MANAGEMENT UPDATE.
GOVERNMENTS QUEST TO FIND CPAS
The American Institute of CPAs (AICPA) has long recognized the acute shortage of members of its profession, as has the National Association of State Auditors Comptrollers and Treasurers. (NASACT). The two groups have joined forces to create a new report titled, “Public Sector CPA Resources: The Current Landscape and Recommendations for the Future.”
The Landscape the report describes is one that is somewhat bleak and that’s not a new story. As Mike Mucha, director of the Research and Consulting Center at the Government Finance Officers Association (GFOA) has told us, “Organizations that we’ve been involved with have trouble hiring. When they can’t hire, they aren’t able to opt out of completing certain tasks, so they get used to completing the work with less people. . . At some point employees will burn out. . . “
One alternative, when governments are short on CPAs, is to turn to outside contractors to pick up the burden. But the report quotes a respondent from a state government entity with a budget over $1 billion as saying “Hiring outside contractors to fulfill the needs of the entity inevitably leave the entity with no institutional knowledge in house and an increased dependency on high-cost options.”
The report identifies a number of factors that are impeding governments’ efforts to hire enough CPAs. Some of the outstanding ones are:
“The failure of government entities to offer a competitive compensation package” – a factor identified by government entity respondents more than twice as often as any others that impact their ability to hire/retain CPAs.”
Finding CPAs who have the knowledge and experience of applying Governmental Accounting Standards Board accounting principles is increasingly difficult. In addition, keeping pace with changes in governmental accounting and auditing standards adds to hiring and retention issues.
“Lack of managerial positions/room for advancement”
“Benefits of working in the public sector aren’t widely known”
“Outdated or complicated hiring policies (or both)”
Lack of workplace flexibility
The report explores the kinds of tactics governments are using, finding a wide variation between them and the likelihood that they are effective. For example, mentoring efforts are in wide use and “when utilized by a government entity, respondents found it to be at least somewhat effective 91% of the time. By contrast, “While on campus recruiting is a common tactic, government entity respondents only found it to be effective or very effective 18% of the time.” That’s the tactic that rated lowest.
Of course, there is no single silver bullet to address the pressing shortage of CPAs in cities, counties and states and the report indicates that “It is important to note that the issues contributing to the CPA talent shortage within the public sector have been developing over many years and cannot be attributed to one challenge or solved by one recommendation. It will take a collective, sustained effort by all stakeholders to reverse this current trend.”
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