THOUGHT LEADERSHIP
Chartered Accountancy: it’ s a Career to Count On
by Pamela McCreedy, Chair, Chartered Accountants Ulster Society
uring August many students and parents get to experience the dread,
Drelief, disappointment or exhilaration which comes with exam results.
It’ s the culmination of a long, difficult period of work. It also comes during a time in their life when students have a lot of other things going on. Quite often results day throws up more questions than answers. Some of that uncertainty may still be hanging around.
Sometimes those best laid plans don’ t work out – or at least get deferred for a year. Sometimes students find out that they can perhaps afford to aim a little bit higher than they thought.
If you are a student reading this, or have a son or daughter still weighing up their options, I’ d like to make a suggestion – why not look at Chartered Accountancy. It’ s also a great way to open doors if you need to take a step forward in your own career. There’ s still time to enrol for classes starting in October this year if you are quick about it.
Through the school leaver and training contract options, thousands of people start their careers in accountancy firms and businesses across the island of Ireland each year. Chartered firms are actually the largest recruiter of graduates in Ireland.
For those put off by University fees or wanting to get into the world of work sooner rather than later, all of Northern Ireland FE Colleges now offer a Higher Level Apprenticeship in Accounting In partnership with Accounting Technicians Ireland. This gives trainees the opportunity to work with a local firm while studying. When candidates have completed their Accounting Technician diploma, they can then go on to study Chartered Accountancy.
For people already in the workplace, Chartered Accountants Ireland also offers a dedicated flexible route and there are now over 1,000 people training in industry, financial services and the public sector.
The flexible route is designed to allow people to study while they work. There is no training contract and students can study in their own time while working in their current role, or change jobs midway through.
Like their training contract counterparts, flexible route students do need to get an average of 3.5 years’ experience across tax, audit, finance or IT.
Not everyone starts out in such a role, but students generally find that as they progress through their training the opportunities to take such a role begin to open up as they become more employable.
20 www. businessfirstonline. co. uk
A focus on student services helps students to get through the challenge of training to become a Chartered Accountant – almost 78 per cent of candidates are qualified within four years.
Chartered Accountants Ireland is the largest and fastest growing accountancy body in the UK and Ireland over the past 10 years, with 25,000 members and 6,500 students. While there is a strong network in accountancy practices, almost 65 per cent of members work in business, many of them as board members, CEOs and CFOs in every sector.
As Chair of a Chartered Accountants body, you would rightly expect me to be a strong supporter of the qualification. No surprise there.
Becoming a Chartered Accountant was a formative part of my business education and set me up for everything that has come later in my career in the public sector.
I was always interested in running a business. I couldn’ t have imagined at the start of my career that it would lead to working in a senior position in the public sector.
Chartered Accountancy has equipped me with the experience to lead a multimillion pound organisation, understand the complex governance structure, drive a reform and service improvement agenda and work with a range of skilled professionals.
Chartered Accountancy has allowed me to become a leader and to make a contribution which can really make a difference. It has allowed me to work with committed and positive professionals who work hard to make the lives of other people better.
The thing is that almost every other
QUOTABLEQUOTE
As Chair of a Chartered Accountants body, you would rightly expect me to be a strong supporter of the qualification. No surprise there. Becoming a Chartered Accountant was a formative part of my business education and set me up for everything that has come later in my career in the public sector. Pamela McCready
Chartered Accountant I’ ve spoken to feels the same about their qualification, they feel that it has set them up for great things and that it has given them a key understanding of how businesses and how organisations work.
Qualified Chartered Accountants are in high demand in Northern Ireland, while our members also work in over 90 countries around the globe. Chartered Accountants Ireland has reciprocal agreements with other accountancy bodies throughout the world which means the qualification is extremely portable.
There are over 1,000 Irish Chartered Accountants working in Australia and there is unique recognition for members in the United States. That means, as a Chartered Accountant, wherever life takes you, you’ ll never be short of options.