Are technological developments making accounting careers more attractive?

Some see a link between accountancy tech adoption and student interest in the sector. We take a look at whether developments such as AI are making work easier.

The accounting profession is one of the oldest in the world (not quite the oldest, naturally). As such, it’s constantly changing and growing, and so is its appeal as a career path.

Perhaps the most impactful change in the last decade has been the huge changes wrought by technology – first cloud computing and then, most recently, AI. And while technology has made many accounting tasks easier, the question remains as to whether it makes the profession more attractive to new entrants.

Software in the day-to-day

Allee Bonnard, UK Managing Partner in Deloitte’s Audit & Assurance practice, says she believes technological developments will make the day-to-day job more enjoyable. “I think we’ll have better tools and the companies we audit will have better tools, which will mean that we won’t have to manipulate data into a form that we can analyse,” she says.

“And although that saves us time, one, it’ll also make us better because we’ll have more time to focus on the things that matter most. And two, I think in five to 10 years, we will have a much broader remit of the things we have to give assurance on. I can’t even imagine what the metrics will be by then; it won’t just be the profit, it will also be all of the ESG metrics we will be signing off on as well.”

More attractive elements

However, Nick Jeffrey, Director of Professional Standards at Baker Tilly International rejects the idea that the chance to work with cutting edge software tools is the profession’s most compelling USP. “The back office systems – HR and finance and all those things – in most accounting firms are now much better than they were 10, 15 years ago, and the firms themselves are reasonably slick.”

“However, if you’re coming into the accounting profession, it’s the variety which is the distinguishing factor. You’re not going be stuck in a shoebox office at a desk doing rubbish jobs all day. You’re out and about making a difference.

“And you’ll have the tools: a nice laptop and probably a decent mobile phone, and tools on that laptop, which allow you to engage with the clients in as sophisticated a way as they are ready to do.”

Why should it matter whether tech is appealing?

For some in the profession, this is a genuine concern, as fears that falling enrolment in accounting courses will lead to a skills shortage down the line. While that can’t be pinned on one factor alone, some fear sluggish adoption of tech may be part of it.

D. Scott Showalter, CPA, CGMA, Director of the Jenkins Master of Accounting Program and Professor of Practice in Accounting at North Carolina State University recently suggested that one of the principal reasons for decreases in accounting enrolments could be put down to accounting firms’ “Inability to leverage technologies to transform the work and tasks performed by associates, and the lack of a diversity of clear career paths to success.”

That was echoed by Sarah-Jayne Martin, Director of Financial Automation at accounting software house Quadient, who recently wrote that “Many accounting firms still cling to outdated practices when it comes to areas such as data entry and document handling, which discourages young talent and slows innovation. If the UK is to maintain its position as a global financial leader, it must align with expectations of a modern workforce and rethink how accountants are trained, how they work, and how firms operate.”

James Hadfield, Partner and Head of Audit at Menzies agrees that the profession has to take care when leveraging its technology offer to potential entrants an attractive career path. “When we ask the question as to whether the profession is more challenging or more interesting at the moment, I think people’s initial answer might be ‘no’, but not for the reasons of technology.

“In fact, I think technology is one of the ingredients that’s going help us out of it. But at the moment, I do think that in some cases new tech is another change that’s coming through and people are already feeling beaten up and a bit worn out; do they want a new type of technology and a new approach being put straight into the mix?”

Case study: Some limitations apply

Some certainly feel this way about AI, especially for those concerned it represents an existential threat to skilled professionals. For many in the accounting space, AI represents as much risk as opportunity. Tahir Gupta is an apprentice at KPMG and, as such, is in the vanguard of younger accountants starting their careers very much in the AI world.

“It has shifted the way that we work and perform our day-to-day tasks,” she said at the recent AAT Connect conference in London. “I work in auditing specifically and our take on AI is it’s very helpful in some respects and the things that it does: it makes things a lot quicker, it speeds tasks up, and there’s so many tasks now which don’t actually require people to do them because AI can do them.”

So does the chance to use AI enhance the experience of a young accountant? “In the accounting and auditing space, what we’ve noticed is that AI can’t actually help with everything because we work with clients’ data, and using AI for those kind of tasks can be very challenging because we’re putting other people’s data at risk,” Tahir says.

“So there are limitations to how much we can use AI to help our work, and it’s really important to establish what we want to use AI for and what we can’t, because we have a responsibility to deal with our clients’ data in a safe way and keep everything confidential. So I think the main thing with AI is to really understand how far we can go with it and how much we need to keep away from it as well.”

Tahir recently joined the International Federation of Accountants Young Leaders Collective (with the support of AAT) and is now one of the two representatives from the UK. One of the key issues that that group discusses is sustainability in AI within the accounting space and whether it represents a game changer for new entrants into the profession.

“I think getting into opportunities like that, doing your research and actually knowing what the benefits and cons are of using AI, are really important so that you’re not falling into the bad side of AI, you’re not becoming dependent on it. I really recommend, especially for the younger generation, understanding properly what AI is before they get carried away by it.”

Christian Doherty is a business journalist and freelance writer for AAT.