The accounting profession is at a crossroads. Audit firms are struggling to recruit newer generations, as younger people are starting to rethink the return on investment of higher education. Jiafan Li and Erhan Kilincarslan write that firms must overhaul the career, and universities must realign accounting education with Gen Z’s tech-driven, purpose-first worldview.
Confidence among global accountants has hit its lowest point since 2020, especially with the US leading the decline. Meanwhile, audit firms are already struggling to attract Gen Z talent (born 1997–2012), a demographic that, alongside millennials (born 1983–1996), will comprise 74 per cent of global workforce by 2030. To survive this generational turnover, accounting firms must overhaul compensation, culture, and career paths, and universities must fundamentally reshape accounting education to align with Gen Z’s tech-driven, purpose-first worldview.
Gen Z career equation
Money, meaning, and mental well-being are the core pillars shaping Gen Z’s career choices. This generation is entering the workforce under financial pressure unlike any prior generation. In the UK, stagnant wages in auditing (£27–44k) trail far behind finance (£37–64k) and tech (£47.5–77.5k). Rent costs have nearly doubled since the millennial entry years and average student debt in England hovers around £48,470. It’s not surprising that they demand faster promotions and pay raises—and won’t hesitate to leave for better offers.
Climbing the corporate ladder? Not for Gen Z. Burnout from exhausting audit busy seasons and qualification pressures for promotion has pushed this cohort to redefine success. They seek employers committed to societal impact. Deloitte’s recent removal of “diversity” from its US core values sent the wrong message. To Gen Z, work is transactional: 40 per cent plan to quit within two years if employers ignore their values.
Raised on AI, they’re both tech-savvy and anxious about automation replacing their roles. Yet paradoxically, firms need their human judgment to spot red flags in AI-generated outputs. Yet shrinking training budgets and the offshoring of foundational tasks have left many early-career professionals without the experiential grounding needed to develop such judgment.
Crisis of relevance in higher ed
The new generation is also rethinking the return on investment (ROI) of higher education. With 31 per cent of Gen Z skipping university and accounting degree completions dropping 7.8 per cent (bachelors) and 6.4 per cent (masters) in 2021-22, universities are at a crossroads. Students flock to finance master’s programs offering practical tech skills and environmental, social and governance (ESG) modules, while outdated accounting curricula cling to compliance-heavy frameworks. The accounting profession’s outdated academic pathways are failing to reflect the modern demands Gen Z will face—namely automation, regulatory flux and shifting global markets.
Four shifts
To retain the next wave of accountants, accounting firms must act boldly and rethink traditional practices from the ground up. It begins with cultivating a flexible, performance-driven culture that respects work-life balance – especially during busy audit seasons, while offering Gen Z autonomy to manage their own schedules. No longer a perk, flexibility is an expectation.
Just as vital is a firm’s stance on social and political issues. This generation expects transparency on matters of equity, justice and sustainability. While some US firms grapple with polarising debates around diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) and UK counterparts focus on regulatory adherence, Gen Z interprets silence as complicity. A failure to engage publicly on societal challenges risks alienating a cohort that deeply values purpose.
Leadership, too, must evolve. Gen Z seeks more than traditional authority figures – they want mentors who invest in their growth, offer guidance, and build trust through open and ongoing conversations about career development. Hierarchical models fixated on paperwork and performance metrics simply no longer resonate.
Finally, the industry must reconsider its operational backbone. Accounting firms’ increasing reliance on offshore centres for routine tasks, particularly in India, may deliver efficiency but comes at a cost: the deskilling of junior auditors. Without early exposure to foundational accounting work, young professionals miss crucial hands-on learning experience, which is essential for developing the judgment needed to work effectively with AI-driven audit systems.
Universities: time to catch up
While business schools race to roll out buzzworthy modules in fintech, ESG, sustainability and blockchain, accounting education remains frustratingly behind the curve. Most programmes still rely on compliance-heavy frameworks that no longer reflect the demands of a modern professional. The Association of International Certified Professional Accountants (AICPA) launched a revised certified public accountant (CPA) exam in January 2024, refocusing on data, technology, and tax planning. That should have been a wake-up call.
If universities want to remain competitive, they must urgently align their curriculum with the realities that Gen Z are walking into: automation, geopolitical instability and volatile job markets. That means embedding practical, interdisciplinary training directly into the curriculum.
UK institutions should expand partnerships with Level 7 accountancy and tax apprenticeship providers and scale up integrated, experiential models such as the University of Manchester’s BSc Accounting with Industrial/Professional Experience. These models resonate more with Gen Z’s demand for hands-on, real-world learning tied to career outcomes.
Equally urgent is the integration of AI literacy. GenAI’s rapid integration into auditing has exposed critical vulnerabilities: misinformation risks, regulatory grey areas, compromised audit independence and data privacy concerns. To equip young professionals for these challenges, the accounting curriculum must prioritise AI literacy, embedding modules on ethical AI auditing and hands-on simulations in AI ethics labs. By demystifying the “black box” nature of GenAI and emphasising human judgment as a safeguard against automation bias, universities can alleviate digital-native talents’ anxieties about AI displacement. This approach not only prepares accounting students to use AI audit systems responsibly but also empowers them to reframe AI as a collaborative tool rather than a threat.
The clock is ticking
If accounting firms and universities fail to adapt, Gen Z talents won’t wait and will go for industries that offer them higher pay, better work-life balance and sense of belonging. The solution isn’t incremental but transformational. Firms must redesign careers and universities must bridge the skills gap. The future of the accounting profession depends on it.
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- This blog post represents the views of its author(s), not the position of LSE Business Review or the London School of Economics and Political Science.
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