On the 29th of November Accounting Insight took place. Accounting Insight is an interactive symposium in which a discussion is held about different accounting-related topics. This event helps building a bridge between academic theory taught in lectures at Tilburg University and the practical situations individuals come across within companies. As of February we, as the organizing committee, have been busy organizing this event. The organization started with choosing a suitable topic and approaching interesting speakers. The topic was quickly chosen, the overall theme of the evening would be ‘Why good auditors do bad audits’. Finding the speakers for the speakers’ panel went more easily than expected. Within a reasonable amount of time we had a prominent and enthusiastic panel of speakers and the two most important components for a successful evening were a fact. After this we could start finding a suitable location, keeping good contacts with the sponsors and designing the promotion materials. “They believe that a whole generation has to be removed before this culture problem can be solved.” Soon we reached the 29th of November and enthusiastic participants who were waiting to obtain more insights in the current developments of the accounting sector were slowly filling the foyer of the Studiozaal of Theaters Tilburg. Chairman of the evening Bas Knoop lead the discussion and four propositions were discussed by Godert van der Poel (CFO Siemens NV), Rob Fijneman (Chairman KPMG), Pieter Jongstra (Chairman NBA), Dagmar van Boekel (Partner Joore) and Johan Hopmans (Partner Deloitte). The 53 measures that were implemented to improve the audits was the first topic that was being discussed. According to Mr. Jongstra the profession is heading the right direction, but this has not been acknowledged by the public yet. On the other hand, Mr. Van der Poel and Mrs. Van Boekel think that the problem is mainly about the prevailing culture within the audit firms. They believe that a whole generation has to be removed before this culture problem can be solved. The capacity problem and the partner structure were the next topics. There was no doubt between the speakers that the sector is dealing with a capacity problem. Audit firms are generally dealing with capacity struggles that don’t benefit the quality of the audit very often. Mrs. Van Boekel states that the partner structure is the reason she left a Big Four firm for a smaller audit firm. Because of this she is working at clients more often, even though she is a partner at Joore now. “Where improvement is needed? Communication” About the role of an auditor when detecting fraud the panel mostly agreed. Detecting fraud should not be the primary role of an auditor, the panel believes, but auditors for sure have to be alert! ‘Where improvement is needed? Communication’, states Mr. Jongstra. The last topic is technology. As of lately, the accounting profession is changing. Technological developments play a major role. Unfortunately this doesn’t show up yet in the education program, states Mr. Fijneman. An auditor doesn’t have to be an IT specialist, but in the future every audit team will consist of specialised individuals including an IT-auditor. After all these insights are being shared, there was a closing drink where all participants could evaluate the evening or get in touch with one of the partner firms of Accounting Insight 2017. All in all, I believe we can look back at a successful evening which has helped bringing together theory and practise! The evening would not be possible without our partners, therefore I would like to make use of this occasion to thank them again. Next to that, of course I want to direct a word of thanks to our speakers’ panel and the chairman of the evening! Last but not least I want to thank my fellow committee members Anne, Rob and Matthieu and our coordinator Cindy for organizing this event! I hope to see you all at the next edition of Accounting Insight!
AccountantsDay 2017: There’s more than the Big Four!
On November 8, 2017, the annual AccountantsDay took place. This year’s edition was organized by a committee instead of the board. As chairman, together with Femke, Steven, Nadia and Kirstin, I formed the committee that was coordinated by Sanne and Roel who supported us during the organization. Six companies and thirty students participated during the day. The education level of the students varied from second-year Bachelor to Master students. In the end, it turned out not to be that difficult to recruit 30 students for this day, indicating that there is indeed interest among students to get more acquainted with smaller accountancy firms. Under the slogan ‘There is more than the Big Four’, the students were able to see what mid-sized accountancy firms have to offer. The participating firms were: Crowe Horwarth Foederer, Grant Thornton, Mazars, Van Oers, Wesselman, and Witlox van den Boomen. The day started at the fancy location ‘Villa de Vier Jaargetijden’. After a welcome speech from the organization, the firms introduced themselves to the students. “Before you knew it, it was already time for the next round.” The SRA also prepared a presentation, including a quiz about the accounting profession in the Netherlands. After this it was time for serious business: Discussing current topics in the accounting world. This was set up by us as follows: As the organization, we first chose themes that are topical right now. Then there were three rounds: Round 1 was thinking of a statement fitting the assigned theme, round 2 was thinking of arguments supporting the statement made by the group of round 1, and round 3 was thinking of arguments against the statement. The themes were: ‘Ethics & Accounting’, ‘Audit quality’, ‘CSR & Accounting’, and ‘Technology & Accounting’. Every firm was assigned one theme that they had to discuss for all of the rounds. The students switched every round to a different firm, and thus a different theme. Of course there was plenty of time for the firms and students to get to know each other more. The variety between firms worked well and before you knew it, it was already time for the next round. As closure of the afternoon program, Claudia from the SRA read all the statements that the students came up with and there was a voting round among all the student whether one was before or against a statement after hearing all the arguments. Examples of statements were: ‘As an organization, you contribute to Corporate Social Responsibility when work and private life are in balance’, and ‘The current accountants are well prepared for the changing technology in the accounting world’. “As extra element, we added a time limit, making us feel like true ‘Heel Holland Bakt’ bakers.” Around 5 pm we ended with the afternoon program and went together to “Bij Maud”. Here we did a very entertaining, interactive workshop. Once again, the students were divided into several groups to meet every firm during the day. During the cooking class we made an appetizer, entrée and main course. As extra element, we added a time limit, making us feel like true ‘Heel Holland Bakt’ bakers. The employees of ‘Bij Maud’ took care of the dessert. Through this, I would like to thank ‘Bij Maud’ again for the delicious food and the fun workshop. Besides ‘Bij Maud’ I would like to thank the participating firms and my other committee members as well. We received a lot of positive feedback from the firms and students, which makes me look back on a very successful day!
