Part of an occasional series on the employment issues of cost and management accountants.  This article refers to issues in the US; we would like to hear from your comments on these issues, particularly from those in other countries.

Those of us who came up through businesses as cost accountants have found that generally this is assumed to be (by our Financial Accounting colleagues, and by Recruiters) a stepping stone leading to an Accounting Manager or Controller position, and there are many people who step through costing and move on.  Unfortunately many of these people end up overseeing cost but have very little understanding of it having moved through quickly.

For those of us who like what we do and specialize in this field, we are viewed by others as analysts which generally lack advancement opportunities.  Some of us end up as Cost Managers but that is generally as far as it goes.  The advantage is having company benefits but limited upward opportunities.

Another approach is to leave business and strike out on your own as a consultant.  Several members of our Executive Committee have chosen this path, but it is difficult without any support network and being responsible for your own benefits.

There is a new trend of CMA firms, I understand this is common practice in many other countries, but in the U.S. it is a fairly new phenomena.  These firms are travelling in uncharted waters and are not receiving much if any support from Management Accounting associations.

In this economy, there are also many temps.  A temp is a person working on a short term contract for a company.  Temps generally receive higher pay, but lack benefits and job security.

Are there any businesses that oursource their costing needs?  This would make sense since many businesses could get by without a full time cost person and the people would all be specialists.  As far as I know this is not currently being practiced anywhere.  The Human Resource function in most businesses has similarly oursourced a good deal of its responsibilities so it would not be that unrealistic.

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