The Successful CPA

Finding a job is hard enough, but standing out from your professional peers is even more difficult.

To help make sure you go far in your accounting career, The Trusted Professional contacted practitioners and professors and asked them to draw a composite of the successful CPA. The following is a list of skills and attributes that you may want to consider as you embark on your professional journey.

Communication

Given the emphasis that is placed on the ability to communicate well, CPAs, if they ever decide to, would probably make good talk show hosts or news correspondents.

All kidding aside, strong communication skills (both in writing and verbally) top the list of every CPA we spoke to and the reason is perfectly clear. “People skills are key because CPAs spend 80 to 90 percent of their time with clients,” said Professor Mary Harris of the Syracuse University School of Management. “(Accounting) is a much more people-oriented profession than students assume.”

Denise M. Gueli, chair of the Young CPAs Committee of the Buffalo Chapter of the New York State Society of CPAs and senior manager at Freed Maxick and Battaglia, said successful CPAs are able to clearly convey difficult financial information to their clients in a manner that is understandable to them. And Charles Toder, a retired CPA and member of the NYSSCPA Not-for-Profit Organizations Committee, said accountants should really like people as they deal with clients from many different backgrounds.

No Fear

It stands to reason that anyone pursuing accounting should be comfortable with numbers and possess solid analytical skills. However, when starting off, our sources said, young CPAs should not overly concern themselves with items like new statements from the Financial Accounting Standards Board. Though technical knowledge is crucial to accounting, new recruits should understand that they will pick up those skills over time.

Leadership Skills

Obviously, this attribute could incorporate a lot of different skills but it primarily concerns organization and management. As CPAs are expected to perform many different tasks and be knowledgeable in a variety of areas, strong organizational skills are one sure way to prevent them from losing their heads. And as noted by both Toder and NYSSCPA Higher Education Committee member Robert A. Semenza, an accounting professor at Quinnipiac University in Hamden, Conn., CPAs frequently have to call upon their management skills as they very often are thrust into supervisory positions.

Looking at the Big Picture

As NYSSCPA Estate Planning Committee chair Susan Schoenfeld, a vice president with Bessemer Trust Company in New York City, said, CPAs should be able to “think outside of the box.” Specifically, Schoenfeld was referring to the need for CPAs to regularly remind themselves that they are much more than tax and audit professionals. Rather, she said, they are trusted business advisors who are capable of offering a wide scope of financial services to their clients.

Dr. Mark P. Holtzman, an accounting professor at Hofstra University in Hempstead, N.Y., also believes CPAs should take a more proactive stance and should not be afraid of change, especially given today’s fast-paced market. “If the world is going global, CPAs should be going there also,” he said.

Additionally, as pointed out by Semenza, thinking outside the box also means that CPAs should always want to learn more about their field—it’s a process that he says is a “lifelong pursuit.”

The Other Things

Like any career, it’s doing all the other things that can sometimes mean the difference between being a run-of-the mill professional and a revered one. As you enter the profession, remember that such basic tasks as following up on questions and promptly returning phone calls are greatly appreciated by your associates and clients. Our sources also strongly encourage new recruits to become active in a CPA society or organization as well as be on the lookout for business opportunities and new contacts.

Honesty, Integrity, Ethics

These qualities speak for themselves.