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Thoughts on new direction

A little about me I graduated with my MSA in 2011 and started working with GT in a middle market that was closer to home.  I always knew I wanted to get away from my region eventually and upon promotion to Sr. Associate I wound up transferring to our Boston office.  Unfortunately I chose the wrong place to transfer to as Boston was in the midst of their merger and the office environment was atrocious, although I was still challenged and pushed professionally.  A member of my family had a significant illness a year after I transferred and at that point looked into various Midwest cities.  My experience at GT was mostly SEC experience and if I was going to industry wanted to continue that.  

After looking for a month or two I had a pretty good opportunity with a real estate firm in a major market that was on the track to an IPO with significantly better pay and still seemed like a challenging opportunity.  The plan was for the girlfriend, now fiance to attempt and hopefully land a position in the same city (Originally I was going to wait out until she landed her job opportunity and I would assess my options at that point however personal events prevented that).  She is in a middle market albeit a better market than I originally started in (Indy to be exact).  

She has been supportive and not pushing me into anything given finding the right next move is crucial so I have no pressure there.  Our company that I am with currently has a terrific atmosphere and although did not wind up going the IPO route (Instead bought out) it was invaluable experience and bettered myself professionally.  However 4 hours apart isn't going to cut it long term and one of us needs to make the move as we are both on the same pay scale roughly so that isn't a concern.  My company presents the most uncertainty given new ownership and therefore looking into opportunities there which has me potentially thinking about public again.  

GT doesn't have an office however I have gotten interest from a few of the Big 4.  Ideally I would like to continue to enhance my SEC experience.  Indy has a few major companies (Lilly, Cummins, Simon, Roche, etc).  Outside of those the publicly traded companies appear to be software which I have no experience in and would have to take a step back in all likelihood given the lack of revenue knowledge surrounding revenue recognition.  The one thing neither of us want to do is for me to take any opportunity and wind up in a very small company which cuts me off from any SEC related opportunity in the future.  I know what I am getting into with the Big 4 and worked my share of long hours at GT (100+ consistently for one busy season) and know everything it takes to make it work there.  

My question is it worth being very select and sticking to when one of the larger companies open up or is jumping back into public not the worst option (With the intention of staying at a place for at least 3-5 years)?  When I moved on from public I was a highly rated performer (4 in GT world which is 2 to most firms) and still enjoyed the work (I also know I would likely take some type of pay cut as opposed to landing at an industry job).