Importance Of Communication Skills And Emotional Intelligence In Accounting - Junior Accountant Essay.

You are applying for a junior accountant position. You are required to respond to the interviewer in terms of your understandings of basic accounting duties and how do you think communication skills and emotional intelligence are relevant for this position?

Duties of an accountant

Communication skills in accounting involve concepts such as establishing meaningful relationships with colleagues and customers. It also entails recognizing one's opinions and those of others, awareness of people's emotions and coping with problems effectively.  Consequently, emotional intelligence is the potential for an individual to make observations and differentiate his own and the others' feelings and use this as a guide for his thoughts and behavior. For the junior accountancy profession, apart from possessing the required knowledge and skills required by profession, having high emotional intelligence and a healthy interpersonal communication should not be ignored and thus opinions about the need of communication skills and emotional intelligence in business are increasing daily. This paper elaborates on how the interviewee will be able to show how the interviewee will respond to essential accounting duties and the importance of having excellent communication skills and emotional intelligence in accounting.

 The following are the duties of an accountant:

First, an accountant calculates taxes owed and analyze tax returns by ensuring that they comply with the payments, reporting and analyze business operations, revenues and obligations to provide advice for future use in the business. (Routledge 2016). He or she also reports to the head on the finances of the establishment of specific issues in the business. Furthermore, as an accountant, one advises the management on the budget forecast and utilization of the available resources in the business for prosperity.

Additionally, an accountant has to prepare and analyze accounting records and financial statements to assess its perfection. Furthermore, an accountant deals with developing and separating the budgets into its constituent parts. He or she also creates and implements document recordkeeping and various systems of accounting, making much use of modern computer technology system and also uses the computer to record the business’s data.

An accountant survey operations to design, and maintain remedies to business and financial challenges and provide advisory services for organizations and personnel.

Lastly, an accountant advises customers in core areas including restitution, employee health care advantages and the designing of accounting systems of the business (Cardon 2014). Also to investigate debts and stand in for their customers before taxing authorities and give necessary support during solutions concerning financial problems.

In accountancy, there are various specific business communication techniques necessary for success at accountancy workplace as discussed below.

First of all, accountancy needs excellent listening skills to take into consideration other views of one's communication. Listening indicates one value other’s points of view and is open to new obligations. (De Lautour 2018). An accountant gives time to the clients to ask questions to ascertain active communication. Consequently, verbal communication will enable accountants to engage with others to reach an agreement.

Communication techniques in accountancy

Secondly, writing techniques are also relevant to accountancy. Written communication for business has to be brief but contain all the necessary information that helps one's customers to focus on only the most critical points (Clokie & Fourie 2016). Excellent written communication also comprises of enough follow-up, which enables good communication and indicates hard work towards one’s objective in the business.

Thirdly, teamwork helps with communication. It is effective communication with other people who might have different points of view. In accountancy, this means laying aside our beliefs and working under one objection; that is the success of the business. For successful teamwork, participants must know that working together is worth more than individual work.

Interpersonal communication techniques in accountancy also allow employees to work together under a common goal. Interpersonal communication also involves interaction between correspondent situation such as between co-workers and subordinates. Additionally, it is the development of strong relationships with the managers of a business organization.

An accountant also needs presentation techniques in presenting information to customers in a way that is motivating and inspiring to them (Libby 2016). This method of business communication enables an individual, to provide satisfactory evidence which gives support to an idea. An excellent presenter should be able to influence his or her clients to act toward a desired business result.

By being a good listener, an accountant will understand what makes people listen to what he or she is talking about. Listening is essential in communication because listening has a distinct value in enabling an accountant to be good at communication (Bhasin 2015). Being a good listener lets one analyze questions and answer it accordingly. Listening prepares one for responding effectively.

Involving one’s client implies that clients have a great interest in communicating with the accountant in an expectation of getting positive results. This communication is fundamentally important if one wants to become an exceptional communicator. During an engagement with the listener, there is an expectation of direct feedback; it can be negative or positive which helps one as a junior accountant to evaluate the level of the business (Low 2016). Positive feedback empowers one to work extra harder to achieve the best.

