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5 Things to think about when deciding on the Industry Path

It is really important to have a good think about what industries interest you.    This can be a pretty hard thing to do though. In fact it might be easier to figure out what industries do NOT interest you and see what is left over.   A little counter intuitive but you might find it keeps your options open but closes the door on what you definitely don’t want.

A couple of things worth keeping in mind keep include:

  1. The type of company you start your career in will effect the type of company you will get a job with in the future. (e.g. If you start working in a small manufacturing company it is much harder to move to a large Bank after you qualify – read more on this concept of “like with like” here – it is a pretty important concept and definitely worth some time)
  2. The larger the company the more structured the training contract is likely to be,  but, conversely the more niche the experience is likely to be (read more on what accounting teams actually do here and how size does matter here)
  3. The smaller the company the less structured the training contract is likely to be, but the broader the experience is likely to be (what I said above but in reverse!)
  4. Bigger companies will have more roles and will be easier to identify; smaller companies will have less roles and will be harder to find out there (makes sense I guess as bigger companies will be hiring more grads and will likely spend more on marketing)
  5. Bigger companies will be more likely to offer you career progression and overseas travel than smaller companies.  Conversely though smaller companies can offer you faster progression and very transferable experience.

You might have noticed that there are good things and not so good things about training in a large company or small company.    There are no easy answers here unfortunately – this is ultimately going to be a personal decision impacted by the availability of roles and companies in the location you are looking for.

In a Local town in Localsville you might be lucky if there is a training contract at all, but in a bigger city there will be a variety of options available which can make the decision a little harder to make – choice is not always a good thing it would seem!