Congress – Our Big Annual Event

CPA Australia’s annual Congress season looms large and near. I’ve just taken some time out to scan the programs, and speaker lists, and so on that are on the CPA Australia website, and it looks like being a fantastic series of events.

The team involved in putting the show together has kindly invited me to speak at the Melbourne event, which I am delighted to be able to do. I also hope to make it along to most of (perhaps all) the other cities for part of Congress that will be held in those locations. Apart from sitting in on some of the interesting sessions, I look forward to meeting other members. After all, as a former headmaster once said to me ‘a school is made up of people, not buildings, or classes – those other things are of little consequence if the right people aren’t also inside’. I feel the same way about our Congress events – what really matters is ensuring that the right people present and attend and are participative during sessions.

Without you, the 2009 Congress season won’t be nearly as successful, meaningful, or fun. I hope to see reader’s of this blog at Congress and to have the chance of meeting you in person then.

MIA… the conference chronicle

Last week I had the pleasure of delivering a keynote address at the Malaysia Institute of Accountants (MIA) regional conference.

CPA Australia proudly sponsored the conference (a reflection of our close ties to the MIA, similar to those we have with many other professional accounting bodies around the world).

The conference theme was ’sustainability’ and I spoke on the topic from an ‘accountant’s perspective’. I imagine that my talk was far less interesting than the one that followed by an 18-year old star who was there to give the ‘younger generation’s perspective’ on sustainability and how to connect with youth on the issue. Her talk was really entertaining. The best of the conference, I thought. [As an aside, it was confronting to finally admit that I’m no longer part of the 'younger' generation… sigh, the mirror don’t lie… and my technological ineptitude marks me as being outside the Gen-Y clan. I am firmly rooted in Gen-X; this borne out by my preference for 80’s hits when I catch a moment to visit YouTube – Matt Finish, The Mentals, Goanna, Jo Jo Zep being recent hits… ].

CPA Australia board member, Christina Foo, was conference chairperson. Christina is also vice president of the MIA and champions the accounting profession in many ways. The profile of the conference, and the calibre of attendees that it attracted, is a credit to Christina and the MIA organising team. CPA Australia was given a fantastic profile at the conference and the information shared throughout the conference will surely have a lasting impact on many of the attendees.

The day after my keynote I grabbed a copy of The Borneo Post to find that the MIA conference was given a multi-page spread and that my talk on sustainability had been quite favourably reported within. My mother was chuffed when she heard. I think Borneo is now on her list of places to visit.

New member centre in Kuching

When next you are in Kuching, Sarawak, be sure to drop in and visit the CPA Australia team at the new CPA Australia Member Centre that I had the privilege of ‘opening’ last week. I was heartened, but not surprised, to find that CPA Australia has close to 400 members living in or near Kuching. Many of them seemed to be at the opening of the member centre to hear Malaysian division president Lam Kee Soon talk of plans for the Malaysian division and about the exciting future that the profession has in Malaysia. Congratulations to Audrey Danasamy, General Manager, CPA Australia Malaysian Division and our other colleagues in Malaysia on this great new step in helping members in Kuching.

Room to Read – Singapore chapter launch

Room to Read launched its Singapore chapter with “an evening of food and philanthropy” on August 5. Regular readers will know that CPA Australia joined similar events in Hong Kong in May and in Sydney in February. This time, Deputy President CPA Australia, Low Weng Keong (“Weng” to friends and colleagues) hosted a CPA Australia table that I was fortunate to be able to join.

It was a wonderful night and our friends at Room to Read were delighted with the result, which at last tally amounted to a little more than SGD 1 million raised to educate children who otherwise would have little hope of learning how to read and write and so on. I am very pleased to let you know that the CPA Australia table raised more than SGD 65,000 on the night. This included the donation of an entire school (you are one of a kind Weng!) and three libraries as well as other smaller but significant items.

The other CPA Australia members who also joined Weng’s table on the night and donated the libraries were: Chaly Mah (Divisional President, Singapore); Loh Hoon Sun (Past Divisional President, Singapore); Soh Yew Hock (Past Divisional President Singapore); Steven Lim (Councillor and Past Divisional President Singapore); Irving Low (Deputy Divisional President Singapore), Bill Bowman (Divisional Councillor Singapore); Albert Ho (Divisional Councillor Singapore); Chan Lai-Koon (General Manager, CPA Australia Singapore Division); Low Lai King (friend of CPA Australia). What a team!

Following the event, Robin Fern, Asia Development Director for Room to Read sent this message:

Once again it was wonderful to have a CPA table at our event and so actively engaged with us. In addition to the CPA libraries, and the school I wanted to let you know that we’ve received our first two donations from the CPA Flyer! They arrived today, a $500 and a $100 SGD donation. The printed brochure looks wonderful… We’ve set up an appeal to track all donations and will allocate the funds to the girls’ education program as you indicate in the brochure… It’s truly exciting to see the momentum building.

John Wood, Founder & Executive Chairman of Room to Read, added this note:

Richard, great to see you at our event… We greatly appreciate everything that you and the worldwide CPA Australia team are doing to help Room to Read to reach more kids with the lifelong gift of education. It is so greatly appreciated, and we’re excited to be working with you…

Remember: “world change starts with educated children”. As Robin and John note, CPA Australia members have already done so much to bring about this change. This is something we all share in and of which we can all be proud.

Innovating the CPA Program the Singapore way

Last week I was in Singapore to join Deputy President Low Weng Keong and others for the signing of a landmark Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the Tax Academy of Singapore, the training arm of the Inland Revenue Authority of Singapore (IRAS).

The agreement seals the launch of the new Singapore Taxation segment which has been incorporated into the professional level of the CPA Program. It is a significant milestone and demonstrates CPA Australia’s commitment to delivering a highly valued and global designation with the capacity to specialise to meet the needs of businesses throughout the world.

Singapore is the first place in which CPA Australia is launching a local tax program and plans are in place to launch similar localised CPA Program modules in other locations including Hong Kong / China.

Chaly Mah, President of Singapore Division, CPA Australia and CEO, Deloitte Asia Pacific noted in a press release that: “In Singapore, we are very proud to be in partnership with the Tax Academy of Singapore – a regional knowledge hub that seeks to bring together local and international tax practitioners, tax administrators, researchers and academia to engage in high quality education and professional development…We are confident that our CPA Program candidates can look forward to acquiring a leading edge specialised training in the area of Singapore Taxation. This specially tailored Singapore taxation segment in the CPA Program will enable our graduates be more relevant and better prepared as they enter the workforce.”

General Manager, CPA Australia Singapore Division, Lai-Koon Chan and her team did a wonderful job in putting this agreement in place and in ensuring that appropriate ceremony was given to the occasion of the signing of the MOU. I offer my congratulations to Lai-Koon, Chaly, and all our CPA colleagues on staff and Council in Singapore who worked hard to introduce this pioneering initiative.