Is your career better served by working at a Big Four firm or a smaller practice? And what are you better suited to? Myfanwy Neville helps to answer this question for an article in the ICAEW’s Economia magazine.
Moving to a larger or smaller firm broadens an individual’s experience, but the decision must be made for the right reasons.
Eleven years after joining Berg Kaprow Lewis (BKL), a firm with 12 partners and about 100 employees, as a graduate, Myfanwy Neville made a career decision to stay put and is now a principal.
She says: “As soon as I qualified I was approached by recruitment firms. Others in the firm who had qualified with me were making plans to move on. It was all very exciting and there is an inevitable sense of wanting to spread your wings, but before I made any decision I needed to look at what was out there that would make me want to move from what I already had at BKL.
“I asked myself: am I still learning, growing, developing? Can I make a difference? Also I think the culture at BKL suited me. It is what I would describe as a controlled jump in the deep end. In other words you are well supported as you learn to manage the challenges.
“In the end, the culture fit was the deciding factor for me to stay with BKL, and also the reason why some of the people who left to go to much larger firms did end up coming back.”