This text is part of the special Accounting Profession section
While the profession has diversified considerably in recent years, it remains largely labeled as boring. A connotation that the Order is working to sweep away in order to get more young people interested in it.
Jean-Philippe Langevin, regional managing partner for Greater Montreal at the pan-Canadian accounting firm MNP, sees the future of the chartered professional accountant (CPA) profession with a positive eye.
“When I started my career around twenty years ago, the CPA profession was more limited, mainly made up of various certification acts, but today the doors are wide open. A CPA can now choose several paths related to business operations, such as forensic accounting or business valuation and financing. »
And yet, according to Geneviève Mottard, president and CEO of the Ordre des CPA du Québec, there is currently a shortage of accountants in Quebec. Shortage which is part of the general labor shortage, but which has characteristics specific to the profession.
“It’s not so much the number of new CPAs who are approved that is decreasing; year after year, we stay at around 1,500 candidates, specifies Mme Mottard, but it is the workload that has changed. The pandemic, with the various government support programs for businesses and individuals as well as the rise of teleworking, has made files more complex, leading to a significant workload. We need more CPAs to simply meet the new demand. »
Jean-Philippe Langevin notes the same shortage in his own office. “We had to change the way we managed files. We work more as a team and we no longer require them to be in the same room. And we seek to better use all of our resources. For example, if a CPA in one of our offices is in a slack period, we immediately try to assign him a file on which he can lend a hand. We have no choice but to adapt, because customer needs have not disappeared. »
Advertising campaign
In order to attract more young people to the profession of chartered professional accountant, the Ordre des CPA du Québec launched an advertising campaign this winter entitled Moi?, which asks young people if they have ever considered this choice careers. The campaign was deployed on posters in the metro and on campuses, on the Web and on social media. Currently, a second advertising campaign is taking place. This one under the theme of Me in the office?
“The Me campaign? aimed to introduce young people to the CPA profession and above all to deconstruct the myth according to which the profession is necessarily boring, explains Geneviève Mottard. The campaign highlighted the multiple facets of the profession in order to demonstrate that it is possible to personalize your career so that it better corresponds to your tastes and skills. With Moi en cabinet?, we continue in the same vein, but with an emphasis on work in private practice, because it is the firms that experience the greatest difficulty in recruiting. Many young CPAs today prefer to practice the profession within organizations, such as businesses or governments, rather than in private practice. The belief that office work is poorly paid and repetitive is stubborn. »
A varied profession
This belief obviously does not hold water, according to Jean-Philippe Langevin. “When I welcome a young CPA to our firm, I always tell them that they have chosen a profession where no two days are the same. A new client, a new problem, a new solution to find and so on. »
Not to mention that the CPA profession involves juggling rather complex files. Take, for example, a company that covets the acquisition of another company. “The CPA assigned to this file must take into consideration a host of things,” continues Mr. Langevin. Is the culture of the company to be acquired compatible with that of the acquirer? How do we finance the acquisition? Do we need partners, grants, loans? Where to find them? To properly advise his client, the CPA must examine this transaction from all angles. »
And there is one thing that Geneviève Mottard can assure future candidates for the profession. “The days of the accountant wearing brown stockings are truly over. Today, we train our CPAs so that they become fine business strategists. »
This content was produced by the Special Publications team at Duty, relating to marketing. The writing of the Duty did not take part.