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Language and globalization

Preparing Filipino accountants to communicate in global workplaces

By March 9, 202018 Comments3 min read7,540 views

How do universities in the Philippines prepare accounting students for communication in global workplaces?

Watch this research presentation by Pia Tenedero to find out.

This presentation was originally intended for the Georgetown University Roundtable (GURT) 2020 conference in Washington, D.C. Not only was Pia successful in having her abstract “Preparing Global South Accountants to Communicate in Global North Workplaces” selected for inclusion in the GURT 2020 program but she also received a highly competitive Macquarie University Postgraduate Research Fund travel grant to enable her to attend and share her research.

Imagine her disappointment when GURT 2020 had to be cancelled due to the global COVID-19 outbreak!

We are taking this opportunity to actually extend the reach of Pia’s conference presentation by making it available to a global audience. Consider this a virtual opportunity to attend Pia’s talk. Sit back at your leisure to watch her 20-minute presentation about “Preparing Global South Accountants to Communicate in Global North Workplaces”. And please feel free to post comments and questions below. Pia will be on stand-by over the next few weeks to respond to comments and questions. The presentation is part of her doctoral research and your feedback will help to support a high-quality submission later in the year.

Abstract

Preparing Global South Accountants to Communicate in Global North Workplaces

Pia Tenedero, Macquarie University

This paper investigates how universities in the Philippines prepare accounting students for communication in global workplaces. For some years now, the country has positioned itself as an emerging global leader in knowledge process outsourcing, providing offshored accounting services to companies in the Global North. The growing demand for communicatively competent accountants who can be deployed globally consequently places a greater onus on the education system to produce accounting graduates with these desired qualities. This paper examines the way “effective (global) communication” is constructed in two top-performing accounting schools in Manila. Using ethnographic data, I do this by first investigating how education authorities frame the notion of “effective communication” in accountancy program documents and by examining how students and teachers, in turn, enact this notion in classroom interactions. Analysis of the discursive and interactional construction of communication in accounting education shows tensions in ideologies about English and Filipino, which are differentially valued relative to students’ global opportunity and national identity, their future work and present learning goals, and their specialized knowledge and relational competence. Ideological tensions are reflected in the shifts in the framing of effective communication in curricular guidelines as closely tied to English and in the way local actors interpret and shape communication in the classrooms, where Filipino comes to the fore. The study has implications for the language instruction of future accountants aspiring to participate in the global enterprise.

Language on the Move

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Join the discussion 18 Comments

  • Thank you so much Ms. Pia Tenedero for this very impressive and informative talk. It greatly helped me as a Language educator.

  • Dong Juan says:

    Dear Pia, I am very grateful to read your insightful virtual presentation, which gives me some inspiration about my own research.

    Likewise, I am also doing ethnographic research on Bangladeshi international students who study in a Border University in China. My participants major in Software engineering, and they receive English as the medium of instruction. Adopting a critical ethnography, through observing the classroom interaction between students and teachers, students’ after-class activities, i attempt to explore the interplay of EMI-related language ideologies, language management and language practices, aiming to investiagte whether or not there are challenges and considerable misalignment between policy expectations and actual practices.

    Align with your discussion with Jiayu Wang, my research findings also uncover that there is a big discrepancy between government / institutional language policy and teacher / students’ actual practice. For instance, because of teacher’s and students’ insufficient English proficiency as well as students’ lack of professional knowledge, teachers claim that their teching experiences are very unpleasent and awful. Meanwhile, due to the ineffectiveness of classes, students have no interest in learning and resist classes in various ways, such as less participation in class, sleeping and playing phone all the time. What’s worse, many students fail in the final exam. Migrant students’ expectations and dreams of studying in China are shattered with helplessness and frustration.

    So, this makes us to rethink about language education and policy, problems and consequences caused by EMI education policy owing to the English hegemonic position in the gobalized world.

    Also, i want discuss one question with you here:

    1. Apart from the linguistic problems, what other factors might affect migrant students’ learning experiences, especially for those Muslim or HIndu female migrant students?

    Thanks

    • Pia Tenedero says:

      Hi Dong Juan! Thank you for your feedback and for sharing some of your research findings that align with some of my own. I think it’s important to call attention to the policy-practice disconnections in education settings that you pointed out, especially where it concerns EMI policy in places where E is not L1. It is truly my hope that somehow our research can help policy makers see the value of bottom-up approach in policy making.

