Message to graduating class of ICAG

Lets eschew mediocrity – Most of the great books teach us that, my Bible says in Psalms 107:23 They that go down to the sea in ships, that do business in great waters; 107:24 These see the works of the LORD, and His wonders in the deep. You cannot wallow is the shallow waters on rafts and hope to make it big, work smart and hard for God and country.

OUR distinguished Guest of Honour, the Honourable Minister of Education, Professor Naana Jane Opoku Agyemang, the President of the Institute of Chartered Accountants (Ghana), who is also the chairperson for the occasion, Professor K. B. Omani-Antwi, Council Members, grandaunts, invited guests, my colleagues from the media, distinguished ladies and gentlemen, good morning.

It is a privilege and indeed an honour to be part of this First Graduation and Admission ceremony of the Institute for 2015.

Mr Chairman, occasions like this bring not only happiness but also soul-searching and deep introspection. Today marks a turning point in the lives of these budding talents, either as graduands or people to be admitted to the noble profession of accountancy. Every profession requires a high level of integrity but your profession as accountants requires an unquestionable integrity, which is the thrust of my presentation.

Albert Einstein, one of the greatest scientists of our time, said: “Whoever is careless with the truth in small matters cannot be trusted with important matters”.

If we agree with him, and I do, then we agree that integrity is paramount in all spheres of life.

The Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary defines “integrity” as “The quality of being honest and having strong moral principles”.

Dwight D. Eisenhower, once said,” The supreme quality for leadership is unquestionably integrity. Without it, no real success is possible, no matter whether it is on a section gang, a football field, in the army or in an office.” I add more importantly as an accountant.

Eisenhower was the 34^th President of the United States, and one of the most popular and successful in the country’s history. Prior to his presidency, he was a football star in high school and the military academy till knee injuries stopped him.

He was also a famous five-star military general who once commanded the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO). His military successes made the Republican Party plead with him to become their candidate.

He agreed, resigned from the NATO appointment and won two terms by landslide on each occasion. His second victory was even by a more stunning margin. He certainly must have known the key to success.

Mr Chairman, ladies and gentlemen, permit me to underscore the fact that accountancy, like other professions, has certain characteristics that should be observed religiously. They include Ethical Code and Rules of Conduct.

Accordingly, I have to caution that to be able to uphold these rules and the code you need to have your integrity intact in order to be continuously successful in your endeavours.

As professionals, you may know some of these but because they are very central to the success of your profession, I still want to recap them with this unique opportunity I have with you today.

Ethics

As professional accountants, you are required to observe proper standards of professional conduct whether or not the standards required are written in the rules. You are specifically required to refrain from misconduct, which is difficult to define precisely but which includes any act or default which is likely to bring discredit on yourself, your professional body or the profession generally.

 Independence

Professional independence is exceedingly important. This is very much an attitude of mind rather than a set of rules. Your objectivity as an accountant must be beyond question and you must approach your work with integrity and objectivity. Your approach to work must be in a spirit of independence of mind. It is desirable to avoid mixing professional relationships with personal relationships.

 Internal Controls

As professional accountants, it is your responsibility as part of management to implement a system of controls, financial or otherwise, in order to carry on the business in an orderly and efficient manner, ensure adherence to management policies, safeguard the assets and secure, as far as possible, the completeness and accuracy of the company’s records.

 Fraud

This is defined as the use of deception to obtain an unjust or illegal financial advantage. As an accountant, your responsibility is to properly plan, perform and evaluate your work constantly so as to have a reasonable expectation of detecting material misstatements in the financial statements whether they are caused by fraud, other irregularities or errors.

 Conflict of Interest

It is the fundamental duty of every accountant to act in good faith in the best interest of his or her organisation. Conflict of interest is whereby one becomes interested directly or indirectly in any business, which competes with that of your company and being personally interested, directly, or indirectly in any contract or other transactions entered into by your company.

Conflicts may come up in many ways including using for one’s own advantage any money or property of the company or any confidential information or special knowledge obtained from him/her in his/her capacity as an accountant.

Therefore, as an accountant, you should be guided by the regulations of your company, the Companies Act, Act 179 of 1963, and best business practice and conventions.

 Relevance of Financial Information

Financial information is relevant when it is capable of making a difference in the decisions made by users. Information is capable of making a difference in a decision-making process if it has a predictive value, such that it can be used as an input to predict future outcomes and confirmatory value, which provides feedback about previous evaluations or both.

As accountants, you are required to take account of the nature of materiality of the information in the course of preparing the financial information. The usefulness of financial information is, therefore, considered to be enhanced if it is comparable, verifiable, timely and understandable.

 International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS)

As professional accountants, you are required to be abreast of the current changes in the Accounting Profession. The adoption of the International Financial Reporting Standards by the Institute of Chartered Accountants, Ghana, puts a lot of pressure on you. You are required to be conversant with the IFRS and apply the standards responsibly. In terms of the IFRS, I have a charge for you and the Institute. I do not believe that the IFRS, as we have it today, took cognisance of our peculiar national context. When these international standards are being developed we will require our professional bodies to make our voices heard so these standards are not developed without our inputs and imposed on us.

It is not too late, you can still help by contributing to the conversation on IFRS at various fora but that will only happen when you learn it and apply it within our context and not just end at that but also document your findings and views. We need to read and write. I can assure you if you write Graphic, will publish it.

