Do experts inhibit revolution?
Can only those with no direct prior involvement or education in accounting and audit bring fundamental change to our profession? Is a completely blank slate led by participants with a fresh perspective the only way to transform our future?
I was challenged on my perspectives of technical change in accounting and audit by a recent LinkedIn posting “liked” by a mutual contact of the poster and me. It essentially said that someone who is already an expert in a particular field can never bring revolutionary change to that field, only evolutionary change. Whether unintentionally due to blinders of artificial boundaries (“we’ve always done it that way”) or (intentionally or unintentionally) limited by self-interest, the original poster claimed only a true outsider can bring major change.
I recalled something similar in a book I read about the emergence of quantum physics/mechanics. The questions of applying physics to the “very small” required new answers, leading to the development of the principles of quantum physics. The proponents felt, however, that it was easier to explain quantum theory to someone with no background in physics at all than to win over an experienced classical physicist. (I have made an analogy of quantum physics and “quantum reporting” – as reporting goes data level and near real-time.)
I have had the pleasure of knowing and collaborating with many experts whose visions of 20 and even 50 years ago are still logical and – to me – revolutionary paths. And I’m not sure how to develop a path from “today” to “an ideal future” without an understanding of today’s limitations imposed by the International Auditing and Assurance Standards Board, Public Company Accounting Oversight Board, American Institute of Certified Public Accountants or other regional standard setter and market expectations.
Somehow to every comment that “only those unbound by the past can truly revolutionize the future” there’s the response that “those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” (George Santayana, later paraphrased by Winston Churchill)
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