Mike Antonetti, 37 /EMPLOYER: Crowe Chizek & Co., Oakbrook Terrace / SALARY RANGE: $35,000 to $100,000
What is an auditor?
An auditor reports on a company’s financial statements–that they’re in compliance with generally accepted accounting principles. But an auditor in our firm will provide a lot of business consulting, internal control consulting and tax consulting to our clients as well.
Why did you choose this field?
I’ve always had an inclination for accounting or bookkeeping. Even in grammar school, I was treasurer of the student council.
What is your educational background?
I have a bachelor’s of science degree in accounting from Northern Illinois University. I am a certified public accountant and a certified management accountant. Now there’s a 150-hour educational requirement to take your CPA, so it’s basically becoming a master’s program. Next year is the first year that takes effect.
Describe an average day.
There really is no average day. Usually you start out with your list of things you’re going to try to accomplish and then you get a couple of calls and that whole list has changed. But I think my typical day is really focused on supervising my engagements and keeping my clients informed.and getting information.
One of the keys to our success is keeping our clients up to date on the progress of whatever projects we’re working on–trying to identify the issues quickly and resolving them. A significant portion of my day, good or bad, is spent communicating with clients via the phone, via e-mail, faxes, whatever, trying to resolve issues, plan for upcoming audits, looking at their tax planning before various points in time.
For private companies the functions are basically the same as for public companies. There are some different requirements for the federal Securities and Exchange Commission you have to be aware of when you’re working on a public company. But without going into the nauseating detail, the core is the same.
Why would a private company get an audit?
A bank may want it to get an audit because loans are secured by the assets of the company. In some situations the owners may not be actively involved in the business so they want to have an audit to feel comfortable in the result. It may be that the owner is thinking about selling down the road and in the selling process it’s beneficial to have audited financial statements so that surprises don’t come up, which could drive the selling price down.
And in some areas there could be regulatory requirements. Every financial institution is required to have an audit. They’re also required to have certain internal audit functions, which we provide as an outsourcing activity, because there are a lot of local community banks that can’t justify a full-time internal audit staff.
A big part of auditing is evaluating the estimates that are made by management, because accounting involves a great deal of judgment.
What’s the best thing about your job?
Hitting a home run for a client. For example there’s a client that we have that had two divisions. One was a business established for 100 years and one was an up-and-coming business, and their plan was to break the businesses apart and take the new business public. We had to set up a separate system for the new business to operate under, as well as to be able to do audited financial statements going back a number of years for the SEC filings for the initial public (stock) offering. We completed all of that in an exhausting time frame. But it was very satisfying.
What’s the worst thing?
The worst thing is if somebody really has to have the audit for the bank and doesn’t want any part of it, doesn’t want to take any of your suggestions on how they can improve. If you’re not appreciated, it’s not much fun. Fortunately, we don’t have too many of those situations, but occasionally it happens.
What three attributes are essential to doing your job well?
We actually have a concept here called core competencies, which we use in recruiting. I think it really does bring out the points that will make someone successful in this business. One is achievement orientation–whether you’re self-motivated and can set goals and work toward attaining them and measure yourself against those goals. The second is client service orientation–you need to want to react to clients quickly and provide them excellent service. Flexibility is also key. The other thing is teamwork and cooperation. In our business you need people from various disciplines. You can’t do it on your own. Conceptual thinking–you have to be able to come up with innovative ideas to help clients solve problems.
Where will you go from here?
I don’t personally have a specific plan at this time to do something else. I like maintaining the continuity of the relationship with a client. I think there’s a lot of value in developing a relationship and trust with a client and having the overall responsibility for managing that relationship.
What advice would you give to people interested in this area?
I don’t think people should become discouraged by the five-year educational requirement. There are a number of things that firms are doing to help with that–providing some assistance to employees with the cost of education and more internship Also, don’t let that auditor bad-guy perception get to you. You know like, “Oh no, the auditors are coming!” Being an auditor has given me the opportunity to travel across the U.S. I’ve worked in Mexico. I spent several months in Sydney working on an exchange program with our international affiliate.
———-
E-mail tribjobs@tribune.com
