Young Difference Makers S2 E2 - Veronica Beilby: Breaking Stereotypes: The Unexpected Impact of Chartered Accountants

Ever thought of accountants as life-savers? You will be surprised by today's guest, Veronica Beilby, a member of Chartered Accountants Australia and New Zealand, who strongly believes that accountants too can make a significant difference in society. 

Veronica invites us into her unusual journey of becoming a Chartered Accountant, and how she’s been able to impact people's lives positively with her work. She brings to light the crucial role accountants played during the COVID-19 pandemic, alleviating financial stress and potentially saving lives. You'll be captivated by her philosophy of continuous learning, the power of human connection, and the art of storytelling in her profession.

Veronica's compelling perspective continues as she embraces the power of networking and finding purpose amid career challenges. Drawing from her personal experiences during the pandemic, Veronica emphasizes the importance of forging meaningful connections and having a definitive purpose to steer one towards success. 

Her stories of fellow accountants who have creatively leveraged their skills to effect positive change will inspire you to push beyond limits. You’re guaranteed not just an appreciation for the world of accounting, but also a healthy dose of inspiration to fuel your own journey. Tune in to hear Veronica's riveting tales of resilience, determination, and how she maintained a positive outlook amidst adversity.

Transcript

Veronica Beilby: 0:00

Okay, it'd be lovely to be a billionaire. I think that might be nice. If I'm going to have to sacrifice my personal ethics and values to get that, then that's a no-go. And as a chartered accountant, being bound by our code of ethics, I think, well, okay, I've got something I can align to and I'm in a profession with a group of others who obviously feel the same, because otherwise they wouldn't be here. Hi, everybody listening, I'm Veronica Bilby. I'm representing chartered accountants Australia and New Zealand. At present I'm living in London, but I am from Brisbane, australia, and I currently work for PricewaterhouseCoopers.

Veronica Beilby: 0:49

I'll give you a very potted history Basically no history of chartered accounting in our family. I'm, in fact, the first person to ever attend university. In my family and my parents neither really knew anything about accounting, but they figured it was great and they encouraged me, got me interested. I was okay at math, so there we go. Chartered accounting worked for me and when I was at university, there was a student society, for then the Institute of Chartered Accountants in Australia, and they said they were the best and I thought right, I want to be part of the best. It looked like a great organization, full of great people. I joined as a student member in 1999 and I've never left. I was okay at maths I'm certainly not genius level and at the moment my career is incredible because I haven't posted a journal for a very long time but I get to interact with accountants and what drove me was that desire to make people's lives better and I sort of stopped and thought at one point oh gosh, how do I do that? I'm an external auditor and most people are pretty unhappy that I turn up, but I figure my life can be better and I can make people's lives better by teaching them accounting. Yeah, really. So at the moment now I create learning programs and I figure each day, if I just make a difference in one person's life by teaching them how to do their job better or teaching them a skill that they can use while they're at work, I can make a very small difference and that's what drives me to get up each day.

Veronica Beilby: 2:25

I find A lot of accountants. We might downplay the role that we have in society. We might think we don't make a big difference. I was actually at a lunch at the Pan Accountancy lunch in 2021. And one of the speakers there talked about how in COVID, it was in fact, accountants chartered accountants who were saving lives. Ok, we're not the NHS, ok, we're not the frontline responders, but financial stress leads to high rates of suicide and if we can help our clients and our customers and the people that we work with understand their numbers, help them when they need issues with debt, getting loans, these sorts of things In fact, chartered accountants are saving lives. So that's how I feel that we can make a difference.

Veronica Beilby: 3:14

But me personally, overcoming challenges and adversity it's I feel it's small, but maybe it's not, so I'll share it is that during the pandemic, I was living and working in New York, so I was away from my hometown of Brisbane. I was by myself and I was, thankfully, I was working for an incredible company. I was working for Flight Centre Travel Group However challenging industry to be in the travel industry during the global pandemic as well, but how I overcame it was really just those human connections. We were isolated, I was in a foreign country, but I had a team to lead. We had a job to do. We had to get everything still running smoothly for Flight Centre. We were looking after corporate brands like Moderna. At that time they were looking for the cure, so we had to keep Moderna in the air at Flight Centre, and so the team pulled together and because I had that sense of purpose and I knew that in a little way my role with leading my team and helping them they would help serve our customers, we'd keep Moderna in the air. They eventually found a vaccine in the US and there we had a big impact.

Veronica Beilby: 4:30

Within my personal friendship group I have a number of people who commenced their careers in chartered accounting and now have gone on to do incredible things. Like I say, I don't do any actual accounting anymore, still very heavily involved with accountants in teaching and training. But one of my closest friends, she's done Kate Moss's makeup on the cover of Vogue and she's a chartered accountant from Sydney Australia. She retrained and we were having a chat about it one day and I said to her her name is Sandra Cook and I said, sandy, what do you think about this? And she said, well, I've never hired a business manager, I've never needed an accountant. I can do all of that myself. She got those skills from a backing in chartered accounting and the sky's the limit. I think with that basic business knowledge and understanding you could do absolutely anything.

