{"id":3904,"date":"2023-08-29T07:46:34","date_gmt":"2023-08-29T11:46:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ubwp.buffalo.edu\/business-management-mba-ms\/?p=3904"},"modified":"2023-08-29T07:46:49","modified_gmt":"2023-08-29T11:46:49","slug":"what-i-have-learned-in-my-accounting-internships","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/ubwp.buffalo.edu\/business-management-mba-ms\/2023\/08\/29\/what-i-have-learned-in-my-accounting-internships\/","title":{"rendered":"What I Have Learned in My Accounting Internships"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Written by: Justin Zulewski, MSA \u201823<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Throughout my time at the University at Buffalo, I\u2019ve been fortunate enough to be involved in two different accounting internships: one as an internal auditor intern and one as an external auditor intern. These internships provided me with invaluable experiences and have also helped&nbsp; shape my career path as I prepare to graduate and begin a full-time job.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>During junior year of my undergraduate studies, I was encouraged to seek out and apply for internships. Like many of my peers, I had no idea what type of internship I wanted so I applied to a variety of different positions on UB\u2019s Bizlink website.&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Eventually, I accepted an internship offer with a private company in their internal audit department. At the time, I knew very little about the role of internal audit at companies, but I viewed the internship as an opportunity to see if working in internal audit was something I would want to do in my career.&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I ended up working as an internal auditor intern for about 10 months where I gained technical knowledge related to internal audit and the accounting profession. In addition, I learned that I prefer to work in-person vs. remotely.&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Due to COVID-19, the company worked remotely for most of my time at the internship. I found that while it can be convenient to work from home, it can be difficult to communicate with co-workers and learn how to perform tasks without direct supervision. My supervisors and co-workers tried to be as accessible as possible and help make the best out of an unfavorable situation, but I couldn\u2019t help but feel that my learning was hindered from working remotely. This&nbsp; has been a hot topic for many companies post pandemic, but I firmly believe that the benefits of working in person outweigh the benefits of working from home.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I really enjoyed working as an internal audit intern and would be open to working in an internal audit department in the future, but I wanted to try another accounting position for my second internship. I decided to try an internship in external audit at a regional firm during the summer after senior year.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I had already enrolled in the Master of Science Accounting program for the following semester with hopes of becoming a Certified Public Accountant (CPA).&nbsp; Even though I had enjoyed working in internal audit, I thought working in external audit was best for me. (It was also traditional for aspiring CPAs to start off as an external auditor.)&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I\u2019m still interning as an external auditor at the same regional firm and currently, I have signed an offer letter for a full-time position in the fall of 2023. The internship is fully in-person, so I believe I\u2019m getting the most out of my internship experience as I\u2019m able to connect with co-workers more comfortably and efficiently whenever I have any questions. More importantly, I\u2019ve really enjoyed working as an external audit intern and could see myself working in this industry for an extended period.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>My internships allowed me to learn what preferences I have regarding different positions and work situations that I otherwise would not have known about myself. I learned the value of working in the office opposed to working from home which I wouldn\u2019t have known of if not for experiencing the two conflicting situations at each internship. Additionally, I learned key technical knowledge at both internships, but I also found that I would be open to working in either internal or external audit later in my career.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\" \/>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-media-text alignwide is-stacked-on-mobile\"><figure class=\"wp-block-media-text__media\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"300\" height=\"200\" src=\"https:\/\/ubwp.buffalo.edu\/business-management-mba-ms\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/33\/2023\/06\/Justin-Z-MSA-23-300x200.jpg\" alt=\"Justin Zulewski, MSA \u201823\" class=\"wp-image-3905 size-medium\" srcset=\"http:\/\/ubwp.buffalo.edu\/business-management-mba-ms\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/33\/2023\/06\/Justin-Z-MSA-23-300x200.jpg 300w, http:\/\/ubwp.buffalo.edu\/business-management-mba-ms\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/33\/2023\/06\/Justin-Z-MSA-23-1024x683.jpg 1024w, http:\/\/ubwp.buffalo.edu\/business-management-mba-ms\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/33\/2023\/06\/Justin-Z-MSA-23-768x512.jpg 768w, http:\/\/ubwp.buffalo.edu\/business-management-mba-ms\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/33\/2023\/06\/Justin-Z-MSA-23-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, http:\/\/ubwp.buffalo.edu\/business-management-mba-ms\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/33\/2023\/06\/Justin-Z-MSA-23-2048x1365.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/figure><div class=\"wp-block-media-text__content\">\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/in\/justinzulewski\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Justin Zulewski<\/a> recently graduated from the University at Buffalo School of Management with a Master of Science degree in Accounting. As of this post, he is working as an intern at EFPR Group LLP.&nbsp;<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Written by: Justin Zulewski, MSA \u201823 Throughout my time at the University at Buffalo, I\u2019ve been fortunate enough to be involved in two different accounting internships: one as an internal auditor intern and one as an external auditor intern. These <a class=\"more-link\" href=\"http:\/\/ubwp.buffalo.edu\/business-management-mba-ms\/2023\/08\/29\/what-i-have-learned-in-my-accounting-internships\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">  What I Have Learned in My Accounting Internships<\/span><span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":127,"featured_media":3906,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,133,5,201],"tags":[134,172,160],"class_list":["post-3904","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-alumni","category-career","category-internships","category-ms-accounting","tag-career","tag-graduate-school","tag-ms"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/ubwp.buffalo.edu\/business-management-mba-ms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3904","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/ubwp.buffalo.edu\/business-management-mba-ms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/ubwp.buffalo.edu\/business-management-mba-ms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ubwp.buffalo.edu\/business-management-mba-ms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/127"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ubwp.buffalo.edu\/business-management-mba-ms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3904"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/ubwp.buffalo.edu\/business-management-mba-ms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3904\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3943,"href":"http:\/\/ubwp.buffalo.edu\/business-management-mba-ms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3904\/revisions\/3943"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ubwp.buffalo.edu\/business-management-mba-ms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3906"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/ubwp.buffalo.edu\/business-management-mba-ms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3904"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ubwp.buffalo.edu\/business-management-mba-ms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3904"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ubwp.buffalo.edu\/business-management-mba-ms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3904"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}