What is the significance of this day?
Like any exclusive day for any other profession, there’s one day for accountants too – the International Accountants Day, celebrated on November 10 every year. People all over the world celebrate their accountants and how important their contributions are to the smooth running of any business. As an accountant, or any aspiring accountant, this is a day to be celebrated.
• The main purpose of Accountants Day is to promote the accounting profession.
• The day allows us to reflect on the significance of the role of the Accountants in our society. Accountants play a critical role in economic prosperity allowing for transparency and accountability in the financial affairs of companies and government
Origins of Accountants Day
November 10 was the date chosen as the International Accounting Day because it was on this day in 1494 when the “Summa de Arithmetica, Geometria, Proportioni et Proportionalita”, which translates to “Everything About Arithmetic, Geometry and Proportion”, was published in Venice. This is the very first record on double entry book-keeping that laid the foundation for future works on business accounting. The author of the book was an Italian mathematician called Luca Bartolomeo de Paciolo, who described the use of journals and ledgers, and warned that one shouldn’t sleep at night until the debits equalled the credits.
The first official celebration of Accounting Day was held as an event in the year 1972 in the USA. In 1976, more professional organisations were invited to participate in this celebration.
What are the major challenges you face in your profession?
• Responding in pace with the changing environment.
• Technology, economic landscape, ethical environment all possess challenges to the accountant to be able to adapt,report and lead.
Accountants often face conflicts between upholding values central to their profession and the demands of the real world. Balancing these competing demands speaks to the very heart of being a professional in contrast to simply having a job or performing a function. Professionals are expected to exercise professional judgment in performing their roles so that when times get challenging, they do not undertake actions that will result in the profession losing the public’s trust as protectors of public interest.
Ethical codes for professional accountants globally compels professional accountants, regardless of the roles that they perform, to uphold values of integrity, objectivity, professional competence and due care, confidentiality and professional behaviour. However, competing pressures can put professional accountants in challenging and often times difficult situations. These conflicts revolve around ethics, commercial pressures and the burden of regulation.
Situations may occur where professional accountants in businesses are expected to help the organization achieve certain financial outcomes. In some of these cases, the required action may risk compromising compliance with accounting and financial reporting rules. Professional accountants in businesses encounter tension in these situations. As an example, accountants in organizations may face pressures to account for inventories at higher values or select alternative accounting methods which are more financially favourable to the company. However, these actions may be contrary to what isallowable in the accounting standards or to what the professional accountant may feel comfortable with.
How compliant are local organisations with international financial reporting standards?
Generally, the compliant levels are encouraging for regulated entities e.g ZSE listed entities, banks and insurance companies, with most of them reporting timeously. Key challenges still lie in the public sector where significant number of entities have failed to report timeously due to various reasons.
What can we expect from ICAZ within the next year?
ICAZ is involved in a project to professionalise the public sector and that will contribute to build capacity and skill within public sector contexts. ICAZ would like to enrich the public sector by assisting in developing professional accountants within the sector.
As ICAZ we have the important mandate of representing, promoting and enhancing the accountancy profession. At the national level, we are the voice for the nation’s Chartered Accountants; this includes all professional accountants both in practice and in business. Because they play different roles in the society,the overall status of the accounting profession can only be strengthened when both professional accountants, in practice and in business are well-perceived by society
