Hey!! those 19 year olds, after ALs - Read this with an open mind.
1) CIMA is extremely tough - some people here would try to bait you saying within 2.5 years you can complete the 4 stages, like tuk tik tuk and thereafter a Rs. 100,000 Accountant job is all possible
.
There are 12,000 CIMA students in SL, but only 3,000 have so far qualified as members, so the chance that you too will become a member is
only a mere 25%!! That means every 3 CIMA students out of every 4 CIMA students, will never make it to be a member in their life time.
I say that quoting the statistics published by the CIMA institute and from my own experience, because even those government uni students, who belong to the top 10% rankers of the AL students in SL, too have failed miserably in CIMA (don't even talk about Chartered), and so many of those had to drag this exam even after their 25th birthday, to qualify as passed finalists. And how expensive it is to fail in this exam do you think? And after becoming a passed finalist, you have to get 3 years of relevant work experience to qualify to become a member of that small 3,000 member community and until then you cannot apply for those very few full accountant jobs.
Now the worst part is, there are only some 10 accounting jobs advertised in the Sunday Observer/ Top jobs. But there are 12,000 CIMA students + some 30,000 Chartered students + thousands of SL uni accounting graduates to compete for that tiny little accounting job market in SL. And because of this big supply of accounting people, employers can always bargain to hire you even for just 20k. So just think how tough is your terrain going to be.
Forget those who point out what's published in the CIMA magazine, saying UK jobs are for Sri Lankans as well. I have lived and worked overseas for many years, so believe me, those UK jobs are for those who have UK experience and not for some SL experienced person. Therefore it's extremely rare, it not impossible to get into a UK job (which also needs a work visa where the employer has to first prove that there's no British national to do the same job) and if that's not the case, then all CIMA members would've already left SL for those greener pastures.
Note that your lecturers will force you to start working from the second stage itself, and that's where the cat jumps out of the bag, because people are simply too tired to study after 8 hours of work and 3 hours of lectures in the night, so no wonder they fail miserably and repeat an exam for quite a few times, and just imagine how fun do you think if you had to repeat ALs in the same fashion? Also if you do not have the luxury of a car and therefore have to spend another 1 - 2 hours to get back home, in a crowded bus, just ask yourself how practical it is to study some boring small letters and numbers.
I talk from my experience and if you want to get further proof, ask a member who had your own AL ranking but do not put all your hopes, money and happiness, in the words of some extremely bright CIMA member, who completed CIMA in 2.5 years in that tuk, tik, tuk fashion.
As a 19 year old fresh youth, know what you doing and be responsible for your actions, as wasted time, money and opportunity can never be replenished. Those who stagnate in CIMA for years are living zombies because they have a deep rooted belief that they cannot be happy in their life, without becoming a CIMA member. Best thing to do is to start your own business or to get enrolled in an affordable degree, if you do not have that extreme brightness of finishing this exam within 2.5 years or even 3 years. Otherwise, you will slowly get old doing nothing but stagnating in this boring exam, where some 9,000 others like you are already stagnating.
Believe me life is much more fun, if you have even your small business or can do a private uni degree, as the curriculum is more relaxed. If you want to be successful in life, do not rely on others to teach you what to do, but rely on your natural talents and ambitions just like every other successful person did. For e.g. if you are good at electric work, do a technical course and go Dubai and make money as an electrician and you will be paid number of times more at 20 than if you still have to do a boring accounts clerk job at 25. In the same sense, once you start your first CSE account, that's your first business for example
.
Put your pride and what your parents think you should do, aside and do what makes you rich fast, because parents may not last long to fund your expensive CIMA drag. Or else 3/4th of those who read my small note, will regret in couple of years for not listening to this SL born Aussie, who had to go through all that crap to be successful at 30, because I did not have someone to tell me the same words of wisdom at that playful age of 19.
Cheers!
