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Public accountants staying ahead of the digitisation curve will be in the driving seat for the upcoming salary increase boom, tips one recruiter.
Hays senior regional director Susan Drew said that while salary increases for accountants have been fairly steady at 6 per cent since 2015, bigger increases will finally start to come through towards the beginning of 2018.
The 2017 Hays Salary Guide published earlier this year also noted that the accounting market “has remained strong since the resurgence witnessed back in early 2015”.
“I think there will be more opportunities coming for salaries to increase but we haven’t necessarily seen that reflected in the market at the moment,” Ms Drew said.
“The reality is the market is definitely improving but increases are probably going to start coming through towards the beginning of next year.”
Noting the highly competitive marketplace, Ms Drew urged accountants looking for a career jump to place emphasis on staying up-to-date with technological developments in the trade and in the loop of market trends.
“You can’t just go in asking for something - you need to be able to articulate what the value is to the employer and the benefit to them and the differences that you are going to make as well,” said Ms Drew.
“It is a highly competitive marketplace; there are a lot of candidates out there with a wealth of experience.
“It is about what can you do that is potentially different from other people - consistent ongoing learning, demonstrating that ambition to keep their skills very up-to-date, very new, very fresh, that will definitely support more opportunity for career progression and then give you the opportunity to be able to articulate the differentiators and the additional value you can add will support salary increases as well.”
While accountants on the eastern seaboard will be most likely to see opportunities to ask for a salary increase, regional accountants might find more roadblocks in place as growth has not translated over, says Ms Drew.