My background…
To give you a bit of background on me, I left KEVI in 2018 after completing my A Levels and joined the Big 4 Accountancy firm EY in September 2018. I joined as a ‘school leaver’ on their Business Apprenticeship programme. I work in private client services within the financial services sector. I’ve been at EY for about a year and a half now but it has absolutely flown by.
The firm…
EY is an international accountancy firm. I have included some stats below to help you appreciate the scale of EY’s operations.
- In the financial year ending 30 June 2019 we had global revenues of US$36.4bn
- We employ over 280,000 people
- We work in over 150 different countries
My typical day…
It’s hard to tell you what a ‘normal’ day is like for me as every day is so very different. My job requires a lot of prioritisation – I feel like I’m constantly swapping things round in my calendar. Most days I like to get to the office at 7am and I’ll typically leave at 3/4pm, however at especially busy times I’ll be there until much later. I’m very lucky I have the ability to do this as EY operates a flexible working policy and if I ever need to work from home or fancy a lie in, I can adapt my work to fit my lifestyle.
The work I do…
Within the team I work on, we have about 1,100 clients and our job is to provide tax compliance with some ad-hoc advisory services to them. A large part of my role is concerned with ensuring our clients are tax compliant in all jurisdictions relevant to them. As a result, my role is largely client facing. I spend a lot of my day communicating with clients by email and by phone. The clients we work with are all high net worth individuals with fairly complex tax affairs. A lot of the clients I personally work with are expatriates/non-domiciled individuals with cross border tax affairs – hurts my brain thinking about them but I do enjoy a technical challenge.
Aside from the actual work I do, another large part of my job over the next few years is exams. I’ve never been fan of exams but at EY there is lots of support put in place which makes them very manageable. In 2019, I sat and passed my first 6 exams but there are plenty more to sit before I reach my goal of becoming a Chartered Tax Advisor.
The best part about my job…
I like what I do, the people I work with and experience a lot of variety and challenge. I also feel that I have been granted a lot of freedom over how I spend my time which best suits how I like to work. I feel very valued at work, since joining I’ve been awarded two impact awards and I got progressed after just one year of being here. If you’re willing to do the work and go the extra mile, it will get recognised.
Opportunities are endless at EY. Here’s a couple of things that I’ve done in addition to my day job:
- Last year I was given the opportunity to work on our US team for a few months who manage the tax reporting for hedge funds and private equity firms. This was very different to the work I’m used but it was a great opportunity to increase my international tax knowledge and see a different side to tax.
- EY launched a new app called Tax Chat which you may have seen advertised. I did some work on the initial testing of the app when it was being developed.
- I also like get involved in student recruitment as often as I can.
The worst part about my job…
- The volume of emails! I can’t remember the last time I left the office on a Friday with 0 unread emails but it’s something I’ve got to live with. I’m sure EY won’t go under if it takes me a week to respond to an email.
My top 3 tips…
- Tomorrow is another day – it’s amazing how many things are easier the following morning when you approach them with fresh eyes and after a bit of reflection.
- It doesn’t matter if you don’t know the answer – the more important thing is having a process for finding it out.
- Embrace new challenges – the most positive experiences I’ve had since joining EY have come from trying something new. Looking at the transformation our business, and many others, have to go through in the next few years it’s more important than ever to be able to be flexible in how you apply your skills.
Opportunities at EY…
