Kristy Illuzzi, CPA, CGMA of International Federation of Accountants (IFAC) on why the Great Resignation is affecting the profession so acutely:
I think the Great Resignation is interesting in that it has impacted almost every sector of our economy and every profession in some way, and it’s no different in the accounting industry. I think a lot of people during 2020, 2021, when we were on lockdown, we started doing things very differently.
You were forced to work from home almost no matter what industry you are in, and I think it caused a lot of people also to just rethink their priorities. They were home, spending more time with family, perhaps caring for ill family members, small children that were home, and priorities shifted. And I think a lot of people got used to that, and in some cases they are now demanding the flexibility and the ability to continue to do their jobs that way.
So we are starting to see in a lot of parts of the world things opening back up. In some cases you have firms that are now requiring people to come back to the office, and in some cases they are having people revolt, if you will, and essentially saying, I got used to this work from home, this flexibility, this type of environment, and I’m not going to go back to the office, and in some cases they are going to places that will allow for that flexibility.
In some cases you also have people, I think that their priorities shifted. They might have gone into a different or have different passions and decided that accounting just was not the industry for them so there are some just leaving industry altogether.
How the Great Resignation has affected the accounting profession [Journal of Accountancy podcast]