Interview Reflection
Interview Reflection
Coming into this assignment, I had a few ideas of people I wanted to interview. I had recently switched to being an accounting major and knew that was the field I wanted to focus on for this project. Among the accountants in my area, there was one in particular I wished to work with. Mrs. Smith was that person. She originally found her way into accounting working a dead end job. Then, she applied to a graduate's assistantship program at Temple University. This opened up the doors for her professionally because she was able to pursue a masters degree in Taxation at Temple, which they paid for as well. This was the opportunity she needed because it has led to her working strictly in the taxation department for her entire career. This focus also allowed her to establish the perfect work-life balance that she wished to achieve, especially with plans to have children in the near future. She now is a manager in the taxation department of a big ten public accounting firm and primarily focuses her work in high wealth individuals.
During the interview I conducted with Mrs. Smith, we discussed how communication affects her professional experiences. She explained how the industry has developed into a paperless, online field. This has been shown to provide a plethora of new opportunities for the accounting field but also comes with a few drawbacks as well. She told me how bringing her laptop everywhere she goes is crucial. She can conduct business from virtually anywhere she gets an internet signal. Another huge technological breakthrough that she uses in day-to-day affairs is emailing on her phone. She works with clients' finances and being able to respond immediately, if not near her computer, is pivotal to making the client feeling like they matter in a client service business. This took her, an old school individual, a while to get used to. But now, she loves having her different tax and work papers on multiple screens. In her company, they also scan all files online so they can be accessed anywhere at anytime. Before that, there was a special room called a tax library that Mrs. Smith would need to search through for the right book to answer the right question. This tedious process has thankfully been converted to an online database that can be accessed anywhere. Making everything online really helps when working for a national firm. She told me how the other week she had a specific question and reached out to someone in their Minnesota office. What would have taken days to answer was answered in a mere few minutes.
One point she kept bringing up about was the loss of face-to-face contact in the field. Especially with the newer generation, they just want to text and not have any personal touch. She said you must pick up the phone and have a conversation with these clients, it pays off ten fold. The clients truly appreciate someone who is handling their money, pick up the phone and give them a call.
I believe me inquiring about how communication has evolved, "How has that changed in the past decade?", gave me some interesting answers about how the field has taken a complete turnaround with paper documentation. Also, " How has technology helped communication between people inside the workplace?", was also a very crucial question. She told me about how the company turned their department into an online library of information from an actual room full of books on taxation. This really helps her team get the proper answers to questions and assist customers quickly and appropriately.
I believe some things that didn't work so well were my question 4 and 6. They gave me the shortest answers in this interview, even though they were helpful. I would rework these questions to be as open ended as possible with good meaty responses.
I learned that no matter what she does, she is working with communicating to someone. That could be a colleague two feet away or a client/colleague hundreds of miles away like in Minnesota. It truly is fascination how much she is talking to people throughout her daily businesses. This connects back to communication as a whole in our class. Everyone does it, and depending on what type of communication you use, there are certain conventions that are taken to utilize that effectively.
Coming into this assignment, I had a few ideas of people I wanted to interview. I had recently switched to being an accounting major and knew that was the field I wanted to focus on for this project. Among the accountants in my area, there was one in particular I wished to work with. Mrs. Smith was that person. She originally found her way into accounting working a dead end job. Then, she applied to a graduate's assistantship program at Temple University. This opened up the doors for her professionally because she was able to pursue a masters degree in Taxation at Temple, which they paid for as well. This was the opportunity she needed because it has led to her working strictly in the taxation department for her entire career. This focus also allowed her to establish the perfect work-life balance that she wished to achieve, especially with plans to have children in the near future. She now is a manager in the taxation department of a big ten public accounting firm and primarily focuses her work in high wealth individuals.
During the interview I conducted with Mrs. Smith, we discussed how communication affects her professional experiences. She explained how the industry has developed into a paperless, online field. This has been shown to provide a plethora of new opportunities for the accounting field but also comes with a few drawbacks as well. She told me how bringing her laptop everywhere she goes is crucial. She can conduct business from virtually anywhere she gets an internet signal. Another huge technological breakthrough that she uses in day-to-day affairs is emailing on her phone. She works with clients' finances and being able to respond immediately, if not near her computer, is pivotal to making the client feeling like they matter in a client service business. This took her, an old school individual, a while to get used to. But now, she loves having her different tax and work papers on multiple screens. In her company, they also scan all files online so they can be accessed anywhere at anytime. Before that, there was a special room called a tax library that Mrs. Smith would need to search through for the right book to answer the right question. This tedious process has thankfully been converted to an online database that can be accessed anywhere. Making everything online really helps when working for a national firm. She told me how the other week she had a specific question and reached out to someone in their Minnesota office. What would have taken days to answer was answered in a mere few minutes.
One point she kept bringing up about was the loss of face-to-face contact in the field. Especially with the newer generation, they just want to text and not have any personal touch. She said you must pick up the phone and have a conversation with these clients, it pays off ten fold. The clients truly appreciate someone who is handling their money, pick up the phone and give them a call.
I believe me inquiring about how communication has evolved, "How has that changed in the past decade?", gave me some interesting answers about how the field has taken a complete turnaround with paper documentation. Also, " How has technology helped communication between people inside the workplace?", was also a very crucial question. She told me about how the company turned their department into an online library of information from an actual room full of books on taxation. This really helps her team get the proper answers to questions and assist customers quickly and appropriately.
I believe some things that didn't work so well were my question 4 and 6. They gave me the shortest answers in this interview, even though they were helpful. I would rework these questions to be as open ended as possible with good meaty responses.
I learned that no matter what she does, she is working with communicating to someone. That could be a colleague two feet away or a client/colleague hundreds of miles away like in Minnesota. It truly is fascination how much she is talking to people throughout her daily businesses. This connects back to communication as a whole in our class. Everyone does it, and depending on what type of communication you use, there are certain conventions that are taken to utilize that effectively.
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