On the other hand, development of healthy and trusting relationships as a junior accountant in the business arena is essential to increase ones effective use of emotional intelligence (Mohamad & Jais 2016). It’s important to remember that emotional state and one's awareness primarily influence the professional relationship with clients. In accountancy, possessing a high emotional intelligence is essential to success as justified below.

The significance of emotional intelligence in accountancy

Accountants should have self-regulation that enables them to regulate themselves accordingly and control their emotions and impulses. For example, they do not make rash emotional decisions, verbally attack others, or compromise their values. Accountants hold themselves accountable, are calm, and understand their benefits.

Self-awareness is likewise essential in accountancy. It is getting a clear picture of one's strengths and weaknesses (Parker et al. 2018). Different accountants understand their capabilities and can weigh their strengths while at the same time, improve on their weaknesses. Inclusively, motivation in accounting enables accountants to be motivated and formulate goals that they consistently work to achieve thus uphold teamwork which takes them to high standards thus promoting effective performance.

Possessing empathy is also crucial to a group of people or organizational management. Accountants take their time to develop and understand the people on their side.  Likewise, they identify the body language and emotions of others and can act accordingly to any situation (Malouff & Thorsteinsson 2014). Empathy additionally includes your ability to comprehend what others are feeling, why and to know how those around you will perceive your words and actions. Without understanding, an accountant will alienate people and never see the reason behind it. It is complicated to succeed without understanding the needs of other people others.

Lastly, influencing yourself is the ability to modify own behavior into a required action. A junior accountant can set personal goals, create a plan to achieve their goals and implement it which influences their behavior positively.

Conclusion

Conclusively, this paper elaborates on the responses or instead importance that the interviewee will give concerning own understanding of communication skills and emotional intelligence as the basis of accounting. Other basics of accounting include; proper dressing to be presentable to the business's customers, office hygiene and also punctuality to the office. Additionally, some other features that one should observe during the interview include: employing comprehensive listening to understand what is being interviewed on and avoid faking attention, asking where it is not clear to cater for correct responses and use appropriate eye contact to gain confidence in the entire interview session.

References

Bhasin, M.L., 2015. Survey on skills required by the forensic accountants: evidence from a developing country (pp.23-25).

Cardon, P.W., 2014. Business Communication: Developing Leaders for a Networked World (3e). McGraw-Hill (pp.32-56).

Clokie, T.L., and Fourie, E., 2016. Graduate employability and communication competence: Are undergraduates taught relevant skills? Business and Professional Communication Quarterly, 79(4), pp.442-463.

De Lautour, V.J., 2018. The Management Accountant as a Strategic Decision-Maker. In Strategic Management Accounting, Volume II (pp. 1-48). Palgrave Macmillan, Cham.

Libby, R., 2017. Accounting and human information processing. In The Routledge Companion to Behavioural Accounting Research (pp. 42-54).

Low, M., Botes, V., De La Rue, D. and Allen, J., 2016. Accounting employers' expectations-the ideal accounting graduates.

Malouff, J.M., and Thorsteinsson, E.B., 2014. Trait emotional intelligence and romantic relationship satisfaction: A meta-analysis. The American Journal of Family Therapy, 42(1), pp.53-66.

Mohamad, M. and Jais, J., 2016. The Emotional intelligence and work performance: A study among Malaysian teachers. Procedia Economics and Finance, 35, pp.674-682.

Parker, J.D., Taylor, R.N., Keefer, K.V., and Summerfield, L.J., 2018. Emotional Intelligence and Post-Secondary Education: What Have We Learned and What Have We Missed? In Emotional Intelligence in Education (pp. 427-452). Springer, Cham.

Routledge.Lim, Y.M., Lee, T.H., Yap, C.S. and Ling, C.C., 2016. Employability skills, personal qualities, and early employment problems of entry-level auditors: Perspectives from employers, lecturers, auditors, and students. Journal of Education for Business, 91(4), pp.185-192.