Chartered Institute of Management Accountants CEO Charles Tilley on the role of
management accountants and the institute that educates them

While accountancy is commonly hailed as one of the oldest professions in the world, it’s quite ironic that its much younger cousin, management accountancy, is what people are turning to as a key business tool for companies to stay ahead. While its name provides some sort of definition, many people are left in the dark as to what management accountants are, how different they are from regular accountants, and how important they really are to a business.

So we went straight to the source for the answer — Chartered Institute of Management Accountants (CIMA) CEO Charles Tilley, who used his love for sailing to craft an analogy to explain what the job entails.

“Suppose you were taking a tanker full of palm oil from Kuala Lumpur to Shanghai,” he says. “You wouldn’t dream of setting off for Shanghai without a navigator on board. You need someone who understands where you are, where the rocks are, what the weather is, where the ship is going and how the palm oil is managing with all that travel. And you would need to know all these in advance. A management accountant’s job is a bit like this.”

Extending that analogy, it stands to reason that accountants are in charge of recording data from the satellites and so on for reference. The real skill is using that information to the ship’s advantage, which is what a management accountant would do.

CIMA, the world’s top provider of academic qualifications in management accountancy, was founded in 1919 simply because its founder didn’t have anyone who could provide that kind of information when he needed it. His bookkeepers couldn’t give him the pivotal information he needed to know in order to run his business, so he developed a system that would help him do exactly that. That management accountancy system is what CIMA is built upon, and 90 years on, its role has essentially remained the same.

“The absolute fundamentals of running a business have not changed at all,” Tilley says. “But the world has changed a lot; it’s more complex. Technology has changed everything, especially in accounting. Technology takes the grunt work out of the basics of running a business. Electronic reporting was a huge evolution; information is now more accurate. The new challenge here is information overload, and companies need someone to understand the information and manage it properly.” Skills management accountants are equipped with.

Keeping abreast with trends is intrinsic to CIMA as courses are re-examined every four or five years so that they stay current. According to Tilley, CIMA is the only accountancy body that does so. For example, the institute recently launched a special certification based on Islamic banking practices, while environmental sustainability has been part of the syllabus for quite a while now. In fact, Tilley sits on the supervisory board of the Prince of Wales trust, which is concerned with environmental reporting.

The global economic downturn, which has affected every single business on the globe, is also something CIMA is equipped to deal with. “Investors really want to know just three things — how you make your money, how you manage your risks and how you manage the business,” Tilley observes. “The details of the accounts are just details, it’s not the main thing. The main story is how your business has fared in a particular year, and how you’ve run your business. Quite clearly, a lot of boards in the financial crisis had no idea how they were making money and they didn’t understand their risks. Going back to the navigator thing I said — you need to know exactly where you are and exactly where you’re going.”

Growing up in a business environment in London — his family owned what was known as the Tilley Lamp Company — Tilley comes with an instinctual understanding of what companies need to survive, especially in a marketplace radically different from what it used to be even 10 years ago. Although Tilley had a passion for farming and the countryside, financial limitations sent him to business school instead.

Tilley had a vibrant career in corporate finance before settling down in CIMA. “I joined for three reasons. One is CIMA does great things, by providing people with a certificate that says they have an accredited academic achievement and they are committed to a code of ethics. It’s a passport to employment anywhere in the world, and I love the way it changes people’s lives. It’s also a decent-sized business. I work with 400 people and the company has become very international. I enjoy travelling.

“My favourite thing, I think, is the thought leadership, how we talk about where the world is going. I’m not a technician, I don’t get into the details, but I like to think about trends and talk about important issues. This gives me a wonderful opportunity to do that. And of course, to see people benefit from all those discussions.”

CIMA has competitors in all the markets it operates, but has generally been able to stay ahead. Compelling content is a challenge for any provider in any industry, but when it comes to academic qualifications in something as necessary — not to mention volatile — as managing the financial health of a company, the challenge is intensified. Yet, CIMA has managed to remain incredibly successful.

Considering that CIMA is a ship full of navigators training new ones every day, that comes as no surprise.

Time for the environment

Swiss watchmaker IWC is embarking on a truly noteworthy project this year — one that aims to save the beaches and the seas — inspired by the latest range in its iconic collection of diving timepieces, the Aquatimer.

IWC has established a partnership with the non-profit Charles Darwin Foundation (CDF) to conserve the threatened species of the Galapagos Islands for future generations and to mark the Darwin bicentennial year in 2009.

Apart from making substantial contributions to the CDF for the upkeep and preservation of the Galapagos Islands, IWC is also organising beach clean-ups in various locations. For example, right here in Pulau Tenggol, Terengganu.

“The days of cavalier treatment of the environment are behind us, with IWC adopting a strong social and ecological responsibility policy,” says Goris Verburg, general manager of IWC Schaffhausen, Southeast Asia. “Taking a leaf out of our global initiative in the Galapagos Islands, we feel it’s only appropriate that we play our part, together with our like-minded partners to protect one of Malaysia’s beautiful marine jewels, Pulau Tenggol, which is one of the most beautiful and untouched dive sites in the world.”

In a unique tie-up with the luxurious Tanjong Jara Resort and luxury retailer Valiram Group, IWC worked out a special holiday package that included a beach clean-up and diving activities as well as a fabulous holiday at one of the country’s loveliest beach resorts. Guided by Reef Check, a non-profit coral reef monitoring organisation, IWC spearheaded an eco-drive over a weekend in October that aimed to create awareness of the problems that plague beaches and coral reefs and to preserve and protect the environment and marine life of Pulau Tenggol.

Divers were the main participants of the underwater clean-up, where they not only removed fishing nets from the coral reefs, but also used tyres, drink cans, batteries and plastic. Non-swimmers combed the beach and collected similar types of waste.

There was also an informative talk by Reef Check on the importance of the preservation of coral reefs, among others.

This project received much support from family and friends, who shed their everyday personas to assume the role of guardian and custodian of the environment, united by their desire to make a difference.

Photo Short

Making People Magazine’s Most Beautiful People List as well as its List of World's Best-Dressed Women, starring in multi-award-winning movie Slumdog Millionaire and dressed by Burberry are all in a day’s work for Indian model and actress Freida Pinto. As if all these weren’t enough, she also has exclusive canoodling rights with the dashing British-born Indian actor Dev Patel, whom she starred with in Danny Boyle’s blockbuster hit.

Pinto’s been spending more time away from her native India these days, and not just to spend time with her 19-year-old beau either. She has two movies up for release in 2010 — Miral, a Franco-Israeli film directed by Julian Schnabel and Woody Allen's You Will Meet A Tall Dark Stranger.

This article appeared in Options, the lifestyle pullout of The Edge Malaysia, Issue 782, Nov 23-29, 2009