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Survey finds over 80% of organisations are increasing accountancy training

In a survey of those responsible for the training and development of accountants and other finance staff, over 80% of respondents stated that recent corporate failures have led to increased company-wide training and development updates.

The survey found that a new emphasis on continuing professional development and regulatory demands, particularly in North America, were also contributory factors.

Commissioned by ACCA (the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants), the research surveyed 500 organisations worldwide ranging from public practice accounting firms, to national and multi-national corporates and the public sector.

The survey also found:

* The new emphasis on development has been matched by increased budget allocation. 50% of all respondents (and 60% in the US) reported an increase in their training budgets over the past three years, while only 6% reported a reduction.

* However, a commitment to training and development was reflected in only 18% of organisations' employee terms and conditions.

* Although HR normally leads on communicating training policies (36% of cases), this department is often not involved in establishing training policy and budget setting - the finance function takes the lead in both these areas.

* For benchmarking purposes, 80% of organisations keep training and development activity records, although one-quarter of the multinationals kept no formal records.

* Although over 40% stated that measurement was being undertaken through some form of benchmarking, much of this was through informal networking to share best practice. Only 14% use formal internal questionnaires to assess effectiveness and 7% use externally commissioned surveys to benchmark policy and performance.

* 70% of respondents review their training and development policies annually; 9% review them every two years and 15% 'as required'. 20% of the multinational companies surveyed limit their reviews to between 2 and 5 years - however, this tends to refer to formal, global strategic reviews.

Commenting on the results, Stephen Heathcote, ACCA Director of Training and Development, said: "The survey suggests that while many organisations have identified the need to ramp up the requirements of their training and development policy, insufficient emphasis is placed on communicating policies throughout the organisation; a co-ordinated approach to benchmarking is lacking and, there is often no clear responsibility for organisation-wide finance training.

"Given these findings, it is unsurprising that 70% of organisations stated that they would welcome a globally relevant framework for measuring training and development policies for finance professionals."

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