Just Graduated
My name is Frank van der Linden, 25 years old and raised in’s-Hertogenbosch. In October 2014 my student life came to an end, as I obtained my master degree in finance. Currently, I am working as young professional at Eiffel, located in Arnhem. In 2009 I started the bachelor business economics at Tilburg University, which I completed in 2013. During my third year of the bachelor the first problems arose. I realized my English skills were still insufficient, which wasn’t very practical as the bachelor thesis finance and master finance were completely in English. Therefore, I decided to extend my bachelor phase with an additional year. This gave me the opportunity to improve my English skills by participating a summer school in Ljubljana (Slovenia) as well as joining study association Asset | Accounting & Finance. In 2012 former board member and good friend of mine Marjan Martens, puts me under pressure, in order to join A&F. At that time, I thought that members of study associations were a bunch of geeks lacking social capabilities. Nevertheless, I became member of A&F by joining the iFinance 2013 committee responsible for organizing a finance symposium. I shortly noticed that my opinion was completely misplaced, as I met a lot of wonderful people, which are nowadays still good friends of mine. Being chairman of iFinance 2013 definitely helped me developing my personal skills, which would never be the case by only attending college. Moreover, I was totally convinced that being member of A&F was a valuable addition to my student life. Therefore, after organizing a successful edition of iFinance, I joined the third lustrum committee, were I started as treasurer for the lustrum trip. Shortly, I also became the chairman of the general lustrum committee consisting of 10 people. Although, this was a huge challenge, I think we made it a great success. People are still talking about the classy gala, beer cantus in Bruges and the other exciting days during that week. It makes me still very proud, that I was part of the organization. I can say that joining A&F definitely enriched my student life, as it were one of the most exciting years of my life. Moreover, I can say that these extracurricular activities helped me a lot during job interviews. Although, I attended a lot of recruiting activities during my master phase, I wasn´t convinced about what kind of company and job fits best to me. Therefore, I thought it would be useful to join a detachment company such as Eiffel. Eiffel gives me the opportunity to work for various companies and functions, which is very exciting. Additionally, it helps me explore what type of company and functions suits best to me. Currently, I am working for McKinsey & Company in Amsterdam to support the finance department. During four months I am responsible for setting up a staff and salary administration and the transition of this administration to a shared service center in Poland. Before this assignment, I worked for municipal Veenendaal, where I assisted the internal audit department. Most assignments have a duration of less than 8 months, which give me the opportunity to obtain a lot experience at various companies. Moreover, I think this job is very useful for my network, as I will meet many ambitious people. I am convinced that when I am ready for the next step in my career, my Eiffel experience will be crucial in order to find a job that suits me best.