Veronica Beilby: 5:38

The advice I would offer is learn everything you can. And when I first started in one of my first firms, the then founding partner used to play a trick on us and he would come dressed and talk to the new starters and he would dress as the janitor and he would tell you he was the janitor and he wanted to know how you treated him and how you worked with him. And thankfully I come from very humble beginnings, so I was having a good chat, like I do, and basically I was able to do all of that. So I was having a good chat, like I do, and basically that taught me that you never know who someone is. You never know who you're working with. As a young chartered accountant, speak to everybody. Learn everything you can about a business. Find out, because from that you'll then work out what it is that you want to do and you'll get the skills to launch. You'll then have those brilliant stories to share with others. I believe stories are the foundation of being a human. We tell them, we share them, we inspire them and then that's what you can use to lift yourself off. But you do. I do believe you have to put that grassroots work in and learn everything, because that's what will give you the best, strongest foundations.

Veronica Beilby: 6:52

Yes, so I left Brisbane, australia, in 2019. I moved to Toronto in Canada, I moved to New York in the US and now I'm here in the UK, and I didn't do that through one employer. You can, I've worked for a lot of global employers, but each time I just packed myself up and thought I'll go there and I'll get a job. I knew I had my chartered accounting qualification and that gave me the confidence someone will hire me to do a job. But then, if I look back on my career, I've worked for some incredible industries. I worked for a theme park company. I had tigers outside my office that I could go and talk to and visit. I now work in learning, design and development. I've delivered lectures to CEOs and CFOs in Canada and in Brisbane in Australia.

Veronica Beilby: 7:48

There's really no limit and sometimes I think I'm limited by my imagination because I've come from a small place like Brisbane, because now in London, I look around and I'm like really that's a job, you can do that and I think I'd like to do that. So now I'm even still inspired to think what's next, what could I try next? Because the Chartered Accounting Foundation just gives you so much to build on. So, like I say, I've come from very humble beginnings. My mother was a refugee to Australia and my father was from very humble beginnings in Sydney. But even if we didn't have much, people say I was raised right and I do believe my parents raised me right. They instilled a strong set of ethics and values. So when I was looking for a profession, okay, it'd be lovely to be a billionaire, I think that might be nice, but if I'm going to have to sacrifice my personal ethics and values to get that, then that's a no go. And as a Chartered Accountant, being bound by our code of ethics, I think, well, okay, I've got something I can align to and I'm in a profession with a group of others who obviously feel the same, because otherwise they wouldn't be here, and I stand very proud with that. And that's how it aligns to my values.

Veronica Beilby: 9:15

One of the key challenges I think of and it was almost a self-made challenge because I I developed a passion for learning I was involved with the CA program for Chartered Accountants Australia, in New Zealand, but I didn't know how to make it my career. I had a strong financial career. I'd been a financial manager and I was leading a team, and so I got to a point in 2016 where I just thought, okay, I'm going to have to force myself. I quit my well-paying job where I was very happy I finished, I'd done everything I needed to do and I thought, okay, now I'm either going to have to make it an education or I'm going to have to go back with my cap in hand and ask for a job. But, starting with connections from Chartered Accountants Australia and New Zealand Brisbane office, I picked up some part-time work doing tutoring in universities, which then went to lecturing in universities. I got to lecture an MBA program where I had incredible impostor syndrome because I thought, gosh, these people are paying a lot of money and they get me. But it turned out they were happy with that, so that's okay.

Veronica Beilby: 10:20

But yeah, the challenge and how I overcame it I used my contacts. I love making friends. I don't necessarily consider networking just about business. It's about making a connection and making a friend, and those friends helped me. And then, from there, I was able to prove my worth. And then I got the job at Flight Centre as their National Learning and Development Leader, all through people who believed in me and gave me a chance because they knew something of me in my network. So I used that network, I worked hard, I proved myself and each day I got up just trying to combat that little voice in my head that said you can't really do it. And then you know. I look back and I think, well, I did it.

Veronica Beilby: 11:02

My key message really would be to understand your why. I'm a huge Simon Sinek fan. Understand what drives you and gets you out of bed. Then, if you think that perhaps the skills you have aren't right, reexamine that, because the skills that you have as a chartered accountant can let you do anything. I wanted to find a way to make people's lives better and to make them happier, and I can do that through learning and education. I can teach accountants. So don't be limited by your thoughts, but know why. Because if you have that driving purpose, even on the days when you don't want to get out of bed and it's really tough the why will drive you, even if it's rainy and yucky outside.