`transformation talks: it all starts with transparency.
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transformation talks
with donny shimamoto, cpa, citp, cgma
center for accounting transformation
accountants have the power to change the world, according to james ross, the corporate responsibility and sustainability executive for buzzacott, one of the largest accounting firms in the united kingdom, in this interview with donny shimamoto.
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“we want to walk the walk before we talk to talk,” ross says. “we don’t want to necessarily be delivering to clients something or an expectation that we’re not actually able to do ourselves. it’s just about being really honest about where you are in that process and continuing to take the next steps to improve more widely across the organization.”
ross reveals how buzzacott issues reports that are transparent and allows clients, potential clients, staff and recruits to gauge where buzzacott is on its commitment to csr, which instills trust with stakeholders the commitment comes from the top down to make sure everyone knows the level of commitment.
“there can be some nervousness around sharing information that maybe isn’t seen as being absolutely the very best it could be because, as part of that process, you’re learning where you need to make improvements,” ross explains. “you’re also holding yourself accountable, putting something into the world to say where you’re going to start making changes. if it isn’t perfect, and i don’t think any firm could ever say that they are. communicating how you intend to improve upon that is just as important because that engenders trust.
“i think it tells the clients you’re working with, it tells your wider workforce that this is something that matters to you and ultimately this is how you intend to make those changes.”
additionally, ross says the ideal person to be in charge of csr at any organization is not necessarily in human resources or in accounting. “i was very specifically taken on to do admin in this area within the organization,” he explains.
“your role is really a complementary role,” shimamoto says. “it’s neither part of hr nor part of the firm admin itself. really, your role is to bring in what i’m going to call ‘diversity of perspective.'”
more takeaways:
- what corporate social responsibility maps to – but differs from – esg (environmental, social, and governance) reporting.
- why csr helps create a diversity of thought.
- how csr and esg can help improve recruiting and retention.
- the opportunity that csr and esg provides to accountants as a part of corporate governance and business reporting.
about james ross
james ross is a corporate responsibility and sustainability executive at london city accountants, buzzacott. his responsibilities cover the spectrum of esg and corporate responsibility within buzzacott, which involves working alongside teams across the firm to support on philanthropic objectives, diversity and inclusion, and environmental sustainability. having previously worked in volunteer management and fundraising and grant-making roles in the charity sector, james undertook an msc in corporate responsibility & sustainability at the university of london (birkbeck). he can be reached on linked: https://www.linkedin.com/in/james-ross-csr
transcript
(transcripts are made available as soon as possible. they are not fully edited for grammar or spelling.)
donny shimamoto: hello, and welcome to transformation talks. i’m donny shimamoto, inspiration architect for the center for accounting transformation, and i’m your guest host today. during these episodes, bill penczak normally would visit with a spectrum of firm practitioners who are successfully navigating changes within their firms and are real-life examples of transformation in the accounting profession. today with me is james ross, the corporate social responsibility executive at buzzacott, an accounting firm based in london and a member of the primeglobal firm association. welcome to the show, james.
james ross: hi donny. thanks for having me. nice to speak to you today.
donny: it’s a pleasure to have you, and i’m really glad that you were willing to do this podcast with me because i think you hold a very unique position at the firm that you work with. actually, as after we did our prep calls thinking, i actually hope that this is a position we’re going to see more often and not have this unique as our profession goes through this transformation. can you share with our listeners some of the background on your firm and your position there?
james: yes, absolutely. i’ve been with buzzacott for about five and a half years now. i started in an admin role and worked to support some of our specific initiatives around philanthropy and volunteering. probably about two and a half coming on three years ago, i spoke with some of our senior team and discussed how i would like to develop the program somewhat within the organization. the reason for that is we’ve grown considerably over the last five years, and we’re reaching, i believe, in september this year, we’ll be at about 550 team members.
