Kaden Cook, a senior advisor at Summit Virtual CFO, joins the show to share his insights on the accounting profession, specifically his strategic choice of pursuing his CMA certification before the CPA certification. Joey and Kaden delve into the nuances of accounting certifications, the 150-hour rule, and the impact of technology on the field. They stress the importance of truly understanding the material over just aiming for good grades. The episode concludes with advice for young professionals to embrace AI and analytical skills. Since this episode was recorded, Kaden has passed the CPA exam!
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Welcome to the Young CPA Success Show (00:00:01)
Introduction to the podcast and its purpose.
Kaden's Journey into Accounting and Certifications (00:00:23)
Kaden's background, choice of certifications, and the differences between CMA and CPA exams.
Discussion on School, Career Choices, and Future of Accounting (00:01:51)
Insights on the 150-credit hour requirement for the CPA exam, career choices, and the future of accounting.
Discovering Summit CFO through a Podcast (00:02:42)
Kaden's discovery of Summit CFO through a podcast and the topics discussed in the podcast.
Choosing CMA Over CPA and Its Benefits (00:07:12)
Reasons for choosing CMA over CPA, including the differences in exam requirements and the benefits of starting the CMA exam during college.
Comparing CMA and CPA Exams (00:13:19)
Kaden's experience with both CMA and CPA exams, including differences in exam structure, content, and difficulty.
Application of Knowledge from School, Exams, and Work Experience (00:18:30)
Discussion on how Kaden applies knowledge from school, exams, and work experience in his current role, and the importance of understanding the material thoroughly.
Understanding Financial Accounting (00:19:28)
Kaden discusses how his college education greatly contributed to his understanding of financial accounting.
Work Experience and CMA (00:19:49)
Kaden explains how his work experience and CMA studies went in tandem, providing practical application.
Challenges in Education (00:21:29)
Joey and Kaden discuss the shift in education focus from understanding to chasing grades.
Impact of 150-hour Rule (00:26:44)
The 150-hour rule for the CPA exam is discussed, and Kaden shares how he and others found loopholes.
Alternative Credit Acquisition (00:31:17)
Kaden shares a loophole to acquire credits for the 150-hour rule through online FEMA courses.
Debate on 150-hour Requirement (00:33:22)
The debate on the value and practicality of the 150-hour requirement for the CPA exam is discussed.
The Future of Accounting (00:37:09)
Kaden emphasizes the importance of technological proficiency for future success in accounting.
The importance of understanding AI (00:38:26)
Discussion on the necessity of understanding AI and its role in the advisory world.
Advising students to think beyond exams (00:39:28)
Encouraging students to focus on synthesizing information and putting pieces together for future success.
Appreciation and encouragement (00:40:01)
Expressing gratitude to the guest for sharing insights and encouraging audience engagement.
Opportunities for young CPAs (00:40:38)
Promotion of career development opportunities for young CPAs at Summit Virtual CFO and Anders CPAs and Advisors.
Intro (00:00:01) - Welcome to the young CPA Success Show. If you're a young accounting professional, this podcast is your ultimate guide to navigating your early career. Join us as we share valuable insights, expert advice, and practical tips to help you kickstart your path to success and excel in the accounting industry. Let's embark on this exciting accounting journey together.
Joey (00:00:23) - Hey everyone! On today's episode of the young CPA Success Show, I have a chat with one of our younger associates here at summit CFO by Anders Kaden Cook. That's Kaden Cook., Kaden is a senior accountant here in our advisory practice, and he has a really interesting story about kind of how we got started into accounting, what credentials he's working on., in fact, he was, I think, one of the first ones that we've hired who wasn't a CPA. He, in fact had a CMA, which, you know, we talk a little bit about how that's a little bit more applicable for the advisory side of the practice, as opposed to the compliance side of the practice.
Joey (00:01:01) - So an interesting conversation about his journey through college and through accounting, and how he kind of figured out where he wanted to go in life, as well as some really practical advice for folks who were trying to figure out what to do,, whether they're in college or just out of college from a certifications perspective. We also really kind of beat up the 150 credit hour thing for the for the CPA sitting, which is a common topic. You've heard us talk about it before. We're going to continue to talk about it, because I still don't to this day really understand the value of the extra, I guess 30 some odd hours that they're going to ask you to take to sit for the CPA exam. So, if anybody who has an answer to that would love to play, you know, the other side of that conversation, let us know in the comments. We would love to hear from you, because we'd love to have the other side of that argument on, because maybe there's something there that, that, that we're missing.
