Mentoring in the accounting field has many benefits. Mentoring can help increase diversity in a profession dominated by white males by creating a more inclusive environment, and encouraging people to progress their careers. Mentoring can also increase employee engagement and lower employee turnover.
Adams, B. L. (2019). The CPA Project: A Model To Embrace Diversity and Inclusion In the
Accounting Profession. Business Education Innovation Journal, 11(1), 154–159.
In this article the author Barbara L. Adams mentioned the lack of minority in the Accounting profession. Adams goes into depth why there is only 3% of African American in the accounting profession. Adams explain what kind of barriers African American when going for an accounting major. She also mentions ways that firms, colleges and others pass African American that have a CPA be able to help other African American get into the accounting profession. By establishing programs in universities to help many young college students know what steps they need to do in order for them to get their CPA. This article is an important resource because the author outlines some important concepts that involve the lack of diversity in an accounting firm. Especially why the process is slow for many minority groups. This can be tied with how firms can include more diversity and how mentoring can help minority groups go into the accounting profession.
Fearfull, A., & Kamenou, N. (2006). How do you account for it? Critical Perspectives on Accounting, 17(7),883-901.
The authors, researcher Anne Fearfull and Nicolina Kamenou conducted a series of semi-structured in-depth interviews with 26 ethnic minority women (ranging in occupation, profession, and industry within private, public and voluntary sectors) focusing on their career history, experiences, opportunities, working relationships with colleagues, and work/life balance within corporate organizations. They extend their research to take into account race and ethnicity combined with the existing information on gender-dominated organizational culture. Fearfull’s and Kamenou’s research derived to two main themes, one is the observance of organisational support to ethnic minority women and the issues of networking and career strategy. This source is favorable to our topic that highlights the lack of diversity in the accounting profession which displays a gender-dominated culture. Not only that, but it also focuses on the double negative barriers coming from an underrepresented marginalized group of women. Although this source contains valuable and useful information, it lacks exclusive information about the accounting industry.
Hall, M., & Smith, D. (2009). Mentoring and turnover intentions in public accounting firms: A research note. Accounting, Organizations & Society, 34(6/7), 695–704.
This study aimed to investigate how different functions of mentoring affect employee retention. Hall and Smith argue that mentoring serves two main purposes: career development support and psychosocial support. They found that career development support could actually increase organizational turnover intentions, because employees with more career development support are more psychologically empowered. More confident employees believe they can find valued employment alternatives at other firms. On the other hand, psychosocial support was found to increase affective commitment, or the level to which an employee identifies with the organization, meaning they were less likely to want to leave their current position. This article is relevant because it gives evidence that supports our blog topic, the importance of mentorship. This study is particularly valuable because it investigates why mentorship affects employee retention, rather than whether it does or not. This study was conducted by surveying Australian accountants, which limits its usefulness to our blog because cultural differences between America and Australia may affect the results.
Curtis, M. B., & Taylor, E. Z. (2018). Developmental mentoring, affective organizational commitment, and knowledge sharing in public accounting firms. Journal of Knowledge Management, 22(1), 142–161.
According to scholars Mary B. Curtis and Eileen Z. Taylor, one benefit of mentorship is that it fosters affective commitment in the protégé. They found that mentoring leads to a sense of belonging in the firm. This finding is supported by Australian scholars Matthew Hall and David Smith, who found that one of the primary functions of mentorship is psychosocial support, in which the mentor serves as a friend and role model. This form of mentorship focuses on interpersonal exchange between mentor and mentee, which creates a sense of belonging at the firm and develops affective organizational commitment in the protégé. According to Hall and Smith, affective organizational commitment is the level of emotional attachment an employee feels towards their firm. Creating affective organizational commitment is crucial because when mentees are invested in their firm, they are less likely to seek work elsewhere. This means that mentorship that supports the mentee psychosocially can be instrumental in helping firms decrease turnover. Although this study was conducted in Australia, its basic premise, that mentorship fosters affective organizational commitment, is supported by Curtis and Taylor’s American study, and therefore it is reasonable to think that the rest of the study’s results are applicable to American accounting firms as well. Accounting firms that wish to increase employee retention should consider implementing mentorship programs focused on psychosocial support to foster committed employees.
Reinstein, A., Sinason, D. H., & Fogarty, T. J. (2012). Examining Mentoring in Public Accounting Organizations. Review of Business, 33(1), 40–49.
This article goes into how mentoring can apply to accounting and the details of how mentoring differs from training and coaching. The trends of mentoring are also covered in detail as well as the perspectives of the mentors and mentees. The article discusses in detail how mentoring can help increase diversity within organizations and how it can benefit public accounting firms. Lastly it talks about who should be mentored and when they should be mentored. I plan on using this article to introduce the topic of mentoring in accounting so we can go into how it can help with diversity problems in accounting firms. This article would be more applicable to our topic if it had information on diversity in accounting firms.
Wells, J. T., & Ross, F. K. (2012, June 1). Best Practices for Promotion of Diversity in the
Accounting Profession.
This article describes what the two authors perceive to be some of the best ways to increase diversity within the accounting profession. When it comes to mentoring within the accounting field they believe it is best to assign best performers as mentors and to rotate individuals until there is a match amongst personalities. Alongside mentoring new hires, it is best to establish a supportive and safe environment from the start. Exposing minorities and youth through boot camps and social media is great for exposure. Building a support line for those interested in the field promotes an increase in diversity for all organizations. Another suggestion made within the article would be to set up a blind assignment system to delegate equal numbers of hours on CEO-type clients. Doing so increases the understanding, exposure, and confidence of all employees. Additionally, these teachings encourage employees to overcome the fear of conflict and speak honestly, further increasing diversity within the organization.
Blake VanDyke, Rosa Paz, Leslie Aguilar, Isaiah Perez, and Lily Kimura