The chasm between older workers and younger ones is, in many ways, an age-old problem, but recent research indicates it’s only growing in the accounting field.
That’s according to a survey of managers and early-career workers released Monday by the Illinois CPA Society. From April through May, the organization queried 470 respondents, which comprised 185 workers with less than five years of experience in accounting and finance, along with 285 managers who oversee individuals with less than five years of experience in the field. Respondents from each group didn’t come from the same firms.
Early-career respondents were asked to rate themselves across six distinct skill categories, and manager respondents were asked to rate their employees with less than five years of experience on the same metrics. Across all categories, early-career respondents rated themselves higher than managers did. To wit: On a 10-point scale, the less-experienced workers rated themselves an average 2.44 points higher than managers’ responses.
To name just one example, in the communication and professionalism category, early-career workers gave themselves an average of 8.2 when it comes to “following up and responding to colleagues or clients in a timely manner.” Yet in this same area, managers gave their less-experienced colleagues a rating of 5.21. Similarly, early-career respondents gave themselves a rating of 8 for managing time, priorities and deadlines, while manager respondents gave their younger counterparts a meager 4.81 in the same area.
The findings hold particular relevance as more and more states continue to green-light a 120-hour alternative pathway to CPA licensure. With the formal blessing of the AICPA and the NASBA earlier this summer, that pathway — which would no longer require candidates to obtain a master’s degree — could one day become a national standard.
In a Tuesday interview, Illinois CPA Society President and CEO Geoffrey Brown said the study was motivated, in part, by changing licensure standards. He noted the organization had already begun to detect an “emerging disconnect” between generations.
“When you look down the road a little bit in this post-150 world we’re leaning into, we know that young people are going to be spending less and less time on campus, which means less time to develop some of those core skills,” he said. “The gap is only going to get bigger if we don’t start acting on it now.”
The society also embarked on the study in light of a growing multigenerational workforce and rapid technological changes in the profession, including, of course, the proliferation of new artificial intelligence tools.
“For the first time ever, five different and very distinct generations are trying to work together, giving way to the greatest amount of generational friction our workplaces have ever experienced,” Illinois CPA Society officials wrote in the report.
Respondents in the study were pulled from an Illinois CPA Society database, so many are from that state. But Brown maintains survey results likely would not have been much different if it were a comprehensive national survey.
“I say that because we have a lot of opportunities to have conversations with firm leaders, employers and professionals across the country, and with our peer group in the state society world. And we’re not alone in noticing this; we’re just the first ones to put this together,” he said.
For CFOs, in particular, Brown hopes the survey results will be a “conversation starter.”
“There’s probably more opportunity to act on some of these findings on the industry side,” he said. “We know that the pace of change in the profession is really rapid, and we don’t want anybody, regardless of segment, to get left behind.”
