Your Role

Tax advisory for medium-sized businesses is relationship work — and it only scales through people who support other professionals. Several thousand medium-sized companies trust us; we are now developing the model into a Germany-wide advisory platform. Tax advisory is not just one business area among many, but the core.

You are a tax advisor with several years of experience after passing your exams — at a Big Four, a Next 6 firm, or a well-established medium-sized practice. You have managed your own client portfolio for years, built up a professional specialization, and led junior managers or seniors. You are making a change because you want to help build a Tax department — with your own direction, your own specialization, and genuine scope for action — instead of waiting for the next title in a pyramid structure.

You will be responsible for a thematic or location-based area within tax advisory: several client portfolios, the managers below you, and the overall departmental output. You lead young leaders, not just clerks. You derive concrete lines of action for your area from the departmental and company strategy and drive the strategic initiatives that contribute to its growth. You will report to the Head of Tax and work closely with the management on strategic client and growth topics.

Your Responsibility

Department & Client Portfolios

• Be responsible for the output of multiple client portfolios — quality, adherence to deadlines, professional depth across the board, not just within your own client engagements.

• Personally handle the complex and strategically significant clients in your department; serve as the escalation point for your managers on anything beyond standard cases.

• Expand your professional specialization into visible departmental depth — a sector (e.g., Healthcare, Family Office, Construction Industry) or a niche area (Succession, International Structures, M&A Tax) — and attract clients who seek precisely this depth.

Leadership & Development

• Lead three to five direct reports, including junior leaders — leading leaders. You bear decision-making responsibility for performance and, where necessary, terminations.

• Actively develop your team — sparring, review, career paths aligned with our Career Framework.

• Be responsible for hiring within your line through Vogel's multi-stage process — from outreach to interview stages to the final conviction decision.

Strategy & Growth

• Derive concrete priorities for your department from the company and departmental strategy and implement them.

• Drive the cross-selling logic across Vogel's departments (FP&A, M&A preparation, structuring, digitalization) and make it standard within your line.

• Contribute your own acquisition efforts and multiplier work — you expand the department, you don't just manage it.

Your Perspectives

What you will have delivered after 6 months:

• You will independently manage the output of your department; the portfolios assigned to you will be handled with full depth through your line.

• You will have personally taken over your managers, led the first performance cycles yourself, and addressed at least one performance issue effectively.

• Your professional specialization will be internally and visibly anchored.

What you will have delivered after 12 months:

• Your department will have grown measurably — through your own acquisition, cross-selling, and developed client relationships, not just through transferred existing business.

• You will have actively hired within your line and further developed at least one leader.

• Your specialization will attract initial clients seeking precisely this depth.

What you will have delivered after 24 months:

• Your department will independently contribute additional sub-segment depth and demonstrate a recognizable growth profile.

• You will be established as the department owner and a candidate for the Director Tax level — not based on years of service, but on an independently built, growing department.

Where the position is evolving:

The next step is Director Tax — responsibility for an entire practice area with its own P&L contribution. This requires an independently developed, growing department, not an automatic progression based on years of service. Beyond cash compensation, there is the potential to participate entrepreneurially in the added value created.

What you bring

Experience & Track Record

• You have passed the tax advisor examination and subsequently held client responsibility for several years — Big Four, Next 6, or an established medium-sized practice.

• You have managed your own client portfolio for years and built up a professional specialization that goes beyond the standard spectrum.

• You have already led — technically guided managers or seniors, been responsible for performance, participated in hiring.

• Profiles that do not fit this mold but possess the substance are explicitly invited — we evaluate based on contribution, not label. Specifically: outstanding Tax Managers with their own portfolio and a clear leadership ambition; professionals from top firms with industry focus and growth hunger. The stated range is calibrated to the primary profile — the logic behind it is in our compensation principles.

Skills & Work Approach

• You possess tax depth in a clear specialization and at the same time remain hands-on across the breadth of your department.

• You confidently lead leaders — you can delegate without losing sight of the output, and you develop people beyond purely technical skills.

