Accounting School Leaver Apprentice - (Small to Medium Enterprise) - Leicester - September 2024

At Mazars we have a wide range of opportunities for you to gain experience in a firm that truly cares about your aspirations. Our business is an engine for rapid and consistent career progression, and we are known for giving ambitious people early responsibility and exposure.

Are you a school leaver with strong analytical skills and attention to detail looking for a great start to your career? Do you enjoy building trusted client relationships? If you are committed to self-development and learning, this is a great opportunity to gain an excellent technical grounding and real responsibility.

About the role

The role is to ensure accurate and timely preparation of statutory financial statements and tax compliance for a range of SME clients. You will work under the direction of Seniors, Assistant Managers and Managers, providing high quality advice on their year-end compliance process and work with other teams to deliver an excellent client experience.

We are now operating a hybrid working model, so as a trainee you will split your time between working from home, visiting the office, client sites when required or studying for your professional exams.

During your first two years you will:

• Learn how to use accounting and tax software and systems in order to prepare less complex financial statements and tax returns.
• Develop an understanding of financial statements and the nature of the clients' business.
• Be able to obtain relevant information from other departments and clients whilst building good communication with both.
• Work closely with your colleagues to encourage teamwork and asking questions to proactively aid your development.
• IXBRL tagging.

During your third year you will:

• Manage your own assigned client work, with a focus on efficiencies to maximise business performance also.
• Self-review your own work, ensuring minimal review points are raised by managers.
• Have confident knowledge of accounting standards which you apply to a given set of year end financials.
• Prepare the corporation tax, personal tax and P11D returns and computations for less complex clients.
• Develop a sound technical knowledge of up to date accounting and tax matters.
• Coach and lead more junior team members.
• Work directly with our clients and begin developing relationships with those clients to deliver on repeat engagements.

In your final year:

• You will be expected to be able to take responsibility for the junior members of your team. You will train them and review their work.

About the team

Our Accounting and Outsourcing team works to support our clients to better run their finance functions, understand their financial position and performance, and to ensure they are compliant with changing accounting and tax legislation. With the relentless pace of technology change you will need to be able to advise clients in areas such as process and digitalisation, business performance and financial reporting, while building enduring relationships that positions Mazars as a trusted adviser. Our successful team of more than 250 professionals is growing across all areas including cloud accounting, payroll, financial reporting and company secretarial.

An introduction to our SME team

The SME team specialise in providing a wide range of accounting, tax and advisory services to the SME market. The clients will usually be owner managed businesses, typically below a £10m turnover, that have few complex issues, but who appreciate a service provided by a single team so that all information about the business and their personal objectives are understood by the Mazars team members that they work with. Clients can be limited companies, partnerships or sole traders, where we prepare their accounts, business tax computations and personal tax returns. The team provides a wide range of support and advice that is relevant to SMEs, covering aspects such as digital accounting systems, tax mitigation, trading internationally and simply being a sounding board for our clients.

About you

We are looking for exceptional candidates to join our team who demonstrate the following:

• Interpersonal skills; the ability to build client relationships with a foundation of trust and responsibility.
• Analytical skills; the ability to think critically, research and solve problems.
• Attention to detail and strong time-management skills.
• Commitment to self-development & learning.
• Affinity with our values; in particular, respect for individuals, diversity and integrity.

Strong academic performance is important; however, we understand that things don't always go to plan. Our recruitment process looks at your whole self – academic achievements as well as other experiences in which you have grown and developed. We balance your academic results alongside the aptitude assessment within our recruitment process to ensure that you will be successful in your role with us.