Joey (00:01:51) - But from our perspective, that 150 seems to be really prohibitive. So, really interesting conversations about school and about, you know, career choices and where the future is going. So, we really hope you enjoy it., speaking of Kaden, he is he is on LinkedIn. He has a lot of stuff that he kind of posts and talks about and gives guidance to. So, if you haven't connected with him on LinkedIn, now would be a great time to do so. He does a lot of really good, good stuff on there. And, let us know as well if there's any questions that you have in the comments and the show notes and the LinkedIn page, wherever you can find us, let us know. We'd love to hear from you. We hope you enjoy the show. One thing I do think is interesting that I really want to jive on with it is did I hear correctly that you joined like initially found out about summit through a podcast?
Kaden (00:02:42) - I found out about something through podcasts.
Kaden (00:02:45) - That's what I love. Yeah. Through the modern CPA podcast.
Joey (00:02:48) - Okay, so the modern CPA, that's Tom Wadellton and Adam, right? Were they the hosts on it? What was the episode that they were talking about?
Kaden (00:02:57) - I it was actually about getting acquired and how to set your business up to be acquired.
Joey (00:03:05) - Okay.
Kaden (00:03:05) - I was interested in M&A for a while. I found that, but I was kind of working in a cast practice as well. And so, it was a good, good blend.
Joey (00:03:13) - So when you when you heard that, what was it about it that was like, oh, I kind of want to work with these guys. Like what was the what was the driving, the driving factor that just. Did they seem like, did they seem like good dudes or were they just kind of talking about stuff that was interesting to you and that kind of made you decide to take a look at our website and see if there was a position here for you.
Kaden (00:03:35) - I thought it was super interesting, so I listened to that one, but I don't know, it wasn't maybe that one that got me into it, but I kept listening. And the thing that kind of got me was that, the whole world is really starting to try to get into, you know, client accounting services and CFO. But what is a CFO really? Right, right. Like there's like, you can sign up for CFO services and get a span of different things. And what interested me most was you guys really focus on the advisory. Yeah. It's not just, you know, accounting. It's you're actually getting into forecast and pipeline and helping the clients. This is what I think the difference is, is the client comes to you and says, I want to hire this person. What do you think? Versus I hired this person, please get them in the books, you know. Right. And so, once I heard that you guys did it more like that, kind of stuff that really piqued my interest.
Joey (00:04:34) - And it's a good point because, I mean, I've, I've worked for a lot of different places and like. A lot of folks will be like, especially like not. And I don't want to make it sound like I'm picking on it, but it's like we use a tax practice, for example, right? Like you complete a tax return and it's like, hey, so here's your tax return. Thanks. Congratulations. You're done for another year. And it's like. That's just like barely scratching the surface of, like, what CPAs can do and how we can influence businesses, and especially for small businesses who don't have the budgets to, like, really go in there and say, we're going to hire somebody who can really drive the strategic side forward, which means it falls upon the business owner. And a lot of times business owners are like, man. I just want to do coding, or I just want to do landscaping, or I just want to do construction, like I want to focus on what I'm good at.
Joey (00:05:27) - I don't want to sit here and think about the business strategy of things. I need somebody for that. So, I too kind of gravitated towards, you know, the advisory side of the practice and just how unique and different that was relative to anything else in the space. Like I was looking for a lot of different places, couldn't find it, found it at summit, which then became Anders, which, you know, there's multiple marketing iterations that will come over the next couple of years as we finalize the merger. But the other thing that I loved about your story is that you did find a sort of podcast, because that's ultimately what we're hoping to do here, is kind of looking at the landscape and being like, man, if we're going to grow the way, we're going to grow, like we need some more people, which means we need to start trying to show people like who we are and how we do it and why we do it, and how it's a compelling place for someone to kind of start their career as opposed to, you know, maybe going other places and not being happy with it, leaving the industry or whatever it happens to be.
Joey (00:06:28) - So that's what I hope we could, talk about here with you. So, one of the things that and I'll share this for the audience on your behalf, as if you're not capable of doing it, which you perfectly are perfectly capable of doing it. One of the things that I think separates you from our usual, employee that we hire is you. You don't have your CPA, you actually have your CMA, correct? That's true. Although you are working towards the CPA, which we'll talk about that later, right? Yep. Yeah. So, when you think about. Certifications. And I think certifications are really important., what kind of drove you towards doing the CMA first instead of the CPA?
Kaden (00:07:12) - You know, the biggest one was the difference in requirements., one thing that's really compelling about the CMA is that, a lot of states won't let you start testing for the CPA until you've graduated. At least that's how it is here in Idaho. I've heard there's a couple states that might let you.
