Finding the Right Mentor

I recently read a great article in Forbes that highlights the challenges of finding the right fit when selecting a mentor. The article Millennial Women Battle With Older, Unwanted Mentors raises a lot of issues that I have seen repeatedly in the accounting profession, and not just among women. The article mentions that many women in the boomer generation want to reach out to young female professionals, but their advice is often misinterpreted as nagging or dated. The generational gap between boomers and millennials is not unique to women, nor are the challenges of finding the right mentor. Rather than settle for a disappointing, dissatisfying mentoring relationship, here are some things to consider before pursuing a mentoring relationship:

• Don't assume you'll only need one mentor your entire professional life. During your career, you will likely have countless employers, job titles, and responsibilities. As you evolve as a professional, your mentoring needs should evolve as well. Early in your career, you may reach out to an immediate superior, such as a senior associate, or someone with whom you personally relate. But as your professional expertise grows, you will likely want to seek the advice of a more seasoned professional. It never hurts to expand your network, and you should always look to do so as you advance in your career. You can also find mentors beyond your coworkers. Professional organizations are a great place to network and meet people eager to share their wealth of knowledge and experience.

• The most successful mentoring relationships seem to evolve organically. While many companies have formal programs for matching up mentors and mentees, these arrangements may be superficial if you don't seem to click with the mentor with whom you are matched. If there are supervisors with whom you work well, or admire their management style, reach out to them for professional guidance. Even if they are not interested in a formal mentoring relationship, an occasional conversation about your professional development might grow into the type of mentoring guidance you need to maximize your potential. 

• Mentoring should be a two-way relationship. Even if your mentor has decades of experience on you, don't discount the importance of what you have to offer. Younger professionals offer a fresh perspective on business, technology, and team work, among other areas. Don't be afraid to offer recommendations to your mentor, because every great professional appreciates the opportunity to grow.

Getting Your CPA Exam Scores Faster

Beginning this month, CPA Exam scores will now be released faster. The AICPA has published a schedule for the fourth quarter of 2011, outlining the new dates on which you can expect to receive your results. This is great news for CPA Exam candidates, as you can now better plan your strategy for tackling all four section within the 18 month window. The biggest challenge in planning your studies is waiting for the results of your previous section before fully committing to sit for the next one. Good luck to all the Exam candidates out there!

Exposing Engagement Partners?

On October 11, 2011, the PCAOB released for comment a proposal to require auditors to disclose the name of the audit engagement partner in a company's annual report, as well as other firms or persons not employed by the audit firm who participated in the independent audit of the company. The PCAOB considers this proposal an augmentation of transparency in the audit of public companies.

While I can certainly understand the argument that identification of an individual partner would increase that person's obligation to adhere to all professional standards and the highest ethical guidelines in overseeing an audit, I feel it might further confuse investors. If a company goes under, investors will simply have another person to personally crucify for any fatal risk that may have led to the downfall. While I am not a lawyer, I can foresee a host of legal issues when investors start assuming that an individual partner is solely responsible for their bad investment. The entire structure of the LLC used by public accounting firms is overshadowed by the engagement partner's name in the audit report.

In considering the second item in the PCAOB's proposal, I think it would be helpful to know when something has been outsourced. Consider the recent mess many homeowners facing foreclosure are now dealing with, as they find out that their bank outsourced the processing of their loan to companies who made up signatures and bank presidents to sign false loan documents. Investors certainly deserve to know to what extent a reputable auditor may be relying on the work of a less reputable auditor. Simply naming firms used by the auditor would not necessarily be helpful, unless the extent of their involvement were disclosed. Perhaps setting a threshold for disclosure would be reasonable, e.g. if a third party is involved in the audit of a high risk area or conducts more than 20% of the audit, their involvement should be disclosed.

What do you think, will the added scrutiny of disclosing engagement partners and third parties involved in the audit improve transparent financial reporting and auditing?

It's Good to be Nervous

As I sent my son to preschool for the first time this week, I had a momentary pang of regret that he should feel so apprehensive about being away from me in a new environment with a bunch of strangers. I wished I could spare him from the feelings of anxiety and uncertainty that we all have when leaving a comfortable and familiar environment. Then I realized that if I did take those feelings away for him, I would be doing him a great disservice.

It is said that nothing worthwhile is easy, and it is absolutely true. If I sheltered my child from every challenging social situation or academic gauntlet, he would never know the thrill of rising to the occasion to conquer his fear and succeed in making new friends or learning new things.

We need to approach our careers with the same eagerness for a challenge if we are to experience professional growth. I've never met anyone who does not experience that momentary panic right before a job interview or public speaking engagement. But it is feelings such as these that help us perform our best. Beyond such short term challenges that end relatively quickly, it's also good for our professional health to experience regular rushes of adrenaline when asked by our boss to perform a task we've never done, or to give a presentation in a meeting through which we would normally sit silently. If you don't have the type of job where you regularly feel a mix of excitement and nervousness when faced with a new challenge, perhaps you should consider moving out of your comfort zone and looking for something new.

Even though I am currently taking a break from my full-time accounting career to raise a family, I still challenge myself in order to avoid losing my professional edge. I work part-time as an online tutor for several accounting courses, and I find my heart races with a mix of eagerness and nervousness every time a student asks me for assistance with a technical accounting topic. I meticulously research their question and review my solution over and over again before submitting it, for fear that I guide a student in the wrong direction. I constantly check my classroom to ensure I address any new questions in a timely manner, and I schedule out the due dates of items on the syllabus so I am aware of when questions might arise on particular subjects or assignments. Managing my tutoring obligations and course deadlines while trying to raise a toddler and infant who make a regular schedule impossible to keep provides just the challenge I need right now to keep me on my professional toes. As the semesters go by, if I find myself losing that bit of nervousness and getting comfortable, perhaps I will need to tutor a new course or play a different role in the classroom.

