As tje accounting field continues to expand, KPMG Barbados is once again looking to recruit new employees and interns from among students at the University of the West Indies (UWI).
Cheryl Fitzpatrick-Payne, senior manager responsible for human resources management and development, said the firm was looking for well rounded students whose majors include accounting or banking and finance.
“There are a lot of new regulations in place that are requiring a lot more from accounting firms, so the accounting student is now required to take on and embrace these new regulations,” she said last Wednesday during the professional services firm’s annual Career Fair at UWI Cave Hill.
Asked which areas of expertise she expected to be in demand within the next five years, Fitzpatrick-Payne said “financial-type accounting” would still be important.
However, she said human resources skills would also be key.
“I think that companies are beginning to realize that the human element is critical.
“You really can’t get the product or the services through the door unless you take care of your human resources,” she said, noting that psychology will also be important to a certain extent.
She said this is because the human resources manager now is required to do a lot more counselling than before and therefore needed to understand people better.
“You have to be able to develop them to get the best out of them,” she said.
Fitzpatrick-Payne said KPMG was looking for individuals with a grade point average of 3.0 or higher who demonstrated leadership ability.
“When we look at the specific courses they’ve done, we’re looking for someone [who has] a good mix of accounting-type courses and has done well in those courses.
“You may have a reasonably good grade-point average but your accounting courses may be your weaker courses, so clearly we would want somebody whose accounting and finance-type courses are their strong courses,” she said.
This year’s fair was paperless, with students completing their curriculum vitae on laptops and information about KPMG being available in electronic form.