Kaden (00:07:32) - But not the case here. And the CMA, you can start taking it when as you're going through college, there's no requirement., you do have to like to for licensure there's some more requirements. But, there's, there's a standing like scholarship for CMA that every student can get. And I've been trying to, you know, advertise it to as many people as I can, that each school gets ten, students that can get free materials, testing and all that. Like I didn't have to pay a cent for it., and three for years with the IMA membership. So I haven't paid a dime for any CMA anything yet. And, all you have to do is get a recommendation from one of your professors. So, if you can buddy up with one of your professors, you can get you can get the scholarship, not pay anything while you're in school, not have to. You know, you're already paying for so many things as you're going through school.
Kaden (00:08:32) - And then as you take your cost accounting class, your, you know, your financial classes, you just start testing, right? You just put it on top and you could leave, college with having passed that. And then just need your experience requirement, which is a little more stringent. It's two years rather than 2000 hours. So it takes a little longer.
Joey (00:08:56) - But I think that's a that's a good trade off because I think about a lot of I'll put myself in there. You know, when I study for the CPA exam, I knew it was all stuff that I knew. You know, like we talked about it in school at some point. But there's a number of things that kind of went in one ear for the test out the other. And I, I have not thought about them in the ten years since I took the exams., and I think, you know, what I like about that is, is like, okay, we're going to take a number one.
Joey (00:09:25) - What that's doing is that's connecting what you're learning in school to a certification. So you're having that connection that's made. And also it's they I do think the hefty experience requirements are important. Like I you know it's one thing to know the material. It's another thing to like know how to apply it. So, I love that the CMA is kind of leaning in that direction and saying like, look, we're going to place our emphasis on experience. We're going to place our emphasis on. You know what we see in other trades, which is yeah, you're the most important thing. Like, yeah, you need to get licensed. You need to show that, you know, the safety stuff. But the most important thing is you need to go work with somebody who, like, has done this before and knows what they're doing, almost like a trade or a or an apprenticeship type situation. I think that's a much better model long term for the industry than just an exam that you have to take, and then you can forget it.
Joey (00:10:22) - More often than not.
Kaden (00:10:24) - Yeah. That's true. That's true.
Joey (00:10:27) - I, I also like the, the fact that you can take it during school too, because that was the other thing that's really hard is as I'm sure you're you noticed once you get out, like I've told, I've told high school kids this before. Like you will never have more time than you do in college. Like you think you're busy in college. You're not busy in college, you're busy later. So, the fact that you can knock some of those things out while you're in school. I love that idea.
Kaden (00:10:53) - Yeah, it's great honestly. And that's why I kind of advertise it and I think I, I want the CMA to keep growing and to be able to be more, more like the CPA where people look at you and say, hey, that's a CMA. I, I know because of this that you have experienced that you I can trust you like they do. Look at the CPA. Yeah. And it helps me.
Kaden (00:11:18) - I think the CPA tells you that you're an accountant, you know, and then what you do on top of that, either from experience or certifications or what you specialize in, and it helps people get around that corner of, oh, this guy knows what he's talking about, about this specific thing.
Joey (00:11:36) - Yeah. And I think with the as you as more firms are leaning into the advisory side of the business, I think the CMA is actually a more useful credential for that. Like, I've, I just critiquing the CPA a little bit., it's very relevant if you want to go big for and do audit, like if you want to run an audit practice, if you want to do something or if you want to be very lean, very heavily into tax, those are two like you really need the CPA for those two specific things, maybe not so much on the prep side of tax, but on like the law and the legal side of things. Like if you wanted to try to move your way up to partner level on the tax side, you're going to have to have that to at least sign a return at the very minimum.
Joey (00:12:18) - But if you're wanting to go like advisory and you're wanting to kind of provide more strategic stuff, I felt that the CMA was way more applicable to what I wanted to do than the CPA. And I think that's probably one of the reasons why, you know, speaking candidly as you're, what, six months in.
Kaden (00:12:40) - Six months in this at this firm? Yeah.
Joey (00:12:42) - Six months in at the time that we're recording this., it was identified about six minutes in that you were going to be someone who is going to be very successful at what we do, because you just inherently understand it. And I think your background in the and the certifications that you have are part of the reason you've been so successful early in your start here. So, love that you love that you took that approach. And, and at least, you know, kind of started knocking that out before you got done with school.
Kaden (00:13:12) - Yeah.
Joey (00:13:12) - So now that you're as you're sitting here and you're taking the CPA exam, how many how many sections have you finished?
Kaden (00:13:19) - So I've passed three and I took one.
