Ep. 58 - What is the Accounting Concentration?

In Episode 58 of the CSUSB Advising Podcast, Matt Markin chats with Dr. David Senteney about the Accounting concentration within the Administration major! What does a CPA do? What career options are there? What resources are available? Find out in this episode!

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Transcript

Welcome to another episode of the CSUSB Advising Podcast. My name is Matt Markin, and academic advisor here at Cal State San Bernardino. And on today's episode, we're learning all about the accounting concentration within the business administration major. And our special guest today is Dr. Dave Senteney. Dr. Senteney, how are you today?

Real good, Matt. Thanks for asking me to be here.

Yeah, I'm glad that you're here. And let's just go ahead and jump in. Can you tell us a little bit about yourself and your background in higher ed?

Yes, let me first say that I'm retired. And I say that to say that I've been doing this for 40 years, 40 plus years, a long time. And I taught at University of Illinois back at the number one accounting program, actually, back in the 80s. And then several programs, we had a number of sixth rank program at Ohio University and then I retired. And they were kind enough to take me in out here so that I'm not just lonely and doing nothing all the time at CSU, and I'm just they've been just as good as can be to me. And so I'm really grateful that they have been that you all have been so nice to me. So I've been doing this a long time. And that's how I got here to CSUSB. And I'm, I'm the CPA professor. And so I think if you don't do the CPA, you're not get maximizing your return on investment in education. So I'm the CPA professor. And a lot of the information is going to be focused on the CPA, but our programs are CPA focused, and a lot of my work over these years, has been with the different CPA groups. And that includes University as well as state and federal governance, which there's one thing that will come out in our discussion is there's a lot of laws regulating the companies and the CPAs. The CPAs, in my opinion, have a very important role in the economy and in society. And so we're kind of like the, the accounting system kinda like is the watchers, if you will, of the companies to make sure they're doing what they're supposed to be doing and, and not doing what they don't supposed to be doing. So like Froggen, and stuff is a big deal. And so we take that very seriously. So the CPAs are professionals and professional conduct and behavior is expected. We are we do have to be a little bit, our behavior has to be better than everybody else's, are held to a higher standard, because we're in kind of a special position of being CPAs and doing audits of the companies and that kind of thing. So and I'm a big believer in that. So we are held to a higher ethical standard will get in trouble for doing stuff that other other people can do. But it's supposed to be that way. And that's the way the system works.

And so specifically for CSUSB, how would you describe the Administration major and the accounting concentration?

Well, there's choices within administration. We're getting a lot with the information technology majors and internal audit. So one of the things that's required by law is companies have to keep a correct set of books. And they're also required to check the books to make sure they're correct all the time. And that's called internal audit, they test the internal controls, those are procedures that companies have to follow to make sure that things get recorded. Okay. And then they hire. We have a kind of a minor in internal audit, and this is 20% projected 20% growth per year for the next 10 years in internal audit. So that's companies checking their accounting records inside the company. Now you don't have to take the full array of accounting classes to do that. It's like a minor or concentration. And these people would not take the CPA exam, but there is something called the certificate CIA. Oh, it sounds like you're a spy or something. You put CIA by your name, but that's a certified internal auditor. And that's where you make sure the company's procedures are making sure that the records are correct and accurate. Of course, this these laws followed on all the frauds did happen back about the 2000s 20 years ago. And so they made all these laws like Sarbanes Oxley is one probably a lot of people have heard of. And so they made these laws. So that's an important overlap between information technology majors and accounting, because every all the records are kept on the computer of course. And then checking those records is an important function in the company now. So we're getting a lot of information tech majors specializing in internal audit. And then of course, finance and management is the ones that do the budgets inside the company. Financial Management is where you pretty much it's 80% of a company's time every day is spent receiving and collecting cash, paying your bills, and making sure that the people who owe you money pay you and making sure you get your bills paid. So the people who do the budgeting that would be called accounting inside the company are the administration and the financial management majors. And then the accounting major is, is pretty much when the companies want to make a set of financial statements, or file their tax returns, or do some filings with the SEC or state of California. And then you've got to have all of the accounting classes. That's when you got to really know accounting to make sure those filings get done correctly. And that's where you need to take the CPA, then. So to just work in the company, you don't have to be a CPA, but also those jobs don't pay as well as the CPA, the placement rate for CPA graduates who have the CPA in hand is 100%. Wow, everybody who has a CPA finds a job. And so it's the best thing that our students can do to make sure that they get they climb that ladder like that, like they're like they would like to that they get the highest salary instead of if you stay in the company. Sometimes the turnover is not as fast, you got to wait on somebody to retire to move up and get that promotion. But if you get that CPA, you'll climb the ladder and the jobs will come to you. You won't have to go looking for.