 Continuous Professional Education

This feeds into the next point I want to make, livelong learning; Henry Ford says “Anyone who stops learning is old, whether at twenty or eighty. Anyone who keeps learning stays young.”  I agree with him and but I do not totally believe that I am like Abraham Lincoln who says “All I have learned, I learned from books.” . Yes you should read but learn from other resources, from your mentors, colleagues, subordinates, clients and from life itself. You will benefit from others experiences if you listen to them, read about, attend quality conventions, conferences and other learning opportunities.

So you must continuously update your knowledge not only in your chosen profession, but also in areas relevant to your profession so as to broaden your scope and assist you in making sound judgements.

Invest in your continuous education, you are not done yet with this graduation. John Quincy Adams, the sixth President of The United States said it best close to 200 years ago. “If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, and become more, you are a leader.”

Challenges

Mr Chairman, notwithstanding all these, the Auditor-General’s Annual Report consistently unearths fraud, misapplication of funds and naked thievery of public funds running into billions of Ghana cedis. Unfortunately, institutions such as the Public Accounts Committee of Parliament only express concern on the fact that these frauds deprive the country of viable investments in key sectors of the economy. We now have more qualified accountants and continue to train even more, year in, year out, yet we are confronted with the fleecing of the public purse.

The question now is, is it a matter of lack of professionalism or an issue of immorality? It is about time we diagnosed the malaise and “DROP THE YAM”.

By this, I am raising the issue of integrity of those accountants who indulge in such malpractices and the urgent need to adopt measures to stem these malpractices. As accountants, we need to sit up and improve on the image of ICA (Ghana).

Distinguished ladies and gentlemen, throughout my speech, what I have sought to do is to tell you that the way to true success is by acting with integrity. You can achieve success by crooked means but it will be only temporary. I have also told you that personal integrity has an effect on national economies – positive if integrity is high, negative if integrity is low.

America’s second richest man, businessman Warren Buffet, shows a clear link between integrity and career success when he says:

“Somebody once said that in looking for people to hire, you look for three qualities: Integrity, Intelligence and Energy. And if you don’t have the first, the other two will kill you. You think about it, it’s true. If you hire somebody without [integrity], you really want them to be dumb and lazy.”

In other words, if you don’t have integrity, you may find it difficult to have a career rise.

Hubris and greed have a way of catching up with people, who then lose the power and wealth they’ve so fervently pursued. But is the opposite also true? Do highly principled leaders and their organizations perform especially well?

From an article I culled from Harvard Business Review – I have posted it on my blog, www.ashigbey.com; it shows a clear link between integrity and the performance of leaders. So don’t be deceived integrity pays in the long run.

According to a study by KRW International, a Minneapolis-based leadership consultancy, they found that CEOs whose employees gave them high marks for character had an average return on assets of 9.35% over a two-year period. That’s nearly five times as much as what those with low character ratings had; their ROA averaged only 1.93%.

The research found integrity as one of the key character traits that set aside these virtuoso CEOs apart. You need integrity for your followers to follow you; you need it for your customers to give you their custom. Without integrity you will build empires that will crumble like the Enron’s of our day. If you want to build a career that will last, build it on integrity.

How many of you stole or bought your results, you are on the path to unfulfillment, if you did. But you have an opportunity to make good, go back and study what you did not learn. Else it will show.

Our challenge as a continent is we do not have leaders with integrity and it is not only political leaders but in all facets and the change starts from me and you. Lets make the change here and now.

Again, you have heard from me that you should aim at excellence through flawless execution to win, consciously learning from those who have walked the path you choose.

Now to those who have distinguished yourselves and would soon receive awards for excellence, society, your colleagues and especially your own conscience will expect more from you. So for you especially, you should not rest on your oars. To the entire group, those exiting and those entering, I say bravo, ayekoo! and akwaaba.

My epilogue is from an advice I gave to the graduating class of UPSA, school of Management. Let me share it with you too.

1. Most of you might be employed, but don’t who do not have jobs yet. Don’t leave here hoping to be employed, start thinking of how you can employ people. What are you going to create? Think big and global but start small with an insatiable aptitude and appetite of greatness. Note that the enemy of greatness is good. Get out of the bad Ghanaian habit of “artificial modesty” – when some of us are asked how are things? We answer small-small! This is no go. We set very low targets for ourselves and miss them any way, so we wallow in mediocrity. You can become the world best account, or whatever you seek to be. We were all made in the image and likeness of God. If anybody can do it, you can also do it. Dream big but again have a plan, start small, execute flawlessly and evaluate and monitor your actions.
2. Let me speak to the Ghanaians among you, build networks, partnerships and lets all give ourselves the opportunity to fail forward. Patronize Ghanaian products, support Ghanaian businesses. Lets stop the self-hatred of the Ghanaian. Yes lets welcome our brothers and sisters from other countries; they will come to complement what we do.

But it is only when we have Ghanaians at the helm of MOST industries that Ghana will develop. So support Ghana & let Ghana be at the center of all you do. For those of you who will go into politics, and for all of us let all your actions be geared towards impact and legacy for the Ghanaian unborn, tribute to those dead and gone and a better life for us living today. Let it not be only for winning the next elections, it should be about the legacy we leave behind.

3. Finally lets eschew mediocrity – Most of the great books teach us that, my Bible says in Psalms 107:23 They that go down to the sea in ships, that do business in great waters; 107:24 These see the works of the LORD, and His wonders in the deep. You cannot wallow is the shallow waters on rafts and hope to make it big, work smart and hard for God and country.

Once again, I encourage you to explore the world for success but remember these wise words from Gordon A. Eadie: “If you don’t stand for something, you will fall for anything”. I urge you to stand for integrity.

Thank you and God bless us all.

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