Co-founder of The Outperformer Brad Eisenhuth noted that the path to partnership is no longer as simple as it once was.
“If you look at the big four, less than 1 per cent of every intake is able to reach partner position,” Mr Eisenhuth said.
“So when you consider an intake of graduates, quite factually they know that within the audit stream, for example, they may not be able to get to the top role.”
Mr Eisenhuth said that accountants wanting to move up the ranks at a firm now have to think more laterally about the decisions they make to get there.
“The firm can still be a fantastic place to build a career, but it may not be in the original path,” he said.
“I think what some of these accountants can start to consider are ways to help the firm continue to evolve in different service lines as opposed to seeing a one track path within their current position.”
Adding to this issue is that many graduates are simply not prepared for the day-to-day reality of being an accountant in Australia.
In line with reports that “thousands” of accounting graduates are under-qualified, Intuit recently said that tertiary education for accountants is being taught on outdated technology systems, which is having a ripple effect into business mindsets and employability.
Australian TAFE colleges and universities are, by and large, still teaching the students on desktop accounting systems, with very few providing adequate training on cloud-based technologies, according to Trent McLaren, senior BDM at Intuit.
“Then, in the real world, nobody uses that technology anymore. So they’ve been set up for failure from the get-go, and would be relying on the accounting firm they go into to be progressive and tech-savvy,” Mr McLaren said.
