My experience as an Audit intern at PwC

December 31, 2022 by Louis DETALLE

My experience as an Audit intern at PwC

In this article, Louis DETALLE (ESSEC Business School, Grande Ecole Program – Master in Management, 2020-2023) interviews a former Audit intern at PwC.

First of all, let’s recall what Audit consists in?

The financial auditor expresses an opinion on the financial statements of a company. Their objective is to carry out the work necessary to enable the auditor to give an informed opinion on the true and fair nature of the published accounts.

The financial auditor is therefore the guarantor of the reliability of the company’s financial information and has a great responsibility, in particular to the company’s third-party stakeholders who invest in the company on the basis of the information published by the company.

Where had you applied for and what makes PwC different from other big 4?

It was my first internship in corporate finance, for that matter, I wanted to get into something but I did not really know what was possible. Since, an internship in Audit is a great way to launch one’s career; because you can do whatever you want after; I figured that it would be easier for me to apply there. I quickly got interviews at KPMG and PwC.

The reason why I chose PwC is because I was accepted there first! They offered me the position first and I was very keen to get over my internship hunting!

What does an intern in Audit work on?

An intern in audit at PwC will work on different tasks depending on the specific organization and the needs of the audit team. Some common tasks that an audit intern may be responsible for include:

• Assisting with the preparation of audit plans and procedures
• Conducting research and gathering information to support the audit process
• Analyzing financial statements and other data to identify potential risks and issues
• Participating in meetings with clients to discuss audit findings and recommendations
• Preparing reports and presentations to communicate audit results to clients and internal stakeholders
• Assisting with the development and implementation of internal controls and other risk management processes

Overall, the work of an audit intern typically involves providing support to the audit team in order to ensure that the audit is conducted in a thorough and professional manner. This may involve conducting research, analyzing data, and participating in meetings with clients and other stakeholders.

What do you plan to do next?

Most former Audit intern go for transaction services, investment banking, private equity or M&A internships.

As a consequence, I am not sure, but I think I will try to get into M&A and see if I like it.

Overall, would you recommend this experience to younger students? Why?

I would personally recommend this experience to anyone who is interested in corporate finance. Because it is one of the rare fields of corporate finance that you can have a with no experience before.

For that matter, it is an excellent internship, and anyone would be very lucky to do this internship because it would mean great opportunity to do things after. However, if you are lucky, you will be able to find a more interesting internship in banking perhaps or even in a financial department of a large corporate firm.

Resources

PwC Careers website

Youtube How to succeed in Audit interviews?

About the author

The article was written in December 2022 by Louis DETALLE (ESSEC Business School, Grande Ecole Program – Master in Management, 2020-2023).

A quick review of the Audit job…

December 28, 2022 by Louis DETALLE

A quick review of the Audit job…

In this article, Louis DETALLE (ESSEC Business School, Grande Ecole Program – Master in Management, 2020-2023) explains what an Audit analyst works on, on a daily basis.

What does the Audit job consist in?

The financial auditor expresses an opinion on the financial statements of a company. Its objective is to carry out the work necessary to give an informed opinion on the true and fair nature of the published accounts.

The financial auditor is therefore the guarantor of the reliability of the company’s financial information and has a great responsibility, in particular to the company’s third party stakeholders who invest in the company on the basis of the information published by the company.

What are the biggest audit firms?

Deloitte, Ernst and Young (EY), PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) and KPMG are the four audit and consulting firms that make up the Big Four. They represent the most influential consulting firms in the world. They are the most influential consultancies in the world, employing nearly 1,200,000 people worldwide.

However, some other players are very influential, such as Mazars in France, which is ranked neck and neck with the Anglo-Saxon Big Four. On the other hand, smaller companies do not necessarily need to call on such large firms as their audits are not as labour intensive.

What does an Auditor work on?

In the case of an accounting and financial audit, it is an examination of the company’s financial statements in order to assess the company’s accounts and verify their fairness, compliance and regularity. As the auditor is expected to give an opinion on the fairness of the accounts, the auditor and his team will study the different accounting cycles of the company: income and customers, costs and suppliers, but also equity, cash flow, stocks and fixed assets, etc.

The objective of this review of the major financial masses is to understand the client’s challenges related to its business, its environment, its organisation, and to understand its internal processes in order to see how all this is reflected in the accounts. A meticulous verification of the accounts and invoice amounts is carried out (often subcontracted).

The common objective of all engagements is to provide confidence to both external investors and the client, who may need to make adjustments after the annual audit. The client may have to make adjustments after the annual audit because their internal control systems are more or less effective, and they may present inaccurate accounts unintentionally but more inadvertently.

Other audits may therefore cover the environment, the production system, ethics, safety and many others. The role of a quality audit, for example, is to check whether the client company’s stated quality objectives are being met. The auditors must ensure that the quality management systems comply with the applicable contractual and regulatory requirements.

The use of AI in order to quicken the audit job.

Artificial intelligence (AI) can potentially impact the audit profession in a number of ways. Here are a few examples:

Auditing large amounts of data: AI technologies, such as machine learning algorithms, can help auditors analyze and interpret large amounts of data more efficiently and accurately. For example, an AI system could be used to identify patterns and anomalies in financial data that might indicate fraudulent activity or other problems.

Improving efficiency: AI can automate certain tasks, such as data entry and analysis, allowing auditors to focus on higher-value activities, such as interpreting results and communicating findings. This can help improve the efficiency and effectiveness of the audit process.

Enhancing risk assessment: AI can help auditors better understand and assess the risks associated with a particular business or industry. For example, an AI system could analyze data on economic conditions, market trends, and other factors to help identify potential risks and provide recommendations for how to mitigate them.

