Monday, December 12, 2011

Is an Accounting Career the right choice for you?


 
Like many colleges students, I was initially unsure what I wanted to major in.  After deciding to pursue a business major, I was required to take two principles of accounting courses. Learning about double entry accounting, accrual accounting methods over cash basis accounting, along with a host of other GAAP accounting methods, quickly lured me into making accounting my official choice of major.  I also enjoyed the growth potentials of being able to obtain my CPA and masters in accounting.  also, the initial salary for an accountant wasn't too bad.  According to to salary.com, the average salary for an accountant with a bachelors degree in the United States is around $44,000.  After receiving my diploma in 2007, I was excited to find my fist position as an accountant.  I was initially offered a position in accounts payable, but was quickly offered a position as an assistant controller.  As an assistant controller, I was sorely disappointed in the job responsibilities accountants are expected to perform. No courses taken in college could have prepared me for what the accounting profession required. These included: 
  • looking through hundreds or thousands of transactions in the general ledger, reconciling them, and looking for mistakes
  • having to find transaction errors, and finding out who made the mistake so I can find contact them and find out what was done incorrectly
  • having to look for missing files
  • having to collect on delinquent accounts
  • being responsible for sending statements to customers
While some of these responsibilities should logically appear to be something an accountant is responsible for, they were not part of my strengths. Personally, I am not someone that works in any organized fashion, and I get completely irritated if I have to consitently clean up other people’s messes. But on the other hand, I truly enjoyed learning accounting in college.  Therefore, just because you enjoy learning accounting as a subject, doesn’t mean you will enjoy it as a career.  I have now determined my strengths lie more in computer information systems and programming. 
Then who would be a good fit for someone to choose accounting as their profession?  While I find it essential to obtain a degree in accounting, some other essential skills include being someone that is:
·         Always clean and organized
·         Doesn’t mind having to clean up other people’s messes, or at least teaching them how to clean up their own messes next time
·         Is able to stare at numbers on a computer screen all day
·         Extremely patient  and does not become easily irritated over little things
·         Is able to work a lot of overtime, especially during year end
·         Doesn’t mind filling or having to look all over for missing files (although this is changing w/ electronic documentation take over).

Do you enjoy working with numbers?  Do you find interest in being able to take business processes and quantify them into something important for management to make decisions?  If this sounds like you, then a career in accounting might be the right path. While this was my initial perception, after landing my first accounting job, I was sorely mistaken.

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