we offer services, such as audit, tax, vat, and a whole spectrum, corporate clients and individual clients and ex-pats. we’ve got a wide range of specialisms across the organization. this role specifically is to work across teams, working alongside some of our professional support teams as well to embed an esg agenda, embed csr into all that we do as an organization. we’re very much on the journey with that, i would never say that any organization can complete that but we’re really trying to take steps to do more and be better as an organization moving forward.
donny: i like that. i often feel like the firm’s are like our accomplished children’s problem, right, that we always tell our clients that you need to do all this stuff but we don’t do it ourselves and so having someone dedicated to this, i think, again, it’s fairly unique that we see that. how did you get started in this role? actually, before i ask that, i just remember you said quite a bit of growth, and you guys are at 500?
can you quantify what that quite a bit of growth is? what was that change? or what was that growth?
james: when i started, i think we were probably around 300 or so. in the space of about five years, we’re coming towards doubling in size to say 40% growth in terms of our team members. reflected in that is growth in our organization, in terms of our profit margins and things as well. we’ve seen a growth in clients. we’ve seen a growth in team and as an organization. we were moving up, basically. we’ve gone from being one of the smaller midsize firms to one of the larger and i think we’re in the top 20 accounting firms in the uk now.
donny: wow. that’s, that’s really interesting. how much of that is merger acquisition versus organic growth? do you know?
james: not a question for me, unfortunately. i was one to snip out there.
donny: i think that’s a good story that you’re seeing, which is, it’s the move from a midsize firm up into the large firm and one of the top firms in your country.
james: absolutely. i think the with that, we want to ensure that i think, as you mentioned, we want to kind of slightly cheesy phrase perhaps we want to walk the walk before we talk to talk, we don’t want to necessarily be delivering to clients something or an expectation that we’re not actually able to do ourselves. it’s just about being really honest about where you are in that process and continuing to take the next steps to improve more widely across the organization.
donny: well, in your positions, you’re not an accountant, right? you said you started in the admin area, which and typically i think when people think of these, csr, it’s people so they go, “oh, that’s hr.” what’s your background? why are you in this job? can i just take any admin and have them do this? i mean that because that’s i think that’s gonna be the reaction when people say, “oh, he’s from admin. assign it to an admin person. my office manager or somebody?”
james: sure, i think that i could see why people might think in that way. to give some sort of context and perspective, i was very specifically taken on to do admin in this area within the organization. i would say that people with a passion and an interest in this area, that’s the great starting points and you want to leverage any individual within the organization that is interested in philanthropy, volunteering, social mobility, environmental causes, dei. anyone in the organization can contribute to that. to give a bit of context to my background, i started in the charity sector. i worked in the charity sector for about seven years or so fundraising organization and then on volunteer management capacity. i had a real insight into the third sector and the charitable world. from those experiences, i suppose i wasn’t fully aware of what corporate social responsibility was. as i became more aware of that, i could see how my skill set could be well utilized in a corporate environment. that was at the point in which i thought i want to pursue a career in that level and use some of my skills certainly philanthropically and in volunteer management, which is how i entered the organization. at the point of entry, i had actually just started on a master’s degree program, specifically focused on corporate responsibility and sustainability at the university of london, birkbeck college, with the view to level up my skills, knowledge, and understanding and also to give me the breadth of understanding of the business environment that i hadn’t necessarily been exposed to. there’s actually a master’s degree that sits within the business school, and everything from corporate governance to pr was covered in that. i had a particular focus on more environmental challenges in my thesis. my entry into the organization was alongside that more rigorous academic understanding, as well as my historic experiences within the third sector.
donny: excellent. i’m glad you mentioned the governance because i think that is the direct tie. a lot of times accountants will hear this and go, “why is this us?” well, this actually falls into the corporate governance area. you use several of the words from e, s, and g and so we know all of this ties back to esg as well. part of my question had been, this is typically we would see in hr, are you part of the hr organization now? how is this different from what the hr person does? because there’s something that they could just say here, hr person, go do this?
