Accounting experts emphasise importance of CIMA

Pauline Dikuelo | Tuesday December 9, 2014 12:59

Speaking at a press briefing in Gaborone last week, country manager for the Botswana Chartered Institute of Management Accountants (CIMA), Letus Chinyepi, said government should train accounting professionals from grassroot level. He also said government should encourage SMEs to have qualified financial management accountants.

“Government should enroll more senior school leaving students into the CIMA course as it would add value to businesses and generate profit. I believe that SMEs fail due to lack of proper financial management,” he said.

Recently CIMA launched the new Global Management Accounting Principles, which the institute developed in collaboration with the American Institute Of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA).

Chinyepi stated that the principles were aimed at improving decision-making, adding that they were developed following extensive research which showed that organisations struggled with data overload, dispersed workforces and speed of change. Fellow a Chartered Management of Accounting, David Cropper, stated that although there were several good SMEs with excellent ideas, they failed to take their businesses a notch further because they lacked solid financial management structures.

“They think they are too small to have the complete structure but that’s where they get it wrong. They need to have a vision and should be encouraged to take Financial Management Accounting courses part time,” he said.  Cropper added that most SMEs used a financial accountant once a month to monitor the businesses’ cash flow, and check if they were making any profit.  He however emphasised that entrepreneurs needed experienced experts to assist them in their business operations. “This country needs SMEs to succeed as mining does not employ many people compared to them as they create lots of jobs,” he said. Cropper noted that people should differentiate between Financial Management Accountants and Financial Accountants. He explained that Financial Management Accountants were largely focused on the future to try and avoid pitfalls, and also gathered and compiled information.

Financial officers, human resource officers and information technology operators on the other hand, needed strong links to make market strategies and decisions together.

“Organisations need to have effective management accountants functioning in order for them to be successful overtime because many companies fails due to lack of having them,” he added. Management accounting provides information that creates a clear roadmap, guiding strategy through the provision of future focused insight and analysis control functions.