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Like the title says, I've been extremely fortunate to receive offers for both exec comp and federal transactional tax positions. I understand that they are vastly different paths, but I truly believe I could be happy in either group. I don't like the idea of limiting future options more than I need to (I feel like tax is already fairly specialized), which is why I was leaning toward the transactional position.

I understand that transactional tax positions are more difficult to get, but prestige isn't a motivating factor for me. I am interested in what people think about changing groups. It's my understanding that it is very difficult to go from executive compensation/employee benefits work to federal transactional tax. Is the reverse true? It seems that the better firms are struggling to fill the exec comp departments, so I assume the change would be easier, but does anyone have actual knowledge?

Thanks for your help!

As someone trying to get into an exec comp practice at one of the “better firms” and struggling immensely, I wouldn’t say it’s necessarily easy for someone to easily lateral from transactional tax to exec comp. it’s easier, obviously because fewer people seem to want to do it, but a lot of top firms do Title 1 ERISA, which is extremely dense material and something you won’t learn from doing transactional tax.

However, going from exec comp to general tax seems nearly impossible, which cannot be said about general tax to exec comp.

Congrats on all of your offers! If you’re not set on exec comp, take the transactional tax job.

I would love some insight on this as well. Everything else equal, would anyone take exec comp at a more prestigious firm as opposed to general tax at a regional firm? Is it likely that one can jump within the same firm from exec comp to corporate after a few years?

Anonymous User wrote:I would love some insight on this as well. Everything else equal, would anyone take exec comp at a more prestigious firm as opposed to general tax at a regional firm? Is it likely that one can jump within the same firm from exec comp to corporate after a few years?

Don’t take a job in exec comp hoping to lateral into a corporate job in your firm. You are being hired as an exec comp associate, so you will have significantly less leeway. I have a friend at a “free market” firm where associates who generally can ask for work in other areas as long as they fit under the same umbrella. The same freedom doesn’t apply to the exec comp associates.

You can probably pick up a project or two occasionally but whoever gave you the offer definitely expects you to spend most of your time doing exec comp work.

Your best chance is probably doing exec comp work that supports transactions so you’re in contact with the M&A/general tax team a lot. Opportunities will naturally arise for you when they get short handed. But actively asking for assignments outside exec comp while your partner and peers are grinding away at the minutiae of ERISA is probably not a good idea.