james: yes, i don’t sit with hr but i like to think i work closely with them and work alongside them. there are a couple of reasons why i think that that’s useful and of benefits to the organization because hr absolutely deliver on a number of these areas. particularly looking at the diversity, equality or equity, and inclusion area because they’re so heavily responsible for the intake of new staff members. i would also bring into that the well-being angle that they take care of within the organization. my role actually sits separately from both the hr teams and the marketing coms teams, i think sometimes this sits inside mark coms. the real benefit to that is it enables a slightly external interrogation of those practices and a little bit of distance from what hr specifically want to focus on. while they absolutely deliver on it, and we have an equality, diversity, and inclusion forum which all team members from across any team within the organization can contribute towards and multiple people will sit on that which includes our managing partner. he is very proactive in forwarding this agenda, which i think is super important for any organization. if that doesn’t come from the top, it’s never going to be embedded.
i really feel that my role complements that by, as i say, offering some interrogation of what we are doing and providing ideas from a slightly different perspective from perhaps the hr regulatory environment. some of this is complementary, it’s not necessarily regulated for, but it’s about taking the next steps and being advanced beyond necessarily what we are regulated to do.
donny: a couple of things that i heard from you that i want to call out. your role is really a complementary role. it’s neither part of hr or part of the firm admin itself. really, your role is to bring in what i’m going to call diversity of perspective that it’s not. it’s also important i think that you are not an accountant because we do have this tendency to look at things in the same way.
you’re really balancing out both the traditional accountant and the hr professional in taking this triple lens, if you will, in the way that you’re looking at, maybe even quadruple, if we add the traditional executive role in there. that’s really interesting.
james: i think that’s a really interesting way of describing actually, and maybe not quite how i would have described it myself, but it encapsulates what i try to do absolutely. you’re right now, i’m not an accountant but we absolutely benefit from bringing those wider perspectives from within the organization because ultimately without that diversity of thoughts, you are inevitably going to miss out on some opportunities. absolutely.
donny: that’s why i brought that up because we’ve had that term diversity of thought has been thrown around a lot. i think everyone goes, “oh, we just need people that think differently, but when you– this is i think a great example of some very distinct viewpoints that were familiar with that it is really when you bring all this together and your job is to question rather than just here’s a solution, here’s what’s happening, it was just right to, you mentioned in our prep call. a lot of it is you’re just asking additional questions or saying, “have you looked at it this way,” or, “have you thought about this?”
james: absolutely. i think that’s certainly one element of it. i think there is a solution focus if we ever could say that we can solve some of these issues. i very much want to see outcomes and impacts and really hear the benefit that people are experiencing by introducing and continuing to raise the agenda for other people within the organization and actually encourage them to raise it for themselves because ultimately, our workforce are who make us a successful organization and we want our people to feel that they matter and that they’re heard.
we take these, you take the hr, the senior management perspective, my perspective, but also part of that is always saying, “what do you think anyone and everyone within the organization?” “why does this matter to you and how can we make this better for you?”
donny: i like that again that that’s basically the inclusion that we hear a lot in dei everyone has a voice and feels like they’ve been included and as part of that decision. even if it’s maybe not the decision that they want, they’ve at least had an opportunity to voice their thoughts on it.
james: absolutely.
donny: you mentioned the outcomes and impact which i think is an important concept to look at because when we look at a lot of esg csr reporting, that’s what you’re trying to do is to say, “this is the outcome of what we’ve done,” or, “this is the impact we’ve had,” whether it’s on the firm itself or on the community.
it was actually the report i actually saw primeglobal had pushed out, here’s a great example that the firm had shared this report. can you tell us a little bit more about that report, what is conveyed and why you publish it?
james: absolutely. we’ve been producing our reports in this area for quite a number of years now. i’ve wanted to develop that over time, and i think that we’re moving towards a more esg-style report, but i don’t think we’re entirely ready to commit to reporting as much in-depth across all areas as we could be so it’s built over time.