If you are completely comfortable with each and every professional responsibility you have right now, it may be time to rekindle your adrenaline and take on a new challenge. After all, nothing worthwhile is easy.

Are you biased toward your clients?

In a recent speech by the PCAOB, the organization noted that they are willing to consider auditor term limits to overcome the inherent bias in auditing. James R. Doty, Chairman of the PCAOB asked questions that all audit firms need to consider: "Do auditors read the literature? Do young auditors learn to hold onto skepticism and look for fraud regardless of long association with management?" If the answer is more frequently "no," then perhaps there is a loss of professional skepticism in the culture of the audit profession.

When I started as an auditor with one of the Big Four, some of my first clients were among the largest financial institutions in the country. This was in the early 2000's, before our current financial crisis. Many of my audit team members considered the length of our firm's association with certain members of management to be adequate audit evidence that the accounting decisions they made were valid. New audit team members were often intimidated by the confidence management exuded about their areas of accounting expertise, backed by decades of experience in the industry. However, as we now know what these financial institutions were hiding, we can appreciate the importance of pushing back when sufficient audit evidence is not provided, or if management's explanations to your inquiries as an auditor raise concerns.

Does anyone have an experience in which they or a colleague allowed their professional skepticism to wane in the face of a long-standing relationship with client management?

Being Bullied at Work

You may have rejoiced the day you graduated from high school, elated at the thought of never having to deal with bullies again. Little did you know that bullying still goes on in the adult world, especially in the workplace. A recent study conducted by CareerBuilder reports that 27% of 5,600 full-time workers surveyed have felt bullied at work. I was surprised that the figure was only roughly a quarter of the survey respondents, because I saw a lot of bullying during my four year tenure in public accounting alone. In my experience, victims of bullying seemed most often to be nontraditional experienced hires who found themselves working with inexperienced campus hires. Given the age, maturity, and experience differentials between the two groups, it often seemed to me that the experienced hires found themselves intentionally isolated from the rest of the audit team. Their job performance also seemed to be held to a higher standard than their colleagues who were recent college graduates. 37% of the survey respondents who had reported being bullied felt that their work was judged by a different measure than their colleagues.

Another form of bullying I have seen is when a person's input in a meeting or among team members is completely dismissed. This was the most common form of bullying reported by the CareerBuilder report. I recall a meeting with more than a dozen audit team members at all levels sitting around the conference room table. The discussion was dominated by two senior managers who were personally attacking each others' ideas as if they were brothers in the backseat of the family car. They completely disregarded others in the room, and in the end, the more senior person turned his back to his opponent, told him no one was going to accept his approach, and changed the subject, effectively closing the book on further discussion. From that point on, everyone was afraid to challenge this person, no matter the size of the issue, for fear of being publicly humiliated themselves. Anonymous upward feedback is a useful tool to combat such behaviors. Most large public accounting firms use such procedures to evaluate anyone in a supervisory role. By reporting consistently stubborn and insensitive behavior on the part of your supervisors, you can make them aware that their attitude causes more harm than good to both the firm and their own potential for promotion.

27% of survey respondents claiming to have been bullied said that their coworkers gossiped about them. I suspect such incidents are even more common than reported, since not everyone is aware when they are the subject of gossip.  I find this to be the most harmful of all professional bullying, because it is often baseless and the victim is ignorant of it. I once worked on an audit team that "roasted" teammates on their off days when they weren't around to hear what their coworkers really thought of them. I tried to combat this type of venomous talk by challenging my colleagues to put themselves in the other person's shoes, defending the person who was being attacked, or just telling the culprits to back off. I'm sure it didn't stop them from gossiping, but at least they refrained from doing it while I was around, so that I would not be considered a part of it.

As an auditor, you have probably already realized that it takes some thick skin just to stand your ground with clients, but you may not have expected how much harder it is to withstand an affront from an office bully within your firm. If you are being bullied by your immediate supervisor, talk to your performance adviser or mentor about it. You don't want to risk looking petty and tattling on someone every time you hear gossip, but sticking up for what you know is right. Also, refraining from joining in can help you win a small battle in the big war against workplace bullies.

AICPA Launches IFRS Certificate Program

Accounting students or professionals looking to build their technical expertise and enhance their value to potential employers should consider enrolling in the AICPA’s IFRS Certificate Program.  With the SEC set to announce their decision regarding the convergence of U.S. GAAP and IFRS later this year, accounting professionals with a working knowledge of IFRS have an enormous professional advantage. The AICPA notes that “current and potential clients and employers will look to the certificate as a measurable standard of IFRS competence.”  

You do not need to be a CPA to enroll in this 42 credit hour curriculum, but you do need to have at least an undergraduate accounting degree or obtain relevant work experience that requires the practical application of accounting principles and concepts. Non-CPAs and non-CAs completing the program will receive an IFRS Award of Educational Achievement.  All courses are presented via a self-study webcast and are available on-demand, covering specific topics such as inventories, PP&E, investment property, intangible assets, revenue recognition, EPS, and the IASB’s governance and conceptual framework.  To learn more about the AICPA’s IFRS Certificate Program, visit http://www.ifrs.com/certificate/index.html.