Professional Services 2022 EOFY Survey

HAL Bowman recently surveyed over 10,000 accountants working within professional services, so we thought it worthwhile letting you know what we found.

Salaries:

• 0-2 years experience - there was a reported average year-on-year salary increase of $8,800;

• 2-5 years experience - there was a reported year- on- year average salary increase of $7,534;

• 5-10 years experience - there was a reported year-on-year average salary increase of $12,543;

• 10+ years of experience - there was a reported year-on-year average salary increase of $7,104

While the higher percentage increase in salary for people with less than 2 years experience (compared with those in the other groups) was surprising, we are seeing this reflected in the actual demand for candidates at the 0-2 experience level.

Anecdotally, hiring managers have advised that due to the actual skill shortages of candidates at this level they have had to start offshoring more work.

What effect did changing jobs have?

We asked respondents to advise if they had changed jobs during the last 12 months and found that people who changed jobs had a marginally higher increase in salary over the 12 month period.

Common Questions:

What effect does changing jobs have on salary and is it worth the risk?

There is an inherent risk in changing to a new employer, however changing jobs is one of the strongest predictors of a salary increase.

My fall back position is that if you are getting the experience you need to be successful, then it is about presenting a value proposition to your existing employer.

I’ve included a link here on how to prepare for performance reviews / these conversations.

What is the appetite for either 4 days per week or WFH?

4 days per week is close enough to full time that most businesses are happy to consider people looking for that.

3 days per week is where it gets a little harder.

Regarding WFH, if you have less than 2 years experience, most businesses will want you in the office. It is not about trust or quality of work, it is because it is just easier to train people who are in the same place.

Regarding people with more than 5 years experience, most firms are much more open to having a conversation around WFH.

What effect would changing to part time employment have on my ability to be promoted in the future?

To be honest, there are so many variables that it is really hard to give a blanket response.

In short, if being promoted means managing either clients or employees, then you need to be available to manage those people.

If being promoted means working on more complicated work then it is all going to come down to the quality of work you are producing.

Someone who is producing high quality work for 38 hours per week, compared to someone who is producing equally high quality work for 20 hours per week, will be getting an extra 18 hours of actual experience - so it stands to reason the former will get promoted sooner.

This is an oversimplification, however most people would consider this a reasonable position for an employer to take.

How do I maximise my salary at my current employer?

Again, this is a really hard question to answer as there are so many variables. Ultimately it comes down to knowing what your experience and skills are worth to your current employer.

An equally important question is: what skills you are developing that are going to make you worth more in the future?

If you are getting paid $50K and the market is paying $100K for people with your experience you might seriously consider a move, however if you are learning something that is going to make you worth $1M next year (as an extreme example), then it is probably worth staying.

If you are interested in discussing any of the above, please feel free to get in contact via email peter@halbowman.com.au