Family Benefits In Public Accounting

This article addresses questions about family benefits in public accounting firms and reports on a survey of Connecticut CPAs. Results suggest differences in the benefits and family policies of Big 6 and local firms, with local firms being more responsive to the family needs of their professional staff. Results also suggest opinions are influenced by gender and organizational position (staff or partner). Women and staff accountants believe that using benefits might hurt their careers, and they have less favorable attitudes about their firms family policies and benefits.

Conflict Resolution Skills For New Staff Accountants And Auditors

This case is designed to help accounting students learn and apply conflict resolution skills that they will need to be successful in the workplace. Accounting students need to develop strong technical and people skills in order to become successful accountants or auditors. This is true whether they enter public accounting, industry or government. Technical skills enable a professional to do the work required in an efficient, timely and accurate manner. They are learned in school, on the job, and through specialized training. People skills enable a professional to work successfully with those inside and outside of the organization. Unlike technical skills, a professional might never receive any formal training regarding people skills. This is unfortunate as people that do not get along with others and resolve conflicts in a productive manner are highly unlikely to attain long-term success.People skills include being able to: establish rapport and get along with others; comfortably work with people with diverse backgrounds and personality types; successfully resolve interpersonal conflicts; influence, persuade and negotiate with others; and to effectively train, supervise, and lead others. Most of the skills are interrelated and a weakness in any of the above areas can either create conflict, or hinder a persons ability to resolve it. When two or more people interact, the possibility of conflict exists. Conflict in the workplace often arises from diversity issues, from people that seem to be in constant conflict with those around them, and when people bring their personal problems to work. Conflict is also likely when company policies are perceived as unfair or arbitrary, when people have control issues and micro-manage others, when reviewers or reviewees act unprofessional, and when there is intense competition for personal rewards or organizational resources. Successful conflict resolution can be complicated. Some situations can not be changed and should either be avoided in the first place, ignored (coped with), or escaped from. Other situations can be resolved through persuasion, influence, and negotiation. Further, the methods used to resolve conflicts may differ based on whether the professional is dealing with a client, a peer, or someone with more or less power than they have.

Tampa Bay Sporting Goods Inc. Case

Providing accounting services is a business. Since business functions in a world of competition and opportunities, accountants must be willing to compete and to seize opportunities. Wrapped around a traditional core of year-end accrual accounting issues and procedures, Tampa Bay Sporting Goods Inc. case makes students experience accounting as a people business. Accounting firm partners compete for clients. Staff accountants compete to get noticed by partners. When a retail business booms so rapidly that it outgrows current accounting services, an opportunity exists for an aggressive accounting firm to prove the value that it can provide to its clients. Accounting firms must foster professional relationships both at the management and staff levels of a client's business in order to deliver successfully its services. And as the firm prospers so does the individual professional who facilitated the accomplishment. As a result of this dynamic, tasks such as preparing adjusting entries and relevant financial statements take on a new importance and urgency.

Margarets Garden Shoppe: A Realistic Simulation Of Accounting For Small Entities

According to the American Institute of CPAs, over 58% of new accounting graduates hired by CPA firms join those with fewer than 50 professional staff members, and over 38% join CPA firms with fewer than 10 professional staff members [AICPA, 2005]. Many of these regional and local firms provide accounting services to small business clients, whose accounting needs can differ significantly from those of larger organizations that are the primary focus of most textbooks. Exposure to the unique requirements of smaller businesses can improve the ability of new staff accountants to serve these entities accurately and efficiently, thereby reducing budget overruns and client complaints. This case study, which is based on 15 years of accounting and consulting experience, provides a unique experience in that it emphasizes the source documents, transactions and unique accounting needs of small businesses. It has been classroom-tested for accuracy and ease of use, and is suitable for principles, systems and first intermediate courses in accounting.

The Effects of Qualitative Overload on Technology Acceptance

Accounting professionals often feel stress from qualitative overload in their jobs. Research in the area of technology acceptance has not considered the potential negative effects of qualitative overload on user intentions. The purpose of this study is to examine the effect of this stressor on intention to use technology. A study was conducted with graduate accounting students using Audit Command Language (ACL) just prior to graduation, proxies for new staff accountants. Results indicate that qualitative overload mediates the relationship between perceived ease of use and intention to use ACL. As the perception of difficulty in using ACL increased, so did the perceived qualitative overload stress which in turn led to a negative relationship with intention to use ACL.

The Effect of Staff Accountant Objectivity in the Review and Decision Process: A Tax Setting

Prior studies report that less experienced staff accountants are often susceptible to confirmation bias in the evaluation of evidence. This bias results in nonobjective information evaluation by staff-level accountants. This study examines how the perceived objectivity of the staff accountant and the manager's own client advocacy affect the manager's use of the staff accountant's research report when formulating client recommendations. The results suggest that objectivity judgments made by partner-/manager-level accountants are influenced by whether the staff accountant's research report confirms their initial opinion. Further, the confirmatory nature of the research report affects the manner in which the report is incorporated into a client recommendation. Nonconfirming research reports were given more weight than confirming research reports. Preference for client-favorable outcomes was found to affect the weight given to staff accountant research reports as well.