Department of Accounting and Finance

Introduction

The accounts and finance profession has always been as an assistant to support and give shape to both the public and private businesses. This epidemic Covid-19 crisis, board with itself drastic changes in handling the business operations of the accounting and finance profession. In this assignment, what impacts Covid-19 have put on the accounts and finance profession, issues, threats and opportunities are discussed which this profession got due to this pandemic. The assignment below is mainly divided in to two parts one states the opportunities and risks that Covid-19 brought to the accounting profession. And the second part discusses the leadership effects of accountants on the community and their clients.

Potential risks and opportunities that Covid-19 presented to the Accounting profession.

The Covid-19 crisis impacted the working of accounts and finance professionals in a big way. It both brought threats as well as some good opportunities with it also. These risks and opportunities put mixed effect of this professionalism which they have to overcome in the coming future with effective measures. It brought major fundamental shift in the working nature of accountants with a significant mental health impacts on the professionals. Contrasting this, the Covid-19 plethora provided opportunities of reinvention in virtual accounting techniques as several surveys of accountants revealed at various discussions held at business schools. The first major threat is that this pandemic came to the most pressuring and busies period of the year for accountants. It brought huge change in working style as working from home instead of office. But this somehow gave them a big opportunity like more time to do their work and along with that they could take little breaks also in the midst of work being at home only keeping their family life balanced. Since the accounting works come with several deadlines in normal days which adds pressure of work for a period of time. De Villiers and Maroun (2017) stated that being in work from home situation this pressure became a little less as compared with working sitting in offices. The most difficult threat in this situation is accessing the information and details of their clients which was quite easy being in office. But here technology helped a lot and gave the opportunity to create new ways of working being anywhere at earth (Hariguna et al. 2017). The technological team of most of the audit firms ensured that all the client information must be availed without any interruption and the taxes and returns filing can be done seamlessly. So somehow Covid-19 did some good too to the accountants. Moving to a new point, in this epidemic time the studies of accounting and finance has also became more easier than normal days since the prevailing of online virtual classes did not stopped the learners from their regular learning (ncbi.nlm.nih.gov 2020). In fact, the online classes became a blessing to those learners who face difficulty in learning amidst of other people or don’t get time to study properly. Although a negative impact of this Covid-19 on accountants is hindrances in group works. As Nørreklit (2017) disclosed that this problem got solved by the help of technology but it was not the same working in group video calls. Somehow this Covid-19 brought few the positive opportunities also like in normal days the accountants who were unemployed due to this crisis, they were flooded with jobs to do because there because the closed firms and offices created huge tons of work to do (Hariguna et al. 2017). So it can be said that Covid-19 removed unemployment partially and gave opportunities to get employed to many jobless accountants. Adding to the above this pandemic had a greater part of negative effect on the accounting and finance profession but still there is a small part which gave new opportunities to the professionals to reset their skills, reconsider their competencies, redevelop their training and become a more enhanced and updated accounts professional for the coming bright and normal future days (tandfonline.com 2020). As a result a major negative impact of Covid-19 on accounts and finance sector is huge disruption in the daily asset management operations. In this crisis situation, many firms tried to create their staff members’ backup sites to work from home with no objection in work. De Villiers and Hsiao (2018) suggested that although this crisis gave opportunity to save a lot of expenses such as business meet arrangement expenses, employee expenses, costs of daily office expenses. Thus this Covid-19 pandemic brought drastic and sudden changes in business accounting operations creating both threats and opportunities for the accounts professionals.

Leadership qualities that Accounting professionals provide to clients and the community.

