<p>Not to sound too rude. I am just wondering if you can be wierd and studying accounting</p>
<p>Please explain. Are you a sociology major deciding to just do accounting, ie applying for accounting jobs?</p>
<p>Or are you a “weird” person who wants to study sociology but is thinking of studying accounting?</p>
<p>morrismm: I think they are trying to ask: if a socially awkward person is able to do accounting?</p>
<p>this^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^</p>
<p>A socially awkward person can’t succeed In any industry. This is a social world that emphasizes teamwork. Get over your fear of people.</p>
<p>^^^^^^^^^engineering is one</p>
<p>I have aspergers…kind of hard to just develop social skills</p>
<p>Many accountants are being stereotyped as awkward and introverted. So yes, you can become one. Are you scared of talking with people? If yes, then you can definitely do books.</p>
<p>You would be better off doing MIS, CS, etc. </p>
<p>I’ve been to interview events and dinners where there were MIS and Accounting people. The MIS people were far more awkward. I think the MIS hiring managers care more about skills than the accounting ones, at least for the public accounting firms with IT advisory.</p>
<p>No…I just really suck at it.</p>
<p>There is only SO much social skills I can fake…and it gives me a headache to fake them</p>
<p>The short answer is yes. On a Meyers Briggs assessment most accountants are ISTJ or introverts with poor communication skills. I have been surrounded by this type all my work life. There is another type INTJ like me who can at least think out side the box intuitively. NExt to actuarial sciences, accounting is probably a good fit for the personality.</p>
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<p>This right here is the answer.</p>
<p>Dude, if you have Aspergers I would not go down the accounting path. I don’t have Aspergers but I’ve been somewhat appalled by how big of a factor social skills are. You are going to have a very hard time finding a job in a career where it seems that interviews are granted according to a GPA cutoff and jobs are handed out at the most socially adept of those that are interviewed. Even if you get a 4.0, what’ll happen is you won’t get past interviews at the best jobs and you might not even be considered at the crummy ones because they’ll assume you aren’t really serious about applying for them.</p>
<p>ACTUARIAL SCIENCE OR MIS.</p>
<p>Why do some accountants decide to become actuaries?
They find bookkeeping too exciting.</p>
<p>Book keeping is hardly accounting.</p>
<p>jonahrubin:</p>
<p>Massive thanks for the heads up…glad I found this out prior to embarking on the Accounting path</p>
<p>I have Asperger’s as well. I was thinking about asking this question. I’m interested in both tax accounting and programming.</p>
<p>I can fake normality, but only so much. I recently got into an argument when I was speaking with a group of 3 people. They often made jokes and used sarcasm. I didn’t understand anything they were talking about, they might of well been speaking another language. I took everything literally and became a target. I was “too serious”, albeit accidental, it didn’t matter.</p>
<p>Not being able to instantly understand jokes, sarcasm, facial expressions, body language, or any other vague behaviour, is detrimental to social interaction success. It’s hard to make friends for me because of this as well. Although I do have a few good Asperger’s afflicted friends.</p>
<p>Tax accounting is more forgiving of social awkwardness in public accounting. Still, getting the job is going to be very hard for an Aspie so if you have the mental ability to be an actuary or something else, I’d pick that. </p>
<p>People that are not good at accounting can get great jobs(by accounting standards anyway) just by meeting the bare minimum GPA and participating in social groups like Beta Alpha Psi. I don’t think that’s really the case for actuarial science and many MIS jobs. In my classes now I’m encountering plenty of people who have interned with the Big Four and often they are pretty poor at accounting but managed to study hard to get through a few classes with good grades prior to when they interviewed. My guess is a 4.0 in actuarial science from a respectable program, with some actuarial exams passed, will make up for a lot of awkwardness. A 4.0 in accounting WILL NOT. Some of that probably has a lot to do with the supply and demand situation in accounting…which is worse than it is for actuaries.</p>
<p>Jonah. You realize one of the most common MIS entry level jobs is Business System Analyst? In this job you have to communicate and interact with peop,e from EVERY department. It requires better communication skills than any public accounting job as you have to take your technical expertise and dumb it down to several different level of technological competence.</p>
<p>So what? There are MIS jobs which don’t require that. </p>
<p>Regardless, many of my peers have reported a lot of awkward silences and general weirdness at the MIS tables during these interview reception dinners. That wasn’t the case at the audit table, I assure you. More than enough bubbly idiot co-eds around to keep chattering away there.</p>