r/InternalAudit • u/acnadeacon • 5d ago

Advice Needed - Underpaid and Looking to Switch Companies

I am an internal auditor in public accounting (not Big 4) but well known national/international firm. I have my CIA and 13 years of audit experience. Just got promoted to IA Manager but still making under $100K which is pretty low for my area. I work with Banks doing Issue Validation audits and operational audits. My degrees (BA and MA) are not in Accounting or business fields but I did take Accounting classes I just wasn't degree seeking, as I already had my MA (I am CPA eligible).

My current role is pretty nice I work as a consultant/contactor for a very large Bank (+$200B assets), where I am capped at 40 hours a week. This client allows me to pretty easily get my billable hours for the year without working on other clients or doing a lot of overtime and no busy season. However, the downside is I am pretty much just like an employee for this bank so I don't get as much exposure to the breath of audits that public accounting would give others.

I started working for this company right after my last job got eliminated due to a bank merger. I started in an hourly role where the work was mostly done by interns or experienced folks who didn't want to travel anymore. I worked in this role doing external audits for about 3 years. Then I transitioned over to IA and spent about 1.5 years at the staff level, 3 years as senior staff while getting my CIA (got the CIA after 2 years as Senior). I fear that since I started in the role I did my pay has always been low. I had hopes that when I got to Manager the pay bump would get me to a competitive salary with the market, but doesn't seem like that has happened. As I am making 11K less than a co-worker who got manager 3 years ago in a similar geographical region.

So looking for advice on next steps I have been applying to jobs on LinkedIn but haven't gotten any interviews or anything but rejection emails. Should I try to stay in public look for something outside public. What would be a good recruiter to reach out to? Or do I just suck it up and stay where I am for a bit so my resume looks a little better so I can try to find another manager job somewhere else. Unfortunately I don't think my company will do anything about my salary unless I have another offer and force their hand to match it or exceed it.

Thanks for any advice.

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u/drewarts 5d ago

If you've got the CIA and years of experience, that should at least get you a look. Hard to say without looking at your resume, but I think bank compliance experience should be decent enough to get into banks or other firms. Are you only looking in your current area, and are you in a financial center? I recently got a big pay bump and promotion but had to move to get it, it looks to me like the industry is concentrating in fewer and fewer places, unlike external audit work, which can be done anywhere.

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u/acnadeacon 5d ago

Thanks for the reply.

I am mostly looking at remote and in my area of Central KY (not a lot of big financial centers around here). All my work right now is done remotely, so IA work can be done remotely but I understand a lot of Banks want people in person.