Kaden (00:13:22) - The, the tax exam, this last week. And so all I'm doing is I'm waiting. This is, this is recorded before Christmas. So yeah, after Christmas I hopefully will get, a good Christmas gift and be done with the CPA. There you go.
Joey (00:13:38) - So now that you've effectively taken all four exams. How what did you think like in terms of the differences in maybe not so much your approach to studying for them, but like, what are the differences between the two exams that you've noticed now that you've kind of gotten through everything?
Kaden (00:13:55) - Yeah. Let me give you like a 32nd overview of how the CMA works. Because most of your listeners will know the CPA. The CPA is for four exams, each of them for ours. The CMA is two exams, each of them four hours., and the first part focuses on accounting and the second part focuses on finance. That's how I would define it. Yeah. And, it's not exactly like that, but, the, the CPA may be covers a little more broad material in my opinion.
Kaden (00:14:27) - Yeah. The CMA,, I wonder if the update it soon, but, the test is very difficult because of how it's set up, they you don't get Excel like you do in the CPA. You have a calculator and you have a lot of cost accounting questions and ones that require a lot of,, a lot of calculations. So, we're maybe it's because I was more practiced by that time at long exams, but the CPA, I've never run out of time. Yeah. The CMA I was pushing I was stress and sweating the whole time trying to, get through those. And then the second difference I would say is the essays on so on the CMA instead of simulations, you have essays and they don't give you dropdowns or input your number here. They give you a blank text box and tell you, give you here's your two page like scenario. Now go put in these answers into these text box. So, you kind of have to format them yourself a little bit.
Joey (00:15:29) - Well it gives them some opportunity to not have a binary answer where, you know, a lot of times on the CPA it's multiple choice at the very beginning or there's a very specific outcome they're looking for.
Joey (00:15:39) - Whereas with the CMA it's kind of like, hey, we want to see how you can apply it, which means it probably takes them a little bit longer to grade them. But, you know, also it's a little bit more broad in terms of how you can express yourself as an advisor. Because again, there's no and that's the beautiful thing of advisory. Like, you and I can look at the same situation and come to the even come to the same conclusion. We'll deliver it in two completely different ways. Because that's just how humans work.
Kaden (00:16:11) - It's true. Yep. So overall, I don't know. That one is I'd say that they're probably near the same level of difficulty other than, you know, CPAs for. So, it's more of a marathon. Yeah, for those ones.
Joey (00:16:26) - Well I remember so I took I actually passed the first test of the CMA exam on February. I took the test on February 29th of 2020. So, by the time I took the test and got the score back, all the lockdowns had started, like all of the stuff that just drove internal.
Joey (00:16:45) - And I think the pandemic was really tough on internal accountants because like. Oh, PPP. Got to figure that out. Oh, Edil loan PPPERT What? What do we do? Man, I don't know. I got to go figure this out. So, like, I have lost the ability to take the second test because I'd have to go back and take the first one again because, you know, it's that was too long ago to still count., and by the time the second half rolled around, I was like, I'm just too tired to study for this dang thing. I don't want to mess with it. I'm exhausted., but that was the thing I remember from that first test, which was very heavy on the computational side. I knew from cost accounting like variances and stuff like that. But the CMA got into like rate versus volume variance. And I never thought like when I was taking that test, I was like, man, I'm never going to use this.
Joey (00:17:38) - And then I sat there in my first digital agency client here at summit, and I was like, oh, when you're doing a forecast, you're going to have rate variance and you're going to have volume variance because you're either going to charge higher or lower than you assume, or you're going to charge more or less than you assume. So, it's all applicable to every single industry. It's not just manufacturing. And that's where I was like this. It kind of blew my mind a little bit, thinking about how applicable it was to everything.
Kaden (00:18:04) - Yeah, that's what I was going to say is more than just digital agencies. I mean, we talk about it everywhere. I mean, yeah, you have to figure out your pricing somehow, right? Or what industry you're in. So even just on the sales side, like. And you have to pay a certain price and they're going to offer you different prices. So anyways, there's. That applies everywhere.
Joey (00:18:26) - So when you think about, think about how you're applying your stuff.
Joey (00:18:30) - Like, what if you could break it down to like, what stuff from like your school you're applying versus what stuff from your exams you're applying versus. Stuff that you've just kind of pulled from various places that you've worked in your experience that you'd have. Do you have like a rating on like where you where you get like most of your prob like most of your stuff from where do you where do you think that how do you think that breakdown is?
