The Missing Curriculum Link: Personal Financial Planning

With increasing personal and business financial challenges facing today’s professionals, we, as business school faculty, have a responsibility to offer the educational background that should enable rising professionals to successfully manage finances.  Unfortunately, the results of a recent analysis of curriculum offerings in Personal Financial Planning indicate that we, as faculty, have not fully accepted this responsibility.  Only three out of the 131 four-year institutions reviewed have a required Personal Financial Planning course in their curriculums. Quite frankly, we’re permitting launching a generation of students who are unprepared to manage both their own and potentially others’ financial affairs.  With that shortfall of a course offering as a backdrop, we suggest the following content for a required Personal Financial Planning course for all students majoring in Business Administration

ierarchical Difference In Auditors Perceptions Of Lowballing: A Study Of Current Attitudes

Auditors are in the business of providing to their clients the value of their attestation services for financial reporting. Auditors (and other accountants) have a strict Code of Professional Conduct which is enforced by the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA). According to this Code of Professional Conduct (AICPA 1988), the AICPA sets forth the requirement that all auditors comply with generally accepted auditing standards (GAAS) in all audit engagements. These rules are a necessary part of the audit process helping to ensure a quality result for the stakeholders of the organization. Lowballing, the practice of bidding under or at cost for an audit in order to attract new clients, may violate the independence in appearance clause of the Code of Professional Conduct. Researchers and regulatory authorities appear to differ on their treatment of this issue. Differences in option (AICPA 1978 compared to DeAngelo 1981) appear to center around the interpretation of independence in the Code of Professional Conduct. This study evaluates current attitudes towards lowballing for all levels of professional auditors within four public accounting firms and specifically addresses the question of whether lowballing is a violation of the impendence in appearance section of the Code. The study also questions auditors as to their beliefs about the Code of Professional Conducts potential for change to accommodate the practice of lowballing