ACCT2111 Accounting Thought & Ethics: Visual and Self-Reflective Essay

This essay, submitted for ACCT2111 Accounting Thought and Ethics, presents a student's self-reflection on professional behavior in accounting, using a photograph as a starting point. The student discusses the importance of ethical values such as integrity, accountability, and fairness in maintaining a true and fair representation of financial reports. The essay highlights how unethical practices can negatively impact investors and the overall reputation of the accounting profession. The reflection emphasizes the direct impact of ethical learning on professional behavior and decision-making, asserting that adhering to ethical guidelines and principles fosters trust and confidence in the accounting profession. The essay also references academic sources to support the discussion of integrity, accountability, and the importance of ethics in corporate governance.

Running Head: ACCOUNTING THOUGHTS AND ETHICS
Accounting Thoughts and Ethics
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

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(Source: Author)
This picture I have taken to discuss in terms of one of the Principles of Professional
conduct that is Professional Behavior. Professional Behavior can be described as a kind of
decorum that every person maintains within their workplace and somehow connected with
respectful conduct. In accounting, this term complies with several rules and regulations that
must be followed and suggest to avoid any such practices that can discredit the image of the
profession. In the above picture, it can be seen that there is a lot of police that is walking on
the road. While one police are moving forward and rest, all are following him. But, in this
picture, it is also visible that the traffic is still not moving from that side as the traffic signal is
red in colour that means to stop. This can result in an accident or problem for the others. In
the same way, the accountants are responsible for maintaining ethics in their professional
Behavior. As any wrong decision made by them or misconduct in their work can affect the
professional image as well as it can also bring a problem to others work.
As I am working as an accountant in an accounting firm within my country, I
generally have adopted some ethical values within myself. Integrity, Accountability and
Fairness are some of the values that I personally adopted so that I can serve the common
people in a better way. Integrity helps me to remain honest and straightforward with the
financial reports of my clients (Dobel 2016). Accountability makes me realize my

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responsibility that I am responsible for some specific work or function within my
profession(Soltani and Maupetit 2015). Fairness is something that all should adopt in
whatever profession they are engaged in. As an accountant, I feel that there should be fairness
in my work which results in a transparent view of the reports and also this will be helpful for
the users (Sepasi 2019). Any unethical practices can make a huge loss to the common user as
well as the reputation of such a profession.
Being in such sector, I must have to inhere professional Behavior within myself as I
am responsible for helping the user through maintaining a true and fair representation of the
financial reports. Any wrong decision or any misconduct can impact the investors’ money as
well as the overall professional image of an accountant.
The ethical learning has a direct impact on professional Behavior and the decision
made to be implemented. Ethics within the accountant and accounting plays an important role
as it has some strict guidelines that all must have to follow. Any activities done within such
profession shows a serious dedication to serve the common people or user so that to bring
clarity. The professional Behavior maintains within the profession increases the trust of the
people and also increases their confidence. Thus, I prefer and suggest to adhere to some
ethical values and work as per the principles to maintain respect.

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Reference
Dobel, J.P., 2016. Integrity in the public service. Dobel, JP (1990). Integrity in the Public
Service. Public Administration Review, 50(3), pp.354-66.
Houdek, P., 2017. Professional identity and dishonest Behavior. Society, 54(3), pp.253-260.
Sepasi, S., 2019. Accounting Ethics. International Journal of Ethics and Society, 2(1), pp.23-
29.
Soltani, B. and Maupetit, C., 2015. Importance of core values of ethics, integrity and
accountability in the European corporate governance codes. Journal of Management &
Governance, 19(2), pp.259 284.