Now, that's really great to know. And I guess I want to jump into more of a question what careers you know, your matching CPA is what other kinds of careers have you seen some of your graduates from CSUSB go into?

Well, you take the CPA exam, and our programs are designed so that we're trying to help you get that CPA as soon as possible. If you don't get it while you're at CSU, the chances are of getting it later, go way down. And that's because this thing called real life sets it you know, you graduate from college, you know, the first thing you do you have you buy a nice car and get a house payment and you know, and then of course you want to get married, start your family and stuff in real life and that CPA goes down in a priority. So if you get that CPA as soon as you graduate, and I can name lots of students who have. You need to get the CPA then you got to get some experience. So you work with a CPA firm for about a year, maybe not that long, and maybe two years, and then you're in the perfect position a little more than a year, year and a half, two years. You're in a perfect position to go someplace of responsibility on your own, either starting your own CPA firm, or we have many students who go to work as CFO or president of university have a not for profit treasurer of the city of Glendora city of Twentynine Palms, and there you're in the salaries, you're up in the twos $200,000 $300,000 and everything from there depends on you avoid any problems in the bookkeeping, for the company that you're working for. Your experience, what they're paying you the high salary for, is to make sure and head off any problems with the accounting before they start so that every year when they have an audit, they get a clean opinion. And that's what everybody wants. And most companies 80 85% of audits are unqualified opinion opinions, meaning we didn't find anything wrong. And that's what everybody wants it, no problems, everybody's happy and they're paying you to talk to the auditors, you speak the same language, what's it going to take to keep them happy and make sure we do it. So make sure that we don't have any problems with our accounting. And so they're, you're up in the, and that's by three to five years, you're moving up into a position of main responsibility, also big bucks. But it's a lot of responsibility. And you have to have the experience and the knowledge capital, to be able to do well in those in those positions. So it starts with getting that CPA, then getting some experience in a CPA firm. And I've never seen the CPA firms that love a school like CSU. The local CPA firms are very, very good does, some of them hire exclusively from us. They don't even hire for many other schools in the area. And so they're watching for the people to graduate and ready and welcome them in. And they provide great mentorship, maybe for a lifetime. But at least for that three to five years that you need, when you as a springboard, then to go to a position of higher responsibility on your own. And then of course, being that CPA is networking is everything, you talk to other people all the time, other CPAs and find out what they're doing. And that has value. If you're the CFO, CFO at Claremont McKenna College is like one of our alums is, and then you want to be talking to other CPAs to find out what they're doing. And maybe we should do things this way. Or maybe we should do it that way. But you're finding out what works and what doesn't work at the other companies. And that has value. And then you bring that back to your job to make sure that you avoid any problems with the record keeping that all these big organizations are, are required to do.

So let's say someone's listening to this, and they're like, this all sounds fascinating. I'm even more interested now in maybe pursuing the Administration major and doing the accounting concentration, but maybe they're still on the fence of declaring. Do you have any suggestions for that student?

It's up to the individual, really, and it's, what do you what would you like to do and of course, when you're young is the time to try for your dreams. And so I encourage the students to if you think it sounds good to you, but you're unsure, you can talk to any of the faculties I always send my cell number and answer emails from students that I never met just to answer questions, because I know they have a lot of questions and need information to decide. But if you take it sounds, CPAs are kind of like, first of all, they're professionals. And I mentioned and I really, really liked that I it, I couldn't have made a better choice when I got in to accounting because in a way the CPAs work for society, they don't work for our company, we're the ones that are make sure that the rules are being followed. And everything is according to the way they're supposed to be. And kind of like a referee in a in a basketball game or something. We call them like we see him. That's what we get paid for, to be professionals and to give professional opinions. And I like that nothing could have been better for me. And not knowing what major to choose. I just chose accounting and nothing could have been better. But if you think that sounds good to good to you like something you want to be part of, then take a chance. And maybe it's maybe it's not CPAs need to be self starters. And so I remember I talked to one person that said they wanted to be a CPA, but they need to be they said, oh, I need to be spoon fed everything. And I thought well, that might be if you need to be spoon fed that maybe you could get it but maybe maybe not because CPAs tend to be more independent kind of people. And so especially if you're starting on your own in a in a CPA firm, you've got a lot of responsibility on yourself that you have to take and so it's not for everybody, but if you think you it sounds good like something you want to do and like I said, nothing could have been better for me, then take a chance. And even if you decide you don't want to do it, you can get that if you take the CPA and get it, you can go into such a broad range of positions that you will find something you like. So you may not want to do the CPA thing per se. But maybe you like working in school systems. We get a lot of people who are teachers who come and take the CPA, we get a lot of people who are social workers, social workers, and nurses that want to get into administration. And so you're perfectly trained, getting that CPA to work in administration, in a hospital, or administration in a government, social organization, agency, something like that. Because you understand budgets and all of the numbers which every organization has budgets, gosh, we can't get by without him, the a CSU has a budget every year that we got to follow. And so you're in a perfect position to work in any organization if you get that CPA, and maybe you don't want to work at a CPA firm, or even be a CFO or anything quite that much. And maybe you've got family and stuff, and you just can't move to climb the ladder as much as you'd like to. But with that CPA, you're perfectly trained to work in any kind of a company or government agency, university, hospital, organization of any size.