within that report, we really do focus on the s part of esg. we have a particular focus on our people, our community, and the environment, and that’s how it’s currently presented. our people is very much looking at what we do and how we support the people that work within the organization. that is absolutely around equality, diversity, and inclusion. it’s very much looking at the wellbeing initiatives that we introduce as well.
what we’re beginning to report in more detail is the makeup of our organization. without that data and without the understanding of who we are, it’s very difficult to make a tangible impact to seek the underrepresented people within the organizations and we want to communicate that as transparently as possible.
then our more external view looking at the community. we’ve got a really long-standing community program. we’ve had a charitable fund that we support other organizations through. a percentage of the firm’s profits from the partners is put towards that fund. next year, 2023, it’ll be the 20th anniversary. that’s the heart of what we do philanthropically and through volunteering. it’s a way to fix some of our csr initiatives to that fund. it gives people an opportunity to match their donations.
we’re giving more specific to causes that are relevant to and mean something to the people across all of our teams. we also, our trustees will receive applications from charities and we research organizations that we want to support much more locally to the community that we work within.
then environmentally, that’s where we’re placing a lot more focus at the moment on developing our understanding and getting a bit more rigorous data collection so that hopefully as we move forward, we’ll be able to fully understand our environmental impacts and actually see where we can make changes that will reduce our carbon footprint moving in the future.
donny: i noticed, on the website, that you guys also have a gender pay gap report and a diversity inclusion report. can you tell me more about those too? i think you also just said that there were– i think some of these i’m trying to remember now when i looked at it, these are actually simpler as well. aren’t they?
james: sorry, what did you mean?
donny: these were not as complex as like a full csr report.
james: oh, sorry. yes. with the gender pay gap reporting, it’s actually a requirement that we have got to submit this file, this report annually, and that’s been since 2017. any organization with a headcount over 250 needs to provide data on gender pay gap reporting within the organization. that’s something we’ve done since then. i think it’s a valuable report for us to continually understand, at one snapshot in time, this is collected from a date, and to ensure that we see trends as they change over time, help us to understand why that might be. has there been a particular influx or has there been more members of staff leaving at any given time? it is a requirement, but it’s really useful for us to see particularly, i think when we talk about diversity and equality within the workplace, the gender issue has long been something that has needed to be addressed certainly at senior level. that’s particularly why we report on that. that is something that the hr team lead on. then our diversity reporting is supposed to complement, i think, what we are doing alongside the csr reports but maybe more specific just looking at that particular area.
donny: excellent. one of my takeaways from what you were just sharing on all three reports is really that, firms don’t have to get all the way to esg. there are other things, smaller things, scopes, maybe– you said the csr is a little, i don’t want to say it’s easy, but it’s easier to be able to do something like that. a lot of times i think people look at it and they go, “man, it’s this big thing and we’re never going to do that,” but there’s graduate steps that they could probably take towards those. yes. i feel like every firm should really be publishing reports like this because the issues that you’re mentioning, they’re so critical today, globally. like me having spoken with different firms and regions throughout the world, we see this whole concept of this great resignation or great reset that’s occurring. you hear that all around as well. if firms were actually to use this as recruiting and retention not just for employees, because we hear about the next generation as very purpose-driven, they want to make sure they’re working for good strong ethical organizations but also from clients in that, the changing awareness around clients that, “i want to work with somebody more than that’s going to just give me a report, my audit report or my tax return or whatever it might be.” do you have any advice for firms that want to start creating any of these types of reports for themselves?
