News contained in the Australian Financial Review 29 October 2014 under the title ‘Accounting bodies do about-face on jobs for foreign students’ and reported by Edmund Tadros is bad for the accounting profession.
The accounting profession, as Richard Laughlin established, contains three main interacting groups – policy makers, practitioners and academics. The policy makers include governments and professional associations who can take a broad perspective on the way to promote accounting for the long run interests of its members. But they are not infallible.
Coming to terms with reality is always a shock for some, given interpretivist views that reality is only in the eyes of the beholder. But job losses in practice, lower revenues for universities as international student numbers vary, outsourcing of routine practice to cheaper countries, mergers of professional associations, and lack of employment opportunities need no interpretation. They amount to a crisis looking for action and problem solving.
Hence, to learn that the professional accounting bodies, CPA Australia and Chartered Accountants Australia and New Zealand, have started to recognise that demand for accounting is at best increasing at a slower rate and at worst in decline allows recognition that a responsible stance has been taken – at least in respect of international accounting students in Australia not securing positions at the end of their studies. They have not done so for many years. This may be the first step on a long road of recognising the reality in which the profession finds itself.
For professional bodies the Financial Review indicates they have been too slow with their recognition of the problem of international students with the recognition that the bodies have been helping such students since 2007. Will they take now take a fresh look at the other problems?
For practitioners the main game has moved and links between supply chain management and accounting will be necessary future knowledge.
For academics and universities: they could listen to the words of the ANU Vice Chancellor, Professor Ian Young. Perhaps ‘smaller is beautiful’ and it is time to manage towards such an outcome, build research and think vegetarian instead of boundless beefing-up of growth when it comes to the accounting discipline.
Roger Burritt 