BUSINESS & FINANCE CORNER
– Head of Corporate Development, ACCA Caribbean
THE big issues senior professional accountants face today are primarily around controlling costs, holding or increasing revenues, holding onto customers and improving productivity.

Most will focus on tried and tested techniques for achieving this and a gifted few will realise that at the heart of meeting these objectives is investment in people.

There is evidence to suggest that organisations which continue to invest in a downturn will increase market share and come out of the blocks quicker when the economic situation improves.

It may come as a surprise, to some, that coaching and mentoring as a professional development technique can help resolve these big issues and is a highly cost effective means of professional development.

But a recent survey by ACCA shows that whilst 90% of finance professionals would value coaching and mentoring, less than a third of their organisations provide it.

Another worrying trend is the tendency to focus solely on technical skills without also ensuring that enabling high performance leadership behaviours are also being developed.

Coaching has been described as “…unlocking a person’s potential to maximise their own performance”.

It is driven by the individual and is designed to specifically enhance performance with a view to enabling the individual to achieve a targeted set of objectives.

It is usually for a defined period of time and can be facilitated by someone from within or outside the organisation.

As it is facilitative, it encourages the coachee to be creative and innovative in setting objectives and resolving their issues.

In this current environment such intellectual agility can be a real bonus.

Mentoring on the other hand is typically more directive and with the objective of the Mentee learning specifically from the Mentor’s knowledge and experience.

Again, in these turbulent times in which anyone who qualified post the early 1990’s will not have experienced such adverse conditions, the experience of those who have is invaluable.

The benefits, including time and cost efficiency and high impact seem apparent. However, why is ‘take up’ so low?

The ACCA research indicates that low ‘take up’ is attributable to coaching being made available to those at senior levels only and little senior level buy in, uncertainty on costs and benefits, a continued focus on traditional classroom teaching and finally the absence of an effective partnership between HR (human resource) and finance.

Where coaching and mentoring techniques are being used, the conclusion from the research was that they were being poorly practiced.

As organisations continue to provide financial support to such processes, this suggests returns on training investment could be improved.

This will continue to grow as an issue with an increased focus on cost and the need to extract better value for each pound spent.

This view should be balanced by the acknowledgement that practices are continuing to evolve, and some good practices exist at the larger global organisations.

So what does good practice look like, and what should firms be doing to implement better programmes which are more likely to implement effective results? The lessons for either implementing or improving a coaching and mentoring programme are:-

** Extend coaching to all levels. Those organisations which have coaching practices typically only make these available to senior finance personnel, which is potentially a big mistake – all finance employees are likely to benefit from exposure to coaching and/or mentoring practices. Employers should be reviewing where coaching and/or mentoring interventions apply best across the finance community.

** Establish a coaching culture across finance. This is key to success, and key to maximizing returns on investment. Where cultures exist, typically they are implied, rather than explicit. Establishing coaching and mentoring processes as endemic across organisations is critically important. In establishing a coaching culture, organisations need to build coaching processes as an integral part of the appraisal and development process, make available both internal and externally accredited coaches, so that it becomes a norm, and a behaviour to be adopted in all aspects of work. This approach is being adopted by Ernst and Young, where coaching becomes an integral part of how the organisation undertakes its business.

** Develop your finance professionals as coaches. Your people will benefit from a more inspirational and rewarding learning process if their managers transform individuals through coaching, rather than through directional instruction.

** Get buy in from top management. They must be seen to champion the philosophy and coaching processes the organisation is establishing. Without the support of the senior team, coaching and mentoring initiatives will fail. Organisations must pro-actively promote and make visible the support such programmes have right from the top.

** Measure success and monitor effectiveness. The very best organisations continually obtain feedback from the learner, the coach, and line management/HR on how the success or otherwise of coaching and mentoring interventions. If success is more transparently measured, the business case for coaching justifies itself.

** Use the (often complementary) resources developed by professional bodies such as ACCA and CIPD. Bear in mind also that ACCA recognizes coaching and mentoring as a valid form of CPD and provides for mentoring as part of its practical experience programme for trainees.

I would expect that the current economic climate will focus the mind when it comes to professional development spending.

And I would expect to see organisations becoming more innovative and, perhaps ironically, being more willing to try new techniques with a view to getting a greater and more tangible return on investment.

Conversely, it could be argued that by those who fail to improve professional development programmes are failing to maximise their return on human capital employed (ROHCE) and as a consequence financial performance will be compromised. Fortunately, a few small steps can be taken to avoid this scenario.

Further information, and access to the full report “The Coaching and Mentoring revolution – is the working?”, as well as a wide range of other research on human capital issues affecting the finance profession (ACCA Professional Insight Series) can be found at www.accaglobal.com/hcm/isr

Brenda Lee Tang is a Fellow of the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants. She previously held the position of Head of Policy Development, ACCA Caribbean where she was responsible for creating a consultative role with stakeholders, establishing and maintaining communication channels with members and other relevant parties on new auditing, accounting and business issues.

As Head of Corporate Development, ACCA Caribbean, Ms. Lee Tang leads ACCA’s business and key relationships in the Caribbean and is responsible for advancing ACCA’s strategy in the region. ACCA Caribbean has agreed to submit regular articles and features to the Guyana Chronicle on various topical financial and accounting issues, especially relating to the current global financial crisis.

This article by Ms. Tang is the second in the series of articles to be published by this newspaper.