james: absolutely. i think apps you bang on the money when you say more firm should be sharing this kind of information. i think the very heart of responsible business and what i try to do is to be transparent. i think that there can be some nervousness around sharing information that maybe isn’t seen as being absolutely the very best it could be because as part of that process, you’re learning where you need to make improvements. you’re also holding yourself accountable, putting something into the world to say where you’re going to start making changes. if it isn’t perfect, and i don’t think any firm could ever say that they are, communicating how you intend to improve upon that is just as important because that engenders trust, i think it tells the clients you’re working with, it tells your wider workforce that this is something that matters to you and ultimately this is how you intend to make those changes.
i think and i’ve been guilty of this in the past. i really want to see lots of huge changes happening now, and that’s never going to happen, because it’s such a huge beast really, because there are so many different areas that you can should look at to make these improvements. being realistic about where you can actively make a change within your organization and target two, three, four things that you really think you can do now and make progress on. once that’s become embedded within the organization, then you can take the next step and get a little bit deeper. i also think one of the most significant factors in all of this is while corporate responsibility is absolutely seen as being a differentiator between organizations and giving a competitive advantage, we do not achieve this alone. looking at the wider business community and building networks and sharing information, sharing best practice, where you’ve succeeded, where you’ve had difficulties, is incredibly important. i’ve been really privileged to have access to lots of different people through various networks locally to our business, where people have had really open conversations. this is a shared goal for society. it’s not about making a quick book against a competitor. it’s absolutely about sharing and moving this forward together and, yes.
you can’t deny the fact that there’s going to be a business case around doing this better, and your more likely to attract engaged team members. it’s absolutely part of keeping people within the organization as well because they see that they’re working for an organization that actually takes this seriously, that it matters too, and actually takes them seriously and listens to their issues and what they would like to see changing. probably all organizations right now, need to keep doing that, listening to our team members and working with external parties to improve the experience of being employed by buzzacott and ultimately do better for the community, do better for our people and make better environmental changes as well.
donny: that’s so powerful. the things from what you just said, the things that really resonated with new– two things that you said, one, the concept of accountability, which i’ll draw back again as accountants that’s part of our role is to hold people accountable and it’s tied to this, what gets measured, gets managed. or you can’t manage what you’re not measuring. the importance of even getting a baseline measurement, where are we? maybe you decide i’m not going to publish this yet, but we’re going to do things having that materializing the number and now being able to track it and figure out what you’re doing, even if at first internally, hopefully eventually getting to that external. the external reporting, i think, again draws this concept back to us as a profession. this is why there’s audits, the whole trend around the audit and sustainability that’s coming around because people want to be able to trust. that was the second concept that you said, i think is super important is, this is a part of creating trust between not just the employer and the employee, but also the firm and/or an organization and the broader community that you’re a part of and shows that whole commitment. like you said, that we are committed to this, and it’s also what we may not be doing that great, but this is what we’re doing to make change or try and enact change to move forward. i think it’s super powerful. a lot of what you said and why the profession needs to be involved and specifically firms need to take a look at this.
james: great. yes, i absolutely agree. in our values, one of our key values is trust. without that, that has to be internally and externally focused. without that, you are not going to be successful because– and we have very fortunate we’ve got very long standing clients that have been with us for years. there’s a reason for that. i think they see the efforts that we’re making. we try very hard to communicate that with them. we also try to demonstrate that internally that our team members are working for an organization that really does take this seriously. yes, i think that’s a really super important point.
donny: well, i really want to thank you again for taking the time to help us understand this whole– we ended up talking a lot about esg, even though that wasn’t our original intent, but the tie between esg, csr, dni, all of these things that are really becoming part of it and i think hopefully, for the listeners out there, we’ve done a good job in kind of showing them how this is really a part of the transformation of our profession, not just within the firm, but in the way that we interact and can impact have a positive impact on the communities that we’re working with. if people have questions for you, how can they contact you? or are you open to them contacting you to learn more about what you’ve done or what buzzacott’s doing?
james: absolutely. i suppose great places on linkedin. i can be found with the handle james-ross-csr. that’s probably the easiest way, but a quick search in google, james ross buzzacott will probably find me quite easily.