Kaden (00:18:53) - Yeah, I've been thinking about this lately., a little bit., I'd say they build on each other is the is the hard part, because what I'm finding out is that if you if you took the easy, the easy way out in college, you know, just burn through the material, you know, got the right answers but didn't understand it. That affects how you do on the CPA, that affects how you do on the CMA., might take you longer., if you don't put in your time on the CPA, maybe you can squeeze by and not, you know, not understand one thing, but then you get into it in your work and you don't understand anyways.
Kaden (00:19:28) - It just affects you. But I will say. My college did a great job with financial accounting. I felt like I had. I'd say a lot of my financial accounting comes from school because they did an excellent job there.
Joey (00:19:44) - Like the underlying like understanding of like the debits and credits and the moving around and what's all happening there.
Kaden (00:19:49) - And that's also just phase of life. Right? Right. Like that's what you have to get through in college. Yeah. Then when I got into I got, you know, a little taste of work experience and then started on my CMA and it was like, oh, this is a, this applies. So, I'd say work. And CMA kind of went in tandem. And then, CPA, you know, I told you I kind of had a grasp on the, on the financial had gotten kind of the business-like back on, though, you know, the CMA, a lot of that was duplicated there. So, I guess, I learned more about audit and tax.
Kaden (00:20:28) - I haven't gotten to apply much of it yet.
Joey (00:20:30) - You get there. Just give it time.
Kaden (00:20:31) - Yeah, yeah, I'm, sure. But that's, that's where I would say I would give I'd give school the most credit for financial and, kind of business analysis to the CMA is probably what I'd say.
Joey (00:20:47) - Well, I think it's you made a really great point there that I've talked about with some folks, which is like the way our school system has been set up for a lot of years for most of my school life and, and maybe even a little bit before. But I felt like the shift happened in the 90s into the 2000, where school became a lot more about getting the grade than it was truly grasping the information. So, I had a I still have a professor from college that I, that I talk with. He, he was our tax professor at K-State, and he and I have sent some messages back and forth over the last couple of years, just sort of checking in on each other, but also talking like super high level about what's going on in the industry, what's happening in education.
Joey (00:21:29) - And, and the thing he said that really sticks with me is he's like, man, we are so focused on like the measurable outcome of school, the grade. Right. We're chasing the grade because the grade defines everything. And he's like, I wish we could get back to a time when the grade was just the measurement. Like the grade was not yay, you passed, or you didn't pass. You're not going to get that job at Deloitte, right? He wanted the grades. And this is kind of what he told us to be like, the reflection of where we are in the process. Like great. You got 100 on that test. Way to go. Like you have mastered that concept. But also, did you really master the concept or did you just study for the test and then you're not actually going to get it down the road? Because that's how I got through. A lot of the CPA. Like with Becker. Becker was great. But for the audit section, I just saw those questions so many times that when they came up on the test, I knew the answer.
Joey (00:22:29) - But it's not because I knew the materials, because I just knew the answer was C, right? Because I've taken it six times and I'm like, did that really serve me? And did that serve the industry by having it structured that way? I don't think it did.
Kaden (00:22:45) - Well, I will say, I think that colleges and professors, if you're an accounting professor, you're really trying to get people prepared for the CPA. And so, if you can make the tests hard and make them be able to test, well, then I feel like you're doing your job, but also on the same page on the same topic. You're also not serving. Your students as much as you could help them in their careers, right? I remember at my school, they I had some they've been they just made our accounting at BYU. I, they made our accounting a Stem degree. Okay. Type of thing. And so, they and they recently made it right before I graduated, they made some minor type things where I took a lot of data science classes and it's, it's served me well.
Kaden (00:23:40) - And all of those classes are really project based. We didn't have tests in those classes in the data science classes. Right. And there was a lot of students that were petitioning and trying to trying to see how they could convert the accounting field more into a project based, you know, knowledge based building experience rather than,, 70, 70% of your grade is based off of the final exam, you know, which is where the.
Joey (00:24:07) - Industry is going. By the way, like, that's very forward thinking at the time, because that's where a lot of accounting has been going for a long time as computers and I have come in like our job is less computational than it is pulling pieces together and being like, well, what's the answer? What's the story? What's the action point from this? What's the future going to tell us? You can't test that in a binary way, and you can't teach it in a binary way. You have to teach it through project based and experience based.
Joey (00:24:34) - And you know what? What this particular professor told us that probably, you know, is similar to what your professors were teaching you is like, hey, focus on the process, right? Like focus on putting these pieces together and like, let's figure out how your brain works because you know, that's what's going to serve you in the future, not whether you know this formula by, you know whether you've memorized the formula. And you can tell me what that is, but you don't know how to use it.
