Developing the specialist;

              Developing
the 1
Specialist
Specialization, to some an inevitability in
a complex age, raises certain thought-provoking
issues.
"Every industry thinks of itself as
unique, as specialized," Larry Walsh,
partner in charge of the Miami office, told
H&S Reports. "But from an auditor's
viewpoint this is not actually true of all of
them. Appliance manufacturing, for
example, may be peculiar only in its tool­ing
costs and warranty provisions which
may not require a major portion of audit
attention. However, there are other
industries which are intrinsically special­ized,
such as banking and savings and
loan, railroads, insurance, health care.
What I mean to suggest is that not every­one
has to be a specialist, nor does every
practice office need a full complement of
industry specialists."
For those fields where specialization is
applicable, Larry sees the trend toward
someone with broad experience covering
the spectrum of audit, tax and MAS: one
who can coordinate a team of functional
specialists in these areas; one who can
counsel in financial, operational and
organizational matters as well as in the
traditional accounting problems. While
the overall focus is narrower, the special­ist's
background will have to be more
inclusive. "The pattern seems to be, if it is
useful to have a specialty, if that is charac­teristic
of an industry, the accounting firm
with a strong corps of specialists will tend
to dominate that industry."
Larry shares the general feeling that as
businesses become more complex there
will be an increasing need for specializa­tion.
"In recent years," he says, "we have
seen a number of industries develop
which are highly specialized. Financing by
lease, virtually unheard of thirty years
ago, is now widely used. Fast-food fran­chising
and real estate investment trusts
are instances of relatively new, specialized
industries. To sum up, I think more and
more new businesses will fit the mold of
the unique and the particular, thus
requiring the attention of a specialist."
In addition to this, the Firm continues
to place greater emphasis on constructive
services. "It may well be true," Larry notes,
"that you can perform an audit and per-
"The real push
comes from within..!'
form it well without an in-depth knowl­edge
of an industry. But if you can talk
about the business with the people
involved, be conversant with a wide vari­ety
of problems in that one field, you can
offer a range of services beyond the audit.
You come to recognize the usefulness of
assigning audit people who are familiar
with the industry, and this in itself leads to
specialization.
"The question of how to train a spe­cialist
is a complicated one. I feel that time
and resources should be budgeted to this
end, but in the final analysis it is the
training the potential specialist gets in
actual client work that is of most impor­tance.
A specialist does not evolve in
some abstract realm; his stimulus comes
from his own interests and from the
availability of clients."
Larry Walsh has ample reason to know
about the way a specialist develops.
Henry Forer has contributed to the strong
position that the Miami office holds in the
savings and loan industry. According to
Larry, Henry had the background and
expertise, plus a broad reputation and a
solid client base, at a crucial time in the
industry's history. His success with clients
then, and his continued service to them
now, has led to his being sought out by
many other S&L associations.
What Henry has done with savings and
loan, partner Al Leiter has done with
commercial banks. Larry explains, "This
office had a substantial number of bank
clients at the time banks began to form
holding companies. Nourished by the
expanding Horida economy, our bank
clients grew and acquired other banks
around the state. These activities necessi­tated
frequent filings with the SEC, with
the banks' need for audits increasing
steadily. Al was assigned to these audits
and began to develop the interest and
expertise which were the impetus for his
specialization. Now he is our commercial
bank specialist, well respected by both
clients and nonclients for his superior
knowledge of the industry.
"The breadth of our practice in com­mercial
banks in South Horida and the
expertise we have developed have en­abled
us to serve a significant segment of
the financial community in a number of
constructive ways. For example, we can
point out tax-planning opportunities in
the timing of security portfolio transac­tions
or in additions to loan loss reserves.
Also, we expect to render valuable con­structive
service in two areas that we see
coming up in the future—mergers of
existing bank holding companies and
substantial broadening of branch bank­ing.
I have heard Al Leiter, counseling our
younger staff, predict that many new and
exciting challenges still face us since banks
are experiencing difficulties with their
loan portfolios, liquidity and capital.
Developing expertise, Al tells them, to
serve this specialized industry will pro­vide
the professional accountant with sig­nificant
challenges, and he will derive
much satisfaction from his services.
"For many years now," Larry goes on,
"Haskins &. Sells has enjoyed leadership
in a number of specialized fields —
railroads, universities, consumer finance,
stockbrokerage, to name a few—and our
specialists in these fields are widely
recognized." So the idea of an industry
specialist is not new, but the concept has
been gaining increased recognition over
the last few years. There are now such
things as the program maintained by
partner Jule Phoenix for identifying
industry areas and the Firm's specialists in
them. Yet the fact remains that, while time
may be budgeted for selected persons to
immerse themselves in an industry, the
real push comes from within the individ­ual,
who follows up an intense personal
interest with a lot of hard work. O