The creation of iFinance 2015
Youssef Essaghir, Chairman iFinance 2015, was asked to give us some insight regarding his experience at Asset | Accounting & Finance. He talks about what it is like to organize an event such as iFinance. If you would like to learn more about why he signed up for the committee or why he believes you should attend iFinance, you can read his story. Could you give a short introduction about yourself? My name is Youssef Essaghir, I’m a third-year bachelor student in Business Economics and I am planning to do my master in Finance after obtaining my bachelor. This year I am the chairman of the iFinance committee and an interviewer for the Food for Thought committee. Why did you join Asset | Accounting & Finance? Asset | Accounting & Finance is the gateway to put theory into practice. This means that you get the opportunity to organize an event in your field of study. By doing this I am able to prepare myself for my future career. For instance, I develop my organization skills and my understanding of finance. Furthermore, the steep learning curve of working as a member on projects is an ideal way to develop your problem solving skills. This is the main reason I joined Asset | Accounting & Finance. But of course this is not the only reason. It is also a great way to meet new people with the same kind of interests. What appealed to you to sign up for the committee iFinance? I knew one thing for sure, after my bachelor Business Economics; I would either do my master in accounting or finance. So that is why I was hesitating between Accounting Insight and iFinance. During that time I was treasurer of the Asset Events committee and iFinance started just after the ending of the Events committee. That made it easy to choose for iFinance. I didn’t choose for an informal committee because I thought it was time to do something where I could use my full potential. iFinance is a very dynamic event. This makes it a perfect opportunity to put my qualities to the test. What and when is iFinance? IFinance will take place on February 5th on Tilburg University. The ‘i’ of iFinance stands for interactive. This means that you will have the possibility to actively participate and discuss a current and finance related topic. During the event different propositions will be introduced by short movies, speeches and voting rounds. Our aim is to spark a discussion between our speakers and the audience after presenting the proposition and a quick presentation. This presentation will be done by one of our speakers. Which guest speakers will there be at iFinance? This year we have some prominent speakers. We will start with Prof. Dirk Schoenmaker, Dean of Duisenberg School of Finance who will elaborate the first proposition. The speakers of the second proposition will be Mrs. Vaishali Bapat, Finance Manager at Shell and Mr. Martijn Rozemuller, Managing Director of Think ETF’s. After this we will also have two speakers who will review the third proposition. The first one will be Mr. Bas Pulles, Former Managing Director NL EVD International and current Director International Programmes at Netherlands Enterprise Agency. The second speaker will be Mrs Marije Lutgendorff, Owner of Crowdlokaal. The chairman of the day will be a known professor amongst finance students, Dr. Alberto Manconi. He is professor of ‘Financial Management’ and ‘Corporate Governance and Restructuring’ at Tilburg University. Are there any possibilities to get in touch with companies? Preceding the event there will be a lunch with the recruitment of Royal Dutch Shell (Shell), which is also our main partner. During this lunch eighteen students have the ability to get in touch with the recruiters of Shell, one of the biggest companies in the world. How did you develop iFinance? What were the processes from beginning to end to organize this? The first and most difficult part of organizing the event is coming up with a subject. During the summer, we tried to keep in touch with all the financial related news articles in order to find a subject that would still be current when the event would take place. This is also what will determine the success of the event. After narrowing it down to one subject we started to contact and invite potential speakers. We tried to have speakers that would be able to clarify the subject from different perspectives e.g. political, academic, entrepreneurial and of course a financial perspective. Until last Friday we were focusing on finding partnerships in order to finance the event. The next coming days we will start with promoting the event and making sure that everything will run smoothly at the 5th of February. What are the benefits to participants of iFinance? Why should students participate? Like I mentioned before, eighteen students are able to attend a lunch with the recruitment of Shell, an ideal way of to get your foot in the door at this company. Of course the subject itself is very interesting for people interested in finance or entrepreneurship. This year we considered the rapid changes in the world of Finance, ranging from the new banking regulations to the rise of crowdfunding. The subject of our event will consequently be: ‘The Future of Finance’. Where we will look at different financing methods, ranging from well-known methods to innovative ways of financing. This subject will be a value-adding experience for students interested in finance. Where can you register? You can register on the website. Here it is possible to register for the event, but also for the lunch that will take place beforehand. I hope to see you all at iFinance 2015 on February 5th. I’m confident that this will be another great Asset | Accounting & Finance event.
‘Just Graduated’ Tom Janssen
My name is Tom Janssen, 25 years old and born and raised in Breda. After completing my high school education here, I started at Tilburg University with the bachelor International Business Administration. After this bachelor, which gave me a broad perspective on the business of corporations, I decided to enroll for the Strategic Management master. The content of this master definitely matched my interests, however I believed the program did not fulfil my needs in preparation for a role in this field. Nevertheless my internship at HLB Van Daal & Partners, were I wrote my master thesis, provided me an opportunity to apply my theoretical skills in practice. Here, I realized that I enjoyed working together with clients and discuss potential solutions of their problems. Finally I defended my master thesis, which was titled ‘Social media as a strategic value driver: A case study in the Dutch accounting industry’, successfully in June 2012 with a 7.0 and graduated for my master. As explained my needs had not been fully met by this program and during the completion of my thesis I decided to pursue another area of my interest by beginning my second master, in finance. At the same time I figured out that I wanted more out of my student life and became an active member at Asset | Accounting & Finance as Vice-Chairman in the iFinance committee of 2012. I fully enjoyed the life at the student association and was asked to join the board of 2012, a position which I proudly accepted. As board member External Affairs I learned and improved a large number of organizational, process and social skills. But most importantly, I have met a great variety of very nice and interesting people, of whom I still have regular contact with and consider my friends. One of the highlights of this year was the studytour with destination India, which I will never forget. Therefore I would recommend any student a very active student life, and not comply to the increased focus on finishing your studies as fast as possible under pressure from more governmental pressure. This is the period were you can meet loads of new people, and find out your personal talents and interests. Finally, I ended this fantastic period by graduating from the Finance master with an 8.0 on CEO compensation, firm risk and the effect of CEO characteristics: Evidence from the U.S. financial industry in December 2013. As External Affairs I already had a great opportunity to get to know a lot of potential employers. During my studies I found out that I wanted to work in consulting, since I enjoyed looking for solutions to complex problems for a wide variety of clients. After my graduation I talked with a number of companies and decided to join the consulting firm of PwC as of May 1, 2014. The company fits my personal preference for an informal organization, with an international network and a great potential to learn perfectly. Reviewing and getting in touch with a lot of potential employers has certainly benefited me in selecting the right match and is something I would recommend any student. As a member of the finance competence of PwC consulting I am currently staffed at a big regulatory reporting project at a large international bank as part of Basel III requirements. The first couple of weeks of the working life were pretty exhausting, with a lot of new impressions combined with the time I had to travel between Tilburg and Amsterdam, before I moved there. Looking back at my first six months at PwC, I am still convinced I have made the right choice and enjoy my work very much!