Kaden (00:25:03) - Yeah. I'm hoping things are going the right way for, especially for, you know, being an alumni of a college, you. Yeah. You really root for your college too, to help their, help their students.
Joey (00:25:15) - Well and especially with, with the, you know, with the rise in remote work like I mean New Mexico doesn't have we don't have the employee base and the employer base to support this type of stuff in the traditional sense, but. Remote work could change all that.
Joey (00:25:31) - And I imagine Idaho is very similar in that you've got one kind of major population base there, and then everything else is just kind of spread out., but with remote work, you know, the state can totally outkick its coverage in terms of, like what? You can do in the cool opportunities that can come from working remotely and in those types of things. So, I'd love to see. I'd love to see more and more schools kind of take that proactive approach of like, this is what the industry is saying we need to provide. So, we're going to fill the niche. And, you know, it's a slow ship to turn. Like I think colleges are still as fast as things are changing. They are still behind the behind a little bit in terms of where they should be. But if you've got a place that's making an effort, it's worth investing in for sure.
Kaden (00:26:22) - Yeah. Yeah.
Joey (00:26:24) - So speaking of school, one of the things that we've talked a lot about on this podcast with other folks is something that I think is incredibly prohibitive to a lot of things, which is the 150 hour rule to take a lot of to take the CPA exam, which I was able to get around because I hit the hard reset button after two years.
Joey (00:26:44) - So I had so many just credit hours just hanging out there that I have way more than 150. I didn't need to go after my masters, but for a lot of folks who were, you know, getting started like that is the path. The only way for you to do that is to get your master's degree. And I'm. I don't know a ton of people who've gotten it, but I'm curious, kind of your experience with the 150 hours and kind of how you handled that requirement for the CPA exam.
Kaden (00:27:11) - Yeah. For sure. Well, beginning my college experience, I think I was a little ignorant. I didn't realize that that was in place. I didn't, you know, and I think that's a lot of people they don't realize. And then they get to their about junior year and then go, wait, fifth year of school. Like I didn't know that was a requirement for this., but. I, I have me and some of my accounting friends.
Kaden (00:27:36) - We have all found loopholes. I think that's what it creates is. Yeah, it sounds like you I mean, you had a hard reset, so maybe it wasn't as much of a loophole, but I.
Joey (00:27:45) - Mean, it kind of was.
Kaden (00:27:46) - The ways to get around it.
Joey (00:27:47) - Yeah. Because like, I had a lot of hours and things that weren't accounting related. Like I was a history major before I, I changed majors in 2008. So I have a lot of history classes that are really applicable and good knowledge. I can tell you a lot more about Civil War history than most accountants, but if your goal with this, with this thing is to say, well, we want you to have a certain we, the 150 is going to be what you need to get all the accounting chops. Like, you know, I took one graduate level class at K-State to fill out a schedule. So, I had three hours of masters of Mac related work. And my average score on the CPA exam was 92.5.
Joey (00:28:30) - It didn't give me any additional benefit. So yeah. You know. Yeah. That was that's kind of always been my point on the 150 is like yeah, I got the 150. But all of them were in in like Civil War history and like Roman history and, you know, history of Ireland and all these other things that had nothing to do with the CPA exam and. The one credit class that I took was like corporate tax. Like I wasn't getting any additional juice. That was going to help me with the CPA exam, which has always led to my thought of, you're just having people get ours for the sake of getting hours and getting the credential. And that has always rubbed me the wrong way about that requirement.
Kaden (00:29:11) - Yeah. And I mean, I it's hard for, for me at least because I, I didn't have to go to graduate school. I feel like I would feel very strongly about it if I had to. I, I would employers would come to our, our classes during college and they would, they would say people would raise their hands and say is it worth it to go get a master's of accountancy? And just a disclaimer like I don't have anything against it.
Kaden (00:29:39) - I think I think people have enjoyed theirs, but they told me that if you can get your CPA without a mat, without a mac, don't go for it. Yeah, it's basically like we don't care is was their feeling. And maybe that's just an Idaho school, but, from what I've heard, it's kind of everywhere., like, I.
Joey (00:29:58) - Know, I know, my wife doesn't have her. Mac., she did not get her Master of Accountancy, and she's tax manager at a firm that is roughly equivalent to the size of Anders. And I don't think any of their people have master's degrees. They all have CPAs. They don't have. I don't think very many of them have master's degrees, though, which. Again, I completely agree with you where you know, this isn't a wholesale thing. Like, I'm sure you learn some really good things and I'm sure that. If it's for you, it's for you. Especially like if you have any desire to go like PhD route or tenure track professor route, like, yeah, that's a necessary next step.
