In this series, we speak with professionals across different sectors about the challenges they face in their roles, and bring lessons back to accounting based on the solutions they have implemented. Read our last instalment featuring lessons from engineers here, and keep watch for lessons from other professions in the coming months.
While accountants have the potential to be powerful influencers and strategic partners, doing so requires them to move beyond technical skills and develop their ability to influence, coach and collaborate, says Karen Gately, Founder of HR consultancy Corporate Dojo.
By taking the lead of HR practitioners and honing these capabilities, accountants can adopt a more holistic approach to their work and develop a better understanding of client needs and broader business context.
“It’s about challenging your own process and your own approach to doing your work,” says Gately. “[As an accountant], I need to be willing to get out of my seat, go and interact with the business and build those relationships in order for us to become one team.”
1. Build your influence
To get their workforce strategies over the line, it’s important for HR professionals to be equipped with the skills and confidence to influence executives and stakeholders. Perhaps more importantly, they also need to influence employees’ mindsets and behaviours to ensure they are aligned with the organisation’s objectives.
“Being able to actually implement your advice requires that you build an understanding of the stakeholder, how that stakeholder thinks, how to influence their emotions, and then ultimately how to influence the decisions that they make,” says Gately.
“Empathy is a really important skill if you want to be influential and have strong relationships. If I can empathise with this person and how they operate, then I can adapt that strategy.”
Gately, who began her career in finance and works closely with accountants in her practice, stresses that building influence is also crucial for accountants to implement their advice and drive decisions, whether working in an accounting practice or as an in-house accountant.
To help build these skills, she suggests that accountants take the lead of HR professionals and hold themselves accountable for building and maintaining key stakeholder relationships in order to hone their influencing skills.
“Actually getting into the trenches and engaging in and taking accountability for some of those conversations is the best way to build confidence around it,” she says.
The lesson: When offering advice or conveying information, consider the approach and communication style that’s most likely to influence the listener’s mindset. To help build these skills, accountants can seek mentorship from influential communicators in the business and take more accountability for client relationships.
2. Turn feedback into insight
Understanding and leveraging feedback is instrumental in guiding the development and refinement of any effective strategy.
Beyond simply having the mechanisms in place to collect client feedback, embracing feedback as a crucial component for growth can transform how accountants interact with and support their clients.
An example of this might be an accountant learning that their reporting is not considered valuable by their client, she says. By being inquisitive, inviting feedback and questioning what it will take for the client to see real value, accountants can adapt the way they present their results to ensure their work is heard, understood and appreciated.
By leaning into feedback with empathy and curiosity and resisting the urge to be defensive or deflective, accountants can not only provide better services but also strengthen their relationships and positioning as indispensable business partners.
The lesson: Embrace feedback not just as criticism, but as a vital source of insights that can drive better understanding, adaptation and ultimately more effective management and reporting.
3. Develop coaching skills
Effective coaching is a cornerstone of HR, and Gately believes accountants can greatly benefit from developing these skills. Coaching helps build confidence, emotional intelligence, and empathy – all essential for influencing and managing client relationships.
“Often, we’re having to educate our clients to build their financial acumen. So building those coaching and education skills, which are inherent in the HR role, is really useful,” she says.
“Both an accountant and an HR professional should be advisors and partners, whether that’s to their client or whether that’s to the leaders in their organisation.”
Similarly to developing influence, developing coaching skills is easiest when approached through a lens of empathy and emotional intelligence.
“If I have the capacity to empathise with you, I’m more able to influence you, but most of all, I’m able to adapt my approach and my style to communicate with you in ways that are likely to land well,” says Gately.
“I can then come at it in a way that’s more likely to keep the person’s confidence and maintain that partnering relationship.”
The lesson: Continuously developing coaching skills can help accountants better support their clients and colleagues, particularly when it comes to less approachable topics such as auditing and regulatory compliance updates.
