Accounting Assignment: Reflection On Knowledge & Insights Gained From Contemporary Issues

Question

Task: Write a 1,000 word ‘essay’ that describes, and critically reflects on, your change in knowledge and insights gained from the topics we have covered in ACFI3009. This exercise requires that you thoughtfully consider and critically reflect on your skills, the subject material and the insights you have gained from the contemporary issues and new skills covered in the course. You should also discuss how this learning has changed your thoughts about your future career.

In preparing your ‘essay’ on accounting assignment you should reflect upon:

• What you did (responsibilities, activities and achievements).
• Any problems you encountered and how you dealt with them.
• The most enlightening or surprising aspect of the course, and why it was enlightening or surprising. This might be course material or your application of it.
• The most challenging or difficult aspect of the course, and why. Include what you did, might have done, or will do to resolve or improve the situation.
• Your own strengths and weaknesses (and what you intend to do about building on your strengths and redressing your weaknesses).
• Your ability to work with others, to take direction or to be resourceful when no direction is given
• What you learned from the course.
• The extent to which you felt you fulfilled the requirements of this course.

You may choose to focus on one or more aspects or material that stand out for you more than others.

Answer

Introduction
As mentioned herein accounting assignment, the concept of accounting is a vital part of today’s world. This is linked with almost all types of business and organisational activities. Not only for the economic or financial issues, but proper accounting processes also address the other business issues. Information is the most precious resource of today's world. There is a large amount of data that are being generated regularly. As per Tschakert et al., (2017), businesses produce quantitative data that are accounted for different purposes further. Decision-making is easier with advanced accounting processes and analysis. In this era of technological advancement, accounting is being improved with the help of different tools and technologies. Handling a large amount of data is quite challenging. These accounting practices helps to have better results for the businesses. In this reflective essay, I have reflected on the coursework and the knowledge gained through this. I feel that this course will allow me to deal with several accounting challenges in further professional life.

Lessons learned from module
According to Hossain, (2020), the growth and development of organisations depend on accounting. This helps to develop proper strategies and decisions for managing the organisations. However, Nielsen, (2020), argued that there is a lack of focus on the cultural aspects and differences in different geographical regions. This is vital in the context of global accounting. I feel that the global accounting views need to change. Imposing traditional or western accounting approaches to all the segments are not effective in all cases. Thus, from this course, I learned that cultural and social background influences the accounting approaches of a region. Some various norms and rules can be portrayed as accounting practices. I feel that these are the backbone of the accounting system. All the accountants or related individuals should focus on these practices while dealing with accounts of different situations. A large amount of data is managed and handled with the help of machine learning and data analytics.

There are different parts of accounting that we need to address while dealing with huge datasets. These help in having effective insights from the quantitative data. This course provided knowledge that says large-scale data accounting helps grow organisations and provide the best possible services to the customers (LUNDY et al., 2021). It also helps in different operations in a business such as marketing, logistics, business planning, analysis of different business records to make the best decision, etc. Therefore, accounting helps in making businesses more effective and controllable.

In this course, I had some responsibilities that I tried to manage properly with my skills and knowledge. My primary work was focused on data collection, big data accounting and developing proper and useful insights from the collected statistical datasets (Woodside et al., 2020). Record-keeping was another responsibility throughout this entire course. I have used many tools and techniques and improved my knowledge and skills of using those in this course of accounting. I have learnt different uses of Excel as an accounting tool. This is the most common and the most useful tool for different levels of financial and other numeric accounting processes. I have also learned to deal with machine learning to account for big datasets and extract that information.

I have encountered a few issues while going through this course. First of all, I was confused about the use of Excel due to my small and limited knowledge of the software. I had limited ideas on what could be done by Excel. Thus, at the initial stage, I felt nervous while using this. Also, this is true for machine learning systems. Practically using these concepts and approaches was challenging for me. Lack of theoretical knowledge pushed me to confuse results in the practical use of these systems. Also, I felt some issues with collecting proper data from different sources. The authenticity of collected data and the cleanliness of those data are needed to be ensured. At the initial stage, I failed in doing so. As the course progressed, I took help from the tutors regarding my confusion and doubts. I researched online and offline to have a better theoretical concept of using these tools and collecting appropriate data for accounting. These helped me a lot in overcoming this situation.

This course taught me about the usefulness of Excel. As per my experience, the most enlightening factor is the vast and useful application of Excel in accounting. I had no idea that this tool could do so many accounting and presentation activities important for business decision-making. I am now highly interested in this tool and working to enhance my skill of using this.
Besides, I have found data collection for accounting the most challenging aspect of this course. There are several types of numeric and accounts data from different sources. Clean and authentic data collection was quite hard for me in this course. I tried to improve my skills and knowledge of data collection through the academic materials of this course. I feel that I have the strength of conflict management while working in a workplace. Dealing with data and accounting raises different conflicts, and I have the ability to manage those. I lack decision-making skills that I consider a weakness of mine (Egorova & Bogdanovich, 2019). However, I have teamwork ability. I can easily adjust myself with other team members of different values and views.

This course helped me to have knowledge of accounting and advanced tools and technologies related to this. I learnt to use excel for different accounting purposes and analyses. I learnt the basics of machine learning in this course. I realised that machine learning is a vital part of accounting these days.

Conclusion
Thus, this reflective essay has discussed the learnings of this course. My strengths and experience, along with weaknesses, are also highlighted in this essay. The issues with accounting that I have faced are discussed. Overall, I can say that accounting is being advanced day by day. With the advancement, the most common issue is a lack of knowledge and skill gaps.

References
Egorova, S. E., & Bogdanovich, I. S. (2019). Prospects for using information technology in accounting in globalised business. St. Petersburg State Polytechnical University Journal. Economics, 12(6), 38.https://search.proquest.com/openview/a86c5b12ac8b0d3fadc6f3504638fc2c/1?pq-origsite=gscholar&cbl=2041935

Hossain, D. A. (2020). Bridging Advanced Data Science, Machine Learning and Future of Accounting and Auditing: A Theoretical Review. Machine Learning and Future of Accounting and Auditing: A Theoretical Review (August 15, 2020).https://www.academia.edu/download/64121898/Bridging%20Advanced%20Data%20Science,%20Machine%20Learning%20and%20Future%20of%20Accounting%20and%20Auditing.pdf

LUNDY, B., SERGEANT, A., JILES, L., TIETZ, W., CAINAS, J. M., & MINTZ, S. M. (2021). ACCOUNTING CURRICULA IN THE DIGITAL AGE. Strategic Finance.https://search.proquest.com/openview/ef4e8453d2bb9cd11504da6ba381e264/1?pq-origsite=gscholar&cbl=48426

Nielsen, S. (2020). Management accounting and the idea of machine learning. Accounting assignmentAarhus BSS, Aarhus University, Department of Economics and Business Economics. https://econ.au.dk/fileadmin/site_files/filer_oekonomi/Working_Papers/Economics/2020/wp20_09.pdf

Tschakert, N., Kokina, J., Kozlowski, S., & Vasarhelyi, M. (2017). How business schools can integrate data analytics into the accounting curriculum. The CPA Journal, 87(9), 10-12.https://search.proquest.com/openview/b3ecd2a1880e4280f748fa9be7fc2280/1?pq-origsite=gscholar&cbl=41798

Woodside, J. M., Augustine, F. K., Chambers, V., & Mendoza, M. (2020). Integrative learning and interdisciplinary information systems curriculum development in accounting analytics. Journal of Information Systems Education, 31(2), 147.http://jise.org/Volume31/n2/JISEv31n2p147.pdf