Joey (00:30:36) - But for people who just want to do kind of what we're doing. I don't feel like I've missed it.
Kaden (00:30:46) - Yeah. So here's kind of a my story of how I got there, I guess.
Joey (00:30:50) - Yeah, I would love I would love to hear this.
Kaden (00:30:53) - , I had a friend that he works for a firm in California, and he's like, he's like, I'm not going to a master's program. I figured out this this way to get around it, and it's by during Covid, they set it up so that you can get online credits with the Federal Emergency Management Association. It's a government. Yeah. Go through.
Joey (00:31:17) - FEMA. Yep.
Kaden (00:31:17) - So FEMA yeah. So, I have you heard this before I.
Joey (00:31:21) - I'm, I'm aware of FEMA. I have not heard the loophole.
Kaden (00:31:24) - Yeah. So, the loophole is that you can take they have their online courses. You just read through whatever you have to and you take a test at the end. It doesn't show you which ones you got right and wrong.
Kaden (00:31:35) - But if you can pass that test then you get a credit.. And so you can take as many times as you want. And so, you just keep banging out those tests as fast as you can until you get. So I needed 15 more credits. I was 15 credits short. It took me two.
Joey (00:31:53) - Effectively a semester. Right. If you think about it in terms, it's a semester.
Kaden (00:31:57) - It's 3 or 4 months. Yeah. And I took those in two weeks while I was in school, while I was already taking 15 credits, and it wasn't that big of a lift on me, honestly. Yeah., and then the, the credits, they cost like 90 bucks a credit, which is like. Way less than any college you could ever go to. Yeah. And you're not finding.
Joey (00:32:19) - You're not finding $9,090 credit hour classes ever.
Kaden (00:32:24) - And so the only drawback is that it's like, okay, so now I'm taking all these credits and what am I learning? I'm learning, you know, what to do if there's a tornado and it kills all the cattle in a field.
Kaden (00:32:35) - What do you do with the cattle? And does that make sense? It's all these federal emergency things.
Joey (00:32:43) - You know, that could I. I mean, I'm not going to sit there and say that's bad information. Like, you know, if I takes over and all of a sudden you got to figure out how to handle yourself in an apocalypse, you're going to be fine, dude. Yeah. You're already you're already set up and ready to go.
Kaden (00:32:56) - Accounting wise. It's like it's like, okay, I could have spent my time maybe a little more wisely, but, I mean, I just wanted 150 so I could go say, yeah. And that's what me and a few of my friends have done to, to be able to get the credits.
Joey (00:33:11) - And see that, that to me, that kind of goes back to the point, not saying that what you did was, was wrong because I did the same thing just a different way. Right? Like I had a bunch of extra hours from stuff that wasn't applicable.
Joey (00:33:22) - You know, humanities.
Kaden (00:33:24) - Classes, bowling classes or. Yeah.
Joey (00:33:26) - Oh, dude, I took so much. I took so much golf and golf and weightlifting and all the things for credit hours, you know, and it was good because, like, yeah, we want to create well-rounded humans. But then, you know, with the reset kind of made me take a bunch of classes over again. So I just had a bunch of extra. But, you know, I think I had a minor in there to like some extra economics classes that helped out, but it's like those were at least a little bit applicable. But,, my point has always been like, especially now where we've seen the cost of college rise so much over the last 20 years. Like, my mom tells stories, she was an accountant as well, and she tells stories of when she went to Texas,, Texas Tech in the, in the 70s where she was like, yeah, you know.
Joey (00:34:12) - you know.
Joey (00:34:13) - I waitressed and did all these things, and I didn't have to take out any loans.
Joey (00:34:17) - Like, she's like, I wasn't doing a whole lot. I mean, it was hard, but she was like, I could make it work., and I didn't have to, to do anything. Whereas, like, the idea of somebody like waitressing or, you know, working a side job ten, 15 hours a week to pay for college, like, that's not even going to make a dent. In 2023. And my thought has always been like, okay, if you're going to force people to take this extra stuff like make it worth it. And make it to where they're actually getting something from it. And I think, like, what a lot of people have proven is that that extra 30 hours of school doesn't. Like doesn't do anything for you above and beyond. Like what it needs to like justify the cost, at least for the CPA exam. For other things. Sure, I think it probably does make a difference. But like if all you're doing is just saying we need you to go to more school and it doesn't impact your ability to pass the exam or doesn't impact your ability to be a great accountant, what are we doing it for?
Joey (00:35:21) - That's kind of my question.
