Evaluating writing: a selection procedure for recruiting accountants

While the accounting profession recognizes effective writing as an important capability of its newly hired personnel, corporations, accounting firms and other organizations rarely evaluate the writing skills of their potential hirees as a specific selection procedure in recruiting. Traditional strategies of screening students' resumes and grade point averages, conducting on-campus interviews, and sponsoring office visits appear to provide little information about the writing skills of prospective accountants. A 4 step selection procedure to encourage and enable employers to evaluate the writing skills of potential hirees is presented: 1. Identify specific writing skills. 2. Develop a writing skills evaluation form. 3. Decide who evaluates the writing. 4. Obtain writing samples for evaluation.