Experienced hire

Transcript

So I think the work in Sydney is, you do the Australian portion of something for a global client, or for an Australian client, whereas over here I feel that often London is the European hub, or even, you know, the global headquarters of very big companies, so it’s really exciting to feel a bit more like you’re in the centre of what’s happening, and where the big decisions are being made.

I have one big client which is what we call a PAT account, which is a priority account, which I do quite a lot of work on, which is a global bank, so that’s really exciting.  The European head of tax is in London, so we do a lot of European work, and if for example, they say we are opening an office in Estonia, or we want to do this particular business in Latvia, what are the tax implications? – they come to us, so we go and speak to our colleagues in Latvia or Lithuania or Africa or wherever it happens to be, and then get the tax advice and try and work it through with them and send it back.

I think, you know, it is a much bigger practice.  When I left FS Tax in Sydney there were 40 people – I mean, I know that’s bigger now – however, I came over and FS Tax in London was 200 – I think it’s now 350-ish, so it is a much bigger group. But I think they handle it well, and that it’s broken down into small groups, so you still have a small team to identify with; but it’s a much bigger practice, which I think gives you a big opportunity to specialise more, so there’s more specific teams. So you can get really good at something, but also when you first come across from Australia and you’ve just done one thing, it actually means that you can try out a couple of different things and see where you fit in.

Well, I’m in the transaction tax team, and there are 14 of us, so I think we are one of the smallest teams, which is really great, because everyone is close, and it’s really nice to have a small team.  We have lots of Australians and Kiwis in the team as well, which is fun; given the fact that we hot-desk, you get to move around a lot, to sit next to different people all the time, which means you get access to a partner one day and a Level One the next day, which is interesting in that you get to have a different experience and see what else is going on.