windfuryFollow

The question would be... would that be subtle, or am I just giving you a random math problem?

If it wasn't across the U.S., then I would have, but as I'm poor as a **** right now... so nope.

East coast for me.

I know you guys have moved on from this but I have to say this is ******* gold

But I have to know...how many people do you (this being a communal 'you') honestly know who live two completely separate lifestyles and the things they are "good at" don't bleed over whatsoever...is it that uncommon to be good at something because it comes to you naturally and thus permeates every aspect of your daily life?

I seem to get asked a lot if I just don't even want to look at a computer when I get home from my 8 hours 6 days a week of being a sysadmin, but I usually just assume that's the ignorant mass who seems to hate computers talking. Do MBAs like suddenly switch off their brains when they leave the office because they're tired of doing math?

I know this guy is just trolling now, this is mostly tangental...just got me thinking.

I'm an accountant, when I come home from work the LAST thing I want to do is play with spreadsheets for WoW.

P.S.-some MBA's never switch on their brains. EVER. They're called managers.(Have you been to a business school? Have you seen management 'classes'? Their own effin' books tell them that they've just been ripped off.) A person with an MSA (Master of Science in Accounting) or CPA spend far more time and energy doing math than some shmuck with an MBA.

...does it show that I hated management major with their ultra-easy classes complaining about having to step foot into any accounting class that couldn't just be BS'ed through? Because, you know, I've totally gotten over that.

1- Never said I was a CPA, just an accountant. On a side note, I also don't work at an a firm, I work in a small business as a staff accountant. I took this job so that I could learn more about business in general because I KNOW college didn't cover everything. I also plan on getting Ph.D. in accounting (Specifically in cost account, I find it fascinating. I'm also crazy)

2-I'll say it again, management classes are a joke. You're trying to apply a general theory to something that should be based on practice knowledge and experience. When the textbook itself tells you that the majority of management is learned from 'the school of hard knocks' (book's words, not mine.) Sending in an MBA to manage engineers makes as much sense as sending an engineer to manage MBA's.

3- Market segmentation, product development, and consumer analysis, are all important things, they just don't deserve the MBA pedestal they've been put on. You need to know where and how you are placed, but that isn't something limited to the MBA's. EVERYONE involved in decisions in what you make and how you make it should be valued, but the people who more directly involved in making it should have greater say than someone who just puts for "We should try to be a high-volume low cost seller!"

4-I agree with you about the 'fresh out of college join the firm' in general, I also know something you probably don't. A LOT of accounting students are a.) bad at accounting, they just want the money and/or b.) Over-achievers who over-dramatically state everything the just "HAVE' to do. They also tend to drink heavily. There's a reason why I have no plans of going that route.

5-As little as you like GAAP/FASB/IASB, if you want to succeed in managing any public company (or a private company that must submit to audits), knowing those things will save you stress. Accountants don't ask for that pile of taxi receipts because they like paper. Nor do they have pre-formed opinions on why certain things are a bad idea without good reason.


Now, for the accounting scandals, do you know WHY Arther Anderson no longer exists? It's because the perception of wrong-doing (which, I'm not going to say is faulty) did them in. They were cleared of all charges against them, but they were dead before they were 'vindicated' (and I still believe that wasn't nessicarily right but..).

What happened with Enron (the weight that killed AA) was that AA was the auditor and a consultant. Even though the groups were separate, there was still (at the very LEAST) the perception of impropriety (Hence SOX). What Enron had going on involved a number of accounting tricks that, technically did not violate GAAP, it was fraud in any sense of the word. Major part of what they did was create other cooperation to buy bad assets with outside investors putting up a enough money for it to be classified as a separate entity, not needing to be consolidated. They attracted investors by guaranteeing assets with stock (See where this is going?). While Enron looked good on paper, they had extraordinary losses hidden by an exploitation of accounting rules.

Arther Anderson got dragged under because they kept saying everything was fine and dandy in the audit, despite the consulting group working to hide the mess.


My point was that having an MBA doesn't mean you do any real math or spreadsheets on a daily basis, an MSA/CPA are much more likely to do so. I also didn't mean to imply Master's Level classes were a joke, just the Management classes (particularly at at BBA level) are people sitting around feeding each other different variations of the same crap and calling it progress and learning. I still get annoyed at people who want a Management degree, but don't want to have to know how to do the hard stuff behind it. Accounting, as boring as it is, is just flat-out something you NEED to know when you want to start running a company. If you can't read your balance sheet and are at the mercy of an accountant, you are an open target for fraud. While I take personal offense as an accountant to anyone who uses accounting to commit fraud, it's done because you can take A+B=CAT if you have enough terms the other person head spin.