And on the flip side of that, do you find that there's any misconceptions students or anyone might have about accounting?

Probably that it involves numbers. Everyone thinks a lot of students think I'm not good at math. So I don't know that I'll be good at accounting. And Accounting has very little to do with numbers. That's surprisingly, it's about rules. Are we following the rules when we show somebody our numbers? That's what it's about. And of course, you can kind of think intuitively, when companies say how good of a company we are, everybody wants to show off and say, look, we're a good company. And but are they fudging the numbers when they do that? And see, that's back where accountants are kind of like the the the referees in a basketball game, or an umpire in a baseball game. When we show somebody some numbers, it's got to be according to the rules, so that everybody's playing by the same rules, right? And so that's pretty much what being an accountant is about is about the rules, and not so much the numbers. It's not really hard, like math, or computer science, or information tech or any of that stuff. It's hard in the sense of reading a lot of rules and stuff. But we have a number of resources that students can use to network and learn about the different jobs that are available with the CPA and I there's a breadth that I've never seen in accounting, the choice of different kinds of jobs that you can, you can do. We have a job fair every fall called Meet the Firm's where the local employers show up and meet people who are going to be graduating maybe in the spring, and go ahead and get their resume and invite him to come and visit the firm so that when they graduate, they've already got a job lined up. The Student Organization Beta Alpha Psi, works with local firms with Cal CPA is the local group of CPAs. And the California accountancy board, of course, comes down to our campus more from Sacramento. They're the ones that regulate the CPAs in the state. They come down from Sacramento to our campus more than any other campus anywhere. Even even Cal State Sacramento, they've got a they've got a Cal State right there. And they come down to us more than they go to the one in Sacramento. And so they're very good does Cal CPA and the California accountancy board comes down at least once every year to meet with our students look over their transcripts. And they just love this one on one. We're in the SMSU in the big ballroom there and have tables set up and the students line up to meet talk to somebody from the California accountancy board to go over their classes with them and see if it looks like they're on track for being a being able to take you got to be qualified to take the CPA exam. And so you got to have the right classes and stuff. And so they look over their transcripts to make sure they're on track. And when they do get ready, they won't have any trouble. Then taking that CPA that CPA, we have tutoring and scholarships available. So money's tight for everybody. And we have free tutoring. And a number of scholarships, both for tuition, but also for CPA is a course, it's costly. It's more money, which is the last thing after you spend money on tuition for some years, you want to hear you got to pay some more, we got scholarships, though, for those CPA costs. So we're we have now and we're working on increasing that number of CPA prep scholarships, so that when students graduate, they can go right into a CPA prep course. And which is kind of a review, it's just a review of the classes. And the hard thing about it is you got to shove all this stuff into your short term memory. And so you got to short term memorize a bunch of stuff for test taking. And that's the hard thing, you know, kind of like getting indigestion when you eat too much, or your mom's cooking or something, you know, you you get indigestion or a headache from shove and too much stuff into your head. So you need an organized prep right before. And as well, we have all of those companies that provide that they give us some free scholarships. They're very good to this every year, but we're working on increasing that. So our goal is we want to have everybody in the master's program. For example, we want to have all of our students have a CPA prep course, during the master's program free, free to them during the Masters so that when they graduate, they're ready to go right to that CPA exam. And then they've got CPA in hand. And when they go looking for a job, what's the placement rate 100%.

Dr. Senteney, a lot of useful information. I even learned a lot more about accounting. So I appreciate you being on the podcast, sharing this information with students. Thank you again for joining us today.

Well, thank you, Matt. You do a great job and this is a great program to get get the important information out there to the students.

I appreciate it.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai