As easy as 1,2,3? Recruiting the finance professional in a recession

SINCE 2001, accountants have been working hard to repair a tarnished reputation.

Once regarded as the bastions of honesty, accountability, and uncompromising scrutiny a series of high profile scandals brought the profession into disrepute.

Their image as dull at heart bean counters only helped to arm dissenters (mostly stakeholders who had lost pensions and investments). The finance function’s apparant invisibility didn’t help to dispel the anger. Back then most business departments viewed the back office as furtive (well you never actually met anyone from accounts), belligerent, pedantic and a barrier to profit.

Not everyone has rectified that view but so much has changed. Accounting is now seen as cool, sexy even, and its allure is set to glisten ever brighter as business leaders increasingly turn to the guys in control of the numbers for solutions in an economic downturn.

Consecutive reports published last year showed that firms, in particular small businesses, looked to their accountant for help and advice above any other business advisor. According to Mark Wilson, managing director of Yorkshire and North West-based recruitment firm Sharp Recruitment, that view is helping to drive recruitment in the finance sector.

“A lot of owner/managers are now wanting to keep a closer eye on their finances such as cash flow for example, so are looking at recruiting an accountant rather than outsourcing perhaps for the first time,” he says.

“But they want someone with the right level of experience.”

Senior level recruitment also remains strong despite cut-backs and Wilson says that his firm has recently helped a number of high profile vacancies.

However, a report released by specialist finance and accounting recruitment firm Robert Half predicts that the finance industry is in danger of facing a skills shortage over the next five years if it does not continue to attract and retain the next generation of accountants, or ‘Generation Y’ – the term used for those born after the year 1980.

The report also found that the continuing encroachment of regulation is threatening future skills as new entrants become too specialised early in their careers and miss out on the broader experience that they would traditionally receive on entering the industry.

Phil Sheridan, UK Managing Director of Robert Half, says: “As the impact of the global economic crisis continues, the profession must look beyond the downturn and continue to focus on attracting and retaining the next wave of finance and accounting professionals.

“Both employer and employee are facing a new set of challenges, with the industry needing to work hard to rebrand itself in order to become more attractive to today’s young people, and new entrants needing to stand out from the crowd.”

For employers looking to recruit Generation Y the report found that these new entrants have a different set of values to previous generations. For example, companies are finding that they need to ‘sell’ their company to new recruits who have high expectations about their employers’ internal working cultures and corporate responsibility policies.

In addition, the report found that the Generation Y recruit would be far less likely to remain in a job or even profession for their whole career, but would be looking for the flexibility to move between jobs and job functions. However, the report did also highlight the ability of Generation Y to bring skills to business, particularly on the technology and creativity side.

Sheridan continues: “Every new working generation is shaped by the social, technological and economic environment of the day, and Generation Y is no different. In an era where communication and technology is at the forefront, employers need to embrace this group in order to meet the business challenges of the future.”

Wilson agrees with the report’s warning. But he says economic stability is putting more talent on the market place as people worry about job security and future prospects.

“People are looking at their situation but they are cautious,” he says.

“And the caution goes both ways. Companies are more cautious about taking on more staff numbers.”

In fact, the finance function has seen a reduction in head count thanks to new technology that does away with the need for manual rekeying of data. A handful of companies have gone so far as automating up to 95% of their processes while others have been able to redeploy staff to other core areas such as data analysis rather than take on new recruits.

Regardless of what technology can do to help companies become more efficient, accountants look set to become the heroes of an unprecedented economic downturn. That said, their reputation could easily bruise as scandals uncovered during the boom years slowly emerge.

Stakeholder memories are short. The profession could still have much to prove is seems.