Accountant trainee is a term used to describe someone who has completed accounting education or training but has not yet been licensed by a licensing board. Many employers will hire you as an accountant trainee if you have a four-year bachelor’s degree with an academic emphasis in accounting or if you complete a structured accounting curriculum at a trade or proprietary school. Because accounting is so practical, an employer may opt to forego the educational requirement for an accountant trainee position and instead provide on-the-job training in the style of an apprenticeship.
People who work in professions that require a license are usually not allowed to practice without one. The legal profession, for example, requires lawyers to be licensed and makes unlicensed practice of law illegal. Similarly, doctors must be licensed in order to practice medicine, and practicing without a license is illegal. The accounting profession, on the other hand, requires licenses for its members but does not prohibit laypeople from handling accounting issues. In fact, preventing people from practicing accounting would be extremely difficult because keeping track of revenue and expenses is at the heart of business financial management.
The accounting profession issues licenses to its members based on mastery of the accounting code, which is established by a licensing board as the industry’s best practices. This process only distinguishes accountants; it does not preclude anyone from working as an unlicensed accountant if they understand the fundamental concepts. Employers commonly use the title accountant trainee to indicate that they want to hire someone who has a basic understanding of accounting principles but has not advanced far enough in the profession to seek official master’s licensing.
A bachelor’s degree with an emphasis in accounting is usually required to work as an accountant trainee. A bachelor’s degree can usually be replaced with specialized training in a proprietary accounting program. This will qualify you to work for most accounting firms or businesses, especially if you have expressed an interest in obtaining a license in the future. An accounting firm is more likely to refer to a trainee as an accounting associate in the private sector, but government agencies are more likely to refer to them as trainees.
It is not necessary to have a bachelor’s degree to work as an accountant trainee. Because bookkeeping and accounting are such important managerial inputs, it’s often more important to show that you know how to do the job than to have a formal education. Outside of a college or formal educational setting, you can become an accountant trainee by gaining practical experience in accounting in a variety of ways. Some people learn the fundamentals of accounting as children, for example, by assisting with the family business. Others have had to learn as a result of running their own businesses.