Journal / Issues / Volume 1 / Volume 1, Issue 2 / Dating an accountant – Taking Account of Love

How do you measure love? What is the value of mess? When can you count on it?

Accounting exists as a social practice and is increasingly present in our everyday lives. Accountants exude palpable levels of loyalty, trustworthiness and conservatism. They safeguard our profitable interests and hold us to account, ensuring our faithful representation.

But in the balance sheet of life how do accountants account for love? While they have a way of calculating profit and loss, a little creativity may be necessary to inject the profession with an accountability framework built for the 21^st Century.

To this end, Monash Business School has introduced an artist-in-residence program aimed at fostering collaborative connections between art and business.

The program is driven by Dr Nick McGuigan, Associate Professor of Accounting at Monash Business School, who believes accountants need to investigate fresh and creative ways to change their profession, or face being replaced – with robots and AI automating many of the tasks they currently undertake.

“We're interested in the way conceptual artists can help you look at things from different perspectives. That’s what accounting needs – a different way to break down silo-thinking and open up people’s minds to find new and different ways of creating value for organisations and society,” Dr McGuigan said.

Dr. Nick McGuigan and Rebecca Conroy strategic planning during filming.

The artist-in-residence program intends to foster new collaborations between art + business. Opportunities are created for individuals that will enable a deeper reflection of one’s work and its resulting impact, open new ways of communication that enhance existing capabilities, and encourage new insights into their own research, research methods and methodologies.

Cohabitating with leading interdisciplinary conceptual artists working at the edges of business and corporate worlds will enable a unique professional development opportunity that brings together artists, academics and students in a cross-disciplinary context.

The inaugural artist-in-residence, Rebecca Conroy (bekconroy.com) is an interdisciplinary artist working across site, community engagement, and performative interventions through artist led activity. Her work is bound up in mimetic strategies and the playful occupation of non-art fields such as urban planning, economics, and housing, particularly where it concerns the behaviour of cities and the rise of the creative entrepreneur within finance capitalism.

Rebecca Conroy engaging with departmental staff during her residency.

Engaging with hair and makeup artist Lou McLaren. Rebecca Conroy and Lou McLaren.

Bek Conroy took up residence within the Department of Accounting, living amongst faculty as she investigated accounting and the everyday. Her innovative art work explored accountants creativity culminating in a dating marathon where she invited six accountants to ‘go on a 30-minute date’ with her. ‘Dating an Accountant’ is a performance investigation that explores the uncertainties of accounting procedures and the necessity for love and courtship. Everything has been captured as a live performance, creating a short film that explores value, the complexity of accounting language and the contradictions and complications of measuring the emotional aspect of our lives as humans.

The dating begins with Manager Investor Relations BHP Billiton Michael Jakobsen. Rebecca Conroy and Michael Jakobsen.

The film was launched to industry by professional accounting body CPA Australia and premiered at the exhibition "Art, Labour & Working Life" at The Mission to Seafarers, 717 Flinders Street, Docklands last year.

Dr McGuigan conceptualised the residency program as an innovation to break traditional thinking in accounting, using art as a way to open dialogue across disciplines and create numerous ways to engage with conversations around the future of the accounting profession.

“The term ‘creative accounting’ is often used in a negative light. However creative skills are highly beneficial in our profession. So collaborating with artists just makes sense. We as a profession need to reclaim the true sense of creativity as it will be the future of all professions” Dr McGuigan said.

“Performance-led artistic interventions and radical provocations aim to explore the messiness of business, creating deeper, more integrated conversations that invoke new ways of seeing and playing in our work,” Bek Conroy says.

Organising on set with Deputy Chief Executive Officer of Foundation for Young Australians, Alecia Rathbone. Rebecca Conroy, Alecia Rathbone and Dario Vacirca.

Up to no good with Monash University Accounting Academic Dr. Alessandro Ghio. Rebecca Conroy and Alessandro Ghio

Photo credits: Thomas Kern

Nicholas McGuigan

Theme Editor for New Economy & Arts

Nick works as an Innovator, Instigator and Disruptor to create future-oriented business education programs that focus on innovation, creativity and design thinking. He has a particular passion for accountability – he is a co-founder of The Accountability Institute, a progressive platform fostering collaborations between art, science, technology and economics, bringing these fields into conversation to create a new language of business – a language of accountability. He researches in the areas of integrated thinking, learning technologies, holistic systems design and regenerative economics. This has led to the awarding of competitive research funds of over a million Australian dollars, including Federal State level grants in both Australia and Germany. He has published widely in international accounting and education journals, been invited to present at research centres and professional organisations in the UK, US Europe, Australia and New Zealand. He serves on boards and committees of the American Accounting Association (AAA) and the Accounting and Finance Association of Australia and New Zealand (AFAANZ).

Nick is an Associate Editor of Accounting Education, Issues in Accounting Education and Higher Education and Research (HERD) Journal. He instigated Monash Business School’s newly created Artist-In-Residency program, conceptually designed the world’s first ever accounting perfume and together with the accounting profession is embarking on research that investigates a Queer perspective of accounting.

See all articles by Nicholas McGuigan

Julie McBeth

Julie is a highly experienced corporate communications executive with a strong media, corporate affairs and digital content background. Julie works with the Monash Business School producing digital content and advising on media relations. Prior to this Julie has been an owner/director of a consultancy with a strong focus on branded digital content and television production. Julie commenced a career as a financial journalist with Business Review Weekly (BRW) and was later a reporter for The Australian Financial Review. She has held senior corporate communications roles with leading Australian companies – National Australia Bank (group manager global media relations and key spokesperson), Skilled Group (head of corporate affairs), and Yellow Pages (brand and marketing communications). Her vast corporate affairs experience includes both stints with agencies and in-house roles, offering high-level advice on media, government and investor relations, issues and crisis management, internal communications and integrated brand strategies.

See all articles by Julie McBeth

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