Technology

The pace of change around digital technologies and their impact on finance is hard to quantify. It is vital for accountant to stay up to date with developments and their potential impact.

Finance in a Digital World is an elearning course ICAEW created in partnership with Deloitte to provide members with a grounding in the key technologies.

Alongside providing a context to how digital technologies are impacting how organisations and finance teams work, modules provide an introduction to:

• robotic process automation (RPA);
• artificial intelligence; and
• blockchain.

These modules are supported by further content within the Technology area of icaew.com, which brings together the latest ICAEW content on these technologies, such as the risks and opportunities posed to financial services by AI.

Meanwhile, the Audit and Assurance Faculty is looking at how digital tools are helping audit to evolve in a data-heavy, fast-moving corporate world. You can access all the discussions on how these technologies are impacting auditor in the Audit and Technology hub.

For those looking to get to grips with data, ICAEW’s Data Analytics Community hosts regular webinars offering free practical support to members. Recordings available from this year include: Financial modelling and scenario planning: master effective decision making.

You can also access all of the hints and tips from ICAEW’s long-standing Excel community, alongside its programme of webinars which includes: Why Power Query can change your life.

Trust and ethics

ICAEW believes its members can play a critical role in contributing towards a positive ethical culture within organisation, as exemplified by the decision to mandate ethics in its CPD requirements from November.

To support members in this aim, ICAEW is developing several online resources, including a new elearning programme which provides up to 12 hours of verifiable CPD.

The Ethics CPD Course created with the support of the Institute of Business Ethics focuses on the practical application of ICAEW’s code of ethics and is split into four modules. The first two modules relate to understanding the fundamental principles and ethical decision making.

The third module covers ethics for specialist roles and includes learning materials relating to audit, tax and economic crime. The final module contains a series of case studies using material from ICAEW’s award-winning training films.

ICAEW ethics team are also engaging with experience accountants and regulators on the challenges facing accountants and have produced a series of short videos on how to resist pressure to behave unethically.

Meanwhile, the Audit and Assurance Faculty have brought together resources focused on professional judgement, including support on the FRC’s Professional Judgement Guidance and a podcast discussing whether ‘good’ judgement can be regulated.

Tax

Tax policy and practice are constantly evolving. The Tax Faculty produces a weekly newsletter, Taxwire, covering the latest changes and you can access all the stories in icaew.com/insights.

Since January, ICAEW members can access all of the technical guidance produced by the faculty, including webinars, TAXguides and its monthly publication TAXline.

Recent support TAXguides have covered the reintroduction of two rates of corporation tax and the recent changes to research and development tax relief, while webinars have covered current issues relating to capital allowances and the latest changes to payroll, rewards and employment taxes. 

Meanwhile, the latest issue of TAXline takes a look at gender bias in tax policy and what progress is being made towards adapting tax policy for a digital world.