Episode 35: The Power of Professionalism (In Demand Accountant Part 6)
In Episode 35, Sam explores the concept of Professionalism and why it's a crucial part of being an In Demand Accountant.
Sam covers how her understanding and thoughts on the concept have changed over time, and which of the two main aspects of professionalism that our industry needs to work on. She also explains the little everyday actions that can whittle away your professionalism, plus the three attributes of the way our industry already works that is a strength of our professionalism.
Finally, Sam explores how empowering the next generation of accountants and integrating our professional and personal lives impacts on our profesionalism.
Listen to an excerpt
What we cover
What professionalism means as an In Demand Accountant
How Sam’s understanding and thoughts on the word have changed on this over time
The two aspects of professionalism, and which one the industry needs to continue to work on
Why professionalism so important in general but especially to be In Demand going forward
The key qualities of professionalism outside of our technical skill areas
The importance of having an orientation towards service
The little everyday actions that can whittle away professionalism
Our strengths and the three attributes of the way we work that make us professional
The need to be continually seeking additional learning, as well as developing new skills, especially the “soft” skills
Why it’s professional to be empowering our next generation of accountants
How the integration and balance between our professional and personal lives impacts our professionalism
Quotes
“To be professional, we obviously have qualifications and membership into professional organisations. But I want to really explore the different aspects of professionalism and why they're so important and why this will be one of our superpowers going forward.”
“As I've worked and developed businesses, and done a lot more deep work around values, and particularly as I've explored options in the accounting industry and had some behaviour personally towards me that that wasn't professional, I've really come to understand professionalism is a whole lot deeper than [qualifications and technical skills].”
“Professionalism should flow into everything you do, not just your conduct with clients, but also your conduct with your staff, and then actually how you conduct yourself outside the office as well.”
“It's actually the little things sometimes in professionalism that actually let us down. We might get those big reports ready, we might get our lodgement deadline done but we whittle away the respect that we've built in [little things] we do every day.”
“We get so much everyday distraction that we really need to focus on this area and work towards it. So part of professionalism is actually exhibiting that temperance, which is the ability to resist distractions. And this is super hard, obviously, in our day to day.”
“We know that we've been hit with technology and digitalization, but to really be of service, we need to look at all of this and spend some time learning about other things outside our everyday technical legislation. We need to learn new technologies, we need to learn new communication skills.”
“It is super important that we are here to be In Demand, here to support our clients, particularly in the next 6-18 months: we have to take care of ourselves. So one of the key attributes of professionalism, that's always overlooked [is self-care and work-life balance]. And I know I have overlooked it, but I know how important this is. The more time I spend on this, the more I've actually got to give back and contribute to my clients.”
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