Nalin
1) CIMA is extremely tough - some people here would try to bait you saying within 2.5 years you can complete the 4 stages, like tuk tik tuk and thereafter a Rs. 100,000 Accountant job is all possible
. There are 12,000 CIMA students in SL, but only 3,000 have so far qualified as members, so the chance that you too will become a member is
only a mere 25%!! That means every 3 CIMA students out of every 4 CIMA students, will never make it to be a member in their life time.
I say that quoting the statistics published by the CIMA institute and from my own experience, because even those government uni students, who belong to the top 10% rankers of the AL students in SL, too have failed miserably in CIMA (don't even talk about Chartered), and so many of those had to drag this exam even after their 25th birthday, to qualify as passed finalists. And how expensive it is to fail in this exam do you think? And after becoming a passed finalist, you have to get 3 years of relevant work experience to qualify to become a member of that small 3,000 member community and until then you cannot apply for those very few full accountant jobs.
Now the worst part is, there are only some 10 accounting jobs advertised in the Sunday Observer/ Top jobs. But there are 12,000 CIMA students + some 30,000 Chartered students + thousands of SL uni accounting graduates to compete for that tiny little accounting job market in SL. And because of this big supply of accounting people, employers can always bargain to hire you even for just 20k. So just think how tough is your terrain going to be.
Forget those who point out what's published in the CIMA magazine, saying UK jobs are for Sri Lankans as well. I have lived and worked overseas for many years, so believe me, those UK jobs are for those who have UK experience and not for some SL experienced person. Therefore it's extremely rare, it not impossible to get into a UK job (which also needs a work visa where the employer has to first prove that there's no British national to do the same job) and if that's not the case, then all CIMA members would've already left SL for those greener pastures.
Note that your lecturers will force you to start working from the second stage itself, and that's where the cat jumps out of the bag, because people are simply too tired to study after 8 hours of work and 3 hours of lectures in the night, so no wonder they fail miserably and repeat an exam for quite a few times, and just imagine how fun do you think if you had to repeat ALs in the same fashion? Also if you do not have the luxury of a car and therefore have to spend another 1 - 2 hours to get back home, in a crowded bus, just ask yourself how practical it is to study some boring small letters and numbers.
I talk from my experience and if you want to get further proof, ask a member who had your own AL ranking but do not put all your hopes, money and happiness, in the words of some extremely bright CIMA member, who completed CIMA in 2.5 years in that tuk, tik, tuk fashion.
As a 19 year old fresh youth, know what you doing and be responsible for your actions, as wasted time, money and opportunity can never be replenished. Those who stagnate in CIMA for years are living zombies because they have a deep rooted belief that they cannot be happy in their life, without becoming a CIMA member. Best thing to do is to start your own business or to get enrolled in an affordable degree, if you do not have that extreme brightness of finishing this exam within 2.5 years or even 3 years. Otherwise, you will slowly get old doing nothing but stagnating in this boring exam, where some 9,000 others like you are already stagnating.
Believe me life is much more fun, if you have even your small business or can do a private uni degree, as the curriculum is more relaxed. If you want to be successful in life, do not rely on others to teach you what to do, but rely on your natural talents and ambitions just like every other successful person did. For e.g. if you are good at electric work, do a technical course and go Dubai and make money as an electrician and you will be paid number of times more at 20 than if you still have to do a boring accounts clerk job at 25. In the same sense, once you start your first CSE account, that's your first business for example
. Put your pride and what your parents think you should do, aside and do what makes you rich fast, because parents may not last long to fund your expensive CIMA drag. Or else 3/4th of those who read my small note, will regret in couple of years for not listening to this SL born Aussie, who had to go through all that crap to be successful at 30, because I did not have someone to tell me the same words of wisdom at that playful age of 19
. Cheers!
Nalin
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. It's not that we are retarded but simply because we were told by a an idiot at 19, that CIMA is the only road to everyone's success, without ever quoting those statistics that I quoted above. 