Kaden (00:35:23) - This isn't like a new idea and no people have said it but yeah. they need to I think they need to make a work opt out experience. If you have this much experience you can prove it. You get recommendations from CPAs and stuff, then you can bypass that.
Joey (00:35:42) - I think that's a I mean, that's a that's a great that is a great practical solution to this problem. Do what do what the Mac does instead of require or not the Mac the other my space in it. Now your other credential that you've got the CMA do what the CMA does and said, hey, instead of one year of experience, you need to because that's basically what you're trading, right? You're trading a year of school for an extra year of experience. And I've been saying. I've been saying this forever., this goes back a decade at least, where it's like. In certain fields, like if you just want to. I say just if you want to be like a tax preparer or you want to be a bookkeeper, or you want to be something that's doesn't require you to sign tax returns or like be the engagement leader of an audit.
Joey (00:36:27) - Like, why is there not like a practical work solution that's like an internship that turns into an apprenticeship that allows you to get credentialed and things like, based off your experience, like accounting could totally be a trade if we wanted it to. We just don't want it to. Well, I know we're kind of kind of wrapping up some stuff here in terms of, you know, sort of where things are going., is there anything that, like, you can think of over the, over your journey for the last like 4 or 5 years, that you think somebody who's getting ready to start that journey needs to, to pay attention to or be aware of, or just questions to ask in general.
Kaden (00:37:09) - Yeah, but I mean, I think the hot topic right now is always, you know, technology and I, I mean, I think you've got to be on the forefront of that if you want to go places. Yeah. In the next few years, because there's going to be CPAs and partners that, you know, we've always heard the jokes and memes of, you don't like the partner that doesn't know how to rotate the PDF document or.
Joey (00:37:32) - Right, right.
Kaden (00:37:34) - And that's just going to get more prevalent. The like older generations are going to be able to advise, and they're going to be able to give you advice on how to do stuff. But if you're not able to keep up with the tech, I think it's going to be tough to. We're on the flip side. If you are good at the tech, I think you're gonna skyrocket up to the top because. And that's what that's what a lot of accounting firms I've heard have been advertising to is that, you know, partnering tracks are easier for you can get some, some tech experience.
Joey (00:38:06) - Well, it's really interesting you say that because we did we recorded a podcast a couple of weeks ago with, with two guys. I think one of them was working as an auditor, but like, his background was more in coding, and he was just like, I didn't like this solution from an accounting perspective. So I just wrote the code and fixed it and started my own company based upon like that whole idea.
Joey (00:38:26) - And. As we get more comfortable with. I mean, I do think we need some. We need some hard and fast rules around the AI stuff. But like as we figure out the best way to do AI to where we don't end up in, like iRobot or something, where the robots take over, and I'm still not entirely convinced that that movie's not going to be real., as we get more involved, they're the people who understand and are comfortable with, like saying, okay, my job is not to be a computational person, like my job is to understand how to put these pieces together and how to. Like, synthesize all these different pieces of information. Come at me like, those are the people who are really going to do well in the advisory world, because that's I mean, AI is ability to crunch through numbers like. Is infinitely more. They have way more capacity than we ever will for it. So why? Like that's always my advice to kids in school is like, start figuring out how to put the pieces together.
Joey (00:39:28) - If you can start figuring out how to put the pieces together, you're going to go far. Whereas if you're like, man, I just I just really, you know, I'm, I'm studying for the test, but I'm not really, you know, I'm kind of just kind of coasting through this and not really, you know, figuring out the other things. I'm just studying for the test to get the grades so I can get the job, like. That probably worked for a really long time. I don't think it's going to work to the extent that it used to. Moving forward.
Kaden (00:39:56) - Yeah I agree.
Joey (00:39:58) - But cool. Okay. And thanks. Thanks a lot.
Joey (00:40:01) - For hopping on today. And you know, obviously we're really happy that you're here with us. We're happy that you're, you're kind of sharing your journey,, on LinkedIn and, and a couple other places as well, I think on this podcast especially. But,, you know, I always think and hope that, you know, people will reach out to us who are listening to this and ask questions and, and stuff like that.
Joey (00:40:24) - And I think you brought up some really, really good points about credentials and what to do. So thank you so much for hopping on today and sharing your journey. And we're excited that you're part of the team here. So thank you.
Kaden (00:40:37) - Yeah. Thank you.
Outro (00:40:38) - If you're a young CPA looking to develop in their careers, we're always looking for great people. Visit our website for remote work opportunities with Summit Virtual CFO, or find all our open positions at Anders CPAs and advisors.