Providing real-time monitoring: AI can be used to monitor a company’s financial data in real-time, alerting auditors to any unusual activity or trends that may warrant further investigation. This can help auditors identify potential issues earlier in the process, which can lead to more timely and effective interventions.

Overall, the use of AI in the audit profession has the potential to improve the accuracy and efficiency of the audit process, while also helping auditors to identify and address risks more effectively.

Resources

Youtube The Audit Methodology

KPMG Careers website

EY Careers website

About the author

The article was written in December 2022 by Louis DETALLE (ESSEC Business School, Grande Ecole Program – Master in Management, 2020-2023).

My experience as a junior audit consultant at KPMG

November 10, 2021 by Pierre-Alain THIAM

My experience as a junior audit consultant at KPMG

In this article, Pierre-Alain THIAM (ESSEC Business School, Global Bachelor of Business Administration, 2019-2023) shares his experience as a junior audit consultant in the Audit & Consulting department at KPMG.

About KPMG

When we mention professional services networks, everyone is instantly thinking about the “Big Four”. During the last summer from May to July 2021, I had the opportunity to work in one of these companies, KPMG, as a Junior intern in Audit & Consulting.

KPMG’s letters are the sheer remnants of the company’s history. In March 1917, Piet Klijnveld and Jaap Kraayenhof created an accounting firm in Amsterdam called Klynveld Kraayenhof & Co. Then multiples mergers occurred and in 1979, Klynveld Kraayenhof & Co., McLintock Main LaFrentz from the United States and Deutsche Treuhandgesellschaft from Germany, formed Klynveld Main Goerdeler known as KMG. In 1987, KMG and Peat Marwick merged and had one of the biggest mergers at the time. Two of the biggest accounting firms of the 20th century chose to unify and ultimately formed KPMG as we know it today.

Nowadays, KPMG provides multiple finance services including mainly Audit, Management Consulting and Tax Consulting.

Source: KPMG

What I did during my internship

During my internship, I evolved in a global system. I tried to understand the rules and even complex expectations of a work organization. My goals were to adopt an action or work plan coherent with the challenges and success of the requested mission and work effectively in a multicultural and interdisciplinary team while communicating in a dynamic national and international environment. I had to focus on producing clear and well-organized working documents on various subjects (test on revenues, process of a system, bank reconciliation of two pension fund regimes for examples), that the highest graded employees like managers or even partners would review for the mission.

I was mainly involved in audit assignments. The activity entrusted to it was essentially the understanding of target companies: organization, processes, and risks. Then, the understanding of audit objectives and performing substantive controls to identify accounting anomalies, including fraud of all types. And last but not least, I had to understand and perform internal control assessment work. I did a total of four missions over three months, with a range from a national agricultural organization to an insurance and a pension fund.

What I learned during my internship

Throughout my time at KPMG, I learned that technical skills are not the most important skills needed to work in the audit sector. Of course, you need to master hard skills like knowing the basics of financial accounting, being able to find the equilibrium of a balance sheet or having solid foundations on Excel. Nonetheless, there is a big “relational” aspect of the job. Since you are almost always with new people and colleagues, soft skills are definitely required. If you find a way to show your ability to communicate with other people, it always results with a better quality of work for you and the people involved in your mission.

When working in the audit sector, I think there are three principal aspects you need to focus on: logic, flexibility, and tenacity.

Logic

That may sound surprising, but logic is the most important quality you will need. When we talk about audit, people instantly think about big formulas, accounting and working on numbers all the time. This vision is quite wrong, I know for a fact that audit is mostly a process. A process is the description and assessment of the procedures for granting aid to customers: monitoring of their activities, the respect of accounting procedures and the identification of the various risks and controls implemented. You need to ask yourself a lot of questions related to the activities of the company you are working with. The aim is to identify the risks, assess them, define control measures, and simulate different scenarios of incidents to be analyzed: basically, it is called risk management. For example, if you work with Orange on their mobile services, you will first ask them how they make money from this activity. If they tell you each call is counted as a transaction, we will try to know how they make sure a call is counted. Then if Orange answers us that they have antenna A that conveys information to antenna B, KPMG will then investigate the risks of this method and how it can be the cause of a loss of money for the client company. This example is very specific to a certain type of firm, and it directly leads us to the second quality you need to succeed: flexibility.

Flexibility

At KPMG you can work in every field you can imagine and in any country in the world. My first mission was in a pension fund for employees of a bank group, my fourth week I worked in an insurance company and the week just after I worked in a logistics company. Lastly, my final mission was in a company for the support of the rural development of a country.

As you can see, we jump from one subject to another pretty quickly. Versatility is key because you never know what you are going to work on and where you are going to work at. If you don’t like to disrupt your habits, the rhythm of a consulting firm will promptly become fiendish for you. The bright side of this atmosphere is that it constantly stimulates you intellectually and you are always learning. Working in this type of company is extremely formative, but it comes with its advantages and disadvantages, metaphorically it is a double-edged sword, and you will either love it or hurt yourself if you find the correct way to handle it or not. And this is precisely why tenacity is essential to stay on the course.

Tenacity

Sometimes the work can be hard, and you have to try a lot of ideas until you find a solution. This can be even more difficult when there is tension with the management of your client company. Some people are really tough to work with and they just don’t want you to succeed because it will be at their detriment. Therefore, you need to have good communication skills while standing strong in your positions and not letting people walk over you.

The threat cannot only come from the clients but from your own colleagues. Most of the people are benevolent, but it is a dog-eat-dog world and not everyone can get to the top.

Useful resources

KPMG

About the author

The article was written in November 2021 by Pierre-Alain THIAM (ESSEC Business School, Global Bachelor of Business Administration, 2019-2023).