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Better than guns and missiles
It's a whole new weapon threat - "if you don't hand over your oil / precious natural resources / drug profits / nuclear missiles / last Rolo we'll send in the Accountants!" Cue mad panic and a steady stream of refugees fleeing over the borders. Dicators are overthrown, heartless regimes crumble, and high on the mountain top he stands - the Man With The Calculator!
Well we get blamed for buggering up the NHS and anything else that involves numbers, why not destroy a few foreign budgets too. We might save on foreign aid - oh no, hang on, we only give money to countries with lots of their dosh and space programmes.
Just jealousy...
Clearly ACCA are trying to extend their global reach, as their membership is jealous of the CGMA designation us CIMA members now get to use, along with the eleventy squillion pounds in extra fees/pay we get by having this prestigious and worthwhile title.
This title of course easily justifies the CIMA leadership gallivanting all over the world spending our every increasing (above inflation) subscription fees.
Sigh!!!
Reading the above comments from so called professionals just reinforces my perception that the accountancy profession has gone down hill in recent years. Why can't we behave like intelligent adults anymore?
You can be intelligent and sarcastic
Reading the above comments from so called professionals just reinforces my perception that the accountancy profession has gone down hill in recent years. Why can't we behave like intelligent adults anymore?
Years of accrued cynicism built on experience and a distrust for the management of organisations that appear to exist on momentum, which people remain members of in large part due to the effort they made to become a member?
The problem with organisations like ACCA/CIMA/ICAEW is holding them to account. When Tesco's profits drop the shareholders can point to the profit margin, the share price, EPS, dividends etc. as definitive evidence of poor performance. Its harder to judge the likes of CIMA, they bang their own drum about their achievements, they can point to salary surveys I suppose, but how much improvements in that area are due to them can be harder to quantify. If they'd done nothing bar the bare minimum of admin work for the year, would market forces have pushed salaries up anyway?
They often measure themselves on membership, but is increased membership a good thing for existing members? Yes it raises the profile, but it's another shark in the tank is often not welcome. If you can say to an employer or prospective client "I'm a qualified accountant" they might check it out, to make sure you really are, but are they going to come back and say "oooh you're a member of ACCA, I heard about the sterling work they are doing in Afghanistan, here take my money!"
Taking this Afghanistan example, what will be the tangible benefit to existing members?
As a comparative though I think that the ATT and CIOT are a lot more useful,effective and value for money (slightly tarnished by the ex-ATT president being banged up, but you can't have everything....). I would have nothing but praise for them if they could tighten up their admin a little (had to submit my annual return 4 times and they sent me the wrong person's membership card...).
As to professionalism - there is a difference in my approach to dealing with client's affairs and my throwaway comments in pseudo-anonymous online forums where I can let off a little steam with fellow "professionals". Maybe if the profession has gone downhill it's due to the likes of ACCA/CIMA letting in oiks like me ;-)
I'm probably just a little riled as I've paid out my various and sundry subs in the last month and it still stings (especially the inflation busting increases!)