August 19, 2005

Horse 388 - When Two Tribes Go To War

If you've been watching telly for the last few weeks you'll have noticed a bitter advertising campaign by the two main warring factions of accountants - the CPA's and the ACA. Now it's all very well that an advertising campaign informs people of your business, and perhaps it's appropriate that given the end of the financial year in June that they should appear now but it all seems to be a bit pointed.

As an accountant I can tell you that from a professional standpoint it matters not which group you come from at all in the real world. Most businesses only care if you can do the job, in fact most don't even care if you can do the job until they need their annual taxation returns done.
Given the sorts of people who are accountants, this sits well. In general accountants are incredibly nerdy. The image of someone with glasses, buck teeth, a pocket protector (though I don't even know where you could find one for sale anymore) and the standard white shirt and bad haircut is not that far removed from the mark.

I bet that in the board rooms of the professional organisations, there are copies of Bill Gates and Dwayne Dibley the Duke of Dork battling it out across long tables with 17th century pewter soldiers saying things like "I'm going to take over the world of modified capital gains and contra trading, that'll show 'em".

Accountants are the Warhammer 40K of the business world. A club so tightly knit that it's like Willy Wonka's chocolate factory "No-one ever goes in, and no-one ever come out" or should that be two clubs... two clubs* of NERDS!

*Two of Clubs ranks only below 2 of Spades and Hearts.

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