.  Ethics Week and Faculty Appreciation Week are both under my office, and I’m currently talking with potential committee chairs who will run those events.  I love building communities, and I want these events to really help weave that MPA tapestry.

Opportunities like these are why I came to UT, and are the kind of experience that you just don’t get other places.  We’re the top accounting program in the country at one of the largest universities in the country.  That combination gives us resources and access that are invaluable.

I’ll close out my first post here with my best accounting joke:

Why are so many students afraid to major in accounting?
They hear that it’s accrual experience.

MPA Student Life Blog