Hello Reader 👋

I started in Finance like many of us: the audit path.

Four years at PwC.

Tight deadlines, long nights, team rituals, and that sense of mastering the detail.

When I moved into FP&A, I felt confident.

I had years of audit behind me, a solid grip on Excel, and experience working under pressure.

But it didn’t take long to realise the game had changed.

This week, I’m sharing the 6 lessons I learned when I moved from audit into FP&A.

If you’ve been in that move yourself (or coaching someone who is), check these and tell me if you find similarities.

So take a coffee, sit down, and read FP&A Stories just like 22k other readers.

This week in FP&A Stories

🎓 6 Lessons I Learned After Leaving Audit

❓ What Was the Biggest Shift for You?

📺 Good Ways and Bad Ways to Start a Presentation

🎓 6 Lessons I Learned After Leaving Audit

Leaving audit felt like the natural next step.
I had done what everybody did: I’d done my rotations, hit the promotion cycles, handled international clients.
I knew controls. I knew reporting. I knew how to face tough questions.

But within weeks in FP&A, I realised how little that mattered.
The pace was different. The ambiguity was constant. The rules were unwritten.

So here’s what I learned (and painfully unlearned) in those first years outside the Big 4.

Error 1️⃣: Thinking precision was the goal

In audit, your job is to prove the accounts are accurate (and complete, and cut-off,....).
In FP&A, your job is to make the accounts useful.

I once spent three hours tracing a €12 variance in a margin report.
No one asked about it. They were waiting for a what to do about it, not a reconciliation.

Precision still matters. But not at the expense of efficiency.

Your value comes from what you help people see, not just what you check.

Trap: it's generally the point that makes the difference between those who'll grow strategically and those who will have a "financial controller" job.

Error 2️⃣: Waiting for a brief

In audit, the tasks are clear.

In FP&A, I waited too long for someone to tell me what they wanted.

Until one day, my manager said: “I want you to tell me what I should want to know.”

It changed everything. Being proactive is part of the job.

Trap: if you wait for instructions, chances are you're going to get bored and end up in a reporting cycle.

Error 3️⃣: Believing the career path was structured

Audit has grades, goals, and boxes to tick.

Every year, you have appraisal periods and you had to combine great evaluations with a sort of "Oscar" promotion tour to be pushed.

In FP&A, nothing is official. You only get the promotion if you push for it.

And you push for it thanks to your visibility (that one is common with audit).

I learned that passivity doesn’t work: if you wait to be picked, you stay where you are.

Trap: hoping your manager will notice your efforts and fight for you. It's cynical, but each individual will fight for his/her own goals.

Error 4️⃣: Missing the audit tribe

This one had a bigger impact than I had expected.

In audit, your team is your second family. You struggle together, laugh at the same problems at the client, go on training trips each year.

It creates a sense of camaraderie you won't find in the industry.

Yes, sometimes you share some moments, but they're not pushed and if you don't do any efforts, you'll come "to work"...and that's it.

Trap: it's easy to complain and stay in that situation but if nobody does it, be the one who does. I couldn't stand that when I moved in the industry and I planned the "end of the budget dinner" (like the end of busy season)

Error 5️⃣: Thinking training would be provided

At PwC, we had workshops, coaching, and even online modules.

And I'm not even talking about our yearly offsite trainings in France, Spain and Dinant (that one wasn't so far)

In FP&A? Everyone is busy and the HR business partners often wait for inputs that never come.

I pushed so hard to have an "Advanced Power Pivot" training to finally end up learning Excel formulas...

Trap: Levels are disparate in an FP&A team, especially if there are different histories, different generations, etc... Just look for yourself if you really want to learn something. In large companies, you have an internal catalogue that's there for you.

Error 6️⃣: Underestimating how long it takes to build trust

In audit, your badge gives you instant credibility and is a sort of umbrella: everyone feels they MUST provide you answers.

In FP&A, that badge doesn’t exist. Trust is built project by project, meeting by meeting.

In the beginning, I felt a big frustration because of that situation: emails not answered after 3 reminders, meeting with no input provided, ...

Then I learned that nobody owes you anything: you have to earn it.

Trap: If you think your responsibility ends at the moment the question/request is thrown, you can wait for the answers a loooooong time. Be accountable until your work is done, including resolution.

Final Thought

If you’re about to leave audit, know this: it’s not easier, it’s just different.

There are fewer rules. Fewer safety nets. But also much more room to grow.

Don’t expect a path. Build one. Don’t wait for clarity. Ask better questions. Don’t assume your badge earns trust. Earn it again.

If you’ve already made the move, you know how tough it can feel at the start.

But every struggle you go through is shaping your next level.

What was the biggest shift for you? I’m curious to know.

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