Those old enough to remember the movie The Graduate will no doubt remember the "plastics" scene. It takes place at a college graduation party for the lead character - Benjamin Braddock, played by Dustin Hoffman.
Braddock, who is totally lost about what to do next with his life, is getting career advice from the friends of his parents.
At one point a man walks up to Braddock and says "Plastics .... enough said", and walks away.
The intent of the reference is that Braddock should enter the plastics industry, a rapidly growing field with lots of opportunities.
Instead of getting a job in plastics, Braddock has an affair with Mrs. Robinson, the much older wife of his father's business partner. He also drives around northern California while Simon and Garfunkel music plays in the background.
Eventually he decides he wants to marry Mrs. Robinson's daughter, which leads to a far-fetched ending. But I digress.
Last week we held a workshop on data and analytics with our research partners at Intuit. We had a mix of experts on data and analytics from both large and small organizations.
There was a very clear consensus that there is a shortage of people with data and analytical skills - and this shortage is going to get worse and last a long time.
So my advice to those in school? Data ... enough said. Oh, and stay away from my wife.
Steve,
Love it! Data is the new Plastics and I remember the movie and the scene about careers from The Graduate.
I would add two things to this, structured data (like what XBRL Global Ledger is about) and visualization. Making sense of the data in a way that people can easily grasp is how CPAs can add value. Combined with their disciplined thinking around accounting standards if applied to more data can lead to some desperately needed skills for 2012 and beyond.
I recently attended an XBRL US Conference where they talked about students in accounting being able to accelerate their careers by 3-5 years if they understand Data (and XBRL).
This was also a major trend in the CPA Horizons 2025 Project.
Data, enough said! and also stay away from my wife, too :)
Hope you have a terrific 2012 and let's talk about working on that student future forum back east soon.
Posted by: Tom Hood | December 27, 2011 at 05:43 AM