Exams without work experience

Tan Princess

i have a degree in Economics and would really like to go that route but with the jobs market so slow at the moment I'm thinking of doing more study part time. Would it be worth doing one or two of the CIMA courses without work experience. Would they be worth anything without the work experience?

shewasoctober

No matter which accountancy qualification you pursue, you will always have to complete 3 years of training for qualification. I don't know the market for CIMA, but I know there are lots of trainee jobs out there. That said, studying first and passing a few exams before training isn't a bad thing. In fact, you will be part-qualified prior to your training start and that may open up a few more job opportunities. The only real downside to this is that you will have to pay for registration, course, and exam fees. If you took any accounting courses in college, you may qualify for some exemptions, but since you degree is in Economics, it isn't guaranteed.

Maybe some else can offer more details, but I don't see any issue with it except the fact that you have to pay for it.

Cheers!

daheff

I'd say go for it. If you have a degree in Economics and are part qualified as an accountant it will open up more doors for you than not having any acc experience.

Even get a job in some business related field and study part time for 6mths- a year and go looking again for a job more related to what you want to do.

you can always get your work experience as you go along...by the time you pass all your exams you will prob have enough experience to get your acc designation.

suckslikeafox

The Big 4 (and others) will start looking for applications soon for 2009 entry, they take on roughly 100-200 each but mainly on ACCA and AITI. There are plenty of trainee jobs out there and its not incredibly hard to get one if you put some time and effort in.

Also a lot of big companies have graduate recruitment programmes that take on people to train for accountancy so there are loads of opportunities, though maybe not at this time of year

If it was me, I wouldnt do anything without work experience. Learning by doing would be far easier and you would get a lot more support and also as the job market might tighten up soon experience is the key, get as much of it as soon as you can

EmilioB

Depends on what you want to do.
You can always put down on your CV that your studying for them, even if you're not. Some jobs look for you to be intendng on sitting them or started the process. This is what i did after college, i signed up to CIMA, put on CV, got a job around same time, i imagine i got a bit of luck with the job, but it certainly helped.
Don't worry about the work experience, you prob won't have them done in 3 years anyway and if you do, you'll have a job by then

Best of luck with it!