Abstract:This study investigates whether aspiring and professional accountants understand the benefits and security challenges brought by emerging technologies such as: Big Data, data analytics, cloud computing and mobile technologies. 115 participants took part in a survey during January and February 2017, all having at least one year of practical experience in accounting or audit and 80% of them being affiliated with national or international accounting professional bodies. The research has three key findings: (1) Professional accountants and auditors are having in average a theoretical knowledge of the emerging technologies in the accounting field, but they still need to enhance their skills to exploit them efficiently, (2) Mobile technologies started to be adopted by the Romanian practitioners and (3) The profession has become aware of the security risks brought by emerging technologies in the digital accounting. The accounting profession is on the verge of change and the practitioners do not yet possess sufficient skills regarding the analyzed emerging technologies. As per this, the professional bodies and academic environment should reassess their curricula to enforce the necessary changes for preparing practitioners to successfully face the future challenges and avoid their replacement by other professions more qualified.

The accounting profession is in a continuous process of change as ERP applications and emerging technologies such as cloud computing continue to bring improvements into the accounting and financial areas. Nevertheless, beside the variety of benefits, these technologies carry specific risks that can affect the fundamental characteristics and security aspects of data.This paper aims to highlight the most common vulnerabilities of ERP applications and cloud computing platforms in the context of digital accounting. At the same time, in addition to the technical aspects and good practices used to prevent and correct these vulnerabilities, the study focuses on a critical component of data security: the human factor. Moreover, the empirical research conducted has highlighted the fact that young professionals understand the need for sensitive data protection, but they do not always display the best behavior to prevent security incidents.This article aims to provide an overview of ERP applications and cloud computing platforms that are currently used in the financial and accounting field, focusing on the main technical vulnerabilities and the human factor, which is one of the most important aspects of data security.

The technological progress changed during the last decades, leading to a huge amount of stored and shared data, as part of the value creation process. New developments

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Research Question: The research proposition is to identify the information technology (IT) skills required from accounting professionals by the labour market from European emerging and developed economies and analyse whether there are differences between the requirements, depending on the type of economy. Motivation: The wide adoption of several emerging technologies across various domains of activity is a widely debated topic. However, regardless of its popularity, little research focused on comparing the expectation of the professional bodies and the current labour market expectations in terms of the IT skills accountants should demonstrate. Idea: This study aims to analyse if there is any gap between the expectations formulated by accounting professional bodies and the labour market’s requirements in European countries regarding the IT skills accountants should demonstrate. Data: The dataset selected for this study consisted of 1000 accounting job advertisements, collected between two periods: September 2017 - July 2018 and January - February 2021. Tools: A cross-sectional study, including a content analysis and statistical analyses, was conducted to analyse the dataset collected. Findings: The results illustrate the European labour market’s current expectations regarding the IT skills accountants should demonstrate. The statistical analyses conducted highlight an association between the skills asked by emerging and developed European based companies. Contributions: This paper provides a glimpse regarding the European labour market’s expectations in terms of IT skills requested from accounting professionals, thus being a reference for the European professional bodies and academia.

Do accountants clearly understand the benefits and challenges of using AI? Do they perceive AI as a threat? The adoption of AI in the accounting field has increased significantly in the last few years. Since the techniques continue to evolve, more companies will integrate these solutions to facilitate the accounting processes. Therefore, the accountants’ skills should be adapted to efficiently use these solutions and continue to provide valuable support. This study explores the perception of accounting practitioners regarding the most important benefits and challenges of using AI-based technologies and analyses whether AI is being perceived as a threat that might impact employability. The data were collected during June–August 2021 using a questionnaire addressed to accounting practitioners from Romania. The exploratory research was conducted by statistically analysing the data collected. The results highlight that the practitioners have a clear understanding regarding the main benefits and challenges associated with the use of AI-based solutions in accounting processes, and AI is not perceived as a threat to employability; however, practitioners acknowledge that skills transformation is required and are willing to undergo the changes. By providing a glimpse of the main drivers that encourage accounting practitioners to embrace AI, employers, professional bodies and academia can address the main concerns and continue to support the practitioners in adapting their skills.

The digitalisation of the accounting profession is leading to changes in the accounting education by integrating more IT-related topics in response to the business environment's shifting needs. The relevant literature regarding accounting education currently focuses on introducing more IT-related subjects into the curricula; however, less attention has been paid to the undergraduates' predilection toward digitalisation. As in Romania the accounting faculties offer the specialisation accounting and management information systems, the present study aims to examine the accounting students' attitude toward management information system subjects and provide a glimpse regarding the preference of choosing the research field. A qualitative approach has been selected, organising semistructured interviews, focusing on the undergraduates' experience with IT-related subjects. The findings indicate that the students' experience has been determined by various factors, such as previous education, the online context, personal preferences regarding the professors, sense of connectedness, and English fluency. Although the participants appreciate the importance of the management information systems subjects, they seem to have a limited understanding of the practical use in an accounting context. The study contributes to the understanding of the accounting students’ predilection toward digitalisation and its findings can be leveraged by both educators and management to improve the future practitioners' experience.

This paper delves into the impact of the automation-driven evolution of enterprise resource planning systems (ERPSs) on sustainability accounting and reporting and the associated challenges. By employing a holistic approach focusing on the current characteristics of both ERPSs and automation platforms and an inductive approach to perform a content analysis, this study highlights how the new generation of ERPSs can support the improvement of accounting in general and sustainability accounting and reporting quality in particular. The analysis was based on information provided by the developers of leading ERPSs and automation platforms with a significant worldwide market share. In this paper, we deepen the understanding of the role that ERPSs play in improving sustainability accounting and reporting, focusing on both the benefits and challenges derived from the impact generated by increasing the integration of robotic process automation and intelligent process automation solutions. The results obtained have academic and managerial implications, addressing a research gap concerning the understanding of the consequences of ERPSs evolution from the perspective of professionals and the competitive edge companies can take advantage of to improve sustainability reporting and accounting processes.