I just finished an incredibly exhausting week but I had a ton of fun.
In my last post I mentioned that I interviewed with 5 different accounting firms for internships this coming fall. I interviewed with the “Big 4” (Deloitte, PricewaterhouseCoopers, Ernst & Young, and KPMG) and a smaller firm called Protiviti. I found out the following week that 3 of these firms (Deloitte, KPMG, and PwC) liked me and wanted to continue recruiting with me.
The PPA program regulates what these firms can and cannot do when they recruit us. This past week was “open week” where all of the firms brought people down and could have as many events as they wanted. Basically the entire week I went from one event to another - all day, everyday. The events were lots of fun but doing all that stuff plus talking to lots of people and trying to impress them and getting to know as many different people as I can and getting to know the personalities of each firm was pretty tiring.
This was my schedule this week:
On Monday, I went to work for a couple hours, had breakfast with Deloitte, played golf with PwC, went to 2 classes, had dinner and played Bingo with KPMG, went to dessert with PwC, and then went to Impact prayer meeting.
On Tuesday, I went to breakfast with PwC, went to 2 classes (w/ quizzes in both), had lunch with KPMG, went bowling with Deloitte and then we had the night off to go to Aggie Muster, which I went to with a couple of my friends.
On Wednesday, I worked for a couple of hours, went to lunch at a restaurant on the lake with Deloitte, went skeet shooting with PwC, went to a baseball tailgate with Deloitte and had dinner at Excell Steakhouse (i.e. one of the nicest restaurants in CS) with a partner from KPMG.
On Thursday, I went to 1 class, went to lunch with PwC, hung out at Research Park with Deloitte, went to another class, went bowling with KPMG, went to a crawfish boil with Deloitte, and then went to another dinner at The Republic (also one of the nicest restaurants in CS) with PwC.
On Friday, I went to breakfast with PwC, lunch with Deloitte, hung out at the Rec with KPMG, then helped set up for Impact retreat and when we found out we didn’t have to stay for the actual retreat, a couple of the Crew girls and I went to a Dave Barnes concert in downtown Bryan.
This coming week is “restricted week” and each firm has 24 hours to do whatever they want, so I just have 2 events with each firm and I won’t have to choose between events.
I have a pretty good idea right now who I want to go with, assuming I get an offer. In May I’ll get to do an office visit with each of the firms and meet more people that I would potentially be working with. If all goes well, I will be doing my internship in the fall and then will get to be back in College Station for 3 more semesters before I graduate.
I can’t even believe that this is really happening. I have friends that are graduating in May and don’t know what they’re going to do because it’s hard to find jobs right now and here I am, not even close to graduating and I have 3 firms wining and dining me – it’s crazy.
As much as I try to ignore it, I really am growing up and it won’t be very long before I have a real job and will be pretty much on my own. Even though I love college, I’m excited to see what this next stage of my life will be like.
