Broader Skill Sets, New Learning Solutions are the Future for CPAs and Business Professionals

A recent article from The Wall Street Journal titled “Employers Find ‘Soft Skills’ Like Critical Thinking in Short Supply” reaffirms the need for vital skills that are often overlooked. Two surveys are cited, both finding that employers have difficulty hiring candidates with strong non-technical skills. It’s not just high ranking professionals that need them. Employers are seeking these skills in early career professionals. The article also refers to a Harvard University paper that states “employment growth is strong in jobs requiring both cognitive and soft skills.”

Understanding you need the education is one step. Getting what you need in the way you need it is another. We all know that CPAs and other professionals are busier than ever. Finding time to sit in a class for eight hours is difficult. Even if you do, the time spent may not be meaningful or beneficial. The format of the course or style of the presentation may not resonate with you. An hours-based system isn’t for everyone. At the end of the day, you may walk away having learned very little compared to the time spent.

A 2015 article in Forbes magazine titled “Leading the Future of Learning Through Four Key Trends” examines the forces shaping professional education today and addresses the innovations necessary to change out-of-date education models. First is unbundling, the movement toward a competency-based approach. Second is personalization, allowing for differing learning styles, speed and interest. Third is continuous, emphasizing the need for education on an ongoing basis. And fourth is creativity orientation, the integration of a variety of skills.

The Indiana CPA Society, through its CPA Center of Excellence^®, has embraced both the development of skills that are needed by today’s professionals and the forces that are driving new methods of learning. It has also served the role of change agent, as a recent rule change in Indiana marks the first time in the CPA profession’s history that competency-based education is available to meet continuing education requirements and count toward CPA license renewal. This significant change will certainly have ripple effects throughout the nation.

“I’m so glad to see Indiana make the progressive move to adopt competency-based education,” said Donny Shimamoto, CPA.CITP, CGMA, who is well known throughout the CPA profession and has been named as a Top Thought Leader in Public Accounting and to the Top 100 People in Accounting list. “It is a change that measures actual learning and application, rather than just hours in a seat. I hope to see the rest of the profession and states make this change soon, as competency-based education is the future of learning.”

That future of learning is what the CPA Center of Excellence^® represents. And its work has not gone unnoticed. After receiving four awards in the first two years of existence, the COE^® was honored with the Power of A Summit Award from the American Society of Association Executives on Oct. 5 in Washington, D.C. The Indiana CPA Society is the first state CPA society ever to receive a Summit Award, ASAE’s most prestigious award.

Breaking New Ground

Since its establishment in 2014 after four years of planning, the COE^® has broken new ground in a number of areas. Among them, developing descriptors for the CPA profession’s core competencies, championing a competency-based approach to CPA education, and developing innovative courses, tools, resources and events designed to build upon each other to provide a thorough and forward-thinking individual enhancement process. Areas of focus include:

Competency-based approach – Transforming the nearly half-century old hours-based model of continuing professional education is a significant goal. In addition to the rule change that became effective in October that allows competency-based ethics education, the COE^® also achieved success through a pilot program with the Indiana Board of Accountancy that enables up to two of its competency-based courses to count toward a waiver of up to 16 hours of CPE.

Rapid learning – Known throughout learning circles as the acceleration of learning behaviors and processes that leads to the absorption of learning in order to develop business improvement processes, structures and behaviors. The COE^® courses are designed to improve a person’s learning orientation – in other words behaviors – that, in turn, speed up the learning process. This is a critical component of addressing the personalization of learning.

Flexible learning – The COE^®’s interactive online courses were designed with the busy professional in mind. Using an award-winning social learning platform, the courses can be accessed by any type of desktop or mobile device, and can be completed in incremental segments of the participant’s choosing. Though not nano-learning, the courses do provide participants with a similar feel in that course material can be taken in chunks.

Digital badges ­– Recent studies have proven that alternative forms of credentialing such as digital badges are gaining in popularity, particularly among millennials. The Indiana CPA Society, through the COE^®, was the first accounting organization in the United States to offer digital badges. The badges can be placed on online profiles such as LinkedIn and provides validation and verification of the subject material that has been mastered.

Skill assessment – In order to develop your skills, you must know where to start. The COE^®’s Insight Toolkit effectively identifies your skill gaps and strengths. It uses a creative 360° technique for colleagues and coworkers to rate your skills to provide a well-rounded perspective. Learning recommendations and mentoring are part of it as well. As an added bonus, the toolkit can be customized to include your own firm or company’s competencies and standards.

Collaboration – The COE^®’s Online Community and Member Networks provide ample opportunity for CPAs to engage in intelligent collaboration to share knowledge and benefit from the expertise of others. The COE^® courses and skill assessment tool also have online collaborative features in which participants can interact with others to share experiences and further develop learned concepts.

Talent management – The HR Pathway begins with recruitment and ends with succession planning. The COE^®, through its Quick Start Guide to Defining and Mastering Vital Skills for Success, and Talent Academy, examines all points along the pathway and provides strategies and best practices for process improvement. Skill development is a key aspect with the descriptors based on the core competencies of the profession identified in the CPA Horizons 2025 Report.

The beauty of the CPA Center of Excellence^® is that while it is CPA-focused, it is not CPA-exclusive. Its courses, skill assessment tool and other resources are as applicable to professionals in other areas of business as they are to CPAs. Critical success skills and new learning solutions are not unique to CPAs. But they are essential for CPAs if the profession is to move forward and continue to be viable, vibrant and relevant.

As a recognized thought leader, the CPA Center of Excellence is re-inventing education for CPAs and other professionals.