Accounting for everyone
Rodrigo Verdi is aware that accounting does not have the most — how to put it — alluring reputation. He senses, from the first time students walk into his accounting class, their anticipation that the subject will be dry and technical. So Verdi addresses this issue head-on. “Accounting is the language of business,” Verdi, an associate professor at the MIT Sloan School of Management, tells his students. Moreover, he emphasizes, it is the basis of evaluating almost any aspect of a firm. “When I step in the classroom to teach the core accounting class to MBA students, I tell them, ‘I’m not training you to be an accountant. I’m training you because whatever you decide to do, accounting is going to be fundamental.’”Consider MBA students who want to pursue marketing, finance or operations. “Accounting is not separated from these activities in a corporation,” Verdi says. “If you’re going to do...