Accountants aren’t mere heads-down, number-crunching functionaries, of course. Today, they need a strategic orientation to fulfill their professional potential. And in that vein, there’s still another side to accountants — the socially aware side.
In North America, almost two-thirds (63%) of participants in a recent study by the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants said they’re interested in pursuing accountancy and finance roles with a focus on social impact issues.
Almost as many (59%) of the 335 respondents expressed interest in working on environmental issues.
At the same time, though, only 50% of those surveyed said they are currently contributing to organizational or client responses to social impact and environmental issues, and just 42% said the same with respect to environmental issues.
Organizations should heed these views in their efforts to recruit and retain accounting and finance professionals, ACCA counseled. “The importance of social issues, challenges with cross-generational collaboration, and mental health aspects of work are all factors, among others, that impact the workforce and should not be ignored,” said Jillian Couse, head of ACCA North America, in a press release.
Indeed, 70% of the surveyed professionals identified social impact matters as a key factor when considering potential employers. Companies, consequently, should embed ESG commitments into everyday decision-making and operations, rather than relying solely on high-level commitments, ACCA wrote in its survey report.
Half of the respondents identified the social component of ESG as the most important, compared to 27% for governance and just 20% for the environmental aspect.
The survey also found that respondents were split on whether their organization’s approach to ESG is genuine (37%) or more of a branding exercise (35%). Almost a third (28%) answered, “don’t know.”
The North America survey was part of a global study that included 11,389 respondents from 160 countries. The broader research showed significant variances in the proportion of accounting and finance roles with social impacts based on the type of employer. Such roles are most prevalent at not-for-profit organizations, and least prevalent at small and midsized businesses.
The global study presented five key areas in which accountants will drive the social impact agenda for the future.
- Investment appraisal and capital allocation. “Estimating the intangible benefits of investments and their social impact will be an important objective,” ACCA wrote.
- Performance management. Effective data governance processes help capture internal and external data flows that can create a meaningful picture of the organization’s social value contribution, according to ACCA.
- Future financing and investor engagement. “The role of the CFO, in particular, is key, as investors continue to place more scrutiny and interest on an organization’s broader value activities,” the report said. “There’s a growing need for finance leaders to demonstrate the connection between financial outcomes and ESG commitments.”
- Governance and risk management. Finance professionals have a critical role to play in establishing appropriate control frameworks and reporting mechanisms to manage risks appropriately across all social impact issues, ACCA wrote.
- External regulatory and reporting requirements. More specific regulatory requirements will continue to evolve around social impact issues, including AI and data protection, human rights and corporate social responsibility, according to ACCA.