      Your question about factors affecting migrant students’ learning experiences is important but is beyond the scope of my current research. You may find the work of Dr. Li Jia relevant. Her PhD is a “critical sociolinguistic ethnography of Burmese students’ learning experiences at a border high school in China”. Here’s a link: https://www.languageonthemove.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/LI_Jia_Social_reproduction_and_migrant_education.pdf.

  • Jiayu Wang says:

    Pia, I have watched your video presentation online which is truly expressing! I think you did a really good job on your Ph.D. journey for having uncovered the ideological tension between English and Tagalog. Really interesting and inspiring research!

    I have some feedback or thinking after listening to your presentation. I am not sure whether they may be helpful, but I think it would still be nice to show you a listener’s opinions.

    1. Do you believe or do government/teachers/the Philippine accounting students believe that classroom teaching is the most “effective” way to get students well-prepared for communicating in Global North workplace? Are there any other ways influencing their preparation beyond the classroom?

    2. Although English is regarded as “superstar” and Tagalog as “back-up media” or “sidekick”, it seems that English is for very superficial (or official) uses while Tagalog is much closer to students’ heart. Perhaps, (I am wondering whether) through the CDA lens, this situation may be explained as to how the power of English forces non-native English speaking students to be enculturated into the English world. Since if accounting students want to lead a “life” in the global market, they have to sacrifice the uses of their mother tongue and turn to the use of English. Do you think this may be one part of ideological tension between English and Tagalog (I am not sure and just asking)?

    3. As a listener of your presentation, I really enjoy your talk about classroom turn-taking between teachers and students. Except for “personal touch”, I am also thinking about whether there are some situations when students are so eager to make themselves clear in English, they cannot but speak Tagalog instinctively. These moments may also be interesting to show the ideological tension in the classroom.

    4. I am just curious about whose CDA framework you used? Have you adopted Systemic Functional Linguistics to analyze the linguistic features of the classroom interaction?

    • Pia Tenedero says:

      Hi Jerry! Really appreciate your taking time to engage with my presentation.
      1. The neoliberal view of higher education supports the idea that classroom teaching is essential, in fact, it is purposed for the production (or preparation) of students for the workplace. Whether this is “the most effective way” to prepare them is, however, not within the scope of my study, but is a worthy question to explore. Of course, what is meant by “effective”, who frames it, how, and possible motivations all have to be clarified as well. This evaluative term is quite slippery, which makes interesting qualitative inquiry! 😉
      2. Such a wonderful point! Yes, indeed, one critical tension involves the positioning of English as the “superstar” in the classroom as a kind of mirror to its positioning in the global market and the shifting value of Filipino as primary rapport language and secondary learning language. This secondary role of Filipino in official use is discursively negotiated by new language courses that emphasize the usefulness of Filipino in academic and professional communication.
      3. Another interesting point! In fact, I did observe students “slipping” into Filipino while reporting in English-only classes. In these scenarios, Filipino is used to help manage students’ linguistic and knowledge insecurities, as when, for example, they struggle to find English words to express their ideas and instinctively switch to a more comfortable language (Filipino). These excerpts are included in my chapters.
      4. I follow Fairclough’s CDA approach to examine the dialectical relationships between textual discourse and social practices in the classroom.
      Did I answer your questions? 🙂

      • Jiayu Wang says:

        Great! Pia, you answered my questions in a logical and thorough way!
        I think the theory CDA that you used in your research perfectly matches your research aims since it deepens the research from a socio-political aspect.
        I hope to see your publication of this research! 😎

  • Raquel R. Jimenez says:

    Hi Pia, I just watched your presentation and I think you clearly explained your objectives and provided answers based on the results. I may not be well-versed in accounting program, and I am not sure either if my comment will matter, but I agree with how you explained issues concerning language ideologies. Knowing that it is the actual scenario in our context and it is what the data reveal, I think there is no way we can contest that. I was actually somehow saddened by how Filipino is positioned in the country, but I also have to accept that English is a helpful tool in meeting the demands of the global community. Taking the perspective of learner, since Accountancy is a really difficult program, I just need a language that will make my academic journey a bit easy, while acquiring the competencies needed in the job, and that language is Filipino.

