Supporting Our Young and Emerging Professionals

By Jenny Bolsky, CPA

Last month I attended the CalCPA Council meeting, which featured council business and guest speakers in the morning and a government relations update over lunch. The afternoon focused on young and emerging professionals. A large faction of CalCPA’s YEP members attended the meeting as invited guests, including three of our chapter’s own emerging professionals who participated in a panel discussion about their experiences, challenges and successes in the profession.

After the panel, the council broke into assigned groups with YEP representation at every table to discuss a YEP-related topic. The breakout session was designed to elicit ideas about how CalCPA can serve our newest members. It was very interesting to hear the suggestions each group presented; the dominant theme was mentoring.

No doubt you have seen much about our organization’s YEPs in CalCPA literature and on the website. It is important to note the “and” in the YEP title, as one can be an emerging professional without meeting the technical definition of “young.” Those folks entering our profession who are students, CPA candidates and CPA licensees of five or fewer years are considered YEP. That means that the members of this group are constantly changing.

As our YEP participants move out of this demographic, we must be vigilant in our efforts to engage new students, candidates and recent licensees so that there is an active corps of new CalCPA members engaged in our chapter activities. Some events are oriented specifically to our newest members, which provides important support and camaraderie within the group, yet it is equally important for the newcomers to interact with our chapter’s more seasoned professionals so that we can learn from them and they from us. We need to identify what is important to the incoming generation of professionals so that our organization can serve their needs and so they can be meaningfully involved in the success of our profession.

The chapter’s Young and Emerging Professionals Committee is a dynamic group of successful, energetic individuals with an abundance of good ideas. The committee holds periodic events for its members, both educational and social, plus plenty of networking opportunities in a friendly atmosphere. If you are a YEP, I invite you to join the committee or participate in some of its events. If you know a young or emerging professional, or the next time your meet one, I encourage you to tell him or her about the YEP Committee and its benefits.

I left the council meeting feeling invigorated and inspired by the superb people in our profession. I was also struck by the importance of outreach. Those of us who are successful in the profession must reach out to those individuals just joining CalCPA. We must draw them in, engage them, mentor them and make it easy for them to get involved. We are responsible for the succession plan of CalCPA and the accounting profession.

I wish you all happy holidays, good health and success in the coming year.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, December 1st, 2009 at 12:18 pm and is filed under President's Message. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.