If American companies plan on moving to IFRS, their financial statement preparers will require less technical training and more instruction on "soft skills."
Corporate accountants facing a move to IFRS are quick to say they will need technical training. But their toughest task may actually be mastering "soft skills," says Richard Fuchs, PricewaterhouseCoopers partner and global IFRS specialist. Fuchs says a move from U.S. GAAP to IFRS will require training in how to apply judgment, analysis and critical thinking to accounting standards, as well as how to make transparent disclosures.
Fuchs, who spoke on Monday at a financial reporting conference sponsored by Financial Executives International, worked in Europe and Asia helping companies move from local generally accepted accounting principles to IFRS. His observation from his time abroad is that U.S. accountants will have to be trained differently. No longer will accountants collect and examine the facts, and then pour over 25,000 pages of rules to find the correct accounting application, quipped Fuchs. Rather, when applying IFRS, they will have to work with broader principles and "learn how to report in openness."
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