Chapter 2
Steering Your Career toward Forensic Accounting
In This Chapter
Focusing on education and certification
Looking at potential employers
Considering a computer fraud specialty
As we note in Chapter 1, fraud is a big business, and it’s growing. The FBI reported that from 2001 to 2007, white-collar crime increased 39 percent. In its 2010 Report to the Nations on Occupational Fraud and Abuse, the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners (ACFE) estimated that a typical organization loses 5 percent of its annual revenue to fraud, which means about $2.9 trillion is lost worldwide to business (occupational) fraud.
Someone needs to investigate all these frauds. Because most of these frauds involve financial matters, who better to investigate them than an accountant? Accountants already know how to critically examine a company’s books and transactions; we do that when we perform an audit. Performing a financial forensic examination is a logical next step.
In this chapter, we guide you through some steps you want to consider taking if you think forensic accounting is your thing. If you work hard up front and prove that you’re serious about fraud investigation and prevention, this ...
