As we continue our ‘Meet the Team’ series, we recently caught up with Alex Powell, a Senior Executive at Bevan Buckland LLP, to learn about Alex’s career journey, role at Bevan Buckland LLP, and predictions for the industry’s future.
Q: How did you first get into Accountancy?
Bevan Buckland was my first accountancy job. Having always preferred numbers over words, I felt I would always pursue a career working with numbers, so after being informed of a graduate scheme opportunity, I applied for the job.
Q: How long have you been at Bevan Buckland, and what’s your current role?
I am approaching nine years with Bevan Buckland. I’m currently a Senior Executive in the Audit department.
Q: What does a typical day look like in your role?
A typical day would see me working primarily on statutory audits; depending on the job stage, I could be planning the next audit, working on the current audit or finalising the previous one. The job role varies, and a big part is the training and mentoring we provide to lower-level staff members. One positive of working at Bevan Buckland is that the client size we act for means that we often offer ad-hoc services, which could be anything from a company valuation to monthly management accounts.
Q: Have you had any other job roles along the way?
I spent a year at PRA Health Sciences (Now ICON), where I was a project associate. My responsibilities included running various reports for the manager of particular studies and manipulating the data in a more user-friendly format.
Q: What do you find most interesting/rewarding about your work?
I often find it rewarding when you help clients develop a two-three-year plan for where you feel they can take their business and then see this plan come to fruition.
Q: What is your vision for the practice’s future?
It would be great to be the first name people in Wales think of when they ask, ‘Do you know of any good accountants?’ Word of mouth is still arguably one of the best marketing tools, and by cementing our place as Wales’ largest independent practice, we can achieve this by continuing to provide a high level of client service while still being personable.
Q: What keeps you at Bevan Buckland?
The environment that key management has driven in the past few years makes Bevan Buckland, in my opinion, a great place to work. There is a very high level of trust placed on employees to manage workloads while also juggling the various daily challenges in their personal lives. The flexibility offered has benefitted me, especially since becoming a father.
Q: What one piece of advice would you give an aspiring accountant / someone just starting their career?
Always be keen to learn, be comfortable being uncomfortable and take on new tasks and challenges when presented with the opportunity.
Q: Are there any expectations you had about this career path that you have found differed from reality, in either a good or bad way?
I had the expectation that I would be surrounded by the stereotypical ‘boring accountants’, but that couldn’t be further from the truth. Many of us in the office share similar sporting hobbies, and the various work-social events that occur mean that you see your colleagues in a different environment.
Q: What skills are the most crucial to succeeding in this career? What type of person do you need to be?
The more experienced you become, the more you need to be organised. There are various different ways people carry this out, but I think you need to find the way that works for you and master this approach to give yourself the best opportunity to succeed.
Q: How do you continue learning & growing as a professional?
I personally have downloaded an app called ‘Headway’, provides short summaries of well-known books such as ‘The Four Hour Work Week’, and ‘Atomic Habits’. I tend to listen to these while out walking or on lunch to try and pick up one or two bits of advice that will help me in my working environment.
Q: What is the best piece of advice you have ever received?
I think the phrase is ”swallow the frog”. Everyone has that one task we put off until the next day. The approach is to ”swallow the frog” or complete this task before you do anything else in your work day because once you complete this task, the rest of your day should, in theory, improve. Plus, you often find that it’s not as bad a task as you perceived in your head. i. DISCLAIMER: I have never actually eaten a frog.
Q: If you were to redo your journey, would you change anything?
I would do a bit of travelling between leaving university and starting out in the working world. Now I haven’t; it probably means I’ll be paying for the three of us to see the world rather than just being a clueless 21-year-old, which I was then!
Q: How do you think the accounting industry will change in the next 5 to 10 years?
The whole world has become transparent. You now have trackers on the parcels, and you can tell when someone is putting the toppings on your pizza. I am not saying that the accounting industry will be that advanced, but I do think there will be greater levels of transparency, and a client will be able to know a more accurate live timeline of the account preparation process.