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The purpose of this research is to discern which computer skills are important for entry-level accountants, and determine whether some skills are more important than others. This research is essential to accounting educators who want their graduates to be prepared for accounting practice. Students at a university in the southern United States take part in the research before and after internships in public accounting. A repeated-measures design is used to contrast pre-internship values with post-internship values. Longitudinal analysis is also provided; responses from 2001 are compared to those from 2008-09. Responses are also compared to small samples from faculty and CPA-firm recruiters. The computer skills examined are accounting software, databases, e-mail/Internet, programming, spreadsheets, and word processing. Grade point average (GPA) is also included to provide a reference point. Conjoint analysis is used to measure importance.
No differences between 2001 and 2008-09 exist. In both years, both pre- and post-internship, students believe that GPA and all six computer skills are important. Students place far more importance on spreadsheet skills post-internship than pre-internship; post-internship students view spreadsheets skills as even more important than GPA. Numerous differences also exist among students, recruiters, and faculty. Faculty and recruiters believe all of the skills are important except programming skills. Faculty members place more importance than recruiters on databases, but less importance than recruiters on spreadsheets. Female and male students differ slightly in 2008-09 – the importance measures provided by post-internship males are almost identical to those provided by recruiters. Unlike prior research, this research contrasts the computer skills necessary for entry-level positions in tax with those in auditing. Strong differences exist; computer skills at the entry level are more important in tax than they are in auditing.