The workplace is changing.
Competitive firms and companies know that in order to keep their best people happy and in their seats once the economy improves, flexibility and providing a process to customize career paths are among the keys to success. In return, they enjoy a more adaptable workforce and are able to better respond to the ebbs and flow of economic cycles.
Big Four firm Deloitte has been watching this cultural movement closely, having introduced the concept of Mass Career Customization - which is the shift from the corporate ladder to what they call the "corporate lattice."
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This resulted in the 2007 book, Mass Career Customization: Aligning the Workplace with Today's Nontraditional Workforce (Harvard Business School Press),in an attempt to organize a growing trend among workplace environments.
Mass Career Customization or "MCC" was incubated in the Deloitte's Women's Initiative because, though the firm had introduced 69 different flexibility programs, work-life issues were still the No. 1 reason women were leaving, and the No. 3 reason their male counterparts were leaving as well.
Staking their claim
Meet a few CPAs who decided to pave their own way in the world of public accounting. Margo J. Lind, CPA/CFF/CFE 47 Vero Beach, Fla. Senior audit manager Harris, Cotherman, Jones, Price & Associates How you customized your career? I spent seven years in public accounting with Arthur Andersen and KPMG and 10 years in industry as a CFO. And I have now returned to public accounting. In 10 words or less, how would you describe the course of your career? I started on a traditional path, then changed course. What made you want to become a CPA? Once I chose accounting as my profession, I wanted to be the best I could be and work with the best in my chose profession. Was there anything about the accounting profession that discouraged you from being a CPA? Nothing. What challenges did you have to overcome in order to "own" your career? I always loved public accounting, but was raised in a small town. While I loved living in a larger city (St. Louis, then Fort Lauderdale) at the beginning of my career, I always knew I wanted to move back to a smaller town. After having worked for Arthur Andersen and KPMG, I believed that working for a smaller firm would not be as challenging or as interesting and would not provide me the same quality of opportunities. I left public accounting and went into industry as a CFO so that I could live where I wanted. Four years ago, after my daughter was born, I decided to come back to public accounting, but with a small firm. I made the choice because the position provided me with the flexibility I need to be both a mom and a professional. I have been pleasantly surprised to find that the small firm I am working for is every bit as professional as the larger firms I worked with, and there are enough challenging engagements to keep the work interesting. I have all the same opportunities for career growth, mentoring and education. Our office managing partner (Bob Harris) is the current chairman of the American Institute of CPAs. Although some of my clients are not as challenging as clients I served with the larger firms, I enjoy working with them so much more because they truly rely on my expertise to help them make strategic business decisions. I also have made some wonderful contacts through my role as a member of the AICPA's Women's Initiatives Executive Committee and have developed a wonderful network of colleagues. Now I have the best of all worlds. I live in my idea of paradise and have an interesting, fun job that allows me to continue to keep learning and developing as a CPA, but also allows me the flexibility to enjoy being a mom.
Staking their claim
Donny C. Shimamoto, CPA, CITP 34 Honolulu, Hawaii Founder and managing director IntrapriseTechKnowlogies LLC How you customized your career: Took charge of creating opportunities for myself, while working within "the system" and with others who could recognize my potential (whether it was supervisors, colleagues, or clients). In 10 words or less, how would you describe the course of your career? Inviting opportunity to knock. Taking educated risks when it does. What made you want to become a CPA? I actually originally wanted to be a bio-chemical engineer, but I found the chemistry classes more tedious (not harder, just tedious) than the accounting classes - and the accounting thinking was so much more natural to me that the CPA won out in the end. Plus being a Certified Information Technology Professional provided me with the best of both worlds: science/technology and accounting. Was there anything about the accounting profession that discouraged you from being a CPA? The "conform and pay your dues" mentality that was prevalent in the industry in the mid-to-late 1990s when I started working. I'm not a radical, but I definitely am not your traditional CPA. Luckily, the leadership at the PwC Honolulu office recognized my talents and was willing to fast-track me. They provided me with the opportunities that I needed to grow more quickly than my peers, but also tempered that with making sure that I had good advisors and coaches to ensure that I wasn't bring on risk to the firm. What challenges did you have to overcome in order to "own" your career? I honestly feel like I've always owned my own career. But I had to overcome the feeling that others were always holding me back - not letting me do what I wanted to, not letting me try new things. I realize now that sometimes they were right, and making sure that I didn't set myself up for failure. But other times, they just had a lower risk tolerance than I did - but then, that's probably why I now have my own firm and am an entrepreneur, rather than working for a big firm.
Staking their claim
Jacqueline Akerblom 48 San Jose, Calif. National managing partner for women's initiatives and programs. Grant Thornton LLP How you customized your career: Over 26 years, I have customized my career in a number of ways. In 1995, I went to our London office to be the first woman to lead our European transaction group. In 2002, I left the firm for 18 months to stay at home with my son, and currently, I have the flexibility to work from home when necessary. In 10 words or less, how would you describe the course of your career? My career has sustained me through the ups and downs of life. What made you want to become a CPA? I enjoyed my first accounting class in school and once I learned more about the career opportunities I pursued it. Was there anything about the accounting profession that discouraged you from being a CPA? I never felt discouraged, only challenged. What challenges did you have to overcome in order to "own" your career? When I started my career in 1984, there was strong pressure to conform to masculine norms in order to succeed, which I did. It wasn't until the 1990s and I was a senior manager that I felt confident enough in myself to drop the conformity and embrace the fact that I was a successful female CPA. That was the point that I felt I truly "owned" my career.
Accounting Today spoke with authors Cathy Benko, Deloitte's chief talent officer, and Anne Weisberg, a director in the U.S. firm's talent organization specializing in the field of diversity, gender and work-life integration, about MCC and the new follow-up book coming out this summer - The Corporate Lattice: Achieving High Performance in the Changing World of Work.
What is MCC, and how has it changed since your book was published three years ago?
Weisberg: We first set out to really identify a paradigm
shift that we saw happening in the workplace as the result of the convergence
of many changes in the workforce. Mass career customization is a framework for
managing that paradigm shift. The lattice organization is one that is much more
fluid and adaptive; where there are multiple paths through the organization and
flexibility is the way work gets done.
Basically the MCC framework says that any career can be
deconstructed to four core dimensions: pace, which is the rate of career
progression; workload, which is the amount of work you do; location/schedule,
which is where and when you work; and role, which is the set of
responsibilities you have. Any organization should be able to articulate
options for its people along each of those dimensions and the trade-off for
choices made across dimensions because they are very interrelated.
That's what we've been working towards for the last three
years at Deloitte. We have taken that strategic decision to intentionally
become a lattice organization and everyone at Deloitte, and I mean everyone,
has a mass customization conversation with their counselor or manager, and that
conversation gets folded into all the other talent management and performance
management processes. It's part of goal-setting, it's part of how you get
assigned work, it's part of performance reviews, it's part of everything. It's
a way of instantly scaling flexibility and career-life fit.
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