CA - Be a Beckon of New Horizon

The world is ever-changing, everyone is striving toward a new horizon, and chartered accountants should not be left behind and deplete their beckoning.

The accounting profession has transformed from record-keeping and fraud detection to value-added services, from auditing to the C suite and entrepreneurship. Chartered accountants have evolved with time and sailed through various regulatory reforms, reporting structures, corporate frauds, and ever-changing stakeholders, and their expectations.

Historically, chartered accountancy has gone through various changes over the years, but in recent times, we are witnessing unprecedented challenges in the form of post-pandemic social-economic changes, and significant discipline changes.

The touch bearers of all professions were keeping pace with changes in the past but are finding it hard to cope with changes in recent times.

The chartered accountants in particular were always advanced as far as regulatory reforms or changes in financial reporting, or governance and were never ahead of social economic changes.?

The formula for success for chartered accountants is becoming attenuated and requires a sincere effort to remain an indispensable part of society.

Thus, merely updating themselves through the current setup of CPE learning is not sufficient and would require an overall revamp of the learning process to cope with social and economic changes.

There are a number of socioeconomic challenges, such as?high unemployment, poverty, social inequality, and limited access to public services, which the world has always been exposed to. In recent times, and more so post-pandemic, there have been rapid changes exacerbated by cultural, economic, environmental, and technological forces.

Chartered accountants need to see through the clouds of uncertainty and obstacles forced upon us to reach a new horizon.

Our traditional education and training are not commensurate with the rapid social-economic changes, and we need to strive to unlearn, learn, and advance ourselves to create solutions for our clients, various stakeholders, and society.

We should change the mode of our education from a rule-based regime to a real-time outlook.??We should nurture a culture of multidimensional learning, a combination of reading, wisdom from role models, online and community learning, interactive sessions with the global accounting community, and regular dialogue with other professionals.

This requires upgrading our thought processes, expanding our comfort zone, and more so, our mindsets. We should be culture-sensitive, believe in gender equality, give up preconceived notions, move from the easiest ways of doing things to efficient ways of doing things, and embrace technology and not be led by it.

We should be inquisitive and proactive in relationship management with the accounting fraternity, and stakeholders and make every effort to add sustainable value additions and enhance the troposphere of the ecosystem through our professional conduct, services, and leadership.

We should put people before technology but still make strides toward digitalization and endeavor to make technology part of our new normal.

We should aim to become a global brand and act as a transformation agent of global growth by demonstrating ethics, exhibiting professional behavior, enhancing professional skepticism, nurturing empathy in our culture, sharing knowledge, and resources, creating innovative solutions, expanding into new territories, and bringing prosperity that will uproot social injustice, poverty, and gender bias.?We should start changing ourselves before we expect the world to change.

Our motto should be "one earth, one family, and one future," and we should act as a navigator to harmonize sustainable goals across the globe and make the world a better place.

The profession of accountancy will only beckon if we continue reaching the new horizon by trumping over the uncertainties formulated by the social and economic changes.

#socialeconomy #iasb #sustainability #betterworld #woca2022 #ifac #mumbai #india #bahrain #oman #uk #postcovid The Institute of Chartered Accountants of India #ICAEW #ACCA #authorshaz CA Prafulla Chhajed Aniket Talati Atul Gupta Debashis Mitra Julia Penny Dr. Amarjit Chopra