Professional development;

              PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT
By Robert L. Steele
Robert L. Steele, Partner-in-Charge of Personnel
H A S K I N S & S E L LS
CERTIFIED PUBLIC ACCOUNTANTS
BULLETIN
SAN FRANCISCO
LOS ANGELES
SEATTLE
DENVER
ATLANTA
NEW YORK, MARCH 15, 1918
Introducing the Department for Professional Training
Heading of a lead article in the Haskins & Sells Bulletin some forty-five years ago
Mr. John R. Wildman, the partner who
organized the Haskins & Sells depart­ment
of professional training in 1918,
described its purpose as follows:
"The problem is to develop an effec­tive
staff, comprised of carefully se­lected,
well-trained accountants who
will be interested in their work, happy
in their environment, satisfied in their
professional relations, have a sense of
loyalty to the Firm, have a voluntary
desire to render a high class of service
to clients and to work generally for the
Firm's best interests.
"An effective staff is one which will
respond quickly and satisfactorily to
the demands of those who have the ex­ercise
of managerial functions. As a
unit the staff must be adaptable to the
many varieties of work, plastic in meet­ing
the requirements of special circum­stances,
and more or less elastic accord­ing
to the volume of work. The mem­bers
of the staff should, therefore, be of
the proper material and calibre, edu­cated
for their work, capable, willing,
and resourceful."
Early Programs
Mr. Wildman, a former accounting
professor and first president of what is
now the American Accounting Associ­ation,
was a logical choice to head up
the new department. He initially cen­tered
attention on the training of new
recruits. The program was, however,
steadily broadened to provide material
on new concepts of accounting, audit­ing,
and reporting for our entire organ­ization.
Mr. Wildman early established a col­lege
recruitment program to insure a
constant replenishment of the vitality
of the organization through the annual
enrollment of specially selected young
men. It was through this program that
men such as John Queenan and Weldon
Powell became associated with the
Firm. In 1920, Mr. Wildman estab­lished
the Executive Office training
course, which was the forerunner of
our present college graduate training
course.
The basic need to develop an effec­tive
staff is the same today as it was
then. The knowledge, theories, and
4