I had my first office visit of the season with a firm this past week. It’s exciting to be moving past the interviews to the next step. I have a couple more office visits scheduled in the coming weeks, and I have some more interviews on my plate this week.

Office visits are a chance for the student to interview the firm, essentially, but also to spend more time with the firm to prove that they can act professionally. The student gets the chance to see the offices, meet more people, and hear some presentations about the firm. However, they can’t just sit there and relax – the job seeker’s role is to ask questions. Lots of them.

At the end of an “interview” with a manager, senior manager, or partner, you want to be prepared when they ask you “so what questions can I answer for you about our firm?”

So what questions can you ask your interviewer at an accounting office visit?

A couple that I like to ask are:

1. Why did you choose to work here? or What do you like most about working here?

2. Can you tell me what the culture is like at the firm? (Although often, that’s their answer to question 1!)

3. Where do you see the firm going in the next 5 to 10 years? (They’ll ask you where you see yourself in 5 to 10 years, so here’s your chance to ask the question right back!)

Does anyone have some good suggestions for good questions to ask interviewers at office visits?

This week is the first week of on-campus interviews with accounting firms. Good luck to everyone! Interviews will be going on for a few weeks. Luckily, as a grad student I don’t have midterms in that time (except for Tax, which is run like an undergrad class), but the undergrads have both to worry about.

We all need to practice prioritizing this week, so here I am at 7 am, watching Roger CPA Videos (for REG part 4). I still have to do the multiple choice for REG 3, but it’s nice to switch it up between the types of studying. I am almost, not quite halfway through, after 7 weeks of studying, but I only have a month to go now! It’s also great to go from a section covering tax to one covering law, because it is so much easier for me to understand and remember law than tax. Go figure?

Tonight, I’ll be using this handy “Complete List of Behavioral Interview Questions,” from Emurse.com.