As traditional banks undergo transformations to shed personnel, digital banks and fintechs are hiring staff. The Institute of Singapore Chartered Accountants and recruitment firm Ethos BeathChapman share their views on how finance professionals can future -proof themselves.
About 70 percent of the roles in banks involve operational, compliance and sales functions, with the balance being technology roles. However, in the fintech and even digital banking space, the reverse is true, says Chia Hock Lai, president of Singapore Fintech Association in a recent interview.
«As long as the economy keeps growing, the fintech industry should be able to absorb the finance talents,» noted Chia. As digital-only banks arrive on Singapore's shores, there will be openings for talented people to join these newcomers, wrote Ethos BeathChapman in a recent note. Hence, contenders will be looking for the right mix of skills and specialists to help them sustain in the race, the recruitment firm wrote.
Seizing Opportunities
Instead of fearing that technology would replace their jobs, finance professionals can leverage technology to improve their performance with better decision-making, performance management, and information processing, said Lee Fook Chiew, CEO of Institute of Singapore Chartered Accountants, in an interview with finews.asia.
«They must first understand the environment the business is operating in to identify the controls and risks in relation to business performance and financial reporting. Once these have been identified, appropriate tools can then be used to analyze and monitor performance,» he said.
Environment of Change
Amid an environment of rapid and massive changes, the «bread and butter» work of accountants - Financial Reporting - remains unchanged, as it is a cornerstone requirement of the economy and businesses. «High quality and reliable financial reports provide stakeholders and investors with key financial information for decision making. Only accountancy professionals have the training and education to perform this critical and essential work,» said Lee.
«Some of this work may be undertaken by machines and technology, but the fact remains that at key junctures, humans will be required to exercise key judgments or make decisions/recommendations, using the outputs generated by machines.»
Beyond Accounting
To be future-ready, finance professionals also need to broaden their knowledge base beyond accounting to include basic tech and legal knowledge. They also need to deepen their expertise in areas that are in demand, such as financial forensics and data analytics, added Lee.
The view resonates with those of global recruitment firm Ethos BeathChapman, which sees a number of critical hires and new jobs from digital banks in the areas of front-end development and UI/UX design, Data and Analytics, Application Engineering and Cloud Architecture, Blockchain or Distributed Ledger Technology.
Story Behind The Numbers
«Expectations of finance professionals have evolved, and they are now required to provide business insights to improve decision-making, explain the story behind the numbers and work well across teams. This means that finance professionals must never stop learning because the profession will continue to evolve with the times,» said Lee
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