Internship Story at KPMG, an Audit Firm in Manila

Shota Isoda (21), accounting firm, internship (4 weeks), level 3 (Low Intermediate) → level 4 (High Intermediate), TOEIC 530 → 885. Total stay 2 months (4 weeks of study, 4 weeks of internship)

I’m interning at KPMG Consulting (KPMG Philippines).

Why did you decide to join the internship program?

I’m considering an overseas assignment from an audit firm in the future, so I joined the internship as a mock overseas posting. I passed the CPA exam last year and received a job offer from an audit firm. Through job hunting, I felt that accounting × English is almost essential for the kind of talent the Big Four accounting firms are looking for. Also, many people with overseas assignment experience are highly respected not only as accountants but as people, which is one reason I became strongly interested in working abroad.

So I planned to start working with an overseas assignment as my initial goal, but without knowing what overseas work involves, I felt uneasy that with only a vague goal, I wouldn’t absorb much from my work until becoming an expatriate. Then I learned about the internship program, saw it as a chance to clarify my goal, and jumped in.

What did you learn from your internship?

It may not be very specific, but I felt something when I learned that only about 10 people in Manila hold a Japanese CPA, and when I saw first-hand the work and sense of responsibility of one of them, posted from an audit firm. That is, how much expatriates of operating companies expect from accountants, and the breadth of knowledge expatriates from audit firms have to meet those expectations.

Many Japanese companies operating in the Philippines send technical or sales staff as expatriates; very few come from administrative departments like accounting. Yet those expatriates must handle accounting and tax tasks following headquarters’ instructions. That’s when they rely on audit firms.

Expatriates expect audit firms to handle not only accounting and tax but administrative work overall, including legal and internal controls. Audit firms must meet these expectations with only one or two Japanese accountants per firm. So each accountant has broad knowledge of administrative work overall and supports Japanese companies.

Seeing the high level required of expatriates, as described above, was a big lesson.

Based on your internship, what skills do you feel you need to improve?

As above, it’s to gain broad knowledge. Accountants are seen as accounting and tax specialists, but abroad each accountant’s scope is very wide, and Japanese companies’ expectations extend to administrative work overall. So in my upcoming work at the audit firm, I want to take an interest in and learn a wide range of areas including legal and HR, not just accounting and tax.

Did you prepare anything before the internship?

Improving my English. My English before coming to the Philippines was very low, and I thought a minimum level was essential to work properly in a workplace that is over 95% Filipino. In fact, even in the department serving Japanese companies, instructions from my Japanese boss sometimes came through a Filipino secretary, so English was of course essential.

I couldn’t prepare much in Japan, but I used Grandline’s language school for four weeks in the Philippines before the internship started, which I feel was very effective.

This time you also took one-on-one language study along with the internship. Please tell us the good and bad points.

I acquired conversational English at the language school to receive instructions and express my opinions, so as mentioned, the internship went smoothly. Also, one weekend during the internship I took a one-on-one lesson to prepare for an interview the following week with a local manager about transfer pricing. Being able to freely arrange the lesson content like this was very helpful. Even though the content involved many technical terms, the teacher prepared in advance, and I felt the quality was high.

On the other hand — my own decision — I somewhat regret completely separating the language school and internship because I was worried about my English. The language school curriculum is arranged by your main coach according to your English level and work.

But I had no experience using English at work, so the curriculum ended up emphasizing more general content — broad but shallow, to put it negatively. If I had taken language lessons alongside the internship, they might have built a more effective curriculum aligned with situations where I use English in practice.

How much did you need for living there?

Transport (per day): 0–100 PHP. I basically walked, so I hardly spent anything on weekdays.

Food (per day): breakfast 0 PHP — breakfast is delivered, so there was no charge. Lunch 100–200 PHP — the cafeteria was so cheap I rarely spent 100. Dinner 200–500 PHP — naturally more than lunch, and occasionally over 1,000 PHP if I drank at a Japanese restaurant, but still quite cheap.

Other food and drinks: 50–100 PHP. Local staff always took a snack break around 3 pm, so I often went with them to cafés or fast food places.

Entertainment: 3,000 PHP (weekends, including transport). It depends on what you do, but a day trip to Tagaytay, a cool resort called the Karuizawa of Manila, cost about this much including transport.

Daily schedule