There is still some uncertainty regarding the need or importance of coding, specifically for accountancy professionals. Are we all becoming programmers or has coding become a basic skill we need to now have?
Chartered accountants and associate general accountants are rethinking their skills, behaviours, competencies and mindset as they continue to reflect in line with SAICA’s CPD policy and to align to the new Competency Framework (Pathways to Relevance). Following the re-engineering of the accountancy and other professions, individuals are upskilling to prepare themselves for the needs of the new world of work. Emerging as one of the clear leaders in areas of importance among many, including accountants, has been coding.
Why your accounting friends are learning to code
A combination of accountancy and coding skills can significantly improve the service you offer to clients and stakeholders. Both coding and accountancy feature arithmetic and analytical properties, and accountancy professionals should ideally have at least a baseline working knowledge and competency in coding. Coding is a part of programming that deals with writing code that a machine can translate. The code tells a computer what actions to take, and so writing code is essentially creating a set of instructions.
An accountant that can write code can instruct computers what to do, when and how. Think about the frustrations and limitations you have experienced in your career as an accountancy professional trying to process or analyse data and to add value for stakeholders. Now think about the accelerated emergence of the digital economy, the growth of data volumes and complexity, data currently not being utilised, and the need to utilise your data processing and analysis expertise on all data (including non-financial). You begin to realise that coding will come in handy when analysing and processing data as accountants continue to provide strategic advice to businesses. Coding will assist you to quickly manipulate data sets in order to meet organisational needs. It can also enable you to do lots of other cool things as career lines become grey and flexibility and agility define the working life and professional development.
Coding versus programming
While coding refers to how we communicate with computers, programming is the process of creating a program that follows certain standards and performs a certain task. Coding requires fewer software tools, since it is just an act of code translation to machine-readable form.
As a coder, you would need to know a particular programming language (such as Python, R, Java, or JavaScript), including its syntax and keywords. Programmers, on the other hand, solve specific problems and their work yields a total solution (for example an application, software products, or a website that is ready to use). Coding and programming may often be used interchangeably, with activities being similar or closely related.
Coders understand the programming (coding) language
You would need to learn a programming language(s) to be able to create instructions that computers can understand. While you speak a human language, computers ‘speak’ binary language (a combination of zeros and ones). There are a variety of programming languages that translate the instructions into binary code for the computer to understand. The language you decide to start with doesn’t need to be the only language you work with rest of your life; it is not the final decision. Programming languages have different rules or syntax, but they share common concepts. In deciding what language to learn, you would need to consider what you want to do or what do you want to build. This is not an easy question to answer as you begin your coding journey. You may need to take some time to reflect on the nature of projects you may want to complete now or in future and conduct basic research on what each language is used for to conclude on your language needs. This may, of course, evolve over time.
You would need to pick your first language based on what you want to specialise in. Examples are: HTML/CSS for making static websites, JavaScript for websites and some other projects, the hugely popular Python for general use, from server automation to data science projects (it is great for beginners, analysis, visualisation, etc), and R for data analysis, graphics and visualisation (used to collect, clean, analyse, and graph data). If you are uncertain, learn Python for a start. The language is open source (freely available), suitable for beginners and experts, has easy-to-use and reusable codes, is suitably high-level, highly versatile, and general-purpose. It can be used to build websites, GUIs (graphical user interfaces) and customised accounting and finance applications, and can visualise data (among others).
Benefits of learning to code
Coding is becoming a core skill of the modern-day accountant. It will enhance your relevance, market value and career opportunities, and help you stand out:
- It will give you a superior understanding of your business environment and operations, which are largely digital (and thus help understand the business approach to data management), and be in a better position to provide advice, support and help the organisation seize opportunities.
- It will provide responsible leadership through aiding data management and facilitating or making better and more-informed (data-driven) decisions. Accountants are already comptrollers of (financial) data and business will rely on their expertise.
- You will be able to enhance the accounting and finance processes and value you add through an ability to collect, manipulate and analyse large and/or complex data quicker and in the way that you need to.
- It will help you present data in a way that makes sense to stakeholders and creates an impact in organisations and society. Programming languages offer flexible, effective ways to present data and analysis results in both static and interactive methods.
- You can reduce the number of repetitive day-to-day tasks that do not challenge you (let codes handle these activities), increase the accuracy of your work, and in turn improve efficiency. Use your time to focus on value-adding activities that are critical for the sustainable growth of the organisation and the betterment of society.
- The lines between business functions are blurring in the Fourth Industrial Revolution, and the need for flexible and agile professionals has grown. You will be able to interact, complement, coordinate, lead and integrate with other role players with ease.
You can do it
Coding is unlike anything most of us have ever experienced in our careers. We may lack confidence in this area, as there is ‘no’ solid ground to build on, especially as it mostly requires independent learning. Many accountants may consider coding to be hard because it is a different type of skill from what they know. Some may consider even basic coding to be too difficult (which, of course, is not the case). Accountants are usually on the other side of computer software or programming, with the majority taking and using whatever they get.
- The uncertainty around how and why (exactly) we need the skill, how it will be used and if indeed it is our new reality may discourage accountants, who are used to clarity and certainty. There may also be no immediate and obvious need in day-to-day tasks. Accountants will need to begin to stretch themselves and their thinking to put the skill to use.
- Coding takes time and persistence to learn. Most accountancy professionals are busy balancing or verifying the books and may struggle to make time. While not nearly as difficult as the qualification you have (this is a subjective opinion, of course), you will still need to make time and commit.
- Coding is not served on a silver platter or presented in bright lights. Unlike our accounting and other qualifications, it can be all over the place and resultantly tricky to navigate. It will take a bit of digging as resources come from different places, in different shapes, forms, and sizes.
Your coding journey will require agility, mental flexibility, patience, motivation, time, persistence, lots of practice, trial and error, and hurdle jumping. You can do it, and it will certainly be worth it in the end. Similar to learning any new language, at first ideas and concepts might feel abstract and there may be patches of difficulty, but over time it will come together and you will be able to architect a solution to a problem. Consider learning coding with friends, support each other and encourage each to keep going.
Conclusion
While there may still be a lot of uncertainty, the potential for an accountancy professional with coding skills is undoubtedly great. Not only would you be in a better position to solve problems and create solutions, but while remaining flexible in approach, you will also be able to collaborate with developers, programmers, data scientists and other experts nimbler and effectively. You will create customised solutions and pull deep insights from large data sets as we move towards a data-driven world.
For now, ‘old ways and tools’ (including spreadsheets) are still common, even in the largest organisations. Even so, the need for coding skills and their use will continue to grow as the need for organisations to use and be efficient with Big Data accelerates. Remember that, especially with coding, practice makes perfect.
Author
Msizi Gwala CA(SA), Project Director: Enabling Competencies at SAICA
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