When talking about accountants to people, responses often come mentioning that such roles lead as tax agents and independent auditors. This accounting profession requires those men and women who must be competent, effective and productive leaders in all situations. Bogale (2018) felt that the accounting leadership leads people, business, clients and community as a frontline safeguard to protect the integrity of business financial report. They also face pressure in organisations in respect selecting the appropriate accounting alternative method which has to be more favourable financially in context with the business. So, it can be stated that accounting leadership helps in handling the pressure smoothly & firmly. Going into details, as leaders, the accounts professionals help the business and community to learn the discipline of execution regarding any work. They make them strategic in nature from both the viewpoints of mission and vision of the future. Acting as leaders, accountants facilitate their clients and community the quality of building up and transformation of relationships with the people one is going to work with (Ntanos et al. 2020). They act as pillars to create a healthy and sustainable financial scenario in business as well as in public sectors also. Leaders contains the quality of conflict solver upholding the central values which acts as peacemakers when it is needed and fulfils demands of people also. So the leadership quality teaches problem solving ways to the community and their clients with patience and maturity & make people learn to create a positive and joyful environment where it can be excelled. They lead people and community and acts as business assistants with corporate strategies by providing advice and helping firms to reduce costs, mitigate upcoming risks and improve the top line. They play the role of a balancer in between the employees’ interest in the company and business’s interest to get what they want from employees. As stated by VOSNIAKOS (2020), they uphold the integrity, values, professional competences, objectivity & due care, and professional behaviour and lastly most important is confidentiality. They have a wide range of reach to provide leadership from the wide spread community to the capital markets present globally. Therefore accounting leadership quality improves the balancing quality in people so that smooth functioning can be done in both professional and personal front. Like in other professions, accounts profession challengers are also high like the expectations from them relevant with the capital market along with their ability to face new challenges and evolve from them with solutions (springer.com 2021). They act as leaders for offering advices to the business in all areas of enhancements. Accountants as leaders provide their clients and the people of community the quality of accountability at every situation, upholding the Rule of Law and making them understand the elements of leadership which are reasonable, being fair all the time in all the operations and dealings (tandfonline.com 2020). It is a must for accounting profession leaders that they meet the requirements of the Administrative Laws along with not abusing the powers and authority which comes with the leadership responsibilities. So, the leadership quality assessed by the accounts professional helps the clients and community to understand various elements of laws & apply them accordingly. Being an internal auditor, the professional accountants give independent assurance to the business’s management authorities that company’s financial governance, risk management, internal control & operating processes are running efficiently and effectively. According to MUZONDO (2018), effective leadership thinks and acts from both the perspectives of long term as well as short term goals in their mind. The accounts profession leads the newcomers by providing resources and support which they need for doing their daily activities keeping up their skills updated. Thus it can be concluded that an accountant’s leadership shapes the behaviour, responses and attitudes of their clients and people of the community towards the future. So, the accounting and finance profession on one hand is difficult to follow whether on other hand is a very responsible job because both the interests of a business and public depends on them. They provide leadership to the people in various ways by encouraging their talents and also by building team-leadership at every level of life. Accounts professionals develop the qualities like self-discipline, vision, responsibilities, confidence, positive attitude and many more by their leadership capability. As opined by Nørreklit (2017), great leadership doesn’t come only with position and status but also found in humanity, goodness and service to others. Therefore the accounting profession provides the quality of leading people towards a confident, competitive & a better future encouraging their talents.

Conclusion

Summarising all the writing above concludes that the accounting and finance profession on one hand is difficult to follow whether on other hand is a very responsible job because both the interests of a business and public depends on them. Though this pandemic had a greater part of negative effect on the accounting and finance profession but still there is a small part which gave new opportunities to the professionals to reset their skills, reconsider their competencies, redevelop their training and become a more enhanced and updated accounts professional for the coming bright and normal future days. Finally after analysing all the above details, it has been revealed that accounting profession can provide a good leadership to the people resolving the treats and adapting the opportunities in it for a productive future.

References

Books

De Villiers, C. and Hsiao, P.C.K., 2018. A review of accounting research in Australasia. Accounting & Finance, 58(4), pp.993-1026.

De Villiers, C. and Maroun, W. eds., 2017. Sustainability accounting and integrated reporting. Routledge.

Hariguna, T., Lai, M.T., Hung, C.W. and Chen, S.C., 2017. Understanding information system quality on public e-government service intention: an empirical study. International Journal of Innovation and Sustainable Development, 11(2-3), pp.271-290.

Hariguna, T., Lai, M.T., Hung, C.W. and Chen, S.C., 2017. Understanding information system quality on public e-government service intention: an empirical study. International Journal of Innovation and Sustainable Development, 11(2-3), pp.271-290.

Nørreklit, H. ed., 2017. A philosophy of management accounting: A pragmatic constructivist approach. Taylor & Francis.

Journals

Bogale, E., 2018. College of Business and Economics, Department of Accounting and Finance Ambo University. indicators, 9(21).

MUZONDO, G., 2018. Faculty of Commerce Department of Accounting and Finance.

Ntanos, S., Asonitou, S., Kyriakopoulos, G., Skordoulis, M., Chalikias, M. and Arabatzis, G., 2020. Environmental sensitivity of business school students and their attitudes towards social and environmental accounting. In Strategic Innovative Marketing and Tourism (pp. 195-203). Springer, Cham.

VOSNIAKOS, N., 2020. BUSINESS SCHOOL DEPARTMENT OF ACCOUNTING AND FINANCE MASTER’S DEGREE PROGRAM IN ACCOUNTING AND FINANCE.

Websites

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov 2020. The COVID-19 Pandemic Crisis and Corporate Finance, available at: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7665700/ [Accessed on: 7th December, 2020]

springer.com 2021. Consequences of COVID-19 on the social isolation of the Chinese economy: accounting for the role of reduction in carbon emissions, available at: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11869-020-00898-4 [Accessed on: 24th December, 2020]

tandfonline.com 2020. Accounting in times of the COVID-19 pandemic: a forum for academic research, available at: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/01559982.2020.1778873 [Accessed on: 12th January, 2021]

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