    • pia tenedero says:

      Raki, thank you for your comment. Of course it matters! Appreciate that you could relate to the finding about Filipino as a tool in the academic journey and English as a tool in the global community. At the same time, this instrumental view is not really as simple and clear-cut as Filipino = language of learning and English = language of work. Textual evidence shows that both languages are being (re)framed in these domains of the accounting field, such that Filipino is promoted as language of professionalism and English is treated as “superstar” in accounting education. Interesting to see how these varied ideologies impact policy, practices, attitudes, even feelings.

  • Aeson Dela Cruz says:

    Dear Tricia,

    Thank you for sharing your research with us. As a former accounting educator (and an accountant as well), I definitely agree with your points. It would be interesting to share or channel these findings to those who are in practice. Specifically, audit firms (who are also now into outsourcing as a line of business), who are the initial recipients of new CPAs in the Philippines. They are also the ones who encounter the challenges brought about by the inability of new CPAs to effectively communicate in the workplace. Importantly, those who are in practice may have the voice or authority to influence the academe to effect the necessary changes in their accountancy programs, to address these concerns.

    • Pia Tenedero says:

      Thank you, Aeson! I take your point about the power of practitioner voice in influencing the academia and would be grateful if you could also share my study with other practitioners and practitioner-teachers in your circle. I sincerely hope my presentation helps bring to their attention some of the factors contributing to the well-published claims about accounting students’ inability to communicate effectively (or the notorious “skills gap”). As I’ve pointed out in my conclusion, I invite a shift in focus from the perennial deficit perspective (I am not validating that accounting students’ communication skills are “effective” or otherwise, rather I wish to contribute) to an understanding of why these gaps exist. Many thanks for your interest. Great to meet another Filipino whose research interest lies in the not-so-technical side of accounting.

  • Susan Hoadley says:

    Thanks for creating and posting this presentation, Pia. Developing communication in business disciplines is of great interest to me and I particularly liked the way you considered how communication is constructed at different levels of the education system.

    • Pia Tenedero says:

      Thank you for your comment, Susan. In pointing this out, you’ve called my attention to your work on program curriculum alignment, which is surely relevant in this part of my study. Will engage more with your research as I finalize my analysis chapters on communication in accounting education. All the best!

  • Ana says:

    What an outstanding presentation Pia! I can only imagine the disappointment that the cancellation of the GURT 2020 conference has brought to the attendees and presenters. However, your virtual presentation shows how things can be turned for the better, now a wider audience has access to your incredibly insightful research. Very well done Pia, and thank you for sharing.

    • Pia Tenedero says:

      How affirming–thank you, Ana. 🙂 I’ve also shared this link in GURT 2020 Virtual yesterday. As you’ve said, research sharing virtually does make access easier, faster, and (in light of the pandemic of our times) safer for more people. It also provides more space for meaningful engagement as comments and questions can be prepared more thoughtfully before they are posted. At the same time, knowing that one’s contribution will be encoded in a more permanent form (unlike questions raised orally in a f2f forum) could potentially discourage participation. Pros and cons. Looking forward to your own virtual research presentation next week!

  • Livia says:

    Dear Pia, I can only second Dr Lising in congratulating you on an engaging virtual presentation. I know how excited you were to attend GURT2020 in person – the program looks fantastic! I hope that by sharing your paper here, your research may be enriched by LOTM readers’ comments and questions and that you may reach a wider audience including voices from the Global South. I also hope you hear from scholars and peers who may not have access to conference travel funds/access to peer-reviewed scholarship and who otherwise would not have had the opportunity to engage with your research yet or – perhaps more importantly – with you directly! Wishing you all the best.

    • Pia Tenedero says:

      Appreciate it, Liv. Agree that going virtual with our research sharing helps make information more accessible to a broader audience, which is ultimately our goal for doing research in the first place. GURT 2020 is also going virtual by hosting a private social media forum on the conference dates (13-15 March). I wouldn’t be surprised if other conferences follow suit. Possibly, we stand at a pivotal moment for the academia where research dissemination is taking a more digital turn.

  • Loy Lising says:

    Another equally lucid and engaging presentation, Pia. I admire how you have done this so well and promptly despite the disappointment that the cancellation of the GURT 2020 conference has brought.
    Well done, and I look forward to reading comments especially from colleagues in the Philippines.

    • Pia Tenedero says:

      Thank you, Dr. Loy. Of course, your guidance and Prof. Ingrid’s, as well as inputs from the reading group, were valuable in putting together this presentation.

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