OUTLOOK & ANALYSIS

Maybe we should front-load the coolest parts of our profession.

By CPA Trendlines Research

If you’re wondering why it’s so hard to find and hire qualified accounting professionals, think back to your college days … your first class in accounting, probably something like “Principles of Accounting.”

Obviously you, a future accountant, passed the course, and apparently you found it interesting.

MORE: Beware the Work-Life/Workload Doom Spiral | Why the Dry Pipeline? It’s About Time | Whole Person Retention: When It’s Not Just the Money | Seven Enticements to Keep Talent On Board | Disruptors: Talent Crisis? What Talent Crisis? | Seven Steps to a Stronger Future | Auditing Standards ‘Yellow Book’ Updated | Compensation’s Up, but Up Enough to Retain Staff? | CPAs Needed to Help Small Biz Adopt AI
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But that puts you in a minority of students with an interest in business. According to a survey from the Center for Audit Quality, 32 percent of students who chose not to major in accounting said lack of interest or passion was the main reason, and 70 percent said it was at least part of the reason.

No surprise, then, that only one in eight graduates in business areas major in accounting. And that’s down from one in seven in 2016.
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Five strategies for keeping your firm out of it.

By CPA Trendlines Research

Is your firm in a doom spiral?

MORE: Business Model Transformation: Do It or Die | Misperceptions, Corrections, Accountancy and Lemonade | Whole Person Retention: When It’s Not Just the Money | Global Trends Show Many Dissatisfied CPAs | More Big Firms Shut Their Doors to New College Grads | Seven Enticements to Keep Talent On Board | Employee Retention Is Easier Than Attraction | Let Interns Fix the Staffing Shortage? | Disruptors: Talent Crisis? What Talent Crisis? | Three Ways to Raise the Bar for Your Business | Accountants’ Advice: Be Careful, Quick, Creative … and Lean
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Here’s what it looks like:

1. A CPA quits or retires.
2. The firm can’t attract a replacement.
3. The firmwide workload remains constant.
4. Increased workloads get redistributed.
5. A CPA quits because of stress.
6. Workloads increase again.
7. Someone else quits. No one gets hired.
8. The firm turns away clients.
9. Revenue drops. Salaries stagnate.
10. Uncompetitive salaries hinder hiring.
11. A CPA quits or retires.
12. Repeat.

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And it’s about time the profession took action.

By CPA Trendlines Research

It’s been with us from the beginning. We can measure it but we can’t see it. It’s our friend and our enemy. It’s infinite, yet we never have enough of it.

And it may be the big leak in the CPA pipeline.

MORE: Business Model Transformation: Do It or Die | Misperceptions, Corrections, Accountancy and Lemonade | Whole Person Retention: When It’s Not Just the Money | Global Trends Show Many Dissatisfied CPAs | More Big Firms Shut Their Doors to New College Grads | Seven Enticements to Keep Talent On Board | Employee Retention Is Easier Than Attraction | Let Interns Fix the Staffing Shortage? | Disruptors: Talent Crisis? What Talent Crisis? | Three Ways to Raise the Bar for Your Business | Accountants’ Advice: Be Careful, Quick, Creative … and Lean
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Yes, it’s time.

So concludes the Illinois CPA Society’s 2024 “Re-Decoding the Decline” survey and report on why the pipeline of incoming accounting talent has been going from dribble to drip.
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Four areas ripe for change.

By CPA Trendlines Research

Five ugly facts your firm may need to deal with:

1. Seventy percent of CPAs are at or near retirement age.
2. The numbers of accounting graduates and CPA exam candidates are both dropping.

MORE: Global Trends Show Many Dissatisfied CPAs | More Big Firms Shut Their Doors to New College Grads | Seven Enticements to Keep Talent On Board | Employee Retention Is Easier Than Attraction | Let Interns Fix the Staffing Shortage? | Disruptors: Talent Crisis? What Talent Crisis? | Accountants’ Advice: Be Careful, Quick, Creative … and Lean | Top Performers Lead in Leverage, Culling, Outsourcing | Firms Culling Clients as Staffing Woes Persist | Compensation’s Up, but Up Enough to Retain Staff? | Are Accountants Charging Too Little?
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3. Gen Z (ages 20-30) is transforming the labor market with new values on workplace environment, compensation, benefits, leadership, DEI policies, culture and corporate mission.
4. The majority of current CPAs have no interest in becoming partners.
5. Roughly half of current CPAs might consider finding another firm, and almost 15 percent wouldn’t mind leaving the profession altogether.

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