• You use AI as a natural tool — for research, drafting, analysis, client communication — and make your line better at it. Repetitive tasks are a challenge for automation to you, not a fate.

Mindset & Personality

• You think entrepreneurially — you take responsibility for the growth of your department, not for your hours.

• You understand client work as relationship building and pass this attitude on to your line.

• You strive to set the highest standard in everything you deliver — not because someone is checking, but because mediocrity personally bothers you.

• Vogel is hierarchical in decision-making, flat in communication, and autonomous in execution. Performance is celebrated, not hidden.

What you won't find with us

• No partner title waiting loop. You become a department owner because you manage and develop a department, not because you put in years.

• No leading without professional grounding. You remain close to complex client engagements — leadership without your own substance doesn't work here.

• No inherited model without growth ambition. Those who only want to manage a department are in the wrong place here.

• No partnership with competing self-interests. We are one company with a One-Firm logic — one brand, one culture, one hiring bar.

FAQ

1. What is Vogel — and where do you operate?

Vogel is one of Germany's leading consultancies for medium-sized businesses — a family business since 1959, originating from Aalen — and is building it into the leading advisory platform for the mid-market. We are growing at several locations: in Aalen/Ostwürttemberg as our established headquarters and in Munich as a new hub. At both, we are looking for people across all functions — from tax advisory to consulting to the strategic teams building the platform.

2. How should the salary bands be understood?

Intentionally broad — and specified at each point. We differentiate based on track record and market value, not by degree: scarce, highly sought-after profiles at the upper end, less scarce at the lower end. We calibrate exclusively to the market — two people with similar experience can earn differently with us.

3. How much — and how — do you work at Vogel?

We measure by what you achieve, not by hours. However, it's also true: if you're looking for 9-to-5, we're not the first choice. We seek people who work intensely driven by their own initiative because the tasks are worth it. How you manage your time is largely up to you. What we share: we work together in person — culture, sparring, and the best ideas emerge from daily proximity. We are not a remote company and do not have extensive home office policies; individual remote days are not a problem.

4. What is the application process like?

Lean, fast, transparent — and tiered by profile. For entry-level roles (internship, working student, career entry), usually two interviews and a short work sample suffice; experienced roles are a bit more extensive. For selected senior roles, we are considering incorporating a joint working day in the future so that both sides can get to know each other better. Always applicable: scheduled appointments, prompt decision, substantial feedback — regardless of the outcome.

5. How does variable compensation work?

Tied to performance quarterly, evaluated qualitatively. The scale increases with the level: up to 20% Associate, 27.5% Manager, 35% Senior Manager, 42.5% Director, 50% VP. The expected value with good performance — you meet the requirements, set your own accents, pass the keeper test — is around 50% of the maximum; the maximum bonus is not the norm. The focus is on a holistic assessment by your supervisor: ownership, quality, learning curve, collaboration, impact.

6. How do I develop — what are the career paths?

Two active paths: Mastery (professional depth, expert career) and Pioneer (leadership, management). You choose the direction after onboarding, usually in years 1–3. Career entry is not a separate path, but the early part of the same journey — from working student or intern to Associate, for the best without a new application process.

7. Team, Culture, Vacation?

A joint lunch is an open daily offer — not mandatory; whoever wants to join, can, and anyone can eat at any time. In addition, dinners, social events, and offsites at regular intervals — not as a mandatory program, but because a good team also shares time outside of work. Benefits: well-thought-out and substantial, not symbolic. Vacation: 28 days.

8. I know someone — is there a referral bonus?

Yes — €2,500 for each successfully filled position (no internships). A brief context is sufficient: whom you are thinking of, for which role, why. It doesn't have to be perfect, but it should be substantial.

Compensation: €162K – €202.5K • Fix: €120k – €150k · Bonus: €42k – €52.5k · EV: €144k – €180k

• • OTE €162K – €202.5K • Fix: €120k – €150k · Bonus: €42k – €52.5k · EV: €144k – €180k

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