Lieke Vermunt about her Finance Internship
My name is Lieke Vermunt. I am 21 years old and currently a fourth year Business Economics student with a Bachelor’s degree as of this summer. When I moved out of my parents house I knew I wanted to integrate further into the well-known Tilburg student life. I decided to join the Study Association Asset | Accounting & Finance. Yes indeed, a study association. Something that in my opinion, was all about students who pretended they were having a lot of fun during the introduction days, however were not man enough to participate in the real student life by joining an actual student association. Today I can proudly say that I am enjoying my membership at Asset | Accounting & Finance. Ever since I joined I have enjoyed myself enormously and now, two years on, I can additionally say that my CV has expanded with my involvement in three different committees. These are, the Promotional Committee, the Financial Business Dinner Committee, and last but not least, the Lustrum Committee. During this time I have learned a lot, I have met tons of new people, and gained different and valuable experiences. My involvement further helped me when I first started looking for an internship last spring. One of the advantages of being an Active Member of Asset | Accounting & Finance is that the association has a lot of alumni. These people love to help those who are experiencing the same things as they did when they were a student. During the third lustrum I came in touch with some of these Alumni and even just talking about my interests and what was involved in their careers gave me, a lot of information about the possibilities and daily tasks required when working for different firms. I also met some people who worked in companies that I was actually interested in. It was nice to have contact with Alumni that really wanted to help you and show you what was involved in their jobs. I even got an interview out of it! Unfortunately this interview did not work out for me. However, shortly after I received a message from Asset | Accounting & Finance where an alumnus within Unilever had been in contact expressing their interest for a finance intern. Until that moment I never even considered applying for an internship at Unilever due to the fact that I had always been more interested in Merger & Acquisition and consultancy. Despite this I decided to send a motivation letter. I knew that the idea of working for an international company really appealed to me. It also seemed interesting to work in an environment that had a more defined business approach, one in which a consumer is served through the cooperation of different disciplines. Currently, I am in my fourth month of my internship in Global R&D Finance. This department is responsible for the planning and control of Unilever’s global Research & Development. At the heart of its activity involves support for effective decision-making, providing input from a financial and economic perspective as well as from a strategic point of view. Additionally, the team is responsible for the integrity of analyses, development of financial and administrative controls and reporting of results to various Unilever Category Management and Leadership Teams. My work involves the support of the Financial Business Partners of the team by providing them with training and programmed Excel files which they can use for their own tasks. I also research into complex cost models, which will down the line help the Business Partners make improved forecasts’. What amazes me the most is Unilever’s dynamic cultural environment. One in which people cooperate with each other in an open, informal and performance oriented manner. It’s been great to have experience working in finance with a business perspective, where I’m actually exposed to some of the great innovations that the researchers in Unilever are working on. Through my experiences so far, I can say that it’s made a big difference in my motivation to go out there. Now I am aware that I actually do like to work in a friendly environment instead of the harsh world of M&A and consultancy. However, I guess that is something I can only find out for sure by also experiencing those kinds of jobs. My advice for you would be to explore your possibilities and try and find some work experience in the fields you’re interested in which allow you to get involved in real hands-on tasks’ similar to what you will do in an internship. Even though you may think you know what you want the more experiences you get the more it can help confirm your interests or change them entirely. You do not have to stay there for six months, like I do in Unilever You will already have a good idea if a job or company appeals to you within a few months. I would also say do not forget to use your network. There are always people around you that were once in your place that have moved up and can give you information about the steps they have taken. Do not hesitate to ask because I am sure they would love to help you. At least, I would ;).