By MATT CHANDLER
Buffalo Law Journal

Larry Lawler is spending this week in Florida.

No, he's not on vacation, he is teaching a seminar.

No, he isn't a teacher, he is an accountant.

No he isn't teaching accounting students, he's teaching professional accountants.

Surprised?

In a profession thought to be a black-and-white game of numbers, Lawler, president of Lawler & Witkowski CPAs, says people often have misconceptions about the world of accounting and the professional number crunchers behind the scenes who make sense of it all.

"There is a thought that being a CPA is the penultimate in accounting; you're now at the top of the heap," Lawler says. "But that's not the case. By definition, being a CPA means you are now qualified to start the profession."

Unlike many careers, life as a certified professional accountant - particularly those who work as tax accountants - are faced with the challenge of perpetually educating themselves on tax codes and regulations that change on an annual basis.

Students who expect to graduate from college with their accounting degree and leave school behind in favor of the "real world" are often surprised at the need for ongoing education and the frequency of regulatory changes, says Al Oddo, an accounting professor at Niagara University. He has been training future accountants for three decades, and says many freshmen are shell-shocked when they discover that they are signing on for a lifetime commitment to education.

"We work with our students as freshmen and get them right into an accounting class to make sure they have a clear understanding of what the accounting profession is all about," Oddo says. "Some are a bit surprised and it isn't exactly what they expected, and we want them to find out early enough so that they can make changes."

To those who stick it out, Oddo stresses the importance of ongoing professional education after college.

"In the senior year, our students learn all about the complicated details involved in the tax code, and they also learn that whatever was in the tax code last year is now irrelevant because it has changed," he says. "They are kind of getting an inkling at that point that even if they get their degree, they can't just rest on their laurels."

Enter Lawler. In addition to working as a hands-on tax accountant, he now devotes roughly half of his time to teaching seminars aimed at keeping those in the profession up to speed on the ever-changing tax laws. It's one such seminar that has him going to Fort Lauderdale, where 20 accountants have come to learn the latest on tax-problem resolution, this week.

While many in the field regularly attend professional education seminars like those Lawler's firm conducts, most supplement their education with in-house programs.

Olean-based Buffamante Whipple Buttafaro PC has a formal training program called BWB University. The program focuses heavily on training associates in their first three years with the firm. Scott Reed, director of the audit and accounting division at BWB, says it is a critical component of the firm's operations.

"What we've done is develop courses we think our new hires should go to, and that includes courses taught outside our firm by experts as well as in-house things we put on ourselves," he said. Reed said the program functions as an unintentional recruiting tool in that it brings firm personnel to college campuses.

The students "are very receptive to it," he said. "What we've found is that students who are looking for jobs are curious about what training will be available to them because they are nervous about making the transition from college to the workforce."

Professional standards mandate 40 hours per year of training to maintain one's CPA licence, but despite any trepidation incoming CPAs might have about continuing professional education, Lawler says most people far exceed the required hours of study.

"To be a professional and do a good job in this field, you've got to keep up to speed or you're going to do your client a disservice," he says. "I think every accountant should plan on spending 40 hours each year in formal training, going to seminars and such, but there needs to be self-education as well."

Lawler, who has been a practicing CPA for 36 years, says he still averages 10 hours a week reading and studying to keep up to speed on the ever-changing world of accounting and tax laws.

It is a notion that colleagues like Reed say is imperative in order to succeed long-term in the industry.

"Staying current is difficult because things are always evolving," Reed said. "It's not always good enough to know what standard or what law just changed. You need to be forward-thinking and see what is on the horizon and how could that affect your client."

Tax professionals as well as those who educate them agreed that theirs is a field that isn't for those who are looking to hang their degree on the wall and leave school behind. Sandra Augustine, a professor of accounting at Hilbert College in Hamburg, says preparing the students early on eliminates any resistance to the idea that they are signing on to be lifelong students.

"We talk about what it takes to become a CPA, and we let them know that what they learn when they take the CPA test five years later isn't a measure of what you know. I tell the students that they have to make a commitment to this profession and expect to be in continuing education forever.

"I tell them in my tax classes, ‘What you learned today can change tomorrow.' All they have to do is pass a tax bill and everything here is obsolete," Augustine said.

She has a message she shares with students who think continuing professional education and keeping up with the changes in the field aren't of critical importance to their future careers.

"You have to keep current," she warns, "or you'll be out of a job. "