New Jersey Society of CPAs: Get Ready for the Fast Future

The fast future

Get ready for …

The anticipatory accounting

and finance professional

Bill Sheridan, CAE

The Business Learning Institute

bli.cnf.io

MPH: 300,000

MPG: 2 million

Price: 4 cents

Our top challenge?

“When the job is in

the way of the work,

consider changing

your job enough that

you can go back to

creating value.

Anything less is

hiding.”

Seth Godin

Top five issues

impacting CPAs

1. Keeping up

2. Information overload

3. Doing more with less

4. Being proactive vs. reactive

5. Complexity

Bill Sheridan, CAE

The Business Learning

Institute

0 2 4 6 8

Poor reputation

No personal relationship

Inadequate staff to meet…

Out-of-date technology

Fees were too high

CPA lacked expertise

Referral to a new firm

Poor responsiveness

CPA advice not proactive

Why SMBs leave their CPA /

accountant

Bill Sheridan, CAE


Institute

Source: CPA.COM Insight into

the CPA of the Future Study 2014

Only 8% of CPAs are future-ready

Future-ready is the capacity to be

aware, predictive, and adaptive of

emerging challenges, tech

innovations, and trends and

changes in business, population,

and social environment.

Bill Sheridan, CAE


“You can’t stop the waves, but

you can learn how to surf.”

– Jon Kabat-Zinn

Oceans of opportunity

The faster you go, the farther

ahead you have to look.

5 steps to becoming future-ready

1. Context

2. Certainty

3. Capacity

4. Competence

5. Core beliefs

Bill Sheridan, CAE


Context

“We stand on the brink of a technological

revolution that will fundamentally alter the

way we live, work, and relate to one

another. In its scale, scope, and

complexity, the transformation will be

unlike anything humankind has

experienced before.”

-- Klaus Schwab, World Economic ForumBill Sheridan, CAE


“In the next five years,

game-changing

technologies

will transform every

business process,

including how we sell,

market, communicate,

collaborate, educate,

train, and innovate.”

-- Daniel Burrus

Source: Frey & Osborne,

“The Future of Employment,” Oxford University

Race against the machines?

Bill Sheridan, CAE


Institute

47%of all jobs gone within 25 years

‘No government is

prepared’ for that level of

job loss

Source: The Economist

Bill Sheridan, CAE


Are your offices, workspaces,

and technology future-focused?

Do you know what your clients

are facing now and in the future?

Are you using the language of

the future or the past?

Will students and potential

employees feel like they are

traveling back in time when they

walk through your door?

Certainty

Hard trends = future facts

Four hard trends:1. Government regulation

2. Technology

3. Demographics

4. Globalization

Disruption and RONIThe gap is widening, faster!

Source: Clayton Christensen, “Innovation Killers”

We think this

is the

trade-off

Bill Sheridan, CAE


Institute

Capacity

6 ways to create

capacity

• Maximize the software and tools you have

• Use the latest, most efficient technologies

• Workflow and process efficiency

• Focus on your best ‘A’ clients / customers

• Communicate your services (cross-sell)

• Engage your people

Competency

Disruptions before they disrupt

Problems before you have them

Customer needs before they have them

New opportunities before the competition

Anticipate

Source: Daniel Burrus

The researchThe latest research inside and

outside the CPA profession re-

affirms the top competencies

and skills needed by accounting

and finance professionals.

Bill Sheridan, CAE


Top skills that accounting and finance

professionals need today

BLI Research in 2015 with over 1,000 responses from all segments of the CPA

profession identified these top skill needed to be successful in these rapidly

changing times. This confirms and reinforces the research from the Conference

Board, AICPA’s CPA Horizons 2025 report, Bersin, and Burrus Research.

75%

covered by

these top 5

skills

V

A

L

U

E

Adding Insight for Action

Information

Wisdom

Knowledge

Data

Compliance

Reliance

Source: CGMA and DIKW Pyramid

V

A

L

U

E

#FutureReadyIs the capacity to be anticipatory

(aware, predictive and adaptive) of

emerging technology and trends in

business, demographics, and the

social environment impacting your

organization and industry.

Bill Sheridan, CAE


Respond lightning fast

Access an encyclopaedic memory

Stay awake 24 x 7 x 365

Remember conversations

Analyze on the fly

Continually learn and improve

Advantage,

machines

Source: AccountingWEB

Intuition

Political acumen

Challenging

Reading the back story

Who’s who?

Probability of change

Culture

What’s in it for me?

Advantage,

humans

Source: AccountingWEB

“Professional

judgment and

expertise is not

replaceable by

machines.”

— Cathy Engelbert

CEO, Deloitte

“What can I become quite good at

that’s really difficult for a computer t

o do one day soon? How can I

become so resilient, so human and

such a linchpin that shifts in

technology won’t be able

to catch up? It was always

important, but now it’s urgent.”

-- Seth Godin

“Humans should only do

work that only humans

can do.”

Peter Sheahan

Trust

Integrity

Objectivity

Excellence

Lifelong learning

Core beliefs and values

Protect the core and stimulate progress

Autonomy

Mastery

Purpose

What do people

really want?

5 steps to becoming future-ready

1. Context

2. Certainty

3. Capacity

4. Competence

5. Core beliefs

Bill Sheridan, CAE


The Shift Change

Leadership

Learning

Technology

Generations

Workplace

The challenge and

opportunity is to make

the shift from the first

curve to the second

curve at the right time

and with the right

strategy.

“How would you think differently about

your strategy if you knew your advantage

might not last?”

Calendar: The No. 1 app

Spend just one hour per week in the future …

“We are

called to be

architects

of the future,

not its

victims.”R. Buckminster Fuller

“The best way

to predict

your future

is to create it.”

Abraham Lincoln

Questions?

Bill Sheridan, CAE


Books These are among the resources that were discussed during

the our “Future-Ready CPA” programs.

The Future of the Professions:

How Technology Will Transform

the Work of Human Experts

By Richard and Daniel Susskind

www.susskind.com

The Fourth Industrial Revolution

By Klaus Schwab

bit.ly/1qLrfzs

Flash Foresight: How To See

The Invisible And Do The

Impossible

By Daniel Burrus

bit.ly/1SOn7FG

The Second Machine Age: Work,

Progress And Prosperity In A Time

of Brilliant Technologies

By Erik Brynjolfsson

and Andrew McAfee

www.SecondMachineAge.com

The Industries Of The Future

By Alec Ross

bit.ly/2fP8cnU

Thank You For Being Late: An

Optimist’s Guide to Thriving in

the Age of Accelerations

By Thomas Friedman

bit.ly/2hag0Rg

What SMBs Want From Their

Accountant

From The Sleeter Group

bit.ly/2fCsvkc

Welcome to the Fast Future

From CPA.com

bit.ly/2gdHlBj

The Future of Employment: How

Susceptible Are Jobs To

Computerization?

By Carl Benedikt Frey and

Michael Osborne

bit.ly/1kre5T6

CPA Horizons 2025

From the American Institute

of CPAs

bit.ly/1UEN1x2

Innovation Killers: How Financial

Tools Destroy Your Capacity To

Do New Things

By Clayton Christensen,

Stephen P. Kaufman

and Willy Shih

bit.ly/1JtBxfG

Ready-Now Leaders: Meeting

Tomorrow’s Business

Challenges

From DDI

bit.ly/V05HQ6

WhitepapersThese are among the resources that were

discussed during the our “Future-Ready CPA”

programs.

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The future-

